Polyamory Weekly

Advice from six different therapists, relationship coaches, and body workers on navigating family events as a poly person over the holidays

• If you're under 18, visit scarleteen.com
• My Thanksgiving Happy Poly Moment

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

• 6:30 Ruby Bouie Johnson, Brené Brown's BIG
• 10:45 Libby Sinback
• 15:00 Karen McDowell, Anxiety is an asshole course
• 21:00 Spyce
• 25:55 Anne More, email [email protected], Facebook
• 28:45 Nolan Lawless, Facebook

To join the online conversation around this and other episodes, follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We love when you review us on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcatcher (including Spotify!) and when you share us with your friends directly.

Thanks to our new PW Playmate, Tom, for his subscription! Also to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

I have abandonment issues, but I don't know what I need when they come up. How do I ask my partners for what I need?

• If you're under 18, visit scarleteen.com
• Thanks to the Close In munch in Portland, Oregon!
• Poly for the Holidays contributions

• November 23 was National Polyamory Day, and other poly holidays
• Discrimination in poly pregnancies

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Katie has abandonment issues and asks how to better cope with them when poly. She knows she has them but doesn't know what to ask for when they arise.

• Knowing and identifying is half the battle.
• Explain to your partners what you shared with me—how it feels. Ask for their help with comfort might you need in the moment. Do the full analysis when you're not in the midst of the issue.

To join the online conversation around this and other episodes, follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We love when you review us on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcatcher (including Spotify!) and when you share us with your friends directly.

Joe writes in with additional advice to the listener in episode 567 on how to find poly community near you.

Thanks to our new PW Playmate, Tom, for his subscription! Also to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

We interview a munch organizer and field audience questions at the Close In munch in Portland, Oregon

• If you're under 18, visit scarletteen.com
• We're at the Close In munch in Portland, Oregon!

Lessons learned include:

• poly and kinky people are everywhere
• it's important to destigmatize a stigmatized group
• "Square up; what you want is fine; fuck 'em all!"

• What advice would you give to solo polys?
  • net
  • Off the Relationship Escalator
• 12:45 How to come out to folks who aren't familiar with poly?
  • Anticipate questions, be prepared, be calm, don't take it personally, give them a year to freak out
  • Folks will match your tone, so adopt one of calm, easy compassion
• 16:00 How has poly changed in the last 14 years?
• 17:45 And now there are terms for everything!
  • my Poly Living keynote How Polyamory Became More Mainstream Than Peanut Butter
  • all the poly recommended reading
• 19:05 How do I bring up the birth control discussion?
  • Be brave and bring it up. Or leave a birth control pamphlet in the toilet for leisure reading! J
  • Use regular relationship check ins as a space to bring up any issues
• 22:15 What is your take on hierarchies?
  • If it works for everyone involved and it's transparent, fine. But it doesn't work for everyone (or me).
  • The challenge with hierarchies is that it sets up a permission model.
  • Be aware if you are talking about power structure or entanglement levels? If the latter, "nesting partner" might be more useful than "primary."
• 26:15 My mom thinks my polyamory is a phase. Do you know folks who have lived out their lives as poly?
  • Allena Gabosch, Oberon Zell-Ravenhart, and many others.
  • Just as with child-rearing, having an extended network to help you in your old age is valuable.

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Thanks to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

After four years, listener Newseeker is tired of asking her husband's permission every time she wants to go on a date with her partner of three years. How long should she accommodate his slow pace?

• If you're under 18, visit scarletteen.com
• We have new FAQs!
  • The Discuss, distract, do exercise to help deal with event-based jealousy
  • When to come out
• We're slowly uploading episodes 1-40 on our LibSyn page to the archives of 2005

• Poly parenting in the news - roundup
• Show your parents

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Newseeker (married 10 years, open for four, with a partner of three years) writes in to say she is tired of the objections her husband has to how she practices poly. He'd prefer she have more random sexual partners and not be in another loving relationship. Even though opening the relationship was her idea, it's taxing on her to constantly have to ask when she can see her partner and wait until the last minute to make plans to accommodate hubby.

• The permission model doesn't work for adults, only with kids
• No one can maintain an unnatural pace indefinitely
• The Relationship Bill of Rights refers to agency: you have a say in how many partners to have, which ones, and how often you see them.

To join the online conversation around this and other episodes, follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We love when you review us on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcatcher (including Spotify!) and when you share us with your friends directly.

This week's HPM is from a gay triad with no one feeling left out!

Thanks to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

A listener is engaged to her fiancée, who just came out as straight. How does she cope with not having sex with her soon-to-be wife?

Content warning and why you can't find our podcast on Apple Podcasts in India.

Let's celebrate Dixie De la Tour, Bawdy Storytelling, and the Bawdy Storytelling podcast that you can subscribe to on Apple Podcasts. There is also a Facebook group of Bawdy fans that is super fun.

Couple-centric and non-diverse article in Cascadia claiming Portland is the center of Pacific NW poly

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Emily writes in to say that her fiancée recently identified as straight and will no longer have sex with her. She says they are poly, so it doesn't mean that there won't be any sex for her, but she is confused. She says she their love is unconditional, so it shouldn't matter, but what does this mean for their relationship?

To join the online conversation around this and other episodes, follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We love when you review us on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcatcher (including Spotify!) and when you share us with your friends directly.

This week's HPM is multinational and tech-assisted!

SLT writes in in response to episode 519 on the issue of poly-friendly housing and

Thanks to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

Kevin Patterson and Alana Phelan, coauthors of For Hire: Operator and the soon-to-be-released For Hire: Audition, talk about why they write a queer poly superhero universe.

Thanks to Anita Wagner for introducing me to the term "petamour"

Vice has a great new article about poly families and poly parenting

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Kevin Patterson and Alana Phelan join us to talk about their next soon-to-be-released queer superhero book, For Hire: Audition. You may remember their last interview with us on episode 563 around For Hire: Operator or Kevin's interview around his book, Love's Not Color Blind.

• Harlequin is putting out a queer line of romance novels. Submit using Harlequin's Romance Includes You mentorship (scroll down the page) runs until October 15, 2019.
• The Broken Earth Triology by N. K. Jenisin
• If It Makes You Happy by Claire Kann
• Find Kevin A. Patterson on his website, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Find Alana Phelan on her website, Twitter, or Facebook.
• For Hire Audition's IndieGoGo
• Gail Simone's Twitter

To join the online conversation around this and other episodes, follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We love when you review us on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcatcher (including Spotify!) and when you share us with your friends directly.

Thanks to Pacemaker Jane for letting us use their song Good Suspicions as our intro and outro music and to you for listening and sharing.

Email [email protected], call 802-505-POLY, Twitter @polyweekly or visit www.polyweekly.com or www.facebook.com/polyweekly

A listener asks what to do when love does feel like a zero sum game; his wife took a lover, and our listener felt like he got even less sex than before.

Under 18? Stop listening now and visit http://www.scarleteen.com

• Minx recorded an episode of D&D Dads podcast with J.R. Blackwell, but the podcast hasn't yet launched. Stay tuned!
• We had fun in Copenhagen!

• Polyamory Works for Them in the New York Times
• "TV's Most Interesting Polyamorous Relationship," says TV Guide about Siren

Listener Micah writes in to ask what to do now that his wife brought up the idea of poly, started dating someone half her age, and is now having much less sex with Micah.

• If we are painting a rosy, easy picture of poly, we need to change, because the emotional development required for polyamory (or any relationship) takes time and effort.
• Lusty Guy wonders about the use of the word "affair"—is this a reflection of your jealousy, or do you feel she wasn't being honest?
• The issue is likely some preexisting issue in your relationship (perhaps the libido difference, perhaps something else). This sounds like "relationship broken, add more people."
• To strengthen your relationship, have an honest conversation with your wife. Stop comparing before and after the metamour and start talking about the behaviors you want to see to feel better in your relationship. And ask for the same of her.

A monogamous listener writes in to share a happy not-poly moment about not panicking when her fiancé shared that he was attracted to a colleague, and our listener could accept it without jealousy or drama!

• Soft Shell Crabby wrote in a follow up after we address her question in episode 574 Is it OK to ask to meet my metamour (spoiler: it helped, and they are better now!)
• Reama says some really nice things about the quality of our content.

Thanks to our new Poly Weekly Playmates, Mirjam, Syncione, Quinlan, and Melvin!

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Friend us on Twitter or Facebook, leave a comment here. Check out Poly Weekly podcasts at polyweekly.libsyn.com. Share this with a friend or write a review on Apple Podcasts! Our intro and outro music is courtesy of Pacemaker Jane, "Good Suspicions."

A listener asks if her new boyfriend is emotionally unavailable, will poly help?

Under 18? Stop listening now and visit http://www.scarleteen.com

• Unicorn hunting spreads as Vice gets it
• Four clear glasses frames that say "I haven't tried polyamory, but I've watched Vice documentaries on it"
• Google Calendar is down, which means you can do anything you want, according to Twitter

A listener writes in to ask if polyamory is possible when her partner seems to be currently emotionally unavailable. Our listener met a guy five months ago, when she was a newly-single mom not looking for commitment. They never talked about what their relationship was, but our listener knew she wanted something casual and honest. Then he planned an all-day romantic date, felt relationshippy, which followed up by not reading her text messages, which led her to feel insecure and question her own behavior. They talked, and he mentioned he didn't want to replicate a previous codependent relationship, and things were fin for a while. Then polyamory came up in a dinner with friends, and he mentioned it might work if she was his primary, but he wasn't involved with any others.

• Good for you for realizing both you and he have boundaries and needs that need to be considered
• Short answer is no, a relationship can't be healthy if both you and he are more concerned about enforcing boundaries than letting the relationship develop organically
• This falls into the "relationship broken; add more people" paradigm, which typically does not work out well
• This is a great opportunity for both of you to negotiate the relationship you each need. Ask for what you want (not to negatively affect your daughter but to still feel appreciated) and listen to what he wants (to have good quality time and lots of space).
• Both of you should ask for specific behaviors--what specific things can he do make you feel appreciated? what specific things can you do to make sure he has "space"?
• And one last thing--relationship conversations are best in person. Avoid having these discussions over text if at all possible.

Laura from episode 588 When to give up on polyamory wrote in to give us a happy update, a year later!

• Laura ends up her feedback by sharing a generous happy poly moment on the part of her husband
• A poly newbie in Germany shares a happy poly moment about her partner and metamour providing a bathroom shelf and toothbrush for her!

Questions? Comments? Feedback? Email [email protected] and attach an audio comment or call the listener comment line at 802-505-POLY. If you want us to teach a class at your event, want us to coach you, or want to appear on the podcast, email [email protected].

Friend us on Twitter or Facebook, leave a comment here. Check out Poly Weekly podcasts at polyweekly.libsyn.com. Share this with a friend or write a review on Apple Podcasts! Our intro and outro music is courtesy of Pacemaker Jane, "Good Suspicions."