How do poly relationships work long term?

[u/Global_Mention_7026]

I’ve recently started going out with this girl who is polyamorous, at first I was a bit apprehensive because although I’m not strictly monogamous myself I’ve never actually gone out or had anything with anyone who is poly, but now I’ve realised that I myself am not monogamous and I’m not as stressed about all this as I thought I’d be, we haven’t been going out for that long but we have talked about making it official some time in the near future, we really like each other and we have a great time together. she’s also seeing another person, we both know about each other (obviously) but we don’t have anything going on between the two of us only my partner and her, everything is great but this did get me wondering about polyamorous relationships long term, in the sense of marriage and living together (if that’s the case) and if/how to make it work out.
This is also my very first “relationship” and although I am very young (20F) and still have a lot of time to figure out my life and these things I do know Id like to get married when I’m older and even live with my partner.
This got me wondering about how those things would work/look like in a poly relationship especially since it’s a V shaped dynamic (I’m sorry if I’m saying it wrong I still don’t know all the terms). I know in most places it’s not legal to have more than one marriage except if it’s just on paper. So how would that work? I guess it could be the case that one of their partners doesn’t want to get married and the other does.
And about living conditions, I know some poly people have partners they live with and then partners they don’t live with but see every now and then. What would happen if more than one partner wants to live with you as the hinge but you’re not in a triad? Would it still be possible to have both partners live with you even if they don’t have a relationship between themselves?? Or would that be awkward and difficult? Honestly all I can imagine is having to choose weeks/days in which room/with who the hinge is going to sleep with.
Also I feel like (and this is only an assumption) looking into the far away future, that it would be very hard to manage kids and families.
Having a family and kids with your partner and having them leave for say a few weeks to stay with their other partners and you have to take care of everything alone. I don’t know I think I still have some deep rooted monogamous concepts from growing up Christian which makes this seem way scarier than it actually is. But right now I am VERY happy and secure, I feel way better mentally and I’m not going insane as I usually do when I try to meet/have anything with monogamous men/women.
I’m sorry this has turned into a bit of a rant but if anyone who has been practicing polyamory for long periods of time and have long term partners, live with their partner/partners or even are married and have families please share your stories and how you’ve made it work out long term, if it is possible to make it work out. Or any advice will be appreciated
Obviously I know it’ll have its ups and downs regardless, not everything can be perfect but I really like her and I’d like to make it work out.
Thank you

[u/highlight-limelight]

So, not married and not interested in having kids, but the cool part about polyamory is that it can look a million different ways.

Re: marriage, you’re right that you can only marry one person (legally speaking) at a time. Some folks marry one of their partners. Some folks marry one partner, and then their other partners marry another person, and so on. Some folks marry one partner legally, and then have another commitment ceremony (like a handfasting) with another partner. Some folks use legal frameworks other than marriage depending on their needs (like medical advanced directives or LLCs). Some people don’t marry any of their partners.

Re: cohabitating, quite a few polyam folks don’t live with multiple partners. If both ends of a V want to move in with their hinge, they can do so as long as they’re comfortable with their metamour (the other end of the V). It’s not my jam, since I hated having multiple roommates, so I just… don’t enter relationships where I’m expected to cohab with multiple people. Again, polyamory allows you to shape your relationships basically however you want.

Re: kids and families, honestly? Having a partner away for a few weeks is honestly not the end of the world. Monogamous couples have to deal with that all the time (flying home to help an ailing relative, see a long/distance friend, do work for a business trip, studying abroad, etc.). Many families make it work. The REAL trouble comes in determining whether or not you want to openly identify as polyamorous. If you’re openly polyam, you could lose your job, your kid might get bullied, your older relatives might disown you, all that jazz. But your partners might not be comfortable in a relationship that needs to be a dirty little secret. Especially if they’re openly polyamorous already.

[u/UntilOlympiusReturns]

You're asking smart questions 🙂

If you know for sure that you want to get married, cohabitate, have kids etc, you'd need to consciously date for people who want that. (This is true for monogamous people too, of course!).

I'd imagine it would be tough if one person had two partners who both wanted to marry them, they'd just have to make a choice I guess. Note though that lots of us don't want marriage or kids, and for example I'm perfectly happy dating someone who is married with kids, I don't want it so I'm happy for them to have it with someone else.

It's also probably less likely that someone would live together with both their partners - but people do do it. I think if you were heading that way it would be useful to get lots of advice on your specific situation.

[u/taucher_]

i'll just share my personal strategies and opinions, i have my own perspective and priorities and im sure others will add theirs which will be different.

marriage: we poly ppl don't have marriage equality. because of this i'll probably never get married. i heard that in the past gay ppl used to adopt each other as siblings, maybe that's an option for my polycule at some point.

living together is no problem. i didnt think about the beds - that's a frequent question, but we all actually prefer to have our own rooms and our own beds and to sleep alone, so it's a no-brainer.

raising kids - the main problem i see here is the state. legal rights to the kids, being considered eligible for adoption in the first place when we're scary queers, that's what i'm worried about. sure there'd be stuff to organize too like who exactly do we raise the kid(s) with, some of us wanna raise kids and some wanna be piblings but no more involved than that, that's something i'll worry about if my general life situation ever becomes appropriate for raising kids in the first place. i leave it to luck for now. but im not worried about being poly specifically. once this is all figured out we'll have regular parent worries. i might read my first parenting guide soon, it's gotta be an anti-authoritarian approach so not necessarily in line with the cultural conventions of my country. obviously i don't believe in nuclear family stuff. i would wanna prioritize the needs of the kids and everyone else involved, traditional notions are irrelevant to me.

[u/Poly_and_RA]

Poly relationships are varied. So there isn't one specific way that it works. This is one of the differences to monogamy -- in monogamy there's a "default" path that at least many people imagine a relationship "should" follow. It's called the relationship-escalator and looks something like:

Meet, flirt, date, kiss, have sex, move in together, get engaged, get married, live happily ever after. (some slight variations, but roughly like this!)

In polyamory that's just one possible trajectory among many others, and you can't simply assume that this is the plan for a poly person you're dating. (That's sort of logical, if you date multiple people it'd often be impossible to share all of these things with all of them!)

Try not to make assumptions, but instead talk to the people you're dating about what kind of relationship they want and whether it's the same thing you want -- is my advice. There's a lot of different possibilities!

[u/Valuable-Fruit-1235]

I haven’t been poly for super long but so far it’s going well for me! I’m in a V shape relationship & am the hinge. I live with a partner I am married to & then I’m dating someone else I met recently! The newer partner sleeps over a lot (the partner I live with works during the night). We’ve talked about all moving in together but it hasn’t happened yet. If we did the idea is that both of my partners would have separate bedrooms and I would rotate the room I sleep in

[u/Sdavistvs]

Individual results may vary. My partner 53M has dated a 36F for the past 4yrs. She is married w/3 kids. Partner drives out of state to visit 1x a month. (previously local) Her hubs likes partner & doesn’t see him as a threat. I don’t date, nor don’t want to. (58F post menopause)