Being enough
Working through things for me usually happens in bits and pieces, nothing as tidy as having it all done at once never to need to be revisited. Recently I have been thinking a lot about feeling like enough and what that means to me.
One thing I've never quite gotten about poly is being able to be fully present with multiple people. In my experience someone gets left out to some degree, maybe not left completely out in the cold but I know I can't give the full force of my affection and attention to more than one partner at a time. This has caused me a fair deal of distress in the past because I've felt I was doing a disservice to my partners even when they weren't unhappy. I think the main problem was that I was projecting my feelings onto them. I knew that I had difficulties with feeling inadequate because my partners wanted to be with other people and assumed that they too felt that way when they didn't.
When my ex told me he wanted to be non monogamous I was ok with it for the most part although in a small corner of myself I wondered why he didn't want to just be with me. I squelched that voice as the voice of insecurity, jealousy, and backward thinking. I am a hip modern woman dammit, lol. We had fun over the years and I had experiences I otherwise wouldn't have had but the voice never did go away. I would have gladly exchanged it all had he said he wanted to close things up and only be with me. I was sad that I wasn't what he wanted enough that he would not pursue others. What I only vaguely understood was that his desire to be with me and his desire to be with others weren't dependant on each other. I didn't understand it because I'm not built that way. I see things first through my own lense and when I'm intimate and invested I am focused to the point that no one else makes it into my line of vision in the same way. I've heard people compare having multiple intimate relationships to having multiple children in the ability to love more than one, not my experience at all. In my experience someone gets top billing, with kids not so much, lol.
Wading my way through contradicting feelings and non PC ideas is interesting especially with an owner since I can't just say I'd be happier if he never had anyone else and that is that. I can't make that call all I can do is seek to understand myself as best I can. One thing that grates on me is the often touted idea that if you aren't poly you are jealous and petty and simply not as advanced as a person. I feel my not being poly has a lot to do with my innate wiring and going against that is what caused issues with jealousy. Generally I'm not petty and I like to think I'm reasonably advanced as a person most of the time.
Being with Das in the beginning was terrifying and heartbreaking in some ways b/c that voice that told me I wasn't enough moved from the back where it was whispering to front and center where it took up a bullhorn. Here I was with someone who said he loved me but who already loved someone else and that's the way it would always be and yet he was pulling me closer to him and further from my hubby. At the same time hubby was dating and having relationships and sex at a whiplash inducing rate but he also was saying he loved me. Even the other slave said she loved me as she enjoyed tryst after tryst. Love was all around me but no one wanted me enough to claim me above all others or to the exclusion of everyone else. I don't actually believe in primaries in poly relationships and yet that is exactly what I wanted to be, someone's primary, proof that I was really enough for someone. yea that wasn't happening so I committed to what was and gave it my all but it took a toll. I don't think I was even aware of how much of one until the situation changed. I never expected to be back in a monogamous relationship with Das but since we have been I've been happier than I've ever been. Granted there was a fair amount of stress in our former poly situation that had nothing to do with just being poly and I'm sure some of my happiness is a direct result of its dissipation.
Thinking on it the desire to be chosen as the only in a romantic relationship for me has to do with more than just a distinct leaning towards monogamy. I am naturally monogamous but also I want to be chosen as proof that I matter. That I am important enough to stand up for, to protect, to claim. There are so many old unacknowledged hurts wrapped up in it, many of them having nothing to do with my love life, rooted as so many things are in childhood. For me the only way to release these things is to look at them honestly and let myself feel for the child and the woman. It's not that I think I will suddenly want to go out and find other partners I doubt I ever will honestly. I fixate so hard on one person when I love that my love for anyone else is moonlight as opposed to the midday sun. It's that I want my feelings to be as much of what I want as possible not what I don't want or what I have to prove.
One thing I've never quite gotten about poly is being able to be fully present with multiple people. In my experience someone gets left out to some degree, maybe not left completely out in the cold but I know I can't give the full force of my affection and attention to more than one partner at a time. This has caused me a fair deal of distress in the past because I've felt I was doing a disservice to my partners even when they weren't unhappy. I think the main problem was that I was projecting my feelings onto them. I knew that I had difficulties with feeling inadequate because my partners wanted to be with other people and assumed that they too felt that way when they didn't.
When my ex told me he wanted to be non monogamous I was ok with it for the most part although in a small corner of myself I wondered why he didn't want to just be with me. I squelched that voice as the voice of insecurity, jealousy, and backward thinking. I am a hip modern woman dammit, lol. We had fun over the years and I had experiences I otherwise wouldn't have had but the voice never did go away. I would have gladly exchanged it all had he said he wanted to close things up and only be with me. I was sad that I wasn't what he wanted enough that he would not pursue others. What I only vaguely understood was that his desire to be with me and his desire to be with others weren't dependant on each other. I didn't understand it because I'm not built that way. I see things first through my own lense and when I'm intimate and invested I am focused to the point that no one else makes it into my line of vision in the same way. I've heard people compare having multiple intimate relationships to having multiple children in the ability to love more than one, not my experience at all. In my experience someone gets top billing, with kids not so much, lol.
Wading my way through contradicting feelings and non PC ideas is interesting especially with an owner since I can't just say I'd be happier if he never had anyone else and that is that. I can't make that call all I can do is seek to understand myself as best I can. One thing that grates on me is the often touted idea that if you aren't poly you are jealous and petty and simply not as advanced as a person. I feel my not being poly has a lot to do with my innate wiring and going against that is what caused issues with jealousy. Generally I'm not petty and I like to think I'm reasonably advanced as a person most of the time.
Being with Das in the beginning was terrifying and heartbreaking in some ways b/c that voice that told me I wasn't enough moved from the back where it was whispering to front and center where it took up a bullhorn. Here I was with someone who said he loved me but who already loved someone else and that's the way it would always be and yet he was pulling me closer to him and further from my hubby. At the same time hubby was dating and having relationships and sex at a whiplash inducing rate but he also was saying he loved me. Even the other slave said she loved me as she enjoyed tryst after tryst. Love was all around me but no one wanted me enough to claim me above all others or to the exclusion of everyone else. I don't actually believe in primaries in poly relationships and yet that is exactly what I wanted to be, someone's primary, proof that I was really enough for someone. yea that wasn't happening so I committed to what was and gave it my all but it took a toll. I don't think I was even aware of how much of one until the situation changed. I never expected to be back in a monogamous relationship with Das but since we have been I've been happier than I've ever been. Granted there was a fair amount of stress in our former poly situation that had nothing to do with just being poly and I'm sure some of my happiness is a direct result of its dissipation.
Thinking on it the desire to be chosen as the only in a romantic relationship for me has to do with more than just a distinct leaning towards monogamy. I am naturally monogamous but also I want to be chosen as proof that I matter. That I am important enough to stand up for, to protect, to claim. There are so many old unacknowledged hurts wrapped up in it, many of them having nothing to do with my love life, rooted as so many things are in childhood. For me the only way to release these things is to look at them honestly and let myself feel for the child and the woman. It's not that I think I will suddenly want to go out and find other partners I doubt I ever will honestly. I fixate so hard on one person when I love that my love for anyone else is moonlight as opposed to the midday sun. It's that I want my feelings to be as much of what I want as possible not what I don't want or what I have to prove.
It's an ironic thing that we were drawn into being together initially in a polyamorous situation by partners that our own growing (very quickly) closeness eventually pulled us away from. My own issue with the polyamorous situation, and one I'm relieved to not have to deal with any longer, was not one of not being sufficient, but being caught in a situation that was inherently political when I'm not particularly interested or accomplished at politics.
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