Big likes to say I only blog when I am hurt, angry or filled with strong emotions. Well he may be right for the most part. But really it seems these days that is really the only time I seem to be able to allow the thoughts to flow unencumbered from my head to hands.

There was a time when I could write freely, when poems and stories were like my children, flowing from my body like special creations filled with pieces of my soul.

Now I feel a sort of responsibility in my writing, the written word can hurt and I know from experience that some stories are better left untold.

There are times when I want to put every single event of our lives in written form, and others when I want to horde those moments for myself. You our readers only know us from what we write, but there is so very much more to us. To each of us as individuals and to our quad and our family as a whole.

When we have a chance to make friends within the poly community, friends who know of our lifestyle, who we can be free, open and honest with, then and only then are our true selves revealed.

We have had to opportunity to meet several poly folk with whom we now feel close too. A sort of kindred spirit feeling if you will. I want to take a moment and thank FireGod, Venus and her quad, Lightening Butterfly, Tom, Amanda, Kris, Glenn, and Shirley for letting us have the opportunity to be us, and to be real. Your friendship means a lot to us, as does the chance to have people who understand, who offer help, advice, camaraderie, and happy times

We receive comments both privately and via our blog comments section. Some are simple words of support, others thanks for sharing and still others are deep and thought provoking and may include detailed analysis and responses.

The fact that people take the time to read what we have to say, and still more time to comment baffles me and causes a feeling a humility unlike any I have felt before.

But I feel the need to tell you our readers that we are 3-dimensional beings, and in reading our blog entries you are viewing only 2 dimensions and reading between the lines for the third piece of us.

As we continue to settle into our lives remember that what you read is what pieces of ourselves we have chosen to  share and there is still so very much more to us and to our relationship(s). As times goes on we will grow, change and evolve as individuals and as a commited quad as we settle further and more contentedly into “our poly life”.

Temptress

Hi folks…. in case you haven’t noticed already by the expanding sidebar… we are slowly but surely moving all of the archives over.

We still have half of my archives (Temptress) and all of The Laundry Goddess’s to go.. but eventually they will all be in place.

I think we are satisfied that Wordpress is going to be the blog program we’ll stick with, so it’s time to move it all over.

 Temptress

                                            

Big holds to the ideal that in every situation and dis-agreement there is a middle ground,

a place that no matter how far apart two people are in their opinions or wishes, they can find a common place to rest their quarrels and come to peace. Generally I might agree with this, but I think we reached a place where there is no middle ground and I can not foresee there ever being a place of commonality.

 

Big has made the statement that the only way he could come to terms with his “jealousy” and the relationship Goddess has with Fix and myself , was to embrace “true” polyamory.

As we all know, polyamory is like Baskin-Robbins ice cream, way more than 31 flavors or definitions. Everyone’s idea of true poly is different and unique to them. One thing I think we all can agree upon however, is it is the ability to open your heart and to love more than one person in an intimate and romantic manner.

 

When we initially came together as a quad it was agreed upon that we would be a closed quad, no external relationships outside of the four. There are arguments all throughout poly-ville as to whether or not you can be considered polyamorous if you practice fidelity within your primary relationships. In all honesty, I will say it again as I have said MANY times. I do not consider myself polyamorous, I am quad-nogomous. I did not go looking for this lifestyle because I needed “more” out of life, I fell into it because I unexpectedly fell in love with my best friend.

 

Fix and Goddess feel very similar to me, in the fact that they are happy and content with our life together and have no desire to be with any others in an intimate setting. Friends will be just that, friends. There are no emotional attachments, or sexual, or non sexual for that matter, romances needed.

Big seems to have had the greatest need to network with other polyfolk since the beginning. Initially he was in agreement that we were Fi and would remain so. Then he started to make noises that he desired to have “friend-girls”.

 

These ladies were to be close friends with whom he could be open with, talk to about our situation and have meaningful conversations with. Then he said he felt he needed to expand on this slightly and the friend girls could fill a place he needed by his being able to emotionally attach to them without any intimate entanglements.

 

Goddess and I have been wary of his need for friend girls all along and we have spoken several times throughout this blog forum about our feelings on friend-girls and similar situations.

As we have said before, there are a few of these ladies whom Goddess and I know and we are happy to have them close to our family and close to Big as conversationalists and friends. There have been others who have crossed lines and boundaries and Big heard real fast from both of us about our serious reservations with those particular ladies. Thankfully, they have moved on to other pastures.

 

So we have gone along fairly calmly with Big understanding our views and us, his.

Big, I believe, has felt that in time he could “help” me overcome my reservations about his need for deeper relationships. And as I move past my issues, Goddess would relax hers as well.

I think Big now understands, Goddess has not been as relaxed about his “friend-girls” as she has seemed. In fact, she has far stronger feelings than I.

 

Enter, the other woman who I shall call Ms. X.

Late forties, single for a good number of years, no children, thin, lovely, articulate, excellent business acumen, un-encumbered by many of the things Goddess and I are. And everything that Goddess and I are not. She is the very personality type Big is drawn to. She is a business associate and has begun to work closely with our company, and Big. It has now come to our attention, and in fact by Big’s own admission, that after months of a business association, he has decided that X may in fact be the woman that he has been searching for to be THE friend-girl. The one he could move to “the next level with”.

I saw this coming on a month or so ago, hoped I was wrong and that the business relationship would remain the one of importance. Unfortunately I had the crappy  privilege of being right.

 

Monday, Big waltzes in from an appt. and tells Goddess and I of an upcoming seminar he would like to attend with Ms. X , even though I am supposed to be his right arm in our business, an invite was not offered and if it was, it was worded in such a way that I did not hear it or did not feel completely welcome or wanted, so Big made plans to attend solo.

 

 I didn’t think to much of it. In fact I forgot about it. Fast forward to Sunday.

Big is interested in trying new churches, always looking for one that fits well.  X goes to a Unity church some distance away, and he has been chomping at the bit to go visit it.

I agreed to accompany him. As a standing activity, a Sunday at church means lunch out, when I asked where he was taking me he said he was open and then countered with “ shall we invite our host?”. Sure I grudgingly replied, seeing a chance to be out alone slip away. Then lunch turned into a before service brunch because of her schedule.

 

When she arrived at the restaurant, and he greeted her with an arm around the waist and kiss on the cheek, the alarm bells went off. She had obviously moved up from business associate, but how far up ?

We had an enjoyable brunch, the service was acceptable and then we returned home to a normal household routine.

 

Tuesday morning a business meeting occurs where X will be there. We arrive, business is conducted as planned and adjourned. Big slips away to the opposite end of the table with X and I overhear of dinner plans being made before the evening seminar.  Dinner was never mentioned, this was supposed to be a seminar.

Again the alarms started ringing…. And as we left the building, another arm around the waist with a kiss at parting. X’s approval rating as a business associate has just dropped about 20 points. Not because of anything she has done, these are all his actions, because I realize that he has become interested in her a way that business has no place. Having been on the receiving end of  “what Big wants, Big pursues and woo’s with the determination of a man possessed” I can see what may be in the pipe, and  even Big’s God won’t be able to stop him once he sets his mind to his goal.

 

Now that I know a friend-girl has passed thru the gate of theory and into the place of “wanting to take it to the next level” my mind can think of little else.

Knowing that he wants to actively pursue this woman and others to Goddess and I , is like him looking at us and saying, alone neither of you are good enough and together you still aren’t

 

Goddess accepted the idea of poly for two reasons. One to try to fill the places Big absolutely had no interest in filling for her, and was very vocal about. And two, in hopes that giving him an approved and acceptable second, he would be satisfied to not feel the need to look further for others and she would not have to watch her husband romance other women while tap dancing in his safety net of a monogamous marriage. She would feel safe in the knowledge that she had what she needed and hopefully so did he.

 

Our quad was not supposed to have happened. I fell in love with my best friend, a woman. I never expected it, I didn’t want it, I was confused by it and terrified that if she ever knew, our friendship would end. So I sat on that information and my love for her for  an entire year. During that time Goddess and Big came to a place where poly was something they were willing to look into given some of the reasons named above. They were looking for a couple they could be close to, travel with a few times a year and be able to have an intimate relationship with during these times.

 

When Goddess told me of their plans, the wheels in my head went into overdrive. I knew that Fix had always harbored a soft spot for her. And I in turn had always been very enamored with Big. All I had to do was open my mouth, tell her of my feelings and let the chips fall where they may. And they did.

After a whirlwind move and Fix’s unfortunate breakdown within 4 months we had gone from couples who would occasionally vacation together to a cohabitating quad.

Really, it all happened so fast. Sometimes I wonder if we did our guys wrong. Did Goddess accepting my feelings and subsequently accepting her own towards me cause us to be blind to the guys?

They both say they want what we have, they both say they don’t want to go back to monogamy, they want this quad, they want our family. But I see them both struggling.

 

Each with their own feelings of jealousy.  Neither man feels that his wife still loves him the same or needs him the same. We don’t love them the same, in fact I think we love them better, we love them in a more healthy and honest way.  And while I am being honest, we don’t “need” them the same as we did. Before Goddess and I needed them in a sick sense of desperation. We put everything we had into being what they needed, what they wanted, in hopes they would not feel they had wasted their lives. Both men always seemed to harbor the emotion of being encumbered by their respective families. Many times Goddess and I felt like our men would be happier without the children we had created or the lives we led. Often we like obligations to them. Goddess and I exhausted ourselves making our homes and ourselves “just so” for the men in our lives.

 

Now we don’t feel the need of desperation to hold them. In fact we want them to look at us and see us for who we really are, not who we allowed them to see all of those years.

Because of this change, both men see us as not “loving them the same”. But really, all of that is a blog for another day.

So… no matter the event that brought us here… here is where we are. I love Big, in a way I never thought possible. I thought a love as strong and as deep as what I feel for him was only reserved for the “one” person in life. My feelings for Big showed me that was flawed thinking. Big on the other hand…he loves me….. I do not doubt that. But he isn’t IN love with me. I accept that, and am content for now with what he is capable of offering.

 

But now I wonder, other than the fact that I live with him…. What makes me any better than a friend-girl. Is it our living situation and the fact that we have sex, that elevates me to actual girl-friend?

Big says that he wants to help me find a way past my “jealousy” and now that he knows Goddess has strong feelings as well…. He wants to help her move past her feelings of jealousy as well so that he can comfortably pursue his friend-girls at whatever level of relationship they attain.

 

This is not jealousy for us. It is a slap in the face that once again… I am not enough, she is not good enough, together we aren’t good enough. Except this time the woman doesn’t have to be hidden, being poly means he can be honest about them. What is his magic number, when will he finally find what it is he is searching for. Will he ever. And how many times will he break our hearts while he is looking.

There is also a deep seated fear that maybe he will find it is he looking for, and when he does, I, or worse yet, we, won’t be needed or wanted.

 

One thing that keeps intruding on my thoughts is this….. Big has said that if Goddess asked him to, he would return to monogamy in a heartbeat. Yet, he can only be polyamorous if he is allowed to have friend-girls in various relationship forms.

So let me get this straight…… He feels, that monogamy is something he can once again accept, without slipping, and having Goddess alone, monogamously will be acceptable and there will be no need of friend-girls. But in order to “justify” polyamory and therefore his relationship with me, he needs to be able to be open to numerous relationships at various levels.

 

Well then, to protect her and keep her emotionally safe, then it seems the correct thing to do would be for us to stop all forms of intimacy amongst the cross couples as well as between Goddess and myself, so he won’t feel the need to “justify” anything by searching for other relationships.

 

Really there is no middle ground here, if there is, it is buried deep.

He wants to be able to be open to new relationships and other loves at various levels. And Goddess, Fix and I wish to keep fidelity within our quad.

If there is a middle ground, I wish someone would show it to me.

 

~ Temptress

When I was a kid I used to love to go to the zoo. To see the monkeys and lions prowling in their habitats, hearing the birds in the screened enclosures and laughing at the antics of the otters in their cement ponds.

Now as an adult I see  the animals differently. I respect them now in ways I didn’t before. Their lives, spent caged and on display were for the enjoyment of others. In truth, these creatures are trapped with little to no choice in their lives and certainly no choice in getting out of the cages they live in.

 

I feel trapped now. I feel like one of the big cats, pacing back and forth looking for an escape, a way to make a change, make my life different.

We have all been very open about the issues with depression Fix has had. But he has had other issues come to light as well. He had a very messed up childhood and suppressed a lot. Over time he felt he had put it all behind him. His nervous breakdown brought out much he had hidden in his psychi and caused him to change in ways that have been difficult to deal with.

 

I find myself in a place I never in my life expected to be.

I married my husband for better or worse. For forever, there was nothing that could or would tear us apart. There was nothing we could not overcome together.

All that I once thought and believed is now dust.

 

I love my husband, I want him in my life, in our children’s lives. I want to grow old with him, to hold his hand as we age and move into the next stage of our life together. I want to share the love and life we have with Big and Goddess and for the four of us to have the life together we dream of.

 

But I sit here now contemplating the thought that Fix will not be in my life, that in fact he may leave so completely that he will never be seen or heard from by myself or our family again. He has changed so very much and has so much anger inside of him that is aimed now at me, that I feel lost and set adrift. He once looked at me with such love in his eyes. His touch was always tender and always made me feel as if he loved me and wanted our life together. I no longer see or feel that. He tells me he loves me when he is on an up swing of “normal”… but when he is down….. I feel all of his confusion and agitation directed at me.

 

Our therapist thinks it could take years to help put Fix back on  even keel. Can I do that? Do I have that in me to hold on hoping that he will one day be healed and be able to deal with his past and our life together?

I hope and pray that I do.

 

Temptress