Ok an update on the situation...

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

(for any of you that didnt read my first few posts i would make a link to it but im not sure how...so just scroll down and find it:S)

Ok, i have spoken to number #3. He still wants to see the other girl, which is understandable but he is not doing anything about it at the moment. He has agreed to get to know me better and give me a chance before he acts on his feelings for this other girl. This is really good progress but there are some complications.

He sees himself as a separate being and if our relationship progressed, he wants to be the one who i love...this is hard to explain..it's like: he doesn't want me to be in love with somebody else as (for example) I wouldn't want him to have feelings for another woman if he is with me..

I can understand the logic in this but it doesn't seem fair in a multiple system situation.
I love #1, he is sweet and caring. #2 i like, he has his nice moments but basically i have to live a lie with him in order to make him think that he is the one i'm interested in.. in order to keep #1 who wouldn't function anymore if he lost me.. This must sound like a really twisted and corrupted relationship but i really do love #1 (who is "out" 90% of the time) and i have to do this so i don't lose him.

I really do have feelings for number #3 and i don't think it is dishonest or betraying to the others because i think it is different when they are sharing a body...you know?

I could easily do the same with number #3 as i do with number #2. Although it would be much better because i genuinally care about #3 and i enjoy spending time with him. Should i accept that the only way i can be with number #1 for the rest of my life is to make the others think that i love them more???

Number #1 can never hear or see anything when either of the other 2 are out, he would never know that sometimes i have to pretend that it isn't just him that i care about. I don't think he would mind if he knew...but obviously i can't tell him about #3 because i would be breaking a promise and the trust that #3 has put in me (also jeopardising my relationship with him)

Losing them is not an option.. number #1 is my best friend as well as my soul mate and my whole future is with him..we have business plans together and he's even named our future kids!

Just your views on this would be helpful..i'm sorry if i'm rambling but you guys are the only people i can talk to about this and i really need advice - even if it is just to back up in my mind what i believe i should do.
xxxxLuciaxxxx

Comments

[kangetsuhime.livejournal.com]

It sounds like you and 3 need to have poly discussions. Since you're already with 1, he can't then butt in and demand to have you all to himself. Has he made any progress in telling the others about himself?

Getting used to poly is hard. Nobody's going to pretend it isn't. Just because they share the body, his wishes would still be fair. Say if 1 said he didn't want you to be with 2 or 3. That is perfectly fair. But 3 is trying to push 1 out of the way and *that* is what isn't fair.

You need to talk this through with him more. And 1 at the very least needs to know about this, somehow. Because without that none of this is going to work. If 3 point blank refuses to say anything, you may be forced to 'fess up.

[shandra.livejournal.com]

That is a hard situation. For the record, we've been married 10 years - we don't all feel a romantic relationship to our husband and we have had some compromises there with having non-physical romantic long-term relationships with others. (Basically we don't have sex.)

I think your approach is sound in terms of building relationships with each of them, but to be dishonest with them about your relationship with the others is probably not helpful in the long run.

If they don't learn to respect that they are both individual *and* in a multiple system, I think that they are likely to have really chaotic times and I would be concerned that they would try to use you as a pawn in that.

So I recommend that you just model for them that you love them for themselves, but you also love *them* not just 1, 2, 3. You may get some flack - but you will eventually anyway. Unfortunately the work from there - communication, coming to deal with the realities of a collective life - is probably up to them. You can love and support them in that struggle for sure.

As for the other girl - set /your/ boundaries. You deserve the relationship you need as well.

[bekkypk.livejournal.com]

I would agree with this... I'm a soulbond/multiple system and me and the boyfriend unit don't have physical relations at all because not all the girls are comfortable with him, and his multiple isn't happy with me.
We (as in me and him) love each other though, so we have to work around them while still giving them their space. Admittedly it's easier for us, as physically we live about 100 miles from each other and he works most of the time.
xx

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

I cannot allow any of them to get in contact with that girl really, its not an issue of setting boundaries, she is very dominant and manipulating....if i let any of them see her then she will worm her way back into his life and find a way of bumping me out!

She is also hell bent on inviting him over at her most 'fertile' times of the month in the hopes that she can seduce him and get herself pregnant.

You see what kind of person we are dealing with? she won't be happy with just seeing him platonically every once in a while...its all or nothing.

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

I don't think i conveyed what #3 said very well. He didn't say that he didn't want me to be involved with #1...i think he realises that i can't just blow him off and never see him as he is "out" 90% of the time! He thinks you can only be 'in love' with one person...having feelings for a few is different but i have to either be 'in love' with him or #1. Sadly i think the opposite and i am beginning to have the same 'in love' feelings about the both of them. *gah*

I think all 3 of them have issues with love, and sibling rivalry in a way because that is what they are like. They all seem to need complete and whole love, #3 is willing to give me a chance (he doesn't know me very well - i've only known about him for 6 months) but he told me that i can either be his girl or one of the other's girl he doesn't want to be second best.

I know honesty is the best policy and all that, i've had it ingrained in me since i was little.. i just feel that living in a separate world with all three of them is the only possible option which has the outcome i need...to stay with them.

I don't see any other way around it, #2 is a ticking bomb and i have to be on my toes at all times when im with him, #1 is lovely but easily manipulatable (is that a word??) by the others. #3 is the only one who can hold all this together, if i built my separate world with him like i've done with #2 then meybe i can keep them all until a more permanent situation can be found.
I don't like it. I really don't. I have moments when #1 clings to me and tells me that i'm his world and he could never live without me.....should i feel that what im doing is necessary because this is the only way i can keep him safe and keep us together? or should i be wracked with guilt for denying my feelings for him to the other two?

Im sorry, im crying as i write this. It's hard to see the damn words!

He is my best friend. I love him so much and i need to do whatever i can to keep him with me. I could never forgive myself if i let one of them pull him away.

Again, i'm sorry if i seem like a lost cause, I just have *nobody* whatsoever to talk to about this..there are only a handful that knows he has more than one person in there.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

3 needs to realise that some people can love more than one person. That your love for 1 does NOT diminish your love for him. This could take time.

I still think you need to work towards getting 3 to come out.

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

I think time may help, i want to see how our feelings for each other progress and see what happens then, I think meybe his opinions may change if he develops much stronger feelings for me and he may come to accept that I love them all and that it's just silly to expect me to only care for one of them...

I will do my best about him showing himself to the others but im not sure how well #2 will react. He is used to thinking that he is easily the strongest personality and i think him meeting #3 will cause a lot of friction (#3 is stronger then #2) and meybe even a large scale fight between them. I will have to weigh out the advantages and disadvantages before i act.

Btw.....

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

Ksol1460, your help last time was really down to earth and it really helped me to be stronger, any more wisdom would be much appreciated.

Re: Btw.....

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

The more we read of your posts, the more it appears to us that you are in an extremely toxic enmeshment. Everything you've posted indicates that you are being used, abused, and manipulated by these various persons in his group. This is less about polyamory than it is about a dysfunctional group who are taking you along for the ride. Were we in a situation like that, and had we the wherewithal, we would leave, at least until they had it more together.

Yes, #1 is very sweet, but he's also overly dependent upon you to help keep him functional and protect him against, among other things, the rampages of #2. A man who clings to you and tells you he could never live without you may be quite flattering and appealing, but he needs to learn to stand on his own and think and act for himself. He would become completely nonfunctional without you? That makes you responsible for his life. What about your responsibilities to yourself? How can you honour yourself and your own needs?

As for #2, do you really want to spend the rest of your life having to walk on eggs for fear of offending him? You've basically offered yourself not only as a wife and mother (Jesus, you want to have kids with a guy like #2 around?!) but as their therapist. Do you think you can help #2 with his anger issues? How can you maintain your own self-esteem with him cutting you down, making you feel you need to lie and smooth things over?

As for #3... This is more manipulation. He can always threaten you with the idea that he would go back to the other woman. You have said several times that you are afraid of losing them, but from the tone of your posts, that might not be such a bad thing.

This is about your self-respect and how much of it you are willing to give up to be in this kind of relationship.

Re: Btw.....

[luciastorm.livejournal.com]

Understood.

Does put things in perspective a bit.

I need to make things clear to them. #2 especially that this isn't how i want to live my life.
Although i do want to add that one day when we do have kids that would be the end of it. They have had a very strict religious upbringing and are firm believers that if you get a woman pregnant - that is it, for better and worse, richer and poorer and all that. Once you have a child with somebody - regardless of your emotional attachment with them (or lack of) You have to be prepared to marry them.
This view is quite twisted in my eyes and i think that a baby would be better brought up with two separated parents than two parents who hate each other and fight all the time.
But anyway, at least this means that if i stayed with them like this then it wouldn't last forever!

It's not a matter of being flattered by #1, i know that he is very reliant on me to look after him and i am willing to protect him but i need to straighten things out with the other two in order for that to happen.

I know that i cannnot continue with them like this and i am going to have to have serious talks with all three of them (just probably not altogether quite yet!)

I have been with them for so long that i have grown used to their shit really, which isn't a good thing i know but it isn't as bad as it seems to all you guys. I was pretty upset the other night, i'm going through some serious dips in hormone levels since i switched medications.

I think the biggest problem is that they don't like each other, #2 can't stand #1 and #1 thinks #2 is cruel. This means that they never do things "for the good of the system" and only for themselves. I think what i need to do is make them realise that they have to start doing things as a whole - they all are still individuals but they need to start being more considerate to each other.

On a happier note, #2 picked up my diary the other day and wanted to read it and i knew that there was loads of stuff in there that he really couldn't read (lots of stuff about how angry i was at #2 for example) and #3 came out and saved my ass by co fronting and intentionally making #2 not read the part about himself...which is definatly an improvement in behaviour! I will let you know how things go...:)

xxxxluciaxxxx