Polyamory in Practice: Communication and Community

♪ This day the energy ♪ ♪ Toity and so soon ♪ ♪ Every time you follow through ♪ ♪ I want you ♪ ♪ This day the energy ♪ ♪ Your finger, your communication ♪ ♪ Just like I want vacation ♪ ♪ I want you ♪ ♪ I want you ♪ Hello, Heidi Saval. Hello, Jeff Gunther. How's it going? It's going well. We've known each other for so long. I know. I was actually thinking about it on the way over here. Where are you? Has it been 20 years? Almost. Okay. It's been like 19 years. 19 years? I think, yeah. 19 sounds better than 20. 20 makes it sound like we're old. I know. 19. We're so young. We're so young. Yeah. We're not over the hill yet. We started working together at a nonprofit for children, child and family therapy sort of stuff. You were like my skills trainer? Yeah. You were a baby therapist, and I was a pre-therapist. Yes. You were still in the womb. I was. Like a little sperm and egg. I was just stating. Is that how you say that word? A little twinkle and Freud's eye. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. We worked together. We did some sassin little kids together, top parenting class together. We did. How old were we teaching people parenting skills? Old enough, like 25, 26 years old. Yeah. I think you were a little younger than me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That was really funny. That was hilarious. Yeah. And we've been friends ever since. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And we both still live in Portland, which was a smart move on both of our parts, I think. I think so. Yeah. I'm really happy with the move. Yeah. And I love that you get to come on. We actually have been, we've done podcast episodes together. I used to have another podcast way back in the day called, "Say More About That," and you would hop on that podcast every now and then. Yeah. I came on more than once, I think. Mm-hmm. That was fun. Yeah. You're a big hit. And now, you know, you're a licensed clinical social worker. Yes. Right. Yes. I am. And I'm a licensed professional counselor, and we're out there saving lives. And you are focused more on non-monogamy, aren't you? I am. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I found my way there. I mean, I've been doing therapy for 15 years, and I found my way there more in the last 10 years. But it's become more and more my focus over the years. And husband, why did you make that shift? Well, it wasn't on purpose at first, actually. It--so people desperately need therapists who understand and can really competently care for people who are polyamorous, and there has not historically been very much of that. And so, initially, it was just word of mouth. People knew that I was a therapist, and they knew that I was polyamorous. And so, they were showing up in my office, and, you know, in the beginning, I was like, "Ah, I'm not trained to do this yet." But, okay, as long as you know that, then, you know, and I think at that time, it was just enough that I was, you know, part of the culture that I understood, that I, you know, had--I already didn't have the monogamy bias or the preconceived notions, and then over the years and years of working with people as well as kind of sorting through my own polyamorous identity and learning through lots of mistakes, I've--yeah, become a lot more adept at supporting people in the journey. Mm-hmm, yeah. I feel like--I don't know if this is true, but is there--I think there's not that many therapists and slurs that specialize in non-monogamy or polyrelationships in Portland area? Yeah, I think that's pretty widespread. I mean, I hear from people all over the country who ask to work with me, who say that they can't find a therapist who is, you know, specialized as a polyamory, not to say that there aren't some out there, there are, and some of them are doing really excellent work, but there's not nearly enough of them. Mm-hmm, yeah. Do you have any idea why that is? It feels like this is the way that relationships are sort of trending a little bit more these days, but therapists haven't quite caught up. Yeah, good question. I think maybe it's just--yeah, like you said, they haven't caught up, you know, polyamory's becoming more popular, and it's going to just take longer for there to be a batch of therapists who feel really competent in supporting people in polyamory. Yeah, this wasn't like a class that you had in graduate school, was it? No, no, there was nothing like that in graduate school. In fact, most of what I learned in graduate school had a really strong monogamy bias. Mm-hmm, yeah. Yeah, I went back--I went to school back in 2003, 2004, 2005 was grad school. Yeah, and there was never one mention of like ethical non-monogamy or polyrelationship or anything like that. And it didn't even--I didn't even think about it. Like I was not asking to learn about it back then. Right. And so I hope that maybe there's more focus on that or classes about it in current grad schools, but it's something that like therapists now have to seek out education. It wasn't something that was like baked into our curriculum. No, and I actually still think there's probably a lot of curriculum for social workers and therapists and counselors that is still really baked in monogamy, unfortunately. But I think that's changing. I've actually been a guest speaker in a couple of graduate level classes. So while it wasn't an entire class on polyamory, like the professor thought it was worth bringing someone in, at least for one hour or one class session, to at least expose folks to polyamory. And you know, it was heartening because every time I did it, there was like one or two people who would reach out to me afterwards and say, like, this is the population I want to work with. And often that was because they themselves were polyamorous. So that's encouraging. Yeah, that is encouraging. Can you tell me--well, before I have more questions for you, but can you tell everybody who you are, where they can find you online and what your website is and what you offer before we continue in conversation? Yeah, okay. So I'm Heidi, Heidi Sevelle, and I am here in Portland, but I work with folks all across the country and the world, actually. I'm a therapist, and I'm also a polyamory coach. Yes, you are. And you're online, aren't you? We love your content. How--workin' they find you online? Yes. So I am on Instagram at She Loves Radically, and my website is also SheLovesRadically.com. But very exciting news. I'm about to do a big rebrand, which I'm super excited about. It's been in the works for a while. So my new website will be SteadyPolyamory.com And my Instagram handle will be SteadyPolyamory. Nice. I hope that's available. I think it is. I think it will be. Okay. Yeah, lock it down if it's not. I know. Can you lock it down when you already have one? Well, can you lock down like a new website? Well, the website I got, but the Instagram handle-- Yeah. Now someone's going to go take it when this podcast comes out. Yeah, before this podcast comes out, we're going to get you to grab it. You know what I can do? Maybe I'll have a second account. That account can be SteadyPolyamory for now. Just a squat on it. No, actually, because then you have to stay there for a while and you won't be able to know. No. I just have to change before next Thursday. Now I've committed. Yeah. Or you take the chance and know that my listeners are very kind. You just don't steal my handle. Yeah. Somebody stole Jeff Gunther.com. What? I don't know. It was a whole thing. I still can't get it back. That is so rude. I know. It's very rude. Not when you're listeners. I'm sure they would not do that. No. No. Some troll from Russia or something. Terrible. It is terrible. But can we talk a little bit about-- go back to what we're talking about for a second-- about how a lot of therapists and counselors are trained to come and nogamy limbs. And maybe look kind of damage that might do to somebody who-- whether they're like monogamous or non-monogamous, like what kind of like what monogamy culture or even like toxic monogamy can do to a client. Yeah. So I think a big part of it is that we are trained and not just therapists, but especially therapists, also just everyone, that monogamous love and monogamous relationships are like the gold standard that they are the hallmark of maturity, of emotional health and well-being, and someone who just is overall a healthy functioning adult. And you know, I don't take issue with that inherently in that like sure. Yes, you can be monogamous and be a totally healthy functioning adult. adult but when we hold it up as the ideal or the the gold standard or the evidence of emotional maturity, what that means. And, you know, it's like one of those implicit bias things that maybe people don't realize. But when you really embody that belief, what you're saying is that someone who is polyamorous or desires some form of nomenogamy is emotionally immature, is less healthy, doesn't totally have their stuff together. And I feel like every now and then you'll get comments on your TikTok or Instagram from those folks that are viewing you as unhealthy or you need to grow up or this is inherently wrong for some reason. Do you typically like ignore those folks or do you engage in those comments sometimes or make content out of it? It depends on my mood, but if I'm feeling spicy, I will either engage with them or I'll make content out of it because I actually think it's a really great opportunity for education to bring up this point that we're talking about right now and to let people know, hey, actually, this is misconception. You know, I am a therapist. I have healthy functioning relationships that are stable and have lasted and are really happy. You know, I'm polyamorous and there are plenty of people out there who are just having like ordinary lives and are polyamorous, you know? Yeah, but there's also, there's like thought they have to put into it of like, all right, if you are somebody who's, you know, happily practicing polyamory or ethical nomenogamy, there's kind of this question of like, how many people are you going to tell? Are you going to tell people at work? Are you going to tell people in your family that would kind of respond in a weird or negative or awkward way? Which friends are you going to tell? There's kind of like this process of like how transparent are you going to be about your relationship, which isn't really a process that most people or any people go through maybe that are in like, well, I mean queer people go through this. But like the like, Hetsis monogamous, like those folks. Yeah, totally. And you know, it's, it's different to in that some people can like, well, it's different in a couple ways. One way is that there is, you know, it can be something that people can hide. I mean, it can be like uncomfortable to hide it, but people can hide it. The other way it's really different is relationship structure is not a protected class like at least currently and hopefully to for the continuing future, you know, gender identity and sexuality and things like that are protected classes. So you can't discriminate against someone for those things. You can't fire them with polyamory. You absolutely can. Interesting. Do you see it, or at least for you personally, is it more of like an orientation or like a choice that you've made? Yeah. So what I find is that it's really pretty across the spectrum. I work with a ton of people who really truly feel like it is an orientation that it is just there the way that they love and that has always, always been true for them. And for some people, it's more of a choice, you know, it's something that maybe they could go one way or the other and they choose sometimes to, sometimes to be monogamous or for political reasons or values based reasons or lots of different reasons they may choose polyamory. But I would say that most of the people I work with over the years have identified as an orientation. Do you feel like there's a different, I don't know, vibe when talking to somebody where it's just like, oh, this is an orientation for me and another person was just like, oh, this is more of like a lifestyle choice. Not really. No. Because I think at the end of the day, like it doesn't really matter. Yeah. Like it's still, I mean, because it is a choice to live this way, whether or not, you know, it's an orientation. Like, you know, plenty of people know that they are polyamorous, but don't choose to act on it. They may choose to be a monogamous relationships for lots of reasons. One reason I often hear is because they didn't realize it until they were in a monogamous relationship. And so the person they're in love with is not interested. And so they choose to stay in the relationship rather than exploring that part of themselves. And I just think like fundamentally, I don't think it matters. I think it takes away from the validity of the relationship style and the relationship structure to drill down to choice versus orientation because it suggests in some ways like that there's almost like something wrong with it. And so like, well, if you could choose it, choose something else. Sure. Sure. And like it is a valid way of loving. Right. And so to me, it's like, it doesn't matter so much if it's orientation or if it's choice. It's like, if this is how you are loving, then great. Let's get you the support you need to like do it well and be happy. Is there a lot of debate or conversation about like, is it a choice or is it orientation out there or are we kind of moving on from that? I mean, I think it bubbles up. I don't know that we're moving on from it. I still see it bubbling up. Sure. Yeah. And like, it's, you know, it makes sense that people ask that question, but I just really at the end of the day, I don't personally think it matters. I feel like maybe another reason, if you're oriented towards more towards being polyamorous or non-monogamous, but you find yourself in a monogamous relationship, you might, a part of you might want to stay in that relationship and just have a monogamous relationship because there's just sort of this like couples privilege or the culture set up for you and operates around you a lot easier, whether it's like, you know, taxes or. Yeah. Hang on out, going out to dinner, whatever it is, like there's sort of like life kind of like is a little easier moving through the world if you're just a monogamous couple, I would imagine. Yeah, I think that's true. I mean, I think there's a lot of like, yeah, couples privilege, monogamy privilege. You know, that's especially, I hear that for some of my clients who have kids. You know, they really worry about like their kids getting bullied or, you know, this only happens in when there's like contentious grandparents or contentious divorce, but like one parent or grandparent kind of using the polyamory as trying to use it as evidence that they're unfit parents. So, and you know, some people like they can lose their job over something like this. And so it's like, yeah, there are real risks involved and things that monogamy, you know, protects you from. Also just the privilege of like getting to see your relationship structure reflected in positive ways out in the world. Like we don't have much positive representation right now. I'm looking at you, coupled with Ruppel. I did hate, I wasn't a triad for a while and we hate watched that show in our triad. We did. Yeah, it was, did you see it? No, I didn't. I'm trying to think of any like positive stories out there in representation. Is there, I mean, in like sci fi, like novels there are, there is in the expanse series, not the TV show, but the, I actually don't know if they do in the TV show, but in the books, there's like this polyamorous sort of family on one of the spaceships. And then in the broken earth trilogy, I forget the name of the author, N.K. Jemisin, maybe. Anyway, yeah, there's a really sweet kind of triad in that that was totally positive. And, you know, I feel like that's also true that like sci fi is kind of this like cutting edge place where you can push boundaries and, and, you know, show more, but it's very fleeting. There's not that much positive representation. Yeah. So it's the privilege of getting that positive representation all around you and just like being able to go to pretty much any of your friends or peers or colleagues and talk about your relationship was and know that that person on some level is going to relate to you and not be like, "Whoa, why are you doing that? That's horrifying." Or like, "Oh, you're struggling. I have an idea. Just don't be polyamorous." Right. Yeah. Do you think there was, I mean, I've talked to a few people like Dan Savage where like, and I see him get this question asked every now and then, which is like, "Oh, is, is Polyamory and Onmonogamy having a moment right now. and is it going to fade away again as it does every now and then? Or does it feel like there's a real shift in the culture? I mean, that's a big question. I'm just wondering what your opinion might be on that. - Yeah, what does dance average say about it? - Right, I think we should just say what dance average does about it. - Well, I'll tell you my take. - Okay, okay, you have your take. - Okay, I'll tell you my take, and then you can tell me, dance average is take. How about that so it doesn't influence mine? - Okay, yeah, tell me your take. - Okay, so my take is, this is such a cop out. I'm just gonna cop out here. I think it's both. I think there is some ways in which it's trending right now and not everyone who is trying an omfersize will stick with it. And I also think it is a cultural shift. So it may be having like an unsustainable boom at this moment, but I do think that there are more and more people out there that are starting to question some of the limitations of monogamy. And I don't mean that to slam monogamy. I think monogamy is a really valid choice and a lot of, I know a lot of people who are very happy in monogamy. But, you know, there are some limitations, just like there are some limitations in polyamory. And so people I think recognizing that and wanting a little more expansiveness or wanting to just unpack some of the things that were handed to them. I guess one way to put this is like, I think that questioning monogamy as a default is going to become the norm. Now that doesn't mean everyone who questions monogamy as a default will choose something else, right? Like for some people the default works. They may question it and be like, yep, this is totally valid for me. This is the choice I wanna make, but there's something so powerful about making the choice versus blindly doing something that was handed to you. And so I think as more and more people kind of critically examine monogamy and polyamory as just like choices. I think more people will probably choose polyamory just because it's another option that wasn't on the table before. - Mm-hmm. I think that makes a lot of sense. Okay, what did wise Dan Savage say about it? - The all-knowing one is Dan Savage, who we love. He kind of says the same thing, but he says like, oh, it's always, it's been like kind of slowly shifting for a long time. It just hasn't been like written about and talked about as much as it is right now. It feels very trendy, like he says, like you can get a lot of clicks if you're a New York Times writer writing about fucking polyamory right now. And that's what's going on. And he's like, and I'm fine with it. That's great. And that like the content piece of like people doing a lot of content about it will probably slow down eventually, but it'll keep on like building steam and stuff like that. - Yeah. - So yeah. - All right, Dan Savage, you and I are in agreement. - I know, right. One of the things that you help folks with is kind of like first stepping into polyamory and non-monogamy. - Can you let's talk about like the sort of like, I don't know if you would categorize it like this, but what are some good reasons and what are some not-so-great reasons if you're wanting to open your relationship and practice non-monogamy. So let's start with some like really good reasons. - Yeah, I mean, I think people I see who are really starting out from a place of strength are exploring it together and really looking at like, what are the ways this might work for us? - So it's typically people that are already in relationship and a non-monogamous relationship and they're thinking about like opening. So it's not, you're not typically working with people that are just single people or all of them. - No, it's both. - Yeah, for some reason I thought you were asking specifically about couples, but it's totally both. So for couples, I think, you know, when they are really looking at it as a way of like, how can this enhance our lives, you know, and looking at it from the perspective of, okay, like what do we believe about love, about community, about, you know, having people who are special to us in our lives outside of just the couple unit. And are there ways that polyamory could be expansive or, you know, enhance our lives in some ways? And also maybe like enhance the connection that you have with your person. - Yeah, that too. I mean, I don't think that's a strong, as super strength-based primary reason to do it, but I think it can be like a tertiary benefit, absolutely. Yeah, and I think you can really get to know someone in a different way. And yeah, there's an opportunity to really see different sides of people when you're in love with them and then watching them date and potentially fall in love with other people. I mean, I actually think it's super sweet to watch my partners like get ready for a date, be nervous for a date, like try to navigate the, do I text them? I don't wanna come off this way or that way. Like I cherish that because it's, if I was monogamous, I would never get to see that part of my partners. And I think it's very sweet, you know? - Mm-hmm, yeah. - It's, yeah, you get to see these sides of your partner that you wouldn't have been able to probably experience before and there's kind of not that like you haven't even deeper love for them, but maybe just a more layered or expansive or multi-faceted sort of appreciation and gratitude and love for them. And you get to kind of like also play a different role in their life where you can be this cheerleader and be there for them when they're nervous or give them relationship advice. - Yeah. - And that sounds very sweet. - Yeah, it is really sweet. So yeah, to get back to your question, I think doing it from a place of wanting to like have expansiveness, you know, wanting to broaden their sense of community, wanting to explore different needs or desires that maybe they aren't getting met in their relationship, not from a place of deficit in the relationship, but just like, you know, each of us are only have a certain amount of things, you know, that we have on offer and, you know, I might absolutely love those things and also not instead of, but in addition to wanting to experience a different dynamic. - And a more maybe like monogamous view would be like, yes, you can't get all of your needs and desires met in a relationship and you're gonna have to grieve that or break up with your person and try to write. Like those are sort of, I don't know, those are basically the two options except that you're not gonna get all your needs met. And even if you're in a like a poly or not, you're still not gonna get every single need in the world, like that's just sort of, like given in any type of relationship style, but it feels like even more of a stark reality or something in a monogamous relationship. And so I feel like it can be like an incredibly loving act too, admit and understand and be aware of the fact that you can't meet all of the needs of your partner and that you want them to get more of those needs met and that you and that they also want that for you and like how sweet and romantic and supportive and incredibly like non-possessive that is. - Yeah, exactly, yeah. I mean, an example for me is that like I'm bisexual and I really like being in romantic relationships with both men and women and gender queer people and there is not one person out there that can give that to me. And so it is really such a sweet and wonderful and deeply satisfying thing to be able to engage in different relationships with like people with different gender presentations and that feels really satisfying to me. - Yeah, what are some like not the best reasons to want to open your relationship? - Yeah, so reasons that I have seen and I'm not saying this never works, I'm sure someone's gonna write in and be like, actually this worked for me, probably. I'm sure it works for someone, but in my 10 years of doing this, reasons that I have seen that don't always work out so well or aren't really coming at it from a place of strength is if you have developed a crush on a specific person and wanna open up the relationship specifically to pursue that one person. Now I'm not saying this can never work but the problem with that is that it short circuits a lot of the work that goes into this like exploring the why. The why can't just be because I'm in love with someone else and I wanna be with both these people. There's gotta be a little bit more of a why than that because what if it doesn't work out this person? - Right. - Then what? And like if you're opening up, and your partners presumably also gonna do that and what is there why and you know, I so and the other reason I see that sometimes go sideways is because it also puts a certain urge. on it and so people tend to rush through a lot of the work that I encourage people to do both before opening up or at the start. I feel like it also maybe sets up your partner to really compare themselves to that person. When that might, like the comparative thing may be happening anyways in any other situation, but that's like a very, like you and I are having a monogamous relationship and now you're interested in somebody else. What am I not giving you that this other person? I don't know, there's just sort of like opportunity for comparison or insecurity or jealousy. Again, there's going to be like insecurity and jealousy that you're going to have to work through, but yeah, it's not coming from just like this strength based I want to like experience love in a different way. Like let's think about how we're going to do that and then deliberately step into this new world together at the same time or whatever, you know what I mean? Totally. It feels very like I'm going to individually focus on my needs. Yeah. You do what you want with your need, whatever, like I'm like I'm centering myself here right now. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that can lead to the other partner kind of feeling a little under duress and kind of entering into it from a place of like I'm not sure I'm on board with this, but I guess I'm going to go along with it because I, you know, I would like to stay in this relationship. Right. Yeah. And then, you know, I want to also just give a shout out to all of the lovely single people or solo people who decide that they want to explore polyamory. I think the good reasons to do that are kind of similar like really realizing that there are ways that it aligns with your values or maybe you're someone who really enjoys like communal living and resource sharing. And so you love the idea of being part of like a community of partners or lovers or you're someone who has like really someone who just I don't want to say blurs the line because I think that has a bad connotation, but someone who goes really deep with their friends, you know, maybe has like friendships that are like, whoa, that's a real deep, really emotionally intimate friendship where, you know, they might reflect and be like, yeah, I have like, I don't want to have to draw this line between like friendship and partner, not to say necessary, like even before we get to sex, just the idea of like what emotional intimacy is allowed, you know, and what is on the table. I think for all people, not just single people, but especially single people like looking at that as like, oh, yeah, like I don't, I would like the freedom to explore each relationship on its own merits instead of like, okay, well, this person all's already fit in this box, so that means no one else can. And so it doesn't matter how much of a spark I have with someone or it doesn't matter like that I have this great friend chemistry, I've got to like really follow these certain rules. And again, if you that is the relationship agreement, you have come up with that is valid, but if you are someone who is questioning that or thinking that maybe that's not what fits for you, then I think those are great reasons to explore polyamory. I think for single people, a not so great reason to explore polyamory is because they are just not quite ready to settle down with one person. So it's like it, they may be like, yeah, someday I'd like to have a long term partner, but for now I'd like to be polyamorous. And the reason I see that go really poorly is because if you are doing that, you are dating people who are looking for someone who aligns with what they're looking for, and you're kind of presenting as if you do, but your end goal is still monogamy. And so that means, you know, you're kind of not really on the same page as a lot of the people that you're dating. And so it can lead to a lot of heartbreak. And it can lead to a lot of people feeling really betrayed when they learn, like, wait a minute, I thought we were forming something really serious and significant here. And like, I'm a short term plan for you. And maybe they'd be okay with that, but it's like full disclosure in the beginning, please. Yeah. And it's a sort of like this mistake that they're making, or they're like, well, I don't want to put all of my, like, I don't want to put a lot of energy into relationships right now. So I'm going to only give half of the energy and be poly or something when that doesn't really work. You just have to put in a decent amount of energy into those relationships. And sometimes have to manage multiple relationships. So there's even more energy that you might have to, but it's like, it's like, I don't care as much. So I'm going to be poly feels fucked up, right? Totally. Yeah. I think it's hilarious to say, like, oh, I want to put less effort in. So I'll just be polyamorous because it is, it is definitely, you know, not less effort. I will say that. Yeah. But yeah, I think that is a real myth that I see, especially when I'm working with people who are solo and polyamorous, they often will find people on dating profiles who are like, oh, yeah, you're polyamorous. That's cool. Not meaning I am interested in pursuing a polyamorous relationship with you, but either meaning I'm cool with this until I fall in love with you. And then I would like you to become monogamous with me or they mean, oh, I guess that means I don't really have to treat you that well or, you know, take this relationship that seriously. And both of those are wrong. Both of those are real misunderstandings of what polyamorous people are looking for and, you know, the kinds of relationships that we form. Right. So that might more, they might actually just sort of want to have some casual relationships or something. Yeah, I think that could fall under ethical non-monogamy. Sure. As long as you're upfront and honest about what you want, what your, where your energy level is, what your intention is. Yeah, I think that's the part that makes it ethical. And also, I also think for a lot of those people, what they really want to do is they want to casually date, which is valid. There's, you know, you can have a lot of fun casually dating, but if you call it polyamory or if you call it non-monogamy or, you know, a certain kind of non-monogamy, then you are misleading people. And there's going to be a lot of hurt feelings and misunderstandings. Right. Yeah. So let's say you're in a couple and you're having a monogamous relationship with your partner. You identify that you're both wanting to move forward for a strength based reasons and you're feeling really good about that. What are some initial steps that that couple should take in order to like really set them set themselves up for success? Yeah. Oh, there's so many good ones. So I would say really starting with coming up with this is going to sound silly, but almost like a mission statement around like this is, this is our, you know, why we're doing this. And the biggest reason, you know, I think people should do that is because it's going to get hard at some points. And I think it's really important to be able to revisit your reasons that you came up with when you were in your most grounded, most strength space place. You know, and thinking through what do we want this to look like for, you know, not just in the next six months, but what do we want to look like in five years or 10 years? Not to say that we all get exactly what we want or the thing we think we want in the very beginning of the journey is actually the thing that we end up wanting or getting. But even just expanding beyond the short term to think about like what is possible? What are some of the things I would be open to? You know, like if you're someone who has kids, like do you want, like if you have these long term partners, do you eventually want them to be like a fun aunt or uncle in your kids' lives? Are you going to always keep them separate? How might that feel? So really playing around with things like that. And then I actually teach a program that is specifically for folks walking through this journey. So in my head right now, I'm kind of going through each module that we do. One of them is on communication. I think what I have found with both individuals and couples, the communication skills that worked for them in monogamy aren't necessarily good enough. I don't want to say good enough, but like, uh, I need like different scaffolding or something for expansive language. Yes. Yes. And like just a more advanced set of communication skills for entering a non-monogamy space. Yeah. Because, you know, just for example, the ways in which you talk about things can shift, you know, in monogamy often it's like, hey, this thing made me jealous and the other person might say, oh, I'm so sorry. Like, I don't want to do that anymore if it makes you jealous. You know, let's let's talk about how I can change my behavior. And in non-monogamy, that conversation can look a lot different. It's like, "Hey, this thing made me jealous. You're not necessarily doing anything wrong, but I'm having these feelings come up and I would like to bring them up with you and sometimes all that person might need is a tender response." To say, "Oh, honey, I could see how that made you jealous. That makes so much sense to me. What are you needing?" That's harder to sit with. I think that some people might want to be like, "All right, what are we going to do about this? How are we going to change behaviors so that you don't feel this way? I'm going to protect you from feeling jealous or insecurity." When really it's sort of like in these sorts of situations, maybe you're more open to be like, "Okay, well, how do we sit with the insecurity in jealousy? How can we like soothe you? What can you do on your own? What can I say to you? Who else can you talk to in the community? What book can you read? What are some nervous system regulation tools you got?" That's totally. Yeah, I think that's so huge. Just knowing that there is such a difference between, "Oh, I'm having this uncomfortable feeling. How do I fix it?" I'm having this uncomfortable feeling and I'm going to get curious about it. I'm not going to judge it. I'm going to get curious about it. I'm not going to assume that it's this terrible thing. In getting curious about it, I'm going to deepen my relationship with myself, my understanding of myself, and perhaps my relationship with my partners when I bring this to them and we can get curious together. Yeah, that's a very different way to communicate. You mentioned emotional regulation and I think that's another really big one. I spent a lot of time in my program working with people around really getting very dialed in on what their own emotional dysregulation looks like and how they can create some concrete strategies to get re-regulated. Yeah, I think oftentimes when we get dysregulated in relationship, we look to solve it outside of ourselves. Can you stop doing this? Can you not talk to that person anymore or something? A lot of times it's going inside and maybe just focusing on your body and feeling grounded and feeling relaxed instead of focusing on the thoughts or the feelings. It's more about how can you feel relief physically? Yeah, I think that's definitely the first step. I think eventually you want to explore the feelings and the thoughts for sure, but I think you're absolutely right. It's got to start with the body. I think that another thing that I really wish more people knew is that when you start this journey, it is highly likely that you will spend a bit of time feeling emotionally dysregulated, feeling anxious, feeling panicked, feeling afraid. And that is not because, not necessarily because you're not cut out for this or that you're bad at it or that it's not going to work for you. It's often because you have been taught your entire life that there is this one right, good, safe way to be in relationships and you are doing something different. And so anytime you have a doubt or a fear or a flash of insecurity, there's like however many decades of training there to fan those flames and to tell you, yeah, what are you doing? Of course, you're going to get your heart broken. You idiot. Like why aren't you just being monogamous? And so there is a whole process of learning both to cope with the dysregulation that comes from that as well as how to challenge and recognize when some of those old beliefs or old ways of thinking are kind of like creeping in and fanning those flames. And I bet it's like, especially at first, it's really hard to tell the difference between. So an example, it might be like the first time you see your partner make out with somebody and say you're in that sort of situation, there might be something that comes up here just like, nope, I don't like this. This relationship feels threatened. I feel really insecure. This feels wrong. I don't want to do this. And you don't maybe know if like, oh, this is like the monogamy conditioning that I've had my entire life. Or maybe you're like, actually, I don't want to fucking do this. Like you have no idea which one it is. And it feels exactly the same. Yeah, that's the fucked up thing about it. Right. So is that partly why you want that this couple to come up with like a mission statement or a revision of those like, here's our values. This is why we're doing it. These are our goals and expectations or something so that they can kind of like anchor themselves back into their into that place when they're feeling really triggered. Totally. Yes. Because I think it is so easy when you have those feelings and you probably will, you probably will to just say, you know what, let's pull the plug. This is hard. This is scary. It feels wrong. Let's just stop. And is that like why you probably maybe like don't jump into the deep end when you first go out there? Do you have to come up with like a plan of like here some very incremental steps? Like is that part of the journey of like, okay, we're going to go, you know, we're going to go to a sex club and I'm going to watch you flirt with somebody and then we're going to leave or like, you're going to go out on a date. We're going to like agree that there's like no funny business, no like sexy stuff that's going on. You're just going to have a coffee with somebody and then come back and we're going to talk about it. Or do you just jump in the deep end to be like exposure therapy, fuck it. Like, it does it depend on the person or the person. I think it depends on the person. I think if you know your own nervous system and you know that jumping in the deep end is going to be torture for you, I don't recommend doing it. I like the idea of starting small and building up, you know, like starting with just some coffee dates and seeing how that feels, you know, and like moving slowly and being really transparent with the people that you're going out with. Sure. That that's what you're doing. Right. You know, I think there is so much pressure and it can be reinforced by certain communities in the Nominogmi world. There's so much pressure to get it perfect and to get it right and to put on this front that like you're further along than you are. And it just does everyone such a disservice because I remember when I was first starting and I felt like I had to put on this like super experienced face and I was like embarrassed to tell people that I was struggling or that I was new. But you know, I think it doesn't do anyone any good to do that and it is okay to struggle. It's okay to be new. It's okay to say I'm just getting started and so right now I'm just doing some coffee dates. And there will be people who aren't interested in dating you. But that's okay. I mean, you want everyone to have fully informed consent when they go on a date with you and plenty of people will be into dating you. That's another thing like not going into it with a scarcity mindset. What do you mean by that? Oh, I see it. People really get messed up by this. So feeling like this is my only chance. So or like there's not going to be that many people. So even though this person doesn't seem like a great fit or even though they don't really like jive with the way I'm trying to do this, I'm going to go out on the date anyway or I'm not going to tell them how early on I am because I don't want to miss this opportunity. So that sort of scarcity of like there's not enough people out there. There's not enough opportunity out there. I think can lead people to rush into things to make decisions that maybe don't serve them or to also break relationship agreements that they've made. I see all of those things happen. Yeah. Do you think it's pretty common for folks to break relationship agreements? Is that like almost like something that you most likely will have to go through and then talk about and heal and figure it out? Or do you feel like people are pretty good at staying within those bounds? I mean, I think relationship agreements do get broken. I think they can get broken in all relationships and they're not always like huge ones. Sometimes they're smaller ones. But yeah, they can get broken. Sometimes it's as simple as a misunderstanding or sometimes people had way too many agreements and they couldn't keep track of them all. Or sometimes, yeah, they messed up. They got wrapped up in the moment. They got stuck in that scarcity mindset. They agreed to something that they didn't really want to agree to. And then when they found themselves in the situation, they actually wanted to do it anyway. There's lots of reasons why it can go sideways. But what I think is really important and I actually do a whole module on this because I think it's so important is learning how to set relationship agreements that are super sustainable and how to dialogue about a relationship agreement when it gets broken. Like how are you going to repair? How are you going to talk about it? How are you going to do kind of a postmortem on like, okay, what happened there? Well, weren't wrong. How do we want to fix this moving forward and like allowing it to be an opportunity for new information and repair instead of like, oh, you are the absolute worst that you did this. Like, yeah, it sucks when it happens. I'm not saying it's a good thing. But like, it does happen. And you know, good people who are well-intentioned, can break relationship agreements. Yeah. Do you find that like there's a lot of folks, do you think that this happens most times where maybe if you're in a couple and you're both decide that you want to have a different relationship style, is there a lot of compromise within that of like, oh, I wanted to be Polly and oh, well, I wanted to be Minagamish or I wanted to do mostly swinging and I wanted to have like a Polly cool or something like, is there a lot of negotiation when it comes to like the compromise that you have to make within those relationships? I think there's some negotiation, but another thing that I tell people is like, you don't have to be aligned in order to be successful. Like, if one person prefers to have like more casual relationships, you know, or like more one nightstands or just kind of like go to play parties and enjoy those and the other person wants to have like deep, emotionally intimate long-term connections, like that's not necessarily incompatible. Yeah, that's a good point. Those people can can do those things as long as they can find ways to support one another and accept that what they want is different and that that's okay. We're running out of time here. Oh my god, I could just keep talking about this. I know. Is there anything else that you feel like you want to add to the conversation? One more thing I want to just revisit is, you know, I was saying like, oh, casual isn't necessarily what Polly Emmer's people are looking for and I just want to revise that because plenty of Polly Emmer's people also enjoy casual dating. I think what I was really trying to say is that like, it is unfair to assume that someone only wants casual because they're Polly Emmer's. So that was a point I wanted to clarify. But yeah, I mean, I guess if you are listening to this and you are someone who is either thinking about doing exploring Polly Emmer or Nomenogamy or has recently started, just knowing that like, it is okay to struggle. A lot of people struggle in the beginning. It doesn't mean you're doing anything wrong and the best thing you can do is get support and get community and that is going to be so huge in the process. You talk about that a lot in your content where it's like one of the most important things to create community, find other people that are like, mind it or going on this journey or have more experience and you actually create community with like the programs that you have. Can you talk a little bit about how people can sign up and yeah, just sort of like more information about that? Absolutely. Yeah, so my program is called Steady Your Polly Wobbles and it's for folks who are newer or thinking about exploring Nomenogamy or Polly Emmery and it is kind of a hybrid program where it's a ton of community building with folks over the course of three months and there are also learning modules, so videos and worksheets on all of these different components. Communication, boundaries, creating agreements, coming up with your why, that are these educational videos that you watch alongside it and then we also have live calls for both building community, getting peer support and then also getting coaching from me. So it's a really kind of juicy mix of different things and the people who go through it often create lifelong friends. You know, a lot of them I'm still in touch with and there are many of them are still in touch with each other. I just think it's something that like we don't think about enough about the fact that like you when you transition into Nomenogamy, you are losing like 90 to 99% of the relationship support that you had. Even if you have people who like are super big cheerleaders and want to support you, they still don't understand what you're going through and so like they may be kind but they can't always offer you meaningful advice or support and that's the biggest thing I hear from people who have gone through. My program is like the community was a game changer. Yeah well you are my go-to expert for anything Nomenogamy and I highly recommend folks check out your program. I'm going to leave links in the show notes for everyone to click on to learn more about you and how they can sign up. Very cool. If also I have a free 10 step guide to Polyamory so people can check that out and it kind of walks you through the modules in the program but gives you kind of a DIY version to try out on your own. Yeah, love it. Thanks. Bye, Heidi. Bye Jeff. Thanks for having me on. [Music]