Author: tenderheartedwriter

  • Capacity

    It’s been over three months since I wrote about my poly journey.

    So much has happened, I don’t know where to begin.

    I’ve entered a new chapter.

    One of deeper exploration, both physically and emotionally.

    I’m learning and growing so much, it’s been difficult to fully process and integrate it all.

    I’m navigating love now.

    Not just feeling love for someone.

    Being in reciprocal love with them.

    And I’m discovering a new side of myself.

    A submissive nature I’ve always inhabited, but never explored before.

    I’ve been lied to.

    Had my heart broken.

    Been promised longevity and devotion only to have it pulled away again, like a rug out from under my feet.

    I’m finding I don’t have endless capacity to hold it all.

    Am meeting my edges, the places where my desires and my limitations intersect.

    I know it’s time.

    Time to shift inward.

    To slow down.

    Pause, process, digest all of these experiences.

    But I don’t know how.

    This part of me just keeps growing, yearning, seeking.

    Autumn has arrived and the yellow leaves from the walnut tree fall all around me.

    As always, the seasons of nature illuminate my own energetic seasons.

    I feel the pull to return to myself.

    To remember who I am.

    And discover where I am, in this moment.

    I started down this path with an open heart.

    So full of love and so ready to share it.

    Yet now that I’ve been hurt, I can feel my trust wavering.

    My protective parts are awake and alert, searching for any clues of danger.

    I wanted so desperately to connect with people who could meet me where I am.

    In the depth, vulnerability, and devotion that flow through me so freely.

    I didn’t fully realize it though.

    How much more capacity it takes to hold this level of connection.

    For all the beauty, excitement, and sweetness that being in love can bring…

    I also have to be able to hold the fallout.

    I’m learning that loving each other isn’t always enough to be compatible together.

    That people may want to show up and meet me in love, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they can.

    At first, it seemed to help.

    When one connection was feeling distant or ending, to seek out another right away.

    It brought me hope when I felt sad and discouraged.

    Every rush of a new spark softening the blow of a flame gone out.

    What I didn’t understand, is that heart ache doesn’t just disappear.

    I now feel a kind of cumulative effect, each painful ending making me more tender and protective of my heart.

    The wounds from the last love infecting my ability to trust a new one.

    I sense myself trying to vet people now, analyzing every little thing to catch any red flags.

    Chemistry can be so blinding at first, I’ve missed important things that I could have seen if my brain wasn’t high on new relationship energy.

    I’m learning though, as I go.

    Every misstep leads to a new lesson.

    Each heart break teaches me more about myself, and what I need in this realm.

    I’m building new pathways, seeing new perspectives.

    Cultivating relational resilience in my nervous system.

    Facing old, deep wounds that keep telling stories I’m tired of believing.

    I know all of this, yet still there are days when I feel hopeless.

    Disheartened.

    Weary.

    I wonder if I can truly walk this path.

    I’m still not sure.

    But I as long as it continues to beat I will keep following my heart.

    Whether it pulls me to stretch and leap, or retract and integrate.

    I will trust in its wisdom and guidance.

    In its courage and capacity.

    That it won’t lead me to anything I am not meant for.

  • Larvae 🐞

    I’ve counted three so far.

    Tiny, black, spotted beings.

    I’m sitting on my back porch, thinking of all I should be doing, and keep finding them crawling on me.

    Each time I pick them up and gently place them on the vase of flowers nearby, the ones on my quitting smoking altar.

    Ladybug larvae.

    They’re not as pleasing to look at as their evolved counterparts, but I find myself curious if they bring a message to offer me.

    Like the butterfly, ladybugs go through what’s called a complete transformation.

    This means they are born into one bodily form, and before they die they change into another form entirely.

    Yet unlike butterflies, they do so out in the open, usually atop of a leaf.

    How vulnerable, I think.

    How exposed.

    How brave.

    I find I can relate.

    This last year has been nothing if not transformative for me, and my inner evolution just seems to continue each day.

    Initially, I felt very much in a closed cocoon that I needed to break out of to grow.

    Lately, I feel more like these little would-be ladybugs.

    Raw and unconfined, laid bare and yet to reach my potential.

    This last month I came completely unraveled.

    So many huge shifts were happening all at once.

    I started hypnotherapy, to help me quit smoking (an addiction I acquired while caring for my dying mom last year).

    As we worked to get to the root of my desire to smoke, we had to go way back.

    It brought a lot to the surface in me.

    Childhood trauma.

    Attachment wounds.

    My sacrifice of self to care for my loved ones.

    It all came flooding through me, escaping through so many tears.

    I couldn’t seem to control when they came or how long they flowed, even though I tried.

    One such moment occurred on the morning of an overnight visit with Two.

    He had kind of dropped the ball on scheduling and there were a couple challenging situations that came up while I was there.

    It meant he was distracted and not as present with me as usual, and my feelings were hurt.

    It led to me breaking down, unable to stop crying or even articulate exactly why I was.

    Two did his best to hold me in that space, but it was much deeper emotion that we usually share and nothing he said actually felt comforting.

    I ended up just going home because I didn’t feel regulated enough to really resolve things, and just needed to get out of there.

    He texted later that day that he felt very heavy after I left, and wanted to talk soon.

    We did.

    He suggested an activity called the ‘smorgasbord’.

    Apparently it’s a tool for people in relationship with each other to discern what they want, are open to, and don’t want in that particular connection.

    I agreed, and kind of dove in head first.

    I looked it up online and researched its origins and meaning and variations.

    Two uses a spreadsheet when he does it, but I fucking hate spreadsheets.

    They make me feel claustrophobic, like someone’s putting me into tiny boxes.

    And I hate being put into a box.

    I decided I could do better, and made my own.

    I added a glossary to mine, because as we talked I noticed Two and I were using the same words but we both had very different definitions for them.

    We’ve had a bunch of back and forth texts and audios about it, and the whole thread of conversation has been a catalyst for my poly journey.

    It’s made me realize that I’ve reached point in my process of exploring where I actually have enough experience to pause, look around, and reflect.

    In the beginning of this chapter, I knew a few things.

    I knew I had an immense capacity for love and wanted to share that love with more people.

    I knew I wanted to learn about myself and the world, through intimate connections and relationships.

    I knew I wanted to practice learning to love others without applying significant attachment to them, or having specific expectations to how things should unfold.

    But that was basically it.

    I had no idea what I wanted that to look like in tangible dynamics with people.

    I also had no idea what I didn’t want yet.

    I was starting from scratch in this ENM realm, and knew the only way I’d know more was to try new things and just feel them out in real time.

    Now, I’m aware that I have had quite a bit of input to work with.

    I have been on four first dates.

    I have made three steady connections that I care about deeply and uniquely.

    I think the honeymoon phase of my poly dating life has begun to transition into a more realistic understanding, with highs and lows and pauses and uncertainty.

    As I try to look within myself and sort through all of these new experiences, I realize how little I’m actually sure of still.

    I think I know what I’m open to, but even that depends on the particular dynamic of each connection I have.

    I also don’t know exactly where my limits are yet, except for one.

    I know I definitely don’t want to just be someone they fuck, and don’t care about.

    I know I at least want to feel like there is a sense of reverence and care in how someone holds our shared space.

    A potential for friendship and mutual respect.

    A presence that communicates to me that I matter to them.

    That’s my one firm need I think.

    Otherwise, I’m still just learning as I go?

    I feel open to things looking all kinds of ways, and actually am enjoying the variety and diversity in my relationship dynamics so far.

    I love emotional intimacy, but if I had that in a deep and consistent way with multiple connections I know that would probably not be sustainable for me.

    I love passion and desire and sensual exploration, but am aware if I only had that element in all my connections I would miss the emotional piece.

    As it is now, on a spectrum of physical intimacy to emotional intimacy, my connections are in chronological order.

    One is the most limited in every way, but our dynamic is heavy on in person physical connecting.

    Two is right in the middle, with a rich physical intimacy and a steady deepening of solid friendship.

    Three is more on the other end of the spectrum, with lots of expressed affection and love and also strong physical desire.

    I like them all.

    I want them all.

    Each brings something special to my life, and offers unique illuminations and insights into my growth and development.

    I’m learning so much about myself, yet as I try to articulate where it’s all leading me it feels difficult to find the words.

    Maybe I’m just still in my larvae form.

    Waiting for the right leaf to emerge in my path.

    Where I can finally complete my transformation.

    Still it occurs to me, I’ll never be done.

    This cycle of birth, death, and rebirth continues on.

    For each form I inhabit and each phase I complete, there will always be more waiting.

    Another cocoon.

    Another leaf.

    Another transformation.

    I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel a bit bewildered and intimidated by this knowledge.

    But damn if it also doesn’t excite me.

  • Vulnerable

    It’s Monday morning and I’m a mess.

    There are many reasons for this.

    In the last week, I quit smoking.

    Well I tried to quit, am still trying.

    I heard from C (ex/first love) that she’d fallen in love with someone new, which made my heart feel like it was inside a trash compactor.

    I got in a fight with my best friend; she hurt my feelings and I got mad (I almost never get mad).

    And I realized I was falling in love with someone new.

    I’ll call him Three.

    Three came out of nowhere.

    I had been hoping for months to meet someone who was more emotionally available than One and Two.

    Someone who could meet me in my deep feelings, and didn’t shy away from expressing affection with me.

    I’d just about given up and let go of that hope.

    Then Three showed up.

    His sweet smile shining through my phone screen.

    He felt gentle, loving, sensitive, genuine, and safe.

    So open and accessible.

    So ready to share and receive.

    So consistent in his efforts to build a connection with me.

    Right after we started talking, I got really sick with tonsillitis, and he was so patient with me while I recovered.

    Checking in on me almost daily to offer loving sentiments and support, and assuring me I could take as much time as I needed and he’d be there waiting.

    We started sending voice notes, long and vulnerable ones.

    We went really deep, really fast.

    My brain told me I’d only just met him, but my heart seemed to already know his.

    He was familiar to me, as though we were old friends, lovers, or both.

    It felt amazing.

    Like I’d finally found what I’d been searching for, praying for.

    But also…

    It was terrifying.

    My heart was all in and so ready to love him.

    My nervous system was not.

    All it could feel was fear that I couldn’t really trust this.

    That it was all too much, too fast, and I’d end up heartbroken.

    I shared with Three about my hesitations a bit.

    He was so sweet and caring and reassuring.

    Yet still, my system couldn’t quite trust his words.

    It needed to see him act on them before it could really accept their truth.

    When we finally met in person, it was like we’d known each other for years.

    There was so much emotional intimacy between us immediately.

    I shared my body with him a bit, and in the moment it was exciting and I felt safe exploring.

    It had been the same with One and Two, I knew I felt safe with them right away and we were intimate pretty quickly.

    This time though, it was different.

    There was so much more emotional sharing and holding while we explored.

    He was so affectionate and expressive and complimentary.

    At one point he looked into my eyes and said with fierce authenticity: I feel like I can be my whole self with you, like I don’t have to hold anything back… I want to make love to you.

    I know it sounds like it could’ve easily been a line to get me to fuck him, but looking in his eyes I just believed him.

    The intensity of it all blew me away.

    I felt so vulnerable afterwards.

    Having so much more emotional intimacy and sharing my body so quickly, it was suddenly really scary.

    What if he changed his mind?

    What if he decided I’m too much and this is all too deep and just disappeared?

    Could I really let myself sink into this connection safely, or was it all too fragile and precarious?

    We talked about it the next day, and I shared my fears and doubts.

    Three reassured me again, and again I could only absorb his words on a surface level.

    It was like my system was saying ok sure, but can you prove it.

    I did some reading and re-reading on attachment wounds, and it helped a bit.

    We made plans to see each other again, and yesterday he drove up so we could spend the morning at the beach.

    He brought a little beach tent so we could have some privacy, and we ended up making love…

    A lot.

    It was beautiful.

    The whole time we gushed to each other.

    Our constant expressions of love and desire toppling over each other, we couldn’t say them fast or frequently enough.

    Both so excited the other was able to meet and share and connect like that.

    Before we had sex, I told him I wasn’t quite sure I was ready.

    He was so supportive and assured me he was ok with whatever I wanted.

    We talked for a little while, and I decided I wanted to, but said I would need some emotional holding later.

    I felt proud of myself for really tuning into what felt right, and asking for what I needed.

    As our bodies connected, over and over, there was so much tenderness and deep affection.

    He couldn’t stop telling me how beautiful and sexy I was, inside and out.

    We talked so much.

    Before, throughout, in between, and after.

    About everything, but especially how much love we felt for each other already.

    We fell into a world of our own making and completely lost track of time.

    He had plans that he was going to be late for.

    Yet as we said goodbye, he slowed down and held me for a long time.

    I worried about his tardiness and tried to end it so he could get back home.

    He dismissed my concerns and said we should just take our time, wrapping his strong and loving arms even tighter around me.

    I felt so safe, so nurtured, so held.

    But this morning, I’m suddenly not sure I can do this.

    Combine emotional and physical intimacy on this level.

    Maybe it’s my ingrained mono-normative thinking again?

    Or is it actually just what my heart needs in order to feel safe in this new terrain?

    Last night I felt vulnerable, and did something really brave.

    I asked for what I was needing.

    I texted Three… Just wondering if I could ask you for a check in before you go to sleep tonight?

    His response was reassuring and he reiterated how special our time had been to him in a few different ways.

    But, he also said he didn’t have time to check in.

    He had to go to sleep and wake up early for work.

    I hadn’t actually meant to ask for a phone call, I was just hoping to hear from him via text.

    But he clearly thought I meant checking in by phone.

    It felt silly, since it wasn’t what I’d even been hoping for, but hearing that he couldn’t make time to talk to me really stung.

    Three has such an open and deep heart, I know he wants to have endless capacity for loving others, including me.

    But I’m starting to wonder if his actual ability to show up for me matches the capacity he perceives in himself.

    I didn’t reply to him last night.

    I felt too raw and hurt and emotional, and wasn’t ready to let him into those feelings yet.

    What if I was wrong wanting more emotional intimacy and consistency?

    What if there’s no such thing in an ENM relationship?

    What if no matter how hard Three tries, he’ll always be pulled in too many other directions for me to feel safe being so deeply connected?

    I guess I just…

    Don’t know if I can do this.

    Being so vulnerable without more of a container to hold it all.

    I really want to.

    I hope I can get there.

    I have so much love for Three already, and the potential for it to keep growing is palpable.

    Is it possible to have too much love?

    I never would have thought so before.

    But then, until this year I never would have thought I was poly either.

    And here I am.

  • Trust

    This post is for my first love, and the one who started this whole journey in me.

    On here, I’ll call you C.

    You were my ground zero, my heart’s beginning.

    We were so young when we met, I was sixteen, you seventeen.

    I remember the first time I saw you, at lunchtime in the quad.

    So charismatic and charming.

    Something in me noticed your fire, your spark, your intensity.

    In a sea of kids I’d known most of my life, you were a new transfer.

    You noticed me too.

    I don’t really remember how we first connected, a mutual friend I think.

    Somehow you got my number, and you called…

    A lot.

    I’d never been pursued before, and it was both intimidating and exhilarating.

    Of course, I saw you as a friend at first.

    I was so shy and guarded with boys, but it had never occurred to me that I could fall for another girl.

    Until you.

    And fall I did, so hard.

    We were suddenly inseparable, spending every moment we could together.

    But it was a different time.

    And even once we realized we were in love, we didn’t tell people.

    It was beautiful, but also hard.

    You were in the midst of deep grief and trauma.

    And came from a different background than I did.

    Your family was more conservative than mine.

    You weren’t ready to really embody your whole self yet.

    So we held our love quietly.

    I only told my best friend, and she kept our secret like a vault.

    I hated hiding it like that.

    I remember wanting to go to prom with you so badly, but you just couldn’t do it.

    So I went with a boy, and cried in the bathroom the whole time because I just wanted to be there with you.

    I made him drive me to your house after, instead of going to the after parties.

    I showed up late at your front door in my big princess dress, and we made love all night.

    After we graduated, we both went to colleges that were close enough for us to see each other frequently.

    We were finally out by then, but now we had to navigate being long distance.

    And it was still hard.

    Eventually, too hard.

    You had an affair, and broke my heart.

    I thought I’d never talk to you again.

    Couldn’t imagine ever trusting you enough to even be friends.

    Two decades went by, and I rarely thought of you.

    Then mom died.

    I had spent ten years caring for dad, watching him fade slowly and walking with him through death.

    Then mom too.

    Three days after she passed, I was sitting on my back porch in the evening.

    I’d felt her presence really strongly in those days, seen images of her young and free in all her favorite places.

    That night I heard a message come through.

    It’s time to reach out to her, it said.

    It didn’t clarify who she was, but I knew immediately.

    It was you.

    I couldn’t understand why my mom wanted me to contact you, out of the blue, after all that time.

    It made no sense to me, but who was I to question such a message?

    So I did.

    On instagram.

    You replied right away.

    Expressing your condolences for my mom.

    Then it came.

    A long, heartfelt apology for how it had ended between us.

    I had let go of ever hearing it, hadn’t been waiting for it or needing it.

    But damn, it felt good to read your words.

    It unlocked something in me, feelings I’d buried so long ago.

    All the love I realized I still had for you.

    So we started messaging, and then talking on the phone.

    Then we saw each other.

    As our eyes connected after all that time, my breath caught in my chest.

    Some part of me knew, immediately, I was in deep.

    We fell back in love, hard and fast.

    It was beautiful, and brutal.

    I was in deep grief, so vulnerable and open.

    And it felt like you’d been waiting twenty years for a second chance with me.

    It was really hard to tell my husband, I felt so ashamed and guilty.

    How could I love you like this when I loved him with all my heart?

    It didn’t make any sense to me then.

    I had never considered I had the capacity to love more than one person like that.

    We tried our best to navigate it all for a while.

    Me, you, him.

    But it was especially difficult for you.

    It had been so many years, but your trauma was still with you.

    And it was just too much, with me being married.

    You’d always be wanting more, you said.

    And you had your own demons you were still wrestling with.

    You just couldn’t do it.

    I understood, but it broke my heart all over again.

    We tried to be friends for a while, but it was too painful for me.

    I was still so in love with you, and every time we talked it hurt.

    So we stopped.

    It’s been almost a year now since we reconnected, and we’re talking again.

    I haven’t seen you since last summer, when we kissed.

    Though it feels like yesterday.

    Do you remember?

    I cried at first.

    Partly because it was the first time I’d kissed anyone besides my husband in eighteen years.

    Partly because it had been over twenty years since our lips had touched, and my whole body felt the force of it.

    You held me and wiped my tears, and then we made out for hours in your truck.

    Just tasting and touching each other, remembering who we once were and rediscovering who we are now all at once.

    This week, I’ll see you again.

    I’m going to visit you.

    So much has happened since that kiss.

    So many months of heartache and letting go.

    I’ve moved through my grief for my mom, the big waves of it anyway.

    I’ve realized I’m poly, and started dating.

    I’ve slept with other people.

    We went months without hearing each other’s voices.

    What will it be like now?

    I’m still in love with you, but it sits inside me differently.

    I feel like I can hold my love for you without it consuming me.

    In connecting with new lovers, I’ve learned a lot about how to care deeply for someone without being too attached to them.

    I wonder, can I do that with you?

    Will everything I’ve cultivated in myself on this journey translate to us?

    Will we connect as friends, or something more?

    Will I be okay with either?

    I’m not sure, but the only way I’ll know is to see you.

    Maybe now you’re ready, to let me in, to let me love you.

    Or maybe it will just still be…

    Too hard.

    I’m trying to prepare my heart for both options.

    Trying to hold my love for you in a way that doesn’t create any expectations or desired outcomes.

    I’m not sure I’m succeeding, but I’m trying.

    I know now, I’ve always been in love with you.

    All that time, and this whole year, I’ve never stopped.

    I know now, I’m always going to be in love with you.

    I think I’ve made peace with it, regardless of whether I can act on those feelings.

    I know they’ll always be there.

    I hope I can feel them and still have you in my life.

    I’ve really missed you.

    All that time we weren’t talking.

    And these last months of space too.

    I’m trusting that this will all work out how it is meant to.

    That we will find our way, love.

    I don’t know yet what kind of relationship will be best for us.

    But I’m trying to just have faith.

    To trust you, and even more…

    To trust me.

  • Chosen

    Dear One,

    I thought this would be a love letter.

    I’d been writing it in my head for a few days now.

    Things I’ve been loving about you lately.

    How you held my hand again the last time I saw you.

    Your excitement to hear about my dating life and my professional growth and how you loved my new turquoise underwear.

    The way I’ve been feeling us moving closer together.

    But tonight, your text made me small and insignificant.

    I wonder, have I made it all up in my head?

    The intimacy I felt growing between us, since the first time we met.

    Am I actually just a convenient and accommodating fuck?

    Maybe I’m just someone who bends to your needs and doesn’t ask for more.

    Every three weeks or so I get a message from you, asking how I’ve been.

    I respond pretty minimally because I’ve learned that’s more comfortable for you.

    Then you ask if I’d like to get together soon, and offer one or two times that work for you.

    Up until now, I’ve always been able to make it work.

    It’s been easy.

    This time, you only offered one night and I can’t do it.

    My monthly women’s circle is meeting and it’s my turn to lead.

    I even considered canceling just so I could see you.

    But I caught myself, remembering who I am and how important this is to me.

    So I offered four other nights in the next week and a half that I could see you.

    You took two days to reply.

    Only to ask if you could let me know the next day.

    When I heard from you tonight, you told me none of them worked.

    I had also suggested the following week, and so you asked if we could meet then.

    Maybe it’s silly.

    But it just made me pause and sit with how you make me feel.

    Like, really and truly.

    I’m snuggled under a blanket on my back porch as the sun sets, and I wonder silently if any of this is actually making me feel good.

    Am I learning and growing with you?

    Am I feeling valued and respected and honored?

    Am I really content with the level of emotional intimacy you can offer, or have I just been telling myself I am?

    I don’t know the particular details around why you couldn’t see me.

    Maybe it was circumstances outside your control.

    But I can’t help feeling like I wasn’t chosen, or prioritized.

    And it’s not that you’ve done anything wrong or unreasonable, I know that rationally.

    It just made me feel like I’m not someone you can’t wait to see again.

    And maybe I’m not.

    How do I hold that possibility?

    I’m not sure I’m okay with it.

    If I’m going to share my heart, my energy, my time with someone…

    I want to feel like they treasure it.

    I don’t think I need you to be in love with me.

    But I do want you to like me.

    I do want to feel like you’re looking forward to seeing me in between our meetups.

    That you think of me from time to time, and moments we’ve spent together are fond memories that cross your mind.

    I’m not feeling treasured right now.

    So what do I do?

    I care about you, and love our time together.

    I think I would miss you deeply should we stop seeing each other.

    But also, I don’t want to settle for someone who doesn’t really care about me.

    I want to feel wanted, desired, missed.

    Chosen.

    Not before other people or instead of them.

    Just chosen.

    I want to mean something in your heart, because you mean a great deal in mine.

    I don’t think I’ll respond to you for a while, I need to sit with all of this.

    I don’t know where I’ll land, but regardless I am sad.

    Sad if I continue with you, never knowing what I really am to you.

    And sad if I end it, because I love you.

  • Grateful

    Dear Two,

    Every time I see you I think it can’t get any better, yet the next time it does.

    I feel so comfortable around you, like we’ve known each other for ages.

    I’m so glad I decided to be brave and go on a date with you.

    I almost didn’t, have I told you that?

    I didn’t think we were going to align, that we were moving at different paces.

    Turned out that we could meet in the middle.

    It was the best surprise.

    Last week I visited, and you had just gotten back from a run when I arrived.

    Shirtless and drenched in sweat, you were so beautiful.

    I wanted my hands slipping all over you.

    I have to shower! You protested.

    I told you to just wait a moment because it was so hot.

    We kissed and I felt your wet skin.

    You tasted so salty and delicious, like when I’m surfing and lick my lips and taste the ocean.

    After you showered you made us amazing salads for dinner, and then we took a walk.

    All through your sweet city neighborhood.

    There was a pond nearby you wanted to show me, and we walked through the park.

    When we walk places you have a little ocd habit of needing to walk in the outside of me.

    It’s so heartwarming and protective and endearing.

    That night you had your arm around me, gently holding the small of my back as we strolled.

    It was such a small but sweet gesture of the intimacy I feel constantly growing between us.

    In contrast to One, you seem to really like communicating between our visits.

    Sending me little notes and check ins if it’s been a few days since we connected.

    I love that you send me audios too, your voice is always so sweet and genuine.

    And the lovemaking…

    It’s so expansive and organic and sensual.

    I lose track of how many times we have it each overnight, but it’s a lot.

    It always feels like you can’t get enough of me, and it’s the best feeling.

    I love that you’re uncircumcised.

    It’s new for me, and so exciting and sexy.

    Everything about you feels new and different, yet at the same time you feel as safe as my childhood home.

    I love you, deeply and truly.

    I think you know.

    And although I don’t think you’re ready for me to say it aloud, you seem to be comfortable and not freaked out by it.

    I’m so grateful for that.

    Thank you, love.

    I’m learning so much from our time together.

    You’re growing me, exponentially.

    Since you’ve entered my life I feel braver, more confident, more comfortable in this new skin I now inhabit.

    And I have the feeling we’re just getting started.

    I can’t wait to see all the things you’ve yet to teach me about myself.

    I drew your portrait yesterday.

    Making portraits of people I love helps me process my feelings about them.

    It’s an outward expression of my inner devotion and adoration.

    It means you’re in, babe.

    You’ve made a home inside my heart, and I’m so happy to have you there.

    You feel so right, so safe, so real.

    So thank you.

    For holding all of me, and not telling me I’m too much.

    I’m so grateful.

  • Permission

    I wanted to be so cool.

    I wanted to only feel excitement and support and compersion.

    After all, I’m the one who opened this door wasn’t I?

    It was me who fell in love with someone else.

    It was me who kissed someone else.

    It was me who realized it wasn’t a one time situation.

    That a part of me had awoken, and I didn’t know how to put it back to sleep.

    It was me who started dating.

    Me who had sex with someone who wasn’t my husband.

    Me who had an overnight.

    Me who took all the steps first.

    So I don’t deserve to have feelings about him dating too.

    I shouldn’t get permission to set boundaries around pacing and crossing thresholds.

    I’m fine! I kept saying.

    To my husband.

    To myself.

    Then it happened.

    He kissed someone else for the first time.

    And the reality of it hit me like a train going full force.

    In my brain, I felt fine.

    In my heart I felt fine.

    But my nervous system freaked the FUCK out.

    It took two whole days for it to stop ringing the danger alarms and telling me that I was not safe, this was not safe.

    I felt ready to call the whole thing.

    I don’t know if I can do this, I thought.

    Is this what you’ve been holding this whole time? I asked him.

    Yeah pretty much, he said.

    And then he shared how appalling it was for him to realize what I’d been holding all this time.

    Going out, connecting with someone new, taking steps with them…

    All the while feeling so guilty, like I’m cheating on him.

    Then coming home, and having so much of my own experience to process, yet having to hold a tender and supportive space for his feelings and reactions.

    Is this what it’s been like for you?He asked.

    Yeah pretty much I answered.

    We thought since we’d been through all of this with me, as I deepened on this path, that we’d be all set when/if he decided to start that journey too.

    Turns out, my process doesn’t just translate to his.

    Actually, we have to start from scratch all over again.

    We were both in awe of each other, of the space we’d each been holding these past months.

    And bewildered at the idea of now holding more.

    His path opening meant we now each had to oscillate between these two roles: the supporter and the experiencer.

    We’d done so much work in this one dynamic, had built a whole framework for processing and navigating it.

    Yet my process looked and looks very different than his.

    And we are our own people.

    What he needed from me as I took steps with others may not equate to what I need from him as he takes those same steps.

    Oof.

    That was a hard pill to swallow.

    It made me realize I still hold so much guilt and shame and self-loathing around the beginning of this journey.

    There is a part of me that still feels like it’s all my fault.

    Like I ruined our beautiful monogamous marriage with my mid-life poly awakening.

    Like I was selfish and greedy for needing anything more than the treasure that is our partnership.

    I thought I’d let those beliefs go, but surprise!

    They’ve hung around, and lingered just beneath the surface.

    My husband is trying so hard.

    To give me permission.

    To counter all these internal beliefs that tell me I’ve done something wrong.

    To create space for me to have all my feelings about this, the compersion and the fear, the excitement and the grief, the delight and the guilt.

    But it’s just so difficult to receive that permission, to internalize that I am worthy of being held in those complexities.

    I was raised by a wounded mother.

    From a very young age I was taught that:

    1) My body, men, and sexuality in general were not safe, under any circumstances.

    2) My feelings were too much, and not allowed to be expressed.

    3) I was selfish and unworthy of receiving love.

    4) Nothing I could do – and I mean nothing – would ever be enough to convince my mom that I loved her.

    5) If my mom was upset, and she often was, it was always my fault and my job to apologize – even if I didn’t know what I was apologizing for.

    I’ve been in therapy for over two decades now, and done so much healing work around these beliefs.

    I’ve moved through them in many beautiful, profound, and transformative ways.

    Yet the pathways they formed in my brain are still there, always primed and ready for new material to latch onto.

    Hungry for fresh evidence that those old messages are still true, and I am the unworthy, selfish, inadequate human I grew up believing myself to be.

    Unbeknownst to my conscious brain, they have grabbed onto this poly experience with full force.

    Working under the surface to convince me that this is a selfish choice I’m making at the expense of my husband’s heart and wellbeing.

    That I’m indebted to him, for rising to this new level of relationship with me and allowing me to explore this part of myself.

    That I owe him.

    And if I owe him, how could I ask for anything in return?

    As my awareness around these beliefs grows, I’m realizing just how deep they go.

    How my mother’s voice still echos in my head, even after all those therapy sessions, even after all the healing I’ve worked so hard to find.

    I thought I was done.

    I’m realizing I likely will never be.

    Even now that I’m conscious of how they have become entangled in this ENM journey, it’s taking so much effort and energy to reframe them.

    My husband has to push and probe and pull it all out of me – my true feelings, my triggers, my needs.

    Has to constantly be verbalizing explicit permission to not just be “fine”.

    As I let it all surface – slowly, tenderly, with the self love I’ve worked so hard to cultivate…

    All I can think is wow, what a fucking catalyst for growth this expansion is.

    How it unearths the deepest desires and also the deepest wounds in us.

    How it asks us to look at our belief systems and emotional frameworks and cultural norms, like nothing else I’ve ever been through.

    This journey of ENM can be difficult and deeply demanding at times, but I wouldn’t go back.

    God, Spirit, Universe – keep it all coming.

    The learning.

    The untangling.

    The raw humanity.

    The epic beauty.

    The profound deconstruction and reworking of all I thought I knew.

    I’m here for it all.

    Bring it.

  • Lineage

    This journey I’m on started with two women.

    My mom, who died.

    And in her death, freed me from the trauma and fear I’d carried on her behalf my whole life.

    And my ex, who was resurrected.

    My first love, my high school sweetheart.

    We reconnected after mom passed, and fell hard and fast all over again.

    But it was hard.

    Too hard.

    You’re married, she said.

    She’d always be wanting more, and I’d always be going home to someone else.

    I understood, but it broke my heart.

    If I’m being honest I’m still in love with her.

    So much so that I can’t talk to her or be friends without it hurting.

    So we went our separate ways.

    And I started dating.

    I thought it would be women.

    I thought maybe I needed to explore my bisexuality more.

    I thought I’d be more comfortable in that dynamic.

    But interestingly, it hasn’t.

    It’s been men.

    The women I like, don’t seem to like me.

    Maybe I’m too straight looking?

    Maybe it’s that I’m married to a man?

    Maybe they just aren’t into non-monogamy?

    Whatever the reason, women and I aren’t happening right now.

    But some of these men…

    Wow.

    The last time I was single I was 22.

    The men, more accurately boys, that were available to me felt so stunted and not emotionally safe.

    Reopening this door now, two decades later, has been surprising and rather taken my breath away.

    All these years I’ve been married and monogamous, those boys have been growing and evolving and maturing.

    Not all of them.

    I’m definitely coming across boys masquerading as men too…

    But some of them have surprised me at every turn.

    These beautiful, emotionally intelligent, communicative, honorable men.

    Every belief my mother taught me about them is being challenged, reframed, and transformed through these connections.

    I find myself healing in ways I never knew I needed to.

    Shifting generational patterns and healing the sexual trauma of my maternal lineage, as naturally as breathing air in and out.

    It’s just, happening.

    And I’m realizing yes, I’m healing, growing, evolving in my sexuality for me.

    But also, I’m doing it for them.

    All the women who came before me.

    All the women who will come after me.

    The ones who never felt safe to heal those wounds themselves.

    The ones who were shown that this world was not made to safely hold a woman’s embodied sexual development.

    The ones who were abused and assaulted and then utterly silenced in that trauma.

    The ones who carried that pain to their graves and along the way completely dissociated from their own bodies.

    My reclamation of this part of me is so much bigger than my one little life.

    It stretches backwards and forwards through time and space.

    I hear their whispers in my ears as I stand in my power and inhabit my body in a way they never could.

    Thank you, they exhale softly.

    Thank you.

  • Boys

    I keep waffling.

    Back and forth between hopeful and hopeless.

    I’m loving all the ways I’m connecting with One and Two, I really am.

    But I feel ready for more.

    A big part of my journey into the poly realm is the realization that my heart is huge.

    It has capacity to hold love in a way that few others do.

    And I just want to share that love.

    Freely, openly, in a way that is healing and transformative for the world around me.

    Only problem is, I’m finding there are few people who are able to receive that love.

    I keep thinking I’ve found them, the ones who can hold it, welcome it, let it in.

    I keep connecting with someone new, and they offer me clues and crumbs that seem promising to their capacity.

    They seem like mature, emotionally intelligent and available men.

    They send me long messages about the old wounds their ENM journey is surfacing, and all the ways they are working through those wounds.

    They send me long voice notes expressing their deep care and reverence for navigating the process of connecting with other’s hearts and bodies.

    They respond to my shares about my life with attention and curiosity and affirmation.

    They say they are open and receptive to however our connection unfolds, and seem excited to explore what that looks like together.

    They invite more intimacy, more sharing, more vulnerability from me.

    And then, every time, there comes a moment when it’s revealed.

    They are not who they presented themselves to be.

    They are not men, they are boys.

    I’m just looking for light, fun, sexy connections, they say.

    I’m just wanting to make sure you’re not overly committing your emotions to this, they say.

    I’m just really busy right now, they say as they slowly retreat backwards towards the metaphorical door of our conversation.

    Sometimes it’s something I’ve said, something that aligns with the presence we’ve been cultivating with one another.

    Yet somehow it’s suddenly too much.

    It always comes out of nowhere for me.

    Maybe I’m too trusting, too naive, too vulnerable too soon.

    But that’s me.

    I refuse to harden my heart and become cynical and mistrusting of people to begin with.

    These boys masquerading as men will not take my hope from me.

    My faith in the human heart remains.

    I will keep entering these connections with openness and transparency and authenticity.

    I will continue to believe they are out there.

    Men who can hold and receive intimacy not as a threat to their autonomy but as a gift freely given.

    Men who can sense intimacy building and see it as a chance for growth and opportunity and expansion.

    Men who can express their true emotions without fear that I’ll get too attached or too clingy.

    Men who can trust in this process of untangling mono normative dynamics and beliefs and frameworks.

    Men who have actually done the self work they proclaim so immediately, so assuredly.

    Some days I question whether they’re really out there.

    Do they even exist?

    Then I look at my husband.

    I see his warm loving eyes, feel his tender embrace, experience his deep capacity to hold all of me.

    And I know it’s possible.

    He’s one of a kind, that much is true.

    But his vulnerability and integrity and intelligence give me pause in those moments when I’m ready to give up.

    He reminds me it is doable, having a male body and also a tender and open heart.

    And I believe again.

    Maybe all of these experiences will give me pause when I hear a man explain how evolved he is.

    Maybe I will wait to believe him until he shows me with his actions that the words he speaks are true.

    Maybe I will hesitate a bit before I share too much of myself so quickly, letting some time pass so I can witness the container we’re creating is truly as safe as they’ve assured me.

    But I won’t give up.

    I won’t pretend I’m not the deeply feeling, deeply loving human that I am.

    I won’t settle for crumbs in return when I know I’ve offered the whole pie.

  • Two

    Two I wasn’t so sure about at first, if I’m honest.

    He was almost, too pretty.

    He didn’t quite seem real.

    All his pictures were from him at a gala or kind of far away.

    I didn’t quite trust him for all his suave style and attractiveness.

    But there was just this feeling, a little pull I couldn’t ignore about him.

    I loved his caramel skin and perfectly quaffed hair.

    I loved how he smiled with his whole face, and heart.

    His eyes caught my gaze and I just couldn’t seem to look away.

    They sparkled like the night sky.

    So I liked him…

    And we started talking.

    Two was deep, genuine, but still kind of guarded.

    And also, his profile was way more kinky than I’m normally comfortable with.

    As we messaged, he shared he’s very sex-forward.

    What did that mean I asked?

    He said if things don’t progress physically fairly quickly he can tend to feel platonically about someone.

    It made me nervous.

    I’m taking things a bit on the slower side, I said.

    I’m still new to this and I need to pace myself.

    But also, I told him I found him interesting and sexy and still wanted to meet him, if he was up for it.

    He was.

    I went into our date with rather minimal expectations, not really thinking we were going to align.

    I looked at it as a chance to be brave and practice going on a date with someone other than One.

    Two lives an hour away from me, so we met in the middle at a restaurant we’d both been to and liked.

    He was a bit late, and arrived kind of flustered and seemingly rather unexcited at meeting me.

    We chatted casually for a moment and he said he was coming from a meeting with an executive coach.

    He’d recently been diagnosed with ADHD.

    I have ADHD, I exclaimed!

    And we were off and running.

    He wanted to bring our food to a park and eat there, which made me a little uneasy because we’d have to drive.

    Should I get into a car with him?

    After all, I’d literally just met this person.

    What did it mean that he wanted to change up the plan?

    But something in me trusted him already, and I agreed as long as I drove.

    We found a tree with a horizontal branch and stopped to sit.

    We couldn’t stop talking.

    There was so much chemistry in our conversation, our brains were just ping ponging connecting thoughts.

    I felt adrenaline just being near Two, like if we touched I’d get shocked from the electricity inside me.

    We basically told each other our life stories, but the spiritual versions.

    At some point we paused the constant stream of words and I asked him.

    How was he feeling about me?

    Was he feeling platonic or romantic about me?

    Stimulated, he said at first.

    I’m really stimulated in a good way.

    Two liked talking to me, he continued.

    And he was very attracted to me.

    I felt my cheeks get hot when he said that.

    And excitement began to build in my chest.

    I told him I thought he was lovely, and loved talking to him, and wanted to kiss him.

    I’d been shivering because I left my jacket up on the bench by the walking path.

    He said he wanted to kiss me too, but didn’t want me to be shivering the first time we kissed.

    I thought that was sweet.

    We got my jacket and our food (which we hadn’t touched because of all the talking) and I started to walk back down the path to the car.

    How about here? He asked.

    Would this be a good place for a kiss?

    It was amazing.

    Our lips moved like they’d met in a past life.

    Electric sparks flew up my spine and his hands grasping me quickly followed them.

    I held his shoulder, his neck, his cheek, his head.

    Pressing him closer to me.

    When I finally pulled away I felt like I’d traveled somewhere else briefly, and had to reorient.

    The look on his pretty face showed me Two had felt it too.

    Yummy, he said through a bashful grin.

    We walked back to my car and I asked if he wanted to make out.

    We couldn’t stop.

    The afternoon light turned into darkness and still I couldn’t stop kissing him.

    We moved to the back seat, and at one point I got so thirsty I reached over to the car seat, to grab my son’s water bottle.

    What even is my LIFE?! I thought to myself.

    It was hard to maneuver at times but we managed to have some pretty sensual intimacy back there.

    Two is my first uncircumcised lover.

    It was a whole new world, and it was beautiful.

    We didn’t have sex, my husband and I have a boundary about that on a first date.

    I’m glad for that limit, but I definitely wanted to do anything and everything with Two in that moment.

    As I drove him back to his car, he asked if it was ok if he gently stroked my leg.

    I said sure aloud but in my mind I screamed YES PLEASE.

    He smiled so sexily as he said goodnight, if I wasn’t sitting already my knees would’ve gone weak.

    As I drove home I felt brave, exhilarated, alive.

    Before I went to bed I checked my phone.

    Amazing date! Two had texted.

    Looking forward to the next time.

    And I knew then, he was going to be different than One.

    Two- you make me feel braver, ready and excited to grow and explore my self, especially my sexuality.

    You bring me right to my edge and invite me in, saying the water’s fine.

    I am never tired of hearing what’s inside your mind and heart.

    And I know there’s so much I still have yet to hear.

    I can’t wait to keep exploring with you.

    Thank you for being the best, most epic second date.