Polyamory - What is it?

First you're probably wondering what the heck that is but as with everything in this Lifestyle we live it means different things for different people, and I know the purists and Old Guard are going to shudder at this, probably walk away shaking their heads too.

Polyamory is having more then 1 love or member of a close unit, in other words instead of a couple it could be a trio or more in the Family unit. There may be more then 1 Dominant, or more then 1 submissive/slave or combinations of sub, slave, switch, whatever works for the unit.

How do I know how this works? Because for the last 2 almost 3 years I've been involved in a Poly relationship with my husband, Master and his wife/sub. This is not role play, it's not in front of a keyboard playing around, this is flesh to flesh real time. I'm going to continue using the words Master and his wife as they do not want me to use their real names, out of respect for their wishes I won't.

I've been asked several times how this could be possible, we're all human with emotions and fears, how is it possible to love more then 1 person in a relationships and do we in fact love the other partners in our relationship. The answer is yes there is love and trust and respect it's just a different love then that between my husband and I or between Master and his wife.
Polyamory is not something to be stepped into lightly or quickly, it takes a lot of hard work on all the members part, but it can and does have it's own rewards and not always on a sexual level.
I can't tell you what you have to do to make this work for your situation, and I can't say that this is for everyone because it's not, all I can say is what works for us.

There are distinct relationships which we all agreed comes before anything else and that is our marriages. If I or my husband want to spend time together alone then we do so, same as with Master and his wife, if we want to play alone we do so as do Master and his wife. Is there sex between the couples or is it just BDSM activities between the 4 of us, that you're just going to have to keep on wondering about as I will not go into really intimate details, enough to say that we're all content with what we do.

You each have to go into a Poly relationship knowing exactly what you're getting into, what your role is and what the others roles are as well. Just as it makes no sense for someone who doesn't know how to cook to have to provide meals for anyone, it doesn't make sense to have one person stuck with all the chores while the others go about their merry way having fun and relaxing, or for them to feel that that's all they're there for.

There can be no jealousy or envy, no resentment or anger that the others in your Family are spending more time with each other and not with you. At the same time you're each responsible for making it work, if there's problems you can't hold back and let it fester into something much larger. A time can be set apart each week or even every day if needed to talk things over and make sure that everything's running smoothly.

For us each of us have our own chores and roles to do to keep the family running, household chores are divided as are the common bills, any extra's the one who wants them gets them out of their own pocket. If it's something for us all to use such as an item for the dungeon then it's talked over and a joint decision is made as to if we want it or not, normally we make what we need ourselves and improvise the design to suit our needs.
So ok we have 2 couples what makes it different then swinging?
Well usually swingers don't live in the same house and they don't share the financial responsabilities of the home, it's usually for sex only and there's no real emotions other then lust involved.

For a Poly household they do share the same home, they do share finances and there is an emotional bond between us. There are rules and boundries agreed on between us all, there is a set format for each of us to go through if we want to play outside of the family or if we want to bring someone else into the family unit. We all know what each one is doing and feeling, we all bond together if one is having problems with something, we love and support each other through whatever the world throws at us. We all know each other's hard limits and will not break them, we all know that if there's something bothering us we not only have 1 person to go to but 2 others as well.

We never play each other off against each other, that's the quickest way to ruin what we have and lets face it it's stupid to give up something that works so well. We don't beat about the bush either, if there's something on our minds it comes out, we trust each other to listen and at least try to understand. And if there's something wrong we try to fix it as well as we can, it's not always perfect but it works for us.