To think that you can own someone's
body and mind and spirit is ridiculous.
It's absolutely ridiculous to me.
I agree with you.
It's okay that other people don't agree.
But, um, and I think, I think
the idea of
strict monogamy is actually a newer idea.
Sure.
I think that we as as humans
have not been strictly monogamous
for nearly as long as we think.
You know, or we pretend that we've been.
Mhm.
This is a. Really good question.
All these questions are good.
When you think of us together,
what are your biggest hesitations?
Biggest hesitations?
Okay, I'm trying to word
this without sounding harsh.
I know
I was going to say
try not to commit so soon, but
I don't want to rush it
for it to end so soon.
Okay. - Yeah, makes sense. - Okay. There you go.
So that would be your hesitation
was to go, like, slow?
Yeah.
So, yeah, go slow.
Don't go fast. - Gotcha.
What about you?
Um. Hmm...
Maybe a hesitation would be...
Are...
Are you, like, very-
Like, how are your-
What's the dynamic in your relationships?
Like. Is it like, are you monogamous?
Are you open or...?
Oh, monogamous. - Okay.
Yeah, you- are you open?
I've- yeah, I've been in like open
relationships before. - Wow.
So I think maybe that could be
a hesitation.
Okay. - For both.
Yeah, kinda. It could be.
I'm not- I'm not opposed to,
like, monogamous relationships,
but I tend to,
like open.
Interesting. Okay.
I feel like there's power in doing that
or something.
Yeah.
At what point did you realize
you wanted to get a secondary partner?
I feel this is not applicable.
to our situation.
When I started dating you,
when I was still talking to my ex.
When I was the secondary partner.
When... you were the first time, though,
to be fair,
you were the first time
that I found a girl that I wanted to date
as much as I wanted to date __________.
Yeah.
And that was that.
That is,
I think in a lot of ways the fantasy.
I don't know if it's
never really it doesn't
it hasn't seemed to have materialized
very well.
But that is the fantasy for me
is like the third,
ideally the third
that the like both of us share.
But you know,
at least
a third that I really care about and want
and feel as much of a connection to
as you.
But-
Yeah.
The first time I ever like really
wanted a secondary,
so to speak, like a meaningful
secondary was
when I started dating you
at the same time.
I was dating _________.
I guess before that we,
we certainly had other partners.
But- - Yeah.
What's a quality that _______
and I if that enables us to share you?
First of, I don't think you share me
because, um...
You don't think or you do?
I don't think you share me.
Yeah, I don't know.
Yeah, no, definitely not.
I think
we've got two
fully grown relationships,
which both are still growing, but,
and I think they're
both 100%,
which means I have to have 200%.
And I think I can do that.
And I think that
I think everyone
could do it with enough talking.
So if there would be one quality
that you both have to have
to do this, it would be
communication skills
and talking everything over and
I think sometimes
we tell each other
that we
don't talk about something enough
or I tell you to explain something to me.
But I don't think we realize that
we talk a lot
and we tell each other a lot
and we share a lot of our feelings
about the other partner
or about our own relationships,
and that the days that we don't talk much
or when we're not really in the mood
for sharing,
we still share more than 99% of people,
I think.
And I think that's something special
that we all three of us have,
which makes this work
Why are you still
considering polyamory?
Because it's fun,
no strings attached.
Maybe eventually another partner
who isn't a flake,
which is impossible in the city.
So
why close the door
that hasn't been explored yet?
What about you?
Well,
if the idea is to share
peace and happiness and,
you know,
openness and explore things sexually
with other people
invited into our thing,
it's pretty much the point
of a relationship, I think.
I think you should always share
happiness and peace.
And most people
approach relationships
out of loneliness and desperation,
and they end up sharing misery
and, um,
you know,
having been through many relationships
like that,
I've gotten to a point where I realize
that that is the true
definition of insanity.
Um, so
I'm just, I'm open to experience.
I don't think my mom
ever understood.
I remember
she called me a hoe once, actually,
that was- or like very strongly
alluded to me being a hoe. She was like,
you have a lot of male friends
or like you're-
what does Raheem
think about all your male friends?
Something like that.
And I remember
being like, We're non-monogamous.
And she was like, Oh,
I tried that like a long time ago.
It didn't work.
She was probably the only person in
my family
that I could gesture towards about it.
And after that reaction, I was like,
I'm not going to be talking
to her, to my family about that anymore.
Also, at that point,
you had come to Thanksgiving already.
Mm hmm.
So I was, like, honest, like, this is all gonna be hectic.
I don't wanna get into all of that.
Right.
And we also didn't know, like,
we hadn't explored polyamory
or ethical non-monogamy,
because that's not where
we were supposed to be heading.
So
being that open relationships
mostly seem based out of sex,
and sex is a topic
I do not discuss with my family.
We did not really talk about it much.
I mean, with friends.
Um, I think all our friends knew
about it.
Nobody was about it, right?
So everybody kind of had
their own thoughts
and judgments about it.
And they were all
a lot of people already had ideas
as to what they thought we were about.
And so they're like,
Why would you even do this?
Like,
you and Raheem are like
the staples of black love at the school.
Why are you doing this?
Um, yeah.
So I didn't really talk to people much.
And especially after knowing too
that people weren't too fond of _________
I stopped talking about it as well.
I just didn't have many people to talk to
about it.
Yeah.
Do you regret committing to me?
Not a single second.
No. I'm going to expand on that.
I think part of me mourns
as you know, we always talk about
this idea
of being monogamous
while at the same time being polyamorous.
So I'll be honest with you,
part of me mourns
and is of choice,
because as a person that functions best
in a monogamous relationship
I still mourn this idea of,
of, of experience in other people, of
of actuating love with other people.
So, so that's just a little more.
But however,
my commitment to you, our commitment
never, never.
It's such a gift.
And it was so easy to say yes
to this commitment.
I mean, from the very first time and
I mean, there is not a day
that I'm not grateful for
our journey together. So...
Have you always been into non-monogamy?
No, I started in college
and it
I mean I started casually dating people
and I ended up being with a few people
and I realized
when I graduated
that I hadn't
gotten to know them
as well as I wanted to.
And so then after college,
I kind of tended more to polyamory
as opposed to just casual
like open dating. - Right.
So I still do multiple people,
but I try to form
like I try to invest emotionally
into those relationships,
which is,
you know, it's gone
well so far,
but there is the chance of burning out,
especially with a
the tendency
to give everything you kind of have.
Right. Yeah. - In the moment.
So
I'm trying- I'm trying to do it
less nowadays
just because I'm at that part where I'm
losing energy
and I'm still trying to figure it out.
So I'm not super articulate about it.
But yeah, that's just something to know.
Okay, cool. Yeah.
I feel like it's hard
to like emotionally invest
in just like one person
that have many people
because I've considered
that as well. - I was gonna ask.
Because yeah, I feel like I kind of felt
a little
suffocated like in my last relationship
in that sense.
But yeah.
No, that's okay.
Listen, I mean,
I can't recommend it or not recommend it.
It's really individual,
but and I've been having conversations
with people who don't fully get it
and it's hard to explain that you can be
kind of fully invested
even if it's not in terms of time.
And if you do,
if you don't balance it out
well enough,
then people can get hurt. - Right.
Yeah. - Yeah.
Um, but
there's never the risk of cheating
and there's never the risk of,
um, I mean, I guess
there can be the risk of jealousy
if people aren't completely secure
going into it.
So it's always good to have that talk
first hand.
Yeah. - So I'm glad that we're talking about this.
Yeah, yeah. - Yeah.
I feel like
communication is like
most like very, very,
very important,
especially if you're doing non-monogamy.
Yeah, exactly.
Otherwise, you know,
you have to make sure
everyone is cool that
or else it's just cheating.
So yeah. - Agreed.