SUMMARY KEYWORDS
relationship, people, partner, life, monogamy, person, monogamous, feel, kids, polyamory, triad, monogamous relationship, jealousy, parenting, married, insecurity, question, marriage, live, jealous
SPEAKERS
Ellecia, Wilder
Ellecia 00:07
Hey, I'm Ellecia, your non monogamous relationship coach. Welcome to the podcast where my friends and I chat about our relationships, enthusiastic non monogamy, polyamory, swinging, kink and our lives, you'll get a candid peek into what makes it worth it to live life outside the box. And in case you're still wondering, nope we're not monogamous. Hey friends, today I'm talking to my dear friend Wilder. Wilder is in a closed triad with a married couple. And they live together raising a ruckus with chickens and ducks and children and having a bunch of wonderful adventures together. This conversation today has been so good. There's so much good stuff in here. We're talking about triads and the assumptions people make about them. The monogamous deconditioning we have to work through when moving into polyamory, and raising kids and polyamorous families, and just a lot of really in depth, juicy stuff. Enjoy. Wilder, you're here. That's me, makes me happy? I'm okay. I want to ask you. First, what kind of labels or what kind of relationship style? do you have? Or use?
Wilder 01:37
Oh my gosh, that's been really fun. So I'm in a, what we we These are our terms, but we're in a close triad. So we don't have intimate relationships outside of our three person relationships. So my partners are married to each other, and then I'm obviously not married to them. And so yeah, Polly fidelladus, this closed triad. People like to throw terms at us, like thrupple, and that doesn't, it doesn't stick. You know, sometimes we just, you know, we'll say things like squad or whatever. But generally, the things we default to is a closed triad.
Ellecia 02:13
Why? I'm curious why, and why you consider it closed?
Wilder 02:19
We, oh, gosh, what an evolution. We want to really focus on each other. Like we're not, you know, as far as like, dating other people like, I mean, that's something that I think is a perception thing that poly that people who want to be in a non monogamous relationship, want to be able to do all the things and I don't, I would not say that describes us. We're very, you know, we have a family, we have a homestead, we have kids and pets, and... And we're in a pandemic, and like the I think we just really enjoy focusing on each other and like, and growing that even though you know, it's been a year and a half, almost two years, since we got together, which is crazy. There's been so much that's happened in there. And you know, it requires every day our full attention to each other. So where would dating possibly fit? You know, and I don't none of us want that right now, which doesn't mean, we couldn't change our minds later. And that's always possible. We have very, you know, frank conversations about taking care of each other's needs, and like what's real for us right now. And right now, that's what's real for us. We just are really devoted to each other and don't have time for anything else.
Ellecia 03:27
We, time is a limited thing, for sure. Especially when you're like, dealing with everybody's emotions and needs and desires. And family. Yeah.
Wilder 03:41
I mean, I have so many Google calendars, and they're not even related to that it but they're all affected by it. And so just, it's inter I live with them half the week, and I live here half the week. But, you know, every single day, I'm there at some point, just about and so I call that my home, like we and I'm moving there. So like, this is just sort of an ancillary place where my stuff is until we get the location all figured out. But it really is just one unit. And so our family life is just so consuming. They're just there is not space for anything else. There just isn't so you know, who knows about the future?
Ellecia 04:20
I love that. Okay, tell me this. Have you always been non monogamous or polyamorous?
Wilder 04:25
Oh, I love that question. I think that I love that question because it resonates for me as a queer person who has had a couple of coming outs. And I feel like when you come out everybody sort of goes, That's who you are now. So my answer to that question, is I looking back? Yes, I definitely have never understood monogamy but I've only ever had monogamous relationships. That's all that's ever been offered to me. That's the what I'm surrounded by. That's the only model that exists and so yes, I've I've only ever had monogamous relationships but I have never ever been a person who... Understood possessive love, or that's mine, or, you know, I, I encourage my partners, if you want to go sleep with somebody else, please do that. Let's talk about it, you know, let's be ethical about it. But I don't want to be the I don't want to limit your ability to live your life and experience joy and love and passion. So I want you to have those things. And I'm willing, I'm willing to do the work for you to get those things if you want them and all my partners were like, no, like,
Ellecia 05:25
Oh, that's,
Wilder 05:27
you don't even love me if you want me to do those things. And I was like, What are you talking about? So, at this point in my life, I can look back and see that monogamy never made sense to me. Like, please limit yourself in really fundamental ways so that I can feel secure. That's my experience. I'm not going to be right.
Ellecia 05:45
Totally, totally, please just show up the way you showed up the day we met.
Wilder 05:50
Yes. And that's it, I'm afraid. Don't change oh, gosh, I want to be part of every part of a person's evolution, or people like my partners. I'm so excited. Even my former partner who I'm super, super close to, like, watching us all change and grow older. You know, my former partner I've known since I was 14, and I'm 44. Now, so like, 30 years, he's observed me and I've observed him and like, we've made this life and these children and like, it's so exciting to me to think about where we're all all of us will be in 10 years or 20 years or whatever. So I'm so I'm so I love change. I'm an agent of change.
Ellecia 06:32
I can totally like, I don't know, that resonates. I have always been in monogamous relationships up until about like seven years ago. And I also thought that they were dumb. For me, totally valid for other people. But for me, it just felt like, this was the thing that was expected of me, in order to maintain my value and love ability.
Wilder 07:02
I mean, even now, I still I still struggle with wanting, you know, that sort of programmed desire, that my partners are jealous of time I spend somewhere else, like I want a little bit of possession, I want a little bit of like, and because you know you want to belong, and I think that's a really healthy normal part of being a mammal, you know, like, we have to we want to belong, that's part of our survival. But as a human with a big brain, I have to think about how do I want that to feel like how do I want to belong? I want to belong, because I'm chosen every day, not because I'm possessed not because I'm just assumed to always be there, I want to be joyously and gratefully understood, I don't want to just be furniture. So I think, you know, I had a really great monogamy experience with my former partner. And also I was living as a queer person and a straight relationship and as a, as a poly person in a monogamous relationship. And just, you know, you can't fold yourself into that suitcase. You have to you have to bust out at some point. I mean, I had a really I had good monogamy experiences for a poly person. But I that's not that's not for me. And yay for people that have that it works for them. Yeah, like, let us all live our best lives, you know,
Ellecia 08:24
what do you think was the hardest part about choosing to live, polyamorously?
08:31
Oh, my gosh, well, for me personally, I mean, I had to, I had to completely turn my life upside down, I got divorced, and I, you know, like, ended a really beautiful relationship to go into another beautiful relationship. Going from, you know, having 20 years behind me and developing mastery with a person to going back to the beginning and creating a lot of trying to build mastery. Like, I would say those, you know, were, those were probably the hardest parts. For me personally, you know, ending a relationship is excruciating, even when it's mutually desired or beneficial, or just the end of a long haul. It's still very hard, but I would say that, you know, like, the vigilant work that we all have done to not just maintain our relationships, like all of us thinking and working within what makes sense for all of us, but also flourish. You know, I think I think everybody's flourishing with a new, a new reality, you know, and, you know, changing your kids lives is hard. I think people would expect the answer to be like coming out. And I don't mean, my name is Wilder, I don't have a life where you look at me, I don't have a life where I have to really come out. And that's a huge privilege that I have. I don't have to think the scariest person I told was my, my brand new boss, you know, like I started a brand new job a year ago was like, my partners, and then I just got really frank about it and I don't I just sort of dove in. Cuz that's how I do it. And, but I don't, you know, the relationships I have in my life are people who accept me and love me period, end of sentence. And so I have a lot of gifts of privilege. And that I'm I don't have family relationships where they're complicated because I don't have those relationships. And so there was nobody to approve or disapprove of me it was, it was, wow, that's a really big change. And we, we love you, and what do you need? And then whatever feelings they had about it, they took away and process on their own. And that's great. That's, I feel like how it should be. You know, I think everybody's coming out story is very different. And I absolutely know how fortunate that I am, because I'm surrounded by so many other complicated stories. And so, yeah, that that was not the hardest part. The hardest part was turning my whole life upside down to be able to meet the truth of who I really am and what I really want.
Wilder 10:52
Yeah, that was it.
Ellecia 10:55
I love that. And I think, yeah, I think a lot of people when they think about changing their relationship style, or the way that they're showing up in the world, that those are the things that they think about, like what are people gonna think and who's who needs to approve or who's gonna disapprove. But really, it's, it's showing up for yourself over and over again, to live authentically and live like in the way that like, really speaks to your soul? Yeah. Regardless of all that other stuff. I agree, that's like, the hardest thing
11:27
It would be really easy for me to say, like, when I was navigating my my identity within the confines of my marriage, it was, you know, well, meaning people saying, Be true to you, you've got to be true to you. And I'm like, none of your none of my life is at stake for you. It's really easy for you to hold a space that I should be authentic, but like, Where are the examples of authentic life that are everyday accessible to people, like people who live authentic lives are, you know, are constantly working at it, we don't see that grueling work, but they're also on the edges of something, they're people that we hold in, like high regard and go, I wish I could, I could never like that's how that always goes. And so when we love somebody, and we say, I see that you're unhappy, please live an authentic life, be daring, do the things, you can do it. But you don't have to pay any of the price.
Wilder 12:15
For that,
12:16
you know, the way that the blocks tumbled down for me. I didn't, I knew that I had to press forward toward myself. Like, I knew that that was all I knew. And I didn't know what I was gonna get, I could absolutely see what I was losing. And I knew that the things I thought I might get, I might not get those things, either. So it was just this like, cascade of hold onto myself, like, just hold on to myself. At the end of that, I will have myself and I will pick it up and I will rebuild with whatever there is. And fortunately, I got loved along the way. But you can't know that's going to happen. And everybody can have the best intentions, I'm going to show up and I'm going to be there. But when the chips fall, we know what that feels like when the chips fall and there isn't what you thought or new things that you weren't expecting. So it takes a lot of resources that not everyone has. And it takes a lot of courage that not everyone has. And I think any little bite you can take toward living an authentic life counts as much as the big ones because it all takes all of those things. And so your little gesture to just start I remember when I like discovered my spirituality, I started buying books that felt so big and so daring and scary. And like, I felt like I was claiming land within myself. Like, I'm like I put my flag in and nobody can have this and I just like standing on the edges like, okay, what's going to try to take this property of myself that I've just claimed and nothing Did you know, but this felt the same of like, I'm just taking more land of my within myself, I'm just reclaiming that land that was that's continually, you know, being colonized by other ideas, you know, monogamy, patriarchy, racism, you know, capitalism, whatever. Like all that land is sort of being argued over within our social construct, and I just have to say no, like, I'm gonna live my life within what makes sense to me. And I'm actually not going to entertain these other notions beyond how they might serve me in doing that thing. So yeah, it's, it is an adventure. It is a never ending adventure. Holy moly. But yes, if you don't if you I guess I just feel bad when people go, I don't feel bad I I witnessed the stalled frustration of go live an authentic life and all these lovely like, wooden boards with words and like, you know, just memes and stuff. And we need all that encouragement, but really, who's going to be there for you when you're in the mud? Who's gonna lay in the mud with you because they can't pick you up out of it. Who's gonna lay in the mud with you? You know, not that stupid meme. For the first like, getting the mud with me or move on. That's actually I'm just gonna put that in the world if you can't be in the mud with me. Then just move on.
Wilder 15:00
No, I'm not interested.
Ellecia 15:03
Here's my line. Yeah. You had mentioned that you had to keep choosing yourself because you didn't know what was gonna, you know what you knew what you were gonna lose, you didn't know what you were gonna get. You just had to keep, like choosing yourself. And that really made me think like, there's so many people who don't have enough, like love for themselves or see themselves as worthy enough to choose themselves.
15:30
Yes, I mean, we're surrounded, like, think about when you're a little kid, I have these wonderful videos of Edie, when they were little, and they're singing, and they're like, Mom, I'm amazing at math. And I'm going to be an engineer and all this confidence and sense of self and, and like, and just like this dynamic way of taking up every space that they wanted. And without concern, like, just assuming the world would make room because the world does for kids in a way, then we learn that like we actually need to shrink ourselves down because we have to be acceptable, and we have to belong. So we have to dress the right way and say the right things and do the things that allow us to belong. But we never get examples of coming back around to that until we have elders who go eff it. I'm gonna wear a purple pants and a plaid shirt. And like, you know, I'm gonna spit on the sidewalk and fart in a meeting and like, whatever. Like, we don't get examples of that within the middle part of our lives. So like, how would we know what it looks like to love ourselves? How do we know what are the signposts like? And when we say love yourself, and we have these terrible things, like, if you don't love yourself, no one can love you either. That's such bullshit. Like, that doesn't even make sense. Nobody has ever thought that made sense. We all just go Oh, yeah, that's really wise. But it doesn't actually make sense. Because how would we know if we love ourselves? And I've had to learn a whole bunch about that a whole bunch about that over the last probably like three or four years, especially probably the last two, just how do I know I loved myself? It's because I don't doubt it. I don't actually have to wonder if I love myself. I never asked myself that question. Like, I, I don't ask myself, if I love my kids. I don't ask myself, if I love where I live, do I love where I live, that never happened that never occurs to me. I just do that if I'm trying to figure it out, I have to ask those questions. And so getting to the place where I no longer have to ask those questions. It's a lot of work. But I feel like now that I'm here, and I actually embody and know what it feels like to really love myself, I now can be an example of that I now now the people in my life can see what does that look like when someone loves themselves. And it isn't me personally. It's just what it feels like to be with me. And the way that I talk about myself and the way that I talk about my life and the way that I take up space. That's nothing to do with the ways I try to convince myself I'm worthy. I don't have to. I'm worth it. And I don't actually not interested in anybody who thinks other like I actually don't have time for you. If you don't, if you can't see that. So it's it's very much changed how I go into my relationships, but also it has changed how I compassionately view others who are trying to find that place within themselves and who are moving in a culture of lack. And so you know, you're too fat, you're too skinny, you don't have the right job you don't make enough like lack, lack lack, but they're going but I'm, I want to feel full, but I can't, you know, if I have the right job, maybe I'll feel full and if I have the right relationship, Or I... eat the right foods, or I... diet long enough away the right thing, maybe then I'll feel full but like, you are full, you're just being told all the time that you aren't. It's such a lot. We just live in a lie, you know, so But I mean, again, I have the privilege of having done the work and have those lenses. I just, I feel like if you are standing in your full truth, you are a light to others. Just by being true to yourself. That's literally your only job Be true to you as much as you can. You light the way for others. You give them a way forward just by being true to yourself and you don't owe anyone anything along that way. I pontificate a lot.
Ellecia 18:59
I love it. I love it. And I was just thinking like, that's why I'm doing this podcast right there. Right so that other people can see what's possible. Yes, right. Like like that, that there is a story out there other than a fairy tale with happily ever after. And "the one" and all of these, all of these things that we think we're going to experience when we grow up.
19:29
no, Terrible. Terrible. Yeah, the fairy I actually love fairytales just as a person in the world. But like, I do actually use that language, about our culture, about relationships that, you know, the like, if you do these things in this order, you will have this outcome. And you know, nobody does that. And we still generations and generations of people who do not have that formula work for them and we still try to hang on to it and make it work and we tell ourselves that we are failures in our lives. If we went to school, you You know, met a person got married, went to college had a baby had the job made the money. Why am I not happy? What did I do wrong? I like I did all the things. What did I want? How is this not? You know, how is this not the outcome, not what I put in for? Where were you in there? Like, where are you? That's you doing? But where are you being? Like, who are you in that story? We don't know. We never hear that part of it. So how is all that stuff gonna formulaically work for every single person? Yeah, that's a big, that's a big frustration of just so many, you know, monogamy to like, the one that the whole thing? I I? Yeah, yes.
Ellecia 20:45
Oh, you're arguing? He just must not be the one. It's just not the right one? Uh huh. Yes, or he is the one. So really just suck it up and make it work? Because relationships are hard work.
21:01
Yeah, yeah, he's the one who really put up with all the stupid bs that, you know, like, he really gets me so he must be the one or he's the only one and ever made me feel this way. And I want to go Guess what, if you had another two or three of those, they would also make you feel really unique ways that are not replaceable by other humans. And those are all wonderful too, like, going from a monogamous relationship to a, you know, a poly relationship. Seeing the different needs, I get met with my girlfriend versus my boyfriend, and the different needs they get together then with me, and what we get together when we're together, is just profound. It's so profound, it's delightful. I have such different relationships with both of them, and, and so reflective of our needs of each other as individuals, not our beliefs about our relationship. You know, it should be this way, the prescription of what a good relationship should look like, I have all of those things, you know, they're just divided amongst different people, which gives us all more resources. So yeah, "the one"....
Ellecia 22:08
I'm curious how having been in monogamous relationships your whole life? How has that influenced your current relationship like, like the the monogamy, hangover or the like monogamy, the paradigm that we live in, that tells us what relationships are supposed to be in? How much of that have you had to confront?
Wilder 22:35
I mean, I it's something that we're confront, I don't want to say we I'm confronting it all the time, especially freshly out of the I came out of monogamous relationship, and my partner's had to open their monogamous relationship so that we could all make this thing happen. And so their experience is completely different from mine. For me, I would say the first thing I want to say is, I could finally breathe like I could go, like, it's not that I'm too fat for the dress, it's that the dress isn't the right size for me. And I really believe in that perspective of, you know, like, I am just fine. The world doesn't fit me because the world wasn't constructed for me. So I actually have to learn to do that. And so taking my monogamy ideas, which are constantly being deconstructed by all of us, but I would say that I expected from one partner to provide for me what one partner would in a monogamous relationship, but I expected that from both of my partners. And so it took a long time for me to wrap my head around, and just bless them in their steadfastness of just being like, no, that's you. That's not me. No, that's not me. Brilliant. Because I was just like, everybody has to, like, this is what
23:51
this is what a relationship looks like. Like, we're supposed to want to be together all the time, we're supposed to talk all the time. And we're supposed to, you know, what my relation to my monogamous relationship had looked like, and they were like, that's not, that's not us, like we don't, that's not us, so get to know this. And then you know, my expectation that, that in order to be in a relationship, it should meet as many of my needs as possible, and being able to just relax that and go, Oh, ultimately, all of my needs are being met. And the distribution of weight works in a sustainable way. Because we aren't expecting every single person in our lives to be all of the things all of the time and so I get the best of them and they get the best of me, you know, and which is beautifully very different. And so, you know, the time I spend with Alex is very different from the time I spend with Ashley, they would not want to switch you know, like those things are very different. And so I get to have different parts of myself evolve and be addressed and be nurtured. Where I've heard you know, like, my mom is a great example of this when she was like her favorite food was lasagna. This is such a great example. At the end of her life, I said or after her husband I wanted to bring her food and I said, Can I bring you some lasagna? And she's like, Oh, I haven't had lasagna in 10 years. And I was like, why? And she's like, well, he didn't like it. I was like, What?
Wilder 25:13
it's your favorite food!
25:14
like, she's just like, I mean, she cooked every day and she wanted to cook things he would eat, though she just never did this thing for herself. And, you know, just the like, the submission to a partner in the in a way that is non consensual. It's like, it's toxic. You know? I don't, I don't, I have to think about that. I have to question every single thing I do and go, am I doing this to make peace? Am I doing this to keep the wheels moving? Or am I doing this because I authentically really want to do this thing for this person? And what space can I take up to because, you know, I don't have to sacrifice the things that are important to me or that I like or that I enjoy, because my partner doesn't want to participate. And I see that in monogamous relationships a lot, where somebody will have an interest, but they either sort of don't nurture it, and it dies out, or they go outside to go get it. But like, for me, I have the opportunity of having that part of my relationship. And that's, that's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. The questions that I get from other people is where this really becomes exposed. And it's, you know, people are always curious, about like, that, when people ask me questions, the default format is always prioritizing my married partners to each other. And then me being the thing that's extra. And that is something that I've had to really work on too. I'm still working on it, of not prioritizing the marriage because we're raised with, like, the sacred nature of marriage, and like, how the marriage comes first over the children, like, we're just we get that like messaging all the time. So as a person who's coming into a marriage, I'm swimming upstream, in all of that messaging and, you know, the perception that that other people have, that I am causing harm, even though, you know, like, we're not experiencing that in our lives, but like, just socially, that's, you know, I, I'm discardable, like, if there was a relationship issue, the assumption is, I would go away because they are married. Not that we're on equal footing. Not that we have equal value, I'm actually the extra thing. And so that's been very hard for me just to not go, Well, you guys are married. So you should and I still do it. I absolutely still do it. But it's something that I have to actively work on, because I get very frustrated that the marriage gets focused on, but then I participate in it. And so um, and they're not saying that, you know, like, that's not, that's not what's happening, like, we universally have have jelled into a very equal situation. But I'm constantly been bombarded with that messaging of, you know, the marriage comes first. Not, you know, socially, I'm bombarded with that. And so I have to really be mindful when I'm setting my priorities, or I'm trying to take up space, to make sure that I'm not automatically defaulting to their one entity. I'm a separate entity. Sometimes we come together for something, but then we go back, it's actually that we are one entity that's actually that we all are partners, we all value each other. I'm not left out of anything. That's really difficult, because there's a lot of subtlety to that. Yeah, that one that's a string. I'm going to pluck for a long time, I think. But,
Ellecia 28:33
yeah, yeah. There's also the piece that we're told that a marriage makes two people into one, right, but really, you're all three separate, autonomous, individual humans. Not two parts of one relationship. And then a third part of another relationship that's come together.
28:58
I think too like, when people ask us questions that, you know, the assumption is that it's all about sex. And you know, we've got a married couple wanted to have an adventure, and I am that adventure, and no. Hell no. I mean, not for us like, and that's not how it happened. Um, the then it goes to like, all of the benefits the married couple gets for having a girlfriend, not how it's beneficial for everyone. And so like, the functioning of our system is that all three adults are fully involved in financial decisions and parenting the children, in working the land in making decisions about you know, trips and safety and pandemic like we all have all of those conversations together. And there are certainly lines where, you know, the subtlety of a parenting decision of should we send our kid back to school in a pandemic is a parenting decision, but it affects the third person who also has kids and so while the parents are making it choice, we then all talk about it together. Because there may be other issues we're not thinking of, and everybody's affected. And so we all get to have a say. So like, we're really super good about, you know, I don't I don't get involved in marital discussions that's between them, you know, one partner doesn't get involved in the relationship issues of the other two, like, we're very, very good at those things. But also, we're very, very much just a system. And so the idea that I'm ancillary or that a third person is ancillary, you know, inherently discards the worth and value of that person on a human level. So and certainly, if that's what you're doing, if you're if you're just having sexual relationships with somebody else, you're meant to go for it, like, do it, everybody's consenting, and that end up the realm of that is very different. But we are creating our life together. And again, it's sort of like, Are you the wrong size? Or is the dress the wrong size, we aren't the wrong size, we feel very normal when we go out in public and we're kissing and touching. And that feels like normal, you know, and when other people are looking at us, we sort of have to go, Oh, right, like, mono, people don't see this. And so it's unusual, but like, it doesn't feel spicy to us. It doesn't feel, you know, like taboo or special or it's just that we love each other and we're trying to get some dinner, can you just bring us a menu. It's really funny when we go into like grocery stores, and people are just like, you know, and we're just like, what is it? Oh, right. Yeah.
Ellecia 31:20
Okay. That one time that they watched threesome porn, and it's playing out at the grocery store, in the vegetable aisle.
Wilder 31:32
So who does? You know? What's the other here?
31:41
Yeah, the other part of that, too, that's really we talk about a lot is, you know, because I have a male and a female partner, the assumption is always that Alex has two women, when in actuality, it came together, you know that Ashley wanted to have two partners. And like, we evolved that way. And so we're all very much you know, love each other all very much. But like, when we're out Ashe and I are acutely aware that everybody's assumption is that Alex has two women and What a lucky guy Alex's, and it's true, he does have two women, but also, I have a girlfriend and a boyfriend, and she's got a husband and a girlfriend, like, those things don't seem to weigh as heavily because porn culture and like, patriarchy, and just, you know, all of this sort of isms that break off break into that, but it's really something we're very aware of. It's kind of gross, you know?
Ellecia 32:30
Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's super, it's like, it's like the word thrupple, which just makes me cringe so hard, because it's like they've taken couple and just added a third to make it more palatable for our monogamous culture. And so yeah, so when people see you guys, it's very, they have very heteronormative assumptions about what you guys are doing like oh, clearly, it's just like, he's a stud. Yeah, right. Like he's just he's as manly of a man as they can get because he's got two women. Yeah.
33:06
Wow, good for him. He can maintain that, you know, like, I don't know people are. Little do they know he hides in his Ford alot and I actually do a lot of talking. And he's like, go do that. This is a lot for me.
Ellecia 33:24
How often do you hear the statement? Oh, I could never do that.
33:30
Oh, gosh, I love I love that statement so much. Because I feel like it's such an opportunity. I have just thought about this so much. And I would say you know any, like the Poly community probably confronts this question more than any other or like this the statement you know, I could never and that you know, the monogamy culture has taught us that jealousy is a stopping point. If I am jealous, I can go no further. I just think Gosh, like what other emotion do you have where it's final? What other feeling do you have where you can go no further? Give me any example like you use somebody dies, you feel grief? You don't feel it forever, like you know how you know you're not in the throes of it forever. You're not happy forever. You're not you know, like, you're not in love forever. So like what feeling? Do you have that just as a complete stopping point, you can't feel anything else. And we and like monogamy culture so deeply has entrenched in us this idea that jealousy means I am incapable of feeling anything else. And let me just tell you I'm not I wouldn't say I'm inherently a largely a jealous person. I certainly have confronted a lot of my jealousy in the last couple of years, but, um, but also my desire to meet my partners with a whole heart and with with healing within myself and like notice my insecurity as a wound within myself and a hole that needs to be filled by me. Not by circumstance, not by a person, you know, not by a substance or whatever. I am. I actually have to repair that, and how much more satisfying my relationships are how much more of a emotionally intelligent lens I have on other parts of my life. And, and like the lie, the thievery, I would say the thievery of the notion that jealousy is a stopping point and how it denies us access to loving relationships, whether they're sexual or not, like, it steals that it just out of the gate, like I it's not possible for me, I'm too jealous, therefore I cannot have XYZ. I mean, that makes me really sad. And if you subscribe to jealousy, and that feels like a power place for you, and you don't want to push past it, you are within your rights, absolutely. cheer you on you go right ahead, live, live your life. But if it's keeping you from deeper relationships, and it's keeping you from an understanding of yourself, it's keeping you from healing insecurity that's limiting you from applying for that job you want or asking that person out or trying on that crazy outfit that you've been eyeing, like, that's insecurity stuff. Like, if you can heal that in one part of your life, it ripples out to other parts of your life. And so relationships give us an opportunity to expose those wounds, but also learn how to tackle the healing of those wounds with love in our lives. And so, for me, like,
36:26
what I learned in my journey with this and continue to expose, because it's not a it's not a it's a journey, right? And so, of course, I still have jealousy is that I need connection, I need connection. So when my partners are going out together, and I'm not with them, I have struggled and struggled with that, because I live separately, and it just feels really hard. And you know, they live together, I don't. So they just get all these things I don't get I have all these stories about it. And I realize that my stories are about lack. But they give me no, it means I'm not taking responsibility to fill those places myself, that I'm expecting them, and their time and their way of being to fill a hole that I carried into this relationship that they didn't consent to fill for me. I'm saying, please make me feel better. No, that is not how that works. That is my job, I have to actually go create that. It's different for me to say, hey, like, my partners are out on date night, and I'm struggling, I'm gonna sit here and just cry about it. And be angry that they get to have this thing I don't get to have tonight. Or I can say which I've had to learn. And in a pandemic, that's been very hard. My partners are on date night, and Gosh, I'm really excited for them and really deeply feel the connection and the conversion of like, oh, man, like they're going to be delicious to hang out with tomorrow, because they're going to get so much connection tonight. I can't wait for that. And I'm feeling that insecurity rise up in me. So who can I go hang out with. So I'm having a fun time too, the time passes. And then we all come together and feel good. And so like that is what works for me is people interaction. And I wouldn't know that if I if I just was like, I'm jealous. This sucks. I'm going to lay here and be miserable and make my partners miserable, which I absolutely have done. Absolutely have made them pay for their time without me and my insecurity and not because I just, you know, willy nilly just was shitty. But just like you when you feel bad, you let people know you feel bad. And despite my best efforts to try to rein that in, I haven't been good about it. And I try very hard now to notice my partner's having needs pulled place within myself to prepare for when they get their needs met, so that my needs are met. Um, I don't want anything to stop me from living my best life. I don't want anything to stop me from being my fullest self, from knowing myself as well as I can. And the only person who can ever know me as well as I can know me. And I, you know, my self worth and my love for myself tells me that I'm pretty marvelous and so worth knowing, and worth discovering and worth evolving. So why would I shortchange myself by just not willing to do the hard work of that, like, nobody else can do it for me. So I want people to go, what else is possible? I'm very jealous. So how do I move past that to get the thing that I want? versus I'm jealous, therefore, I must not be able to have that thing. Possible. You're choosing.
Ellecia 39:24
Yeah, just choose. I identified as a very jealous and very possessive person for a really large part of my life. And when I decided I didn't want to do monogamy anymore. I was like, and I'm super jealous and possessive. And this doesn't serve me in any positive way. So I'm going to need to figure this out.
Wilder 39:45
Yeah. Because you wanted something.
Ellecia 39:48
Yeah, I think I think that idea that, that our partners have to fill that hole or have to change their actions so that they don't trigger jealousy on us or that they have to validate validate us is so very strongly tied in with monogamy. Mm hmm. Right? Like Don't ever do something that's going to make your partner uncomfortable because you're the cause.
Wilder 40:17
Do you think our culture makes room for monogamy without codependence?
Ellecia 40:23
No.
40:26
Like they're just so you know yeah I I really I really think that those things are married to each other very deeply in a very monogamous relationship. Like codependence and monogamy like really? I've not seen I don't think any examples of I mean, we're all unraveling codependence right we're all it's it's codependent versus interdependent like and my partner's I work really hard on interdependence. And we call out codependence because we don't want to participate in that. And we see how limiting that is. And, you know, toxic and unsustainable, and also our part of our monogamous culture is like, I talked to poly people who are like, you know, I, if I'm feeling insecure, my partners know to do these things. You know, like, if I'm having one, I was talking with a friend of mine, and they were saying, you know, my partner, my partner was on a date with his girlfriend and, and I was feeling insecure. So he, you know, so I asked him to not go, and I was like, I mean, do what works for you, do what works for you. And, you know, we're all learning. So like, great. And not in a million years, Not in a million years. Like, that's the same thing as me saying, Please limit your life and be monogamous with me and not experience the fullness of love and what you're capable of, so that I can feel more secure in myself. No, and so that we talked about that about just our emotional responsibility to ourselves and to each other. And, you know, I feel like the work that I've done in the last couple of years, to be where I am now, um, I don't know that I would have been capable of it in my 20s. You know, I know myself and I have enough life experience and relationships, and enough, you know, education from working with the families I've worked, you know, like, I have a lot of life experience that lends to my ability to be really centered and grounded and not be able to do that really deep dive shadow stuff that we have to do to get get to the light. And so I wonder if I would have been able to do it in my 20s, you know,
Ellecia 42:40
yeah, I would not have definitely, definitely. Yeah, I'm actually I'm really impressed with a lot of the young people that I see and how they're doing relationships these days, like, so many people are, like, seeing what their parents and the generations ahead of us have done. And are like, there is something not right about this.
43:07
Yeah, I mean, I definitely see like, younger people looking at different models, I see, you know, polyamory is something that seems much more accessible. I see, kink is something that's much more accessible, young people are trying it on in a lot of different ways, for all the like risks and benefits of that. But it's really, it's really like this really cool time of seeing a different kind of sexual revolution of, you know, not just that I want to be able to dress the way I want or wear lingerie if I want or, you know, kiss the girl in a bar if I want, but actually, I can really claim an identity at an earlier time of my life. And that there's some kind of space for that at least where we live. You know, if I was in Georgia, I don't know. I'm just I'm picking a southern state out of the air. I don't know. But like, if I was living in another community that was not as progressive. Would I have all of these freedoms to explore myself? Would I feel so safe to, you know, to do all those things? Would I have peers, you know, could I just go on the internet and find a group and go sit in a park with a bunch of people who are polyamorous? Well, probably not, you know, there's plenty of those places where that's not true. So it's nice to be a part of a community where that we can we can show like, this is what it is, this is normal. You can walk into Safeway and see us there, you know, and like, oh, okay, that's the thing. And that's normal. We've, no, we've never been harassed. We've had looks and stuff, but we've never been harassed or anything. But who will those young people be as a result of their sort of coming into a system that makes room for some of that expansion? That we couldn't we didn't have access to like, Who are they going to be in their 40s? You know, that's pretty cool. That's really cool. I can't wait to see that. What can we learn from them, then? You know, that's gonna be great.
Ellecia 44:47
raising kids. Oh, raising kids in polyamorous households. How's that going for you?
44:56
Really great. I mean, it's really great. I think you know what I want What I saw modeled to me in my relationship is that when other people split up and become blended households, that there's just a lot of conversations about like roles. And you are not this, but you can be that and, you know, slam doors, you're not my mom, like a lot of just drama and conflict. I would, I would say that in respect to all parties, all partners, all all kids, there's been a normal amount of challenge. But like, the bigger things, the sort of navigating who does what has been really easy for us. But also we're very aware, and we both have kids, I've got, you know, my 13 year old and they have three kids at home as well. My other two are grown up. And so so we're both coming to the table with like kids we're trying to protect and kids, we're trying to, like roll them through the transition with support, and understanding. So we all have those shared priorities. And so we can talk from that perspective of how do we make sure our kids are not traumatized by this change in our lives? And if they are traumatized? How do we support them like, so we have shared goals, I think and our parenting syncs up pretty well. I learned a lot from them, they learn probably something from me, and our when we all like each other. So there's, you know, like, there's a lot of love in the house. And that I think lubricates a lot of the things that are hard, is that we come back to loving each other. And so, so that has, that's been really good for us. And again, I just feel the privilege of that, because people have really, really hard time a friend of mine, when she was a teenager, her mom got into a new relationship. And when they tried to blend the households, the other you know, her step parent's child was like, No, I'm not like, we can't live together, I won't live here. And so they ended the partners had to live apart from each other for years, because the teen in the house was like, Huh, and they couldn't navigate it another way. I feel really lucky that, you know, as we're moving toward us all living together, and I'm there basically every day anyway, that we have a sense of flow, I go there, and I do the dishes, and I do the laundry and I take the kids on errands and I you know, leave here and go there and take a kid to an appointment or whatever, like I fully participate as, as a parent without wandering into parenting decisions. I think there's some skill that comes with that too. Like, of just communication. We're not we don't really stumble that much. I don't. There are times where I think probably we get we go. Like, that's my kid. I'm going to make that choice don't really need your input. I think we probably have all felt that. But we've never talked about it because it hasn't been a chronic issue. Again, I feel really lucky. Very, very lucky as me because that's just can be such a difficult, a difficult thing to have to try to do blending. I mean, you you have blended your families. So you You do know, and I don't know how that gone for you. But
Ellecia 47:49
no. It's actually been been really good. I think the kids and their relationship it I remember the first book I ever read about blended families said that it takes about four years for everyone to actually feel like their family and not people that are just living together and tolerating each other. And so the first couple of years, there was some contention between siblings. But for the most part, it's been really good.
48:20
You're pretty good. All right. They were pretty young when you guys got together. So did that help. Do you think?
Ellecia 48:25
Yeah, they were five and three? Yeah. So five, five and three? Yeah, yeah. And so the five year olds went through the whole like, like, we have a boy and a girl that are the same age. So they went through a couple of years of like, we don't like each other. They were always fighting. And now they're best friends. Yeah, yeah. And, and I mean, like, as far as our household and our triad and our relationships outside of the house, like, the kids are so good, they're totally fine. Children are like, they really don't care. You know, they don't care until things actually affect them. Yeah, I
49:08
mean, I think we have to teach them to care. Like, we have to teach them to think that, you know, it's like, as a birth professional, one of the things we know is that like, babies don't want to sit in their own pee and poop like they don't want to, and they like it's not natural for us to do that. We have to learn to relax our pelvic, their pelvic system to eliminate in a diaper that we're going to then wear for a long time. And then we have to retrain ourselves to not do that thing. And so I think about like relationships, the kind of the same way, which is kind of gross.
Wilder 49:39
However,
49:41
we like kids don't come loaded with this is how it should be. So there so we we aren't breaking something in them to not do it that way. unless we've taught them that there's only one model. Then we have to break it then they have to confront some things. But you know, our kids, you know, Edie was 11 or so, when things started to change for us, and so, you know, kind of just getting into puberty, not dating, not, you know, none of those things, but like, early enough and late enough to have a really good understanding of what was happening, and be able to weigh in and say things, but also now that as they start to think, you know, and they're when they get to that point where they're starting to think about relationships. We've already had a period of time where they're asking me those questions like What made you know that you were poly? What? What? How did you pursue that? How did you have this conversation? What does this look like and be able to observe what a healthy polyamorous relationship look like, and hearing from me that like you, you get to define your relationship, this is what mine looks like, your dad and his partner have a relationship. That's what it looks like for them, because they've chosen that. And you get to actually do the same thing. Like there's all of the options, as long as everybody's consenting and being treated respectfully, you get to, you get to write that story. So they don't have to deconstruct monogamy, in the same way that I had to or people who come to, you know, polyamory later in life. It's just what's possible, you know, like, our kids now know that and we're seeing this, like, explosion we're seeing, you know, I was watching Star Trek discovery the other night with, with my, my former partner. And you know, one of the characters says, I'm not a she, my, you know, they say is my pronoun, please. And I was like,
Ellecia 51:25
Oh,
51:25
I just saw that on TV, like, Oh, my gosh, and just, you know, as a kid, seeing gay people on TV was like, oh, oh, my gosh, like, so shocking. And so, you know, taboo in a way. And now we're, we're lovingly giving access to the spectrum of possibility to our young people who will never know another thing, they will never know another thing. So I feel like our kids, like we were talking earlier about just people in their 20s, sort of the sexual revolution in this breaking of ideas, our kids are going to just enter, that's all they're going to know is that they get to grow up and be whatever they whoever they are, and get to bounce around in that as we do and explore it as we do. And really get to write the story of the of their lives and their relationships and man, I wish I had had that kind of time. Like, what would I be doing now? If I wasn't deconstructing monogamy like what would I be doing right now? So yeah, that's a that's a powerful, exciting evolution of ourselves, to look ahead and see the work that we lay and the work that we've done, and how that will benefit the people who come after us. It's really exciting. It really is. And our kids, you know, our kids can get together and hang out and nobody goes, you have to, you know, your mom has partners. You know, it's like, oh, yeah, like, whatever, you know, that's great.
Ellecia 52:44
Yeah, yeah, my dream for or like my wish for the children, like all the children is that they know that they can choose what their relationships look like that they can choose relationships that work for them, and that they don't have to just default to one story, and they don't have to just follow this path that I don't know, history laid out for them that
53:14
ownership and possession and land and you know, like distribution of resources laid out for them. And the church in patriarchy, and misogyny. I mean, like, none of these things were written for love or for, you know, equal access to anything, it was all about trade deals, basically. So I am and celebrate people who want to be married, like, absolutely celebrate that. And certainly, there's a part of me that, you know, the belonging piece of belonging, the model of belonging I have is marriage, and even though I don't want to be married, and that the like, drive to belong in a cemented way is real, like, I feel very done with being married. And I feel very, like, happy with the marriage that I had, and like, let that be the one, you know, let that be the great marriage of my life. But also, like, I'm moving into part of my life where I'm, you know, we're working to spend our lives together, my partners and I, and we're building a place and we're doing all of these really adult long term relationship, rest of your life type of relationship things, and there's no place for us. You know, there's no, you know, they're already married, though. There's no place for us and we can, you know, we could do something but like, again, if I, if I say, let's have a ceremony, I'm participating again, and this notion of ownership and like, I don't know, like, I wish I I wish we could get to the place or maybe someday we will, where we have a better way for non monogamous people or just people, you know, to commit to each other without that binding of property.
Ellecia 54:41
Is there anything that you think somebody who is going from monogamy to polyamory? Absolutely, should know.
54:53
Gosh, that's a great question. The first thing that comes to my mind, it's probably not my final final answer, but for I'll just say, There's no end. Like there's no end to the possibilities you, you don't have to stop. As long as you are honoring yourself and the people with you, you don't have to stop. Like, jealousy is not a stopping point, like it can, you can go past it, number of partners, not a stopping point, you can go past it, the confines of your established relationship and grow past. It doesn't mean that's easy. It doesn't mean those things aren't grueling, and, and eviscerating sometimes, but honestly, if you don't take your guts out and look at them every once in a while, you don't know what you need to keep her go like you, you actually have to do that sometimes. Um, another thing that I would say is that you can't do it safely. Like you can't put yourself on a little island and think I'm going to control the boats that come and, and be in charge of what, what I deal with. And I'm only going to do this much. And I think that's, you know, my former partner, and I tried to do that very much. Like, we'll just do this one thing, we'll explore this one part, and we're going to really control it, and then we're going to feel safe. And then if that goes well, then we're going to add another thing. Ah, no, no, no, that's not you. You cannot humanize other people and compartmentalize their value, you cannot do that. And so you actually have to accept responsibility, that if you are you feel like you've done the hard work, to enter into a non monogamous relationship, that you actually have to continually humanize the people that you are with because they are not commodities that you can just trade off of becomes uncomfortable. You can't start a relationship and just say, I'm not working for my marriage, peace out, that doesn't work. That does not work, you are not engaging in polyamory you're doing that I don't know what you're engaging in. But that's not consensual, ethical, enthusiastic non monogamy. That is not what that is. So know that like, whatever groundwork you're laying in the beginning, it doesn't actually end. So make your relationships that you develop as a result of that hard work. really worth it. Really, really worth it. But you cannot trade souls? Because it's hard. That doesn't work. That's not that's not cool. Don't do that. Yeah, control, the only thing you can control is you if that's it, man, that little that idea of a little island, I'm just going to deal with one little thing. And if I like it, man, we just want to be safe, so bad, you know, we want to be safe, so bad. But that's not that doesn't work.
Ellecia 57:32
Yeah, there's a lot of you see a lot of people putting in like, really arbitrary rules like you can, you can make out with someone but you can't have intercourse with them. As if that difference like that, that line is somehow going to change how you feel are somehow going to change the impact it has on you. Like, it makes no difference.
57:55
Just like having been through that exact thing. I see that as sort of like I have capacity for this much expansion, I'm pretty sure more expansion will break me. So like I'm, I'm willing to expand this point. And maybe just a little bit more, because I love you, but I can't go further right now. So let me get to that place of expansion. See if that feels Okay. And then when I have capacity, we can breathe a little bit more, I'll expand a little bit more. I feel like I feel the urge to control and to not be broken by it. I super super understand that. That for you know, for my former partner that was definitely like part of that, like, how much can we handle. And also, you know, the song, the Katy Perry song, I kissed a girl, all she does is talk about, like how she used this other person to have an experience and there's no humanity in this other person. You know, like, I kissed a girl and I liked it and like, my experiences of that, but but really like this other person also had an experience and I realized it's a song but like it's, it doesn't do anybody like it's such a it's such an allegory for how we feel about these kinds of things that if I want to go have a sexual adventure, I'm just gonna go have it and the other person doesn't matter. They're just a body that I'm experiencing this with. So like you You actually you know, if you're going to expand you actually kind of have to take the whole you have to take the whole thing you don't you don't have to go straight to having sex like that's it's fine to ease into it, but like, make sure everybody knows that that's what you're doing. But how I feel about my partner if I'm monogamous and I don't have these feelings I'm imagining but kissing somebody versus sleeping with somebody like I don't know that those things really do feel different. I only kiss them doesn't make you feel better. If they did it outside of your relationship than if they slept with them. It doesn't you don't go Oh, you only kissed Okay, that's not a big deal. That's fine. You go You're fucking what like you did what? Like the spectrum of betrayal does not changed based on how naked you got. Yeah, but again, we come back to we want to have control. You know, we want it to feel not too hard. Tough Yes, it is and you won't die, like you will die.
Ellecia 1:00:08
You know, people say that a lot like, Oh my god, I would die. Like really? Would you like you would actually die? I
1:00:15
don't know, I think you do. But it's the it's not the death of your life. It's who you know yourself to be you actually become deconstructed, and you then have to go, oh my gosh, I am not straight. What does that mean? That's the death, the death of your identity as a straight person. Now you are reborn as a queer person, like you now know something about yourself? And you look around and go, what does that mean for my relationships? What does that mean for my job? What does that mean for you know, the porn I watch or the stories I tell like, Oh my gosh, right, that person has has died. And so for me having died as a monogamous person, I absolutely wailed on this very floor in crushing grief of what I lost, and had no clue if it was going to be worth it. I had no clue. And I had to just keep standing up and rebuild and like, learn to walk again. And so I do believe there's a death, but also, we, you know, we shed the things we no longer need. And yes, we have to get really uncomfortable, and we have to fight our way out of that skin. But then,
Ellecia 1:01:17
like,
Wilder 1:01:18
what's better than that, like, just getting to like, breathe and like, move around, and like, be fully in our lives until it doesn't fit us anymore, then we do it again. And guess what, you're gonna do that cycle, whether you choose it or not, we all have to do it. So why not make it really worth it? If you're just gonna go shed your skin over and over to fit into your life? Why not make it really worth it? Because you can't stop that process. You're gonna die all the time happens all the time. Get back.
Ellecia 1:01:49
I love that that is just It feels really good. Right? To think that, like, we go through all of these changes in our life over and over and over and nobody wants change, because change is terrifying and scary. We go through all these changes regardless. So like when you can just have him, right and when you can just embrace it. And like, go with it. Like, it's like hopping on a lazy river. Either you can jump on the inner tube that's floating there, or you can like, try waiting up river or not. I don't know, like you if you just hop in and go. It's so much easier. Yeah, you're in the lazy river either way. Mm hmm.
Wilder 1:02:29
yank it out of it. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I mean, life's gonna have its way with you. So like,
1:02:36
you can't stop it, you know, you can't stop it. And I mean, gosh, the thing that's acute for me is, I have one life, I've one chance to love myself, I'm one chance to have my life look like, you know, look like I envision it to be true to who I am, I have one chance to, you know, leave my mark of, hopefully a bright light for others after I'm gone. Like, that's what I want, you know, I can't go back and redo this. And every day that I lose by not being true to myself, it hurts me, like, I lost that, you know, like, I lost that chance. And, you know, I have friends who are reaching a point in their lives, it's, you know, the 40s is just does something to us, right? Like every like every, like 10 years, we have this like power moment. And the 40s is certainly one of them. And like, they're going I've wasted so much of my life. And I think I don't ever want to feel that, you know, even if I don't believe that that's an actual real thing. We don't waste our lives. But I don't want to look back, I don't want to feel that like I've wasted my life. You know, if I if I go out tomorrow, at least when I get to the other side, I'm going to go. I did. I did. I showed up. You know, I showed up in the way that was right for me. Maybe not what was right for someone else. But what was right for me, I showed up and I fully participated in this one life. And whatever happens after that, I'm going to try to do the same thing. But I want to see the Truth of My Life reflected around me and my relationship is a huge part of that. You know, and if something happened to us, and we weren't together anymore, I would not choose monogamy. I would not I don't you know, I would be really fine being someone else's partner if I was their only partner. If they could handle that, you know, if they could handle being responsible for themselves and knowing I don't want to live with you and I don't like I don't want to do those things. I would be fine with that. But I now know what it's like to have multiple people be able to find parts of me and meet me there and celebrate those parts of me with me that I don't have to set aside because they don't fit into a monogamous construct. I actually get to know more of myself and be with more of myself. In reflection of the relationships that I have. I Why would I ever go back? Why would I ever go back. And it's a lot of work to work. I mean, I'm worth it. Yeah, not monogamy not for me. Great for other people. Not for me, like beet I don't like beats either. Nope beet you're not for me. You can have all the beets. I am beet free. Thank you. That's amazing. Thank you. You're welcome. Anytime. Yeah, anytime you definitely
Ellecia 1:05:19
will. We will definitely be doing this again. Yay. I love it.