Technically a relationship is "open" if the involved are free to find new partners without that violating the relationship-rules. A relationship can therefore be sexually open, romantically open, or both. But when someone says "Open Relationship" usually what they mean is "Sexually open, but romantically closed" -- the reason for that is that if it's open in both senses, then people usually say "polyamorous" instead. (Closed polyamorous relationships exist, sometimes called polyfidelity -- but those are rare)
My relationships are polyamorous, and we have a preference for trying to keep hierarchy as low as practically possible. (while recognizing that "zero" isn't really practically possible, especially not since some of the people in the polycule are cohabitating and/or have shared kids and/or are married)
Here's my answer to your questions:
Jealousy can happen in all relationship-structures, including monogamy. For me it's not been a significant problem this far, and I've not done anything in particular to handle it. I'm genuinely fine with, and indeed prefer, that I'm not the only partner my girlfriends have.
You ask about boundaries, but do you even know what that word means? A boundary is something that one person alone has the right to dictate. For example you can have a boundary that says you won't date smokers, or you can tell someone NOT to kiss you. And in such cases your word is the final decision on the matter. Boundaries work identically for poly and mono folks.
Perhaps you intended to ask about relationship-rules? I'm RA-leaning so I don't really believe in trying to control my partners, the only rule we have is to keep each other informed about other important people in our lives. (but informing isn't the same thing as asking for permission, nor does the informing necessarily have to happen *before* some relationship escalates, heads-up-rules rarely work well!)
You ask whether I still feel secure and emotionally special with my partner. The question reveals two mononormative ideas: First you seemingly believe that all couples start out monogamous, and only *later* change to non-monogamous relationship-structure. (thus the "still" -- you take for granted that earlier, when people were monogamous, they did feel these things). And secondly you assume that there is in my life a person who is "my partner" in the singular. But I'm polyamorous. I have multiple partners, so the singular here is wrong for me.
I feel more secure than I ever did as monogamous, and emotionally safely anchored, yes. The very idea that security or emotional closeness requires exclusivity is strange to me.
"How did you know this setup was genuinely for you and not just something you accepted because you didn’t want to lose someone?"
Another question where none of this applies to me. I was monogamous before I even had a first kiss with any of my partners -- and so were they. None of us picked a person first and THEN found that our choice of person required us to "accept" polyamory. Instead we all picked polyamory first and *then* we started dating; and having the same preference for relationship-structure was one of the reasons my partners were a good match for me.
All of it is awesome really, but the chapters on relational outcomes and sexual outcomes are particularly readworthy. A quote from the former:
Compared to people in monogamous relationships, people in CNM and polyamorous relationships were as satisfied or more satisfied in their relationships, were as committed or more committed in their relationships, and were more satisfied with the nature of communication and openness in their relationships. (...) A sample of older adults (ages 55+) who engaged in CNM reported being significantly happier than a general population sample of older adults.
Of course this does NOT mean polyamory is better for everyone. But what it does mean is that the people who choose polyamory (a small fraction of people!) tend to on the average do pretty well.
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u/Poly_and_RA 3d ago
Technically a relationship is "open" if the involved are free to find new partners without that violating the relationship-rules. A relationship can therefore be sexually open, romantically open, or both. But when someone says "Open Relationship" usually what they mean is "Sexually open, but romantically closed" -- the reason for that is that if it's open in both senses, then people usually say "polyamorous" instead. (Closed polyamorous relationships exist, sometimes called polyfidelity -- but those are rare)
My relationships are polyamorous, and we have a preference for trying to keep hierarchy as low as practically possible. (while recognizing that "zero" isn't really practically possible, especially not since some of the people in the polycule are cohabitating and/or have shared kids and/or are married)
Here's my answer to your questions:
Jealousy can happen in all relationship-structures, including monogamy. For me it's not been a significant problem this far, and I've not done anything in particular to handle it. I'm genuinely fine with, and indeed prefer, that I'm not the only partner my girlfriends have.
You ask about boundaries, but do you even know what that word means? A boundary is something that one person alone has the right to dictate. For example you can have a boundary that says you won't date smokers, or you can tell someone NOT to kiss you. And in such cases your word is the final decision on the matter. Boundaries work identically for poly and mono folks.
Perhaps you intended to ask about relationship-rules? I'm RA-leaning so I don't really believe in trying to control my partners, the only rule we have is to keep each other informed about other important people in our lives. (but informing isn't the same thing as asking for permission, nor does the informing necessarily have to happen *before* some relationship escalates, heads-up-rules rarely work well!)
You ask whether I still feel secure and emotionally special with my partner. The question reveals two mononormative ideas: First you seemingly believe that all couples start out monogamous, and only *later* change to non-monogamous relationship-structure. (thus the "still" -- you take for granted that earlier, when people were monogamous, they did feel these things). And secondly you assume that there is in my life a person who is "my partner" in the singular. But I'm polyamorous. I have multiple partners, so the singular here is wrong for me.
I feel more secure than I ever did as monogamous, and emotionally safely anchored, yes. The very idea that security or emotional closeness requires exclusivity is strange to me.
"How did you know this setup was genuinely for you and not just something you accepted because you didn’t want to lose someone?"
Another question where none of this applies to me. I was monogamous before I even had a first kiss with any of my partners -- and so were they. None of us picked a person first and THEN found that our choice of person required us to "accept" polyamory. Instead we all picked polyamory first and *then* we started dating; and having the same preference for relationship-structure was one of the reasons my partners were a good match for me.
If you want some actual data instead of just random anecdotes though, then I recommend this broad meta-study from 2023. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jftr.12546
All of it is awesome really, but the chapters on relational outcomes and sexual outcomes are particularly readworthy. A quote from the former:
Of course this does NOT mean polyamory is better for everyone. But what it does mean is that the people who choose polyamory (a small fraction of people!) tend to on the average do pretty well.