I think it is of limited use to consider polyamory by placing it in boxes constructed by more familiar paradigm, such as married/single or wife/mistress/girlfriend/whore. The best basis for a model I have come upon is the one suggested by the authors of "Designer Relationships: A Guide to Happy Monogamy, Positive Polyamory, and Optimistic Open Relationships." which divides the realms of relationship into Sexual, Emotional, Social, and Practical.
Interesting! My take away is that it's essentially a free for all, (as those categories pretty much encompass all of social interaction) but with the idea of open and honest communication about the context and boundaries of the relationship.
However, from what I can understand, I would suggest that it's more accurate to say that in polyamory, the fundamental realm is sexual and then additionally it could include one of the other realms. Otherwise, my being friendly with the mailman (practical and social realms) would fall under the definition.
From reading about your experiences, I can see how polyamory could be viewed as an overall positive or negative for your life. And if it becomes more prevalent in society, it'll be interesting to see how it plays out.
pukingRainbow wrote:However, from what I can understand, I would suggest that it's more accurate to say that in polyamory, the fundamental realm is sexual and then additionally it could include one of the other realms. Otherwise, my being friendly with the mailman (practical and social realms) would fall under the definition.
Well, nobody owns the exact definition of polyamory yet. My perspective is that it is not limited to fundamental realm sexual, but includes any of the realms if manifested at the level or in the manner often associated of limited to a person with monogamous partner status, particularly if the relationship was formerly sexual. There aren't very many middle-aged divorced actively-dating people on this forum, but I interact with many peers who meet this description, and most of them are pretty much de facto polyamorous in their functioning.
From my perspective, it has to do with life narrative, and the manner in which we already accept a variety of possibilities with acceptance of serial monogamy. For simple instance, I was heart-broken when my first serious college boyfriend dumped me after he got back together with his serious high school girlfriend over spring break. It's pretty easy to imagine two different chick-flicks in which this event represented resolution of tension/happy ending for female protagonist of high school girlfriend or creation of tension to be later resolved with happy ending for college girlfriend. The further along you go in life experiencing major relationships, the more mature acceptance of lack of resolution of some tensions you learn to accept.
It wasn't unpleasant. In fact, in some ways it was quite affirmative and illuminating. I mean, never entirely terrible sensation to interact with a man who thinks you are still beautiful when you are 53 and could stand to lose more than 20 bricks of butter. We had a very nasty break-up, so we were both happy to reach some level of now we can be friends resolution.