Polyamorous / Ethically Non-Monogamous Parents

[CharleeFarley]

Thought it would be good to have a thread for us non-mono / polyamorous / open relationship folks to chat about parenting, family life, relationships, etc.

Also a place for mono folks to ask legit, non-judgemental questions and for respectful discussion about non-mono life.

Pretty sure I can't be the only polyam parent on Mumsnet (right?!). Where's my tribe at? ☺️

Introduce yourself if you'd like to.

I've been polyam for about three years, have a long term partner and have recently started seeing another person very casually. I have three kids, two from a previous relationship and a new baby with my partner. We live separately but spend most of our time together (well, all of it at the mo, with a new baby!).

Also a place for mono folks to ask legit, non-judgemental questions and for respectful discussion about non-mono life

Just have difficulty processing the simple. :)

Most definitely on that note................

It's never boring old Sandra from accounts bickering about the teabags with her five lovers, nothing to see here

Lmao

Don’t people have hobbies anymore? If you both work full time and have kids how in the hell does anyone have time/energy for more in their life?

I expect Sandra only has energy left to bicker about t bags if she works in accounts

I was poly for a while and knew many, many polycules with children.

The horrible stuff I saw...new partners sexually abusing children, CPS being phoned on couples to try to take away their children after they split from other couples, with abuse accusations and counterclaims leveled at all four people, kids forced into roles of emotionally comforting parents through neverending cycles of crushes and breakups, kids whose parents literally swapped living locations and who were told that because relationships don't tie anyone to us, it's ok your dad doesn't live here....

This wasn't one or two isolated cases. And I was in multiple different polycules in different parts of the US for over 6 years. My polycules were open and out of the closet, we were proud of our relationships.

The children raised by polycules were, in my experience, fucked up by it, and often felt they couldn't talk about it. They felt like secondary priorities, if that, and often engaged in attention seeking behaviors including cutting and deliberate involvement in self destructive relationships. They knew they weren't as important to mom and dad as their bedroom activities, and that nothing they did would ever make their parents as excited about them as they were when buzzing with "new relationship energy."

I tried for years to get pregnant in my polycules. I even had a quad so close that we were anarchic about which man conceived the baby with me. Today, with all I have seen from how the people I knew then in poly relationships have turned out, and what their children have endured, I am glad my fertility didn't kick in until I had reentered the world of monogamy.