required.
But Dailey says there's no reason communication should be more important in a triad setting than in a dyadic relationship. In fact, he argues that there are fewer differences between dyads and triads than people may think. He says the individuals within each relationship are what determine the success or failure of the connection. American society, particularly the more conservative, religious part of it, places a high value on dyadic relationships and marriage between two people, he says, but the success rate of American marriages is just about 50 percent.
The only real test of whether a relationship will survive, regardless of how many people are in it, is whether the people in it are differentiated enough, Dailey says. He describes a differentiated person as one who doesn't need external affirmation to feel validated. Problems arise in a relationship when someone develops.
a dependency on others to build self-esteem. A high level of differentiation and the ability to communicate openly and honestly are important in creating healthy, stable relationships.
"It's less about the numbers, less about who you're fucking : It's got a lot more to do with who you are as an individual and the context of that bond," Dailey says.
Rob says he's never been happier in a relationship. But other people's misunderstandings and judgments, even those of family and close friends, have made it more complicated for the triad to live normally.
Shan's sister back in Pennsylvania is the only one of their family members who knows about the triad. Shan says her sister doesn't quite understand the situation, but she isn't against their arrangement. Cat rarely speaks to her family and hasn't since she left Minnesota to move in with Rob; things got messy when they found out she was dating and going to live with someone twice her age. Rob says he sees no point in corresponding with his family much anymore. They're what he calls "conservative religious fanatics" who wouldn't understand his relationship with his girlfriends.
Rob is not alone. Growing up in a Christian household, then breaking away from that upbringing is not an uncommon trend among polys nationwide. According to a survey of about 3,000 people who subscribe to Loving More, 87 percent of polyamorous people say they were raised in Christian households, but only 28 percent are still Christian in their independent adult lives.
Rob says he feels most vilified by conservatives trying to protect the institution of marriage and their ideals of heterosexual, monogamous relationships. He says their criticisms are based on ignorance and closed-mindedness - he says he thinks it's funny that "the most rabid antipoly people sling Bible quotes" at he and his girlfriends. The Bible, he says, often
discusses polygamy and people with multiple partners in their relationships.
—Liz, member of a polyamorous relationship
Paul Mirecki, chairman of religious studies, says the Bible does not contain endorsements of polygamous relationships, nor does it contain many straightforward rules on the ideal of monogamous relationships, but it does mention both. He says that people often interpret the Bible according to their cultural framework — for example, when people read of King Solomon's hundreds of wives, they can claim it's an exaggeration or make the judgment that Solomon was wrong, because while they want to defend the Bible's writings, monogamy is the American cultural standard.
The pressures Liz has felt within her relationship don't involve religion, but people close to her have told her to break away from it because they think she's selling herself short or getting screwed over by a
"I know my friends' reactions are out of love for me,but they still make me not want to tell them what's really going on in my life,"
has a headache or doesn't want sex, and because jealousy doesn't play into their relationship, sex with just two of the three is completely acceptable and normal. It's not a prerequisite for poly to be into kinky sex. Liz says a lot of people envision poly relationships as all "orgies and rampant badness." Some relationships may include orgies, group sex or other alternative sexual practices, but not all do.
guy who just wants lots of sex. She says her friends want to stage a sort of "intervention," saying she's only kidding herself about not being jealous and not needing a monogamous relationship with a future of marriage and family. She says people can get uncomfortable when they don't understand polyamory.
"I know my friends' reactions are out of love for me, but they still make me not want to tell them what's really going on in my life," she says.
Cat and Shan say Rob mostly shrugs off people's disapproval and goes about his life because he knows poly works for him and makes him happy. They say he acknowledges that he can't fully explain his relationship to everyone or convince everyone that polyamory is a valid way of living.
As a heterosexual male, Rob will be able to live his life relatively normally in the United States, but he says he gets furious when he considers the same-sex marriage legislation under consideration by the government. "Fifty-one percent of the country has decided my girlfriends don't deserve civil rights," he says. Financial issues limit their mobility now, but they have considered moving to Holland, where polygamy and same-sex marriage are legal and more commonplace.
Love rollercoaster
Sexually, poly relationships are diverse. Even within Rob, Cat and Shan's relationship, the questions of who will have sex, how much and to what extreme are up in the air on a nightly basis. Most nights, Rob says, one member of the triad is too tired,
Rob, Cat and Shan say their sexual encounters are fairly normal about 90 percent of the time. But their openness to the poly lifestyle has also created openness to sexual experimentation, such as BDSM, a term for kinky sexual activity that includes bondage, domination and submission, and sadism and masochism. Rob says it "adds spice every once in a while." Shan says that sex involving BDSM requires a strong foundation of love, trust and respect to
make it meaningful and that she had tried it in the past, in other relationships, and never enjoyed it as much as she does with Rob and Cat. As much as wild, involved sex can make a relationship healthier and more exciting, it can also be time-consuming and physically exhausting. For three people trying to pay the bills and carry on normal lives, it isn't something that happens all the time.
"I love going to Worlds of Fun, but I don't want to live on the Orient Express," Rob says.
Three's company
Rob says his relationship with his girlfriends is like most monogamous relationships he's seen except that he has two people who say they want to spend the rest of their lives with him. Since Shan moved in with Rob and Cat, they've been making the normal adjustments to living with other people: shared space, leaving the seat up and squeezing toothpaste from the middle of the tube (the girls' biggest pet peeve with Rob). But Cat says it's nice to have shared financial responsibilities, another person to do things with and another person to cuddle on the couch with on late nights.
Rob says most nights are nothing out of the ordinary and consist of convincing one person to cook dinner, then settling back to do their own things: watching old episodes of Firefly on DVD, working on their Web comic "Blue Crash Kit,"
reading, even going bed early. To the three of them, the "alternative lifestyle" doesn't seem exotic or foreign. It's just life, and life is good.
"We're like an old married trio," he says.
Poly primer
Compersion: Taking joy in the fact that those you love are making themselves happy, especially being happy when a partner finds another person with whom they can fall in love.
Differentiation: The ability to make oneself independently happy; not requiring another person's validation to feel happy or worthwhile.
Polyamory, literally, many loves. Forming multiple loving relationships (sexual and otherwise) with people at the same time, recognizing that one person cannot meet every need.
Polyfidelity: A committed relationship that involves more than two people. Members agree to be faithful to each other and not create other relationships outside it.
Polygamy: Being married to more than one person at once. Illegal in the United States.
Primary: A person who has the strongest bond to the V of a relationship. Often they are legally married or share financial responsibilities or a lease with the person.
Secondary: A person who is not as strongly bonded to the V of a relationship. A secondary usually is not involved legally or financially.
Triad: A relationship that involves three people.
V. Pronounced "vee," a person in a poly relationship who has close ties to all others involved. Also called the hinge. Usually the others, sometimes called "arm partners," don't get close and are involved only with the V.
Sources: www.polyarmory.org,
www.polyarmony society.org
02.24.05 Jayplay
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