Our Kitchen Table Poly

There are so many different poly styles out there and I only feel qualified to write about my own- Kitchen Table Poly ( KTP) and we how decided that it was the one for us.

My husband and I were friends from aged 7 but we lost contact between the ages of 18 and 36.

When we found each other and realized we had a ” soulmate” connection we vowed to not waste any more time apart. Those 18 years we lost were to be the last “lost” time in our life. We set about building a business and a life together. Several years later my oldest child grew up, got married and created a family of her own. My immediate household now consists of JayBear, myself and my youngest son, Alex ( who is partially verbal and significantly autistic ). Jay is a wonderful stepdad and the household has a beautiful dynamic that works.

When I came out as bi and poly four years ago it turned our life upside down. Suddenly the world we had so carefully built was almost certainly set to change.

We looked around at the various poly models and realised very quickly that there was one thing we did not want and that was ” separate lives” Jay had come from a first marriage in which their lives were so separate that they had different friends and basically took turns looking after the children on weekends so the other could go out. This was not something he wished to repeat and that was fine with me as due to childhood trauma I tend to err on the side of co-dependence so separate lives sounds pretty horrific to me.

Our family dynamic is such that if one person in the house loves someone then everyone grows to love them too. I’m not even talking about romantic love! If one of us makes a friend all 3 of us end up having a friendship with that person.

So, with that in mind it became apparent that Kitchen Table Poly was best only option for us.

On the practical side it was necessary too. My amazing husband is not the father of my child . Alex needs constant adult supervision and while Jay happily stays home with him when I go away to see my daughter there is no way I would ask him to stay home while I go off with anyone else for a weekend.

I have a massive deficit of love in the overall picture of my life due to a rough childhood and a bad first marriage that went on much longer than it should have. My family loves me with all their hearts but I need more people.

I have a need to create a tribe and surround myself with as much love as possible.

I don’t believe we were meant to be isolated into tiny family groups inside four walls and behind fences. Maybe some people are happy that way but I am not.

So, this is how I specifically define us :

” Love me, love my whole household and we will all love you in our own way”

AND

“Come and visit all of us and we will all come and visit you”

I can just imagine some of you reading this and cringing because this does not suit everyone.

This is perfectly ok! I would never force my life on someone!!

MANY people have walked away from me who would have been interested if I had been single or solo poly.

Whilst this has been a tad sad in the past the bottom line is that if someone does walk away from our family that is their choice and they probably were not “meant to be ” part of our tribe.

We’ve walked away a few times too. A common story is women who have an existing primary partner wanting to leave him alone (and sad) whilst coming to spend time with us. We are all about building our tribe and not taking away someone from another tribe so in the same way as I do not leave my primary behind we do not expect or encourage anyone else to leave their primary ( or offspring) behind if they do not want to be left.

I do specify ” primary” here as I am referring to others in hierarchical poly , as opposed to “solo poly”. Feel free to look up these terms if you don’t know them already as I’m loathe to write about that which i don’t have personal experience of.

Our life is very transparent and above board and another situation I walk away from is the ” Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” model because I refuse to be anyone’s secret.

As you’re probably starting to see not all poly models are compatible. It’s pretty vital to know your model (you wouldn’t believe how many people don’t) and to specify it up front. There’s nothing more heartbreaking than getting involved with someone whose poly model is fundamentally incompatible with your own because down the track this will cause major issues.

I get a lot of questions about our model because from a distance it looks like no one would ever be able to have time alone with me. In my initial definition yes, this certainly is how I present my version of KTP as I do not want to give anyone false hopes in the beginning that I could go away for a weekend with them for example. However the reality is potentially slightly different. I have some significant health challenges which I don’t talk about in this blog ( I have another blog devoted to the subject of that journey) .

There are some people who are very good for me. I am literally healthier in their presence.

Jay is my “constant “ healing presence, but occasionally someone will come along who tops me up further. Jay is quick to spot those who are good for me and when people like this come along my family will sometimes sacrifice some “family time” in order to give me more time with them.

This is love.

This is flexibility.

This is our kitchen table poly.