We're Not the Only Ones [Me]

I finally found some other MPD folks' blogs, and now I'm engrossed in reading through from the beginning. The first I'm reading is called 'Sunshine and Shadows'. I love that. Because you have to have the one to appreciate the other.

I commented on a post where she shows pictures of things - treasures - one of her alters has bought. I remember the first time I woke up with stuff in my house that Kiara had bought. It was confusing, but cute. And it made me smile.

I also commented on a post about memories. Memory is a funny and unreliable thing. Ask three people that had lunch together what they talked about, and you'll get three wildly different answers - and sometimes conflicting. And for a multi, it's like getting up and going to the restroom during that conversation, then later being told, "Oh, you remember when she told that story, don't you? It was so funny!" Do I remember it? Was I even there for it? And that's confusing and maddening sometimes.

And then she has a post where she talks about going shopping with one alter in charge, and having to force a quick switch to try and recognize two ladies that came up to talk to her - her mother and her sister. That's always a panicky moment, when people come up to talk and we can't remember who they are. Maybe one alter will speak up and say who they are. Maybe we'll quickly switch. Maybe whoever is out will just have to fake it until there are enough contextual clues to figure out who they are. In fact, I had that moment of panic today when I went to have lunch with a friend, and she got there first. Several of the alters know her, but what if we didn't recognize her? We did, though, and it was all okay. Still, the panic is there.

More reactions from this blog tomorrow. Or soon, at least.

My Sweetie's Sweetie is my Sweetie [Me]

I was reading a blog that focused on polyamory and choosing relationships wisely, and wanted to share. The page I was at is http://polyamoryparadigm.blogspot.com/2011/11/what-have-i-stepped-in.html, but the thoughts that are relevant are things I've been asked, or thought about on my own, before. Fair warning, this one's a lot more about being poly than about being multi.

Here's the relevant line from the blog above: "If I can't have a relationship with someone and accept how differently their other relationships function then I shouldn't be in a relationship with that person."

My boyfriend has a relationship that he's been in as long as I've known him. She also has multiple personalities, though her structure is very different than our structure. And she has a boy of her own. I don't have a deep individual relationship with either of them. But they both live with him, and I don't yet. So a few people have asked about how I feel about his relationship with her. And that's something that is still 'in progress' as far as dealing with it.

The first and last point on the matter is this - his relationship with her is part of him. If I can't handle that, then I don't need to be with him. It's the same thing if I was dating a man that had children living at home with him. If I'm not prepared for kids to take priority over me sometimes, or to be involved in what we do, then I have no business getting together with him.

Now, she has the same issue - my relationship with him is part of him too. Both of us want him to be happy. He's happy with both of us. And so, the two of us both make some concessions to his relationship with the other. Sure, we'd both like to have him full-time. But he wouldn't be happy, which means we wouldn't be happy either. And so, we work things out. Sometimes more succesfully than others. And that's what a relationship is about, working together, whether there are two people involved, or three, or six.

Sometimes I don't like the way the two of them inter-relate. And I'm sure she feels the same way about me, too. If it's just me pouting or being protective of him, I try to ignore the feeling as 'not my business'. He's an adult and can handle his own relationships. If I think there's a serious problem, it's my job as his friend, at least, to point it out to him, and let him know that I think he's being taken advantage of, or whatever. And then, again, it's his problem. I have to step out of it and let him deal with it - or not - as he wishes. Their relationship does not function the same as our relationship. Heck, his relationship to me doesn't function the same way as his relationship to some of my alters, even. He has a lot of balls in the air; I shouldn't criticize his juggling.

So what does that make his other girlfriend to me? Or me to her? My relationship to her is that of a friend. We plan to all live together eventually, so we better be at least friends, right? I'm not interested in women for relationships, so that option is unfortunately closed. But we've kind of decided that my boyfriend's girlfriend is my girlfriend, at least for the shorthand.

'Need to Know' Information [Me]

Okay, I'm out - doubly out. I've now come out about both my kink and my multiplicity to my daughter and to my sister and brother-in-law. And a little bit to my Mom - she knows that my boyfriend has another girlfriend, sort of, at least. I do feel better about it. My daughter and sister and brother-in-law know a lot of my kinky friends, and I'm not made in such a way that I can keep my circles of friends separate. So know I don't have to worry about someone saying something around the wrong family member that confuses them.

We won't be telling my parents a lot of this. Not because I'm afraid to, but in deference to them. It would worry them and upset them, and they just don't need to know. There's nothing they need to do about it. My daughter needs to know in case it becomes an issue in the future that she has to deal with. My sister and brother-in-law need to know so they aren't lost when it comes up in conversation.

So my daughter's reaction wasn't a huge surprise. It was more of "huh, that's interesting. Hey, that could explain why..." And she told me about a time when she really saw that I was just NOT myself and she didn't get it. Now she does. Then she asked for a 'cast list' so she knows who's who. And I got her one. That was the extent of her reaction, really.

My brother-in-law and sister both have some educational background in psychology. So he looked at it as an interesting case to ask questions about. And she asked how many of us there are and if I was in therapy, and was done with it. I also gave them a 'cast list', and she quickly pointed out that Kiara shares a lot of traits with her. My boyfriend agreed pretty heavily on that - said a lot of her behaviors are the same as my sister's.

Love is a Muddy Track [Me]

So remember the being distracted because I stumbled into love? It hasn't gotten any better. In fact, I think this one might stick around for a while. And that's scary, a little, for me. I'm a very independent person, and the idea of tying myself rather securely over the long term to another person makes me react by pushing people away. I haven't had the best of experiences with people I get romantically close to.

As a teenager, I quickly fell 'in love' - actually more of an 'in lust' - with a series of boys, got my heart broken, and cried just long enough for the next boy to catch my eye. My first real experience with romantic love was when I fell for a fellow at school who completely didn't know I existed. I had it bad, and couldn't understand why. He certainly didn't encourage me or anything. When we actually met up through some friends after he graduated, he only vaguely remembered that we had gone to school together. We've gotten together as friends a few times over the years since - and a couple of times romantically, and now we are friends.

I was only 16 when I really fell in love with the guy who became my first husband. And he was no winner - jealous, physically abusive, and just generally a loser. After a few trips to the hospital, I finally got away from him, taking our infant with us. I really was in love with him - there were moments of magic early on, but love can be destroyed if you try hard enough.

Over the next couple of years, just trying to raise myself and a baby while going to college took up enough energy that dating was merely an afterthought, and relationships just weren't an option. But as things settled down, I found myself with someone. And he seemed to be interested in taking care of us. I convinced myself that that was better than love. Until we married, he quit working, and things just generally fell apart.

So I decided that I needed to grow up a little before sharing myself romantically, and swore off men entirely for six years. I learned how to be an adult all by myself.

Then I dated pretty casually for several years. Back in school again, still living the single-mom life, I just didn't worry about it a lot. I found the kink community, and dated people who are my kind of freaks. I found a dominant that really touched me inside. Love? I don't know; I feel very strongly about him, but I'm not interested in a romantic relationship with him. We're friends, and he's very important to me, but that's where it lies.

Last year, I fell pretty hard for someone that I started off teaching, and ended up playing with. I didn't realize how strong an emotional attachment I had developed for him until something went really wrong and he cut me off suddenly. I cried for three days.

And back to dating - and playing - casually. I had people I love playing with but couldn't get close to romantically, and people I dated but really didn't have a good play relationship with. By 'play relationship', I mean playing in the BDSM sense. A play relationship is very important to me, but it's not at all the same thing as a sexual or romantic relationship. In some ways it's much more, others less.

So now I'm in love. We're in love. We've talked about having a future together, and sometimes it really terrifies me. Kiara and Cherish are both able to give themselves completely over to loving him, and I envy that. I can taste that emotion, but I can't just give myself over to it like they can. Even though I'd love to be able to just say, "We're in love; it'll all work out somehow'; on a 'grown-up level', I have a need to look at the realities and possibilities that are really involved.

I'm all too aware of what's 'over the horizon' - all those other responsibilities and tie-ups we each have. I just don't know if everything can be made to work. I worry about the 'what-if's. His other relationships, my other relationships. Can we eventually combine households without my control-freak nature and his coming into conflict? How long will the blush of love make everything look so rosy? And will I worry myself into creating the very problems I worry about?

For now, there are several situations in his life and in mine that are going to leave us both in a 'hold state' for a the next few months - we just can't make decisions about 'us' until those things are settled first. And I think that's going to turn out to be a good thing in the long run. As we work on our relationships between us, so will each of us be working on our own things to deal with. And if love survives all that processing, then we'll be able to work on combining our lives with some rationality.