How judgmental would you be of this relationship set up?

[FuckTheSphere]

So DP and I have this really good friend. There was a period of time where DP and I were separated (for a year or so, over 10 years ago), I dated this friend. Set up by DP. We had a brief, extremely intense and passionate relationship.

Once DP and I got back together, he remained a friend to both of us. The three of us hung out together a lot. I mean we spent so much time hanging out and laughing just the three of us.

We kind of drifted apart but have all met up again recently, and the three of us had a great laugh.

DP and this friend were extremely close. They have bonded so much. They have frequently shared a bed, at first they top and tailed, then eventually they would just snuggle up in bed together. If they had to share the same bed for whatever reason they'd always end up spooning. I don't think there was anything sexual there (though I wouldn't mind if there was), they just deeply loved one another as friends and were very comfortable holding one another. They understand each other on a level that I never will, they have been so close, so supportive of one another.

So my DP is amazing. But he's emotionally imited. He is really not good with the emotional stuff, not with me anyway. We have fantastic sex but unfortunately not that often, he's on important, life-saving medication that wrecks his libido

Friend is good with the emotional stuff. He and I have been through similar awful emotional pain. So we're good at talking about it together. He's also great at sex, when we've done that together it's been amazing.

Friend is looking for a new place to live at the moment, hating the flat share he's in. We have a spare room. Would it be totally ludicrous for him to move into our spare room?

He and DP would look out for one another, and the three of us could have a great time. DP would love having a close friend around. I'd have someone to talk to, and DP would be relieved that he wouldn't have to listen to me. Okay, the unusual bit is that I could have sex with either of them. But if they're both okay with that, then why not? Friend has made it clear that he'd be interested in he and I having sex. DP, I think, will be okay with that too.

I know people will be extremely judgmental. So I guess I'm using this thread as a trial to see how much people would judge us... How much would you?

Thank you so much, LapsedHumanist, for being so supportive and non-judgmental. And also for re-igniting my love for Murakami. I'm now reading Dance, Dance, Dance with a glass of wine and will be up with it all night. It soothes me. It's literary comfort food.

Definitely read Piercing. It's dark but excellent. I'm trying to get back into books too. I used to read three + on my commute every week. Now I just browse the web. The Wind Up Bird Chronicle is going in my bag for Friday's train journey.

Well, I’m enjoying a glass of La Pamelita (sparkling Shiraz with floral top notes) myself just now.

The web is just chewing gum for the mind I’m realising. No nutritional value just some fading flavour and mindless chewing (present company excepted of course).

Anyway, happy literary travels 📚

I think I’m going to tackle IQ84. It’s been reproaching me with it’s size from my shelf for far too long.

Have you read “I am a cat” by Sōseki? If you like the absurd I’d recommend it. Also Gogol, generally, but particularly The Nose, The Overcoat and Dead Souls. The fevered imagination of the absurdist makes sense of the future...

Oh nice, enjoy. Sounds lovely. Yes, I'm coming to that realisation myself. Great way to phrase it! I've been wasting a lot of time chewing gum instead of eating actual food. Thanks for the help, advice, and chats about literature. You've really helped my whirring, anxious, slightly loopy mind feel a lot more grounded.

If you ever want to exchange tips as to novels to read, just holler.

Please elaborate forthwith...

As long as it doesn't divide you and your DH I can't see a problem. I'd be inclined to change locks tho if your family may walk on! Tell them it's for the privacy of new housemate

I have not read I Am A Cat, but I definitely will, for sure.

IQ84 has been sitting on my bookcase making me feel guilty for years now. I'm going to set aside plenty of time over the weekend to finally crack it open. I've been lazy in my reading. Shall we check back on say, Monday, and compare notes?

Thank you flumpy. Yes, regardless of what happens, keeping the parents out is the first step!

Why not... see you Monday!

My life has been complicated lately. Stuff happens and life isn't always straightforward for all of us and that's okay too

OP I know you didn't ask for actual advice, just opinions as to how we would judge your 'arrangement'. Just an observation ...You say your life is complicated - but you make it sound like stuff is being "done" to you, when in fact you've made those very choices and put yourself in exactly the situation that makes it complicated.

Sorry I can't resist some advice.... please see the bigger picture of your life and whether it's sustainable continuing like this, or whether it may help to break free from it, seek a simpler existence for a while and evaluate options that are more likely to keep you from being a broken wreck. You sound like the architect of your own shite circumstance, otherwise you wouldn't come on here asking what people think.

...and 'enabling' family to drop by unannounced is another thing you absolutely do have a choice about, and could control if you wanted to. So take back control of your life!

If all parties are happy with the set up and no one is being hurt, secretly or overtly, then I don't see the problem.
It wouldn't bother me if I knew you - but then I wouldn't necessarily expect you to tell people!
You would risk disapproval from people with a very conventional outlook, I guess - but again, why tell anyone?

LapsedHumanist, I'm going to suggest Yasutaka Tsutsui - Paprika.

Also, believe it or not, Judy Blume. I grew up adoring Are You There God, It's Me Margaret, and Forever. In terms of adult novels, Wifey, Summer Sisters and In The Unlikely Event are really excellent. She really tackles issues of religion and sexuality.

See you Monday!

Before I depart, I will just st share that the best drink I ever had was drunk whilst sitting at a polished chrome bar in Kyoto. It was a small bar, seating only 8 people, hence the policy of a cover charge to occupy soace. Sadly defunct, the hostelry was called King Britt, in homage to a favoured recording artist of the proprietor. Said proprietor had earned the money to open the establishment as a member of the Kyoto Jazz Massive. They toured extensively. Anyway, he took the virtuosity, creativity and precision he had learned from music into crafting drinks, and as such the established practice of the bar was to order by stating something like “Make me a drink with a base” and leave it up to his experience, creativity and insight. I stated a vodka base and he made me a perfect vodka tonic. Vodka, De Kuyper Citron and tonic. In an exquisite glass, of golden proportions between base and height, hand blown, no lip to the rim.

The perfect antidote to both the humid, 40 degree height outside, and the un-to-semi-requited love affair that had drawn me half way across the world.

Of such moments, life is made. It was the beginning of a very long night, casually littered with such matters of the heart, in the manner that I frequently occurs in one’s mid to late twenties ( and early thirties). Other dramatis personae include a birthday cake shrouded in dry ice, a spiny fish with yellow sauce, a J-ball Game, the best techno DJ outside Detroit, and an incipient love triangle that resolved itself on a late night train between Osaka and Kyoto.
But I digress.

daisychain01, I appreciate your post and I hope you don't think I'm being defensive, but the things that have made my life complicated have been bereavement, sexual assault, miscarriage and... Other stuff. Yes I have made some bad choices and I hold my hand up and take responsibility for that. But I haven't been the architect of all the shit that has happened to me. Some, yes, but not a lot of it. A lot of it happened to me.

Thank you, Thumb. There would be no desire to hurt anyone. Quite the opposite. You are of course correct. There would be no need to tell anyone.

OP you misunderstood, I'm not saying you've chosen to have all those terrible things happen to you, I didn't even know about those things until you just mentioned them.

What I am saying is that the way you're running your life and your choice of relationships sounds (purely on face value) to be a recipe for disaster. Don't kid yourself that none of that is in your control, because there is more within your control than you think there is.

The other thing to say is that the only person you ever need to hold your hands up to, and justify to, is yourself. Nobody else matters in that regard.

You have to live with your choices, whatever those choices are.

The more you write, the more your plan sounds like a recipe for short term gain and long term pain, especially when you’re in the place you’re in. I think you need to explore where you’re at emotionally and it sounds like your friend is a plaster for a gaping wound, which could do further damage.

It’s very tempting to get specific unfulfilled needs met by a third party but it won’t change the fact that your primary relationship isn’t fulfilling. Do you really want the frailties of your primary relationship being exposed like this? Your partner and this man are very close, how impartial could he be while being the emotional crutch for you both?

There’s a good chance you’d gain a temporary lover at the expense of a long term friend.

No more short term sticking plasters, it’s time to get professional support that will benefit you in the long term.

I think it'd probably be ok. No one needs to know and as you all get on well it should work.
Good luck

'I suppose the idea of two people who might love and cherish and desire me was extremely appealing. '

The thing is, it sounds as if your partner might desire his friend more. ?There is real potential for these two men to become a partnership and exclude you. You really need to consider that.

I would think that it was extremely unwise and will end badly but there are no children involved so I don't think that it really matters. So long as your DP agrees with you pressuring him then if someone gets hurt that's a risk you all took and that's fine.