Why I think polyamory is net negative for most people who try it

This is crossposted from my Substack

TL;DR:
-Most people cannot reduce jealousy much or at all
- It fundamentally causes way more drama because of strong emotions, jealousy, no default norms to fall back to, and there being exponentially more surface area for conflict
- For a small minority of people, it makes them happier, and those are the people who tend to stick with it and write the books on it, creating a distorted view for newcomers.

OK, let’s get into the nuance.

Background: I was polyamorous starting with my first boyfriend and was polyamorous for about 7 years. I was in a community where probably over 50% of the people around me were poly.

Unfortunately, poly was extremely bad for me due to its very nature and structure, and my experience is not uncommon but it is not commonly publicly talked about.

Poly makes some people very happy. I am sharing why I think it was bad for me and many other people in the hopes of letting people make an informed choice.
 

Premise #1 - Most people can't just stop being jealous

If you look into the poly literature, you’ll always find some variant of the story “yes, jealousy will suck at first. But if you work on yourself, eventually it’ll go away or reduce a ton. Maybe you’ll even start feeling “compersion”, where you feel happy that your spouse is falling in love with and having sex with somebody else”.

I have no doubt this happens to some people, but it is by no means the norm.

I was poly for 7 years and I was trying to fix my jealousy for almost that entire time.

And not to brag, but I am good at self-improvement. I’ve reduced my anxiety by about 85% and my sadness by 99% over my life. I have an emotion spreadsheet I’ve filled out nearly every day for the last 11 years. I'm pretty good at optimizing my emotions.

And that was my downfall.

I just couldn’t admit to myself that I couldn’t change this part of me.

After all, I’d read Ethical Slut and More Than Two and they’re full of stories saying “I used to be like you. But I just worked on being a more confident person and trusting my partner and did some CBT, and now I have compersion!”

And that just seemed so much more enlightened.

If they can do it, surely I can too.

But the thing is, most people can’t.

Even for all the stories you read there, you’ll find that they usually say they just reduce jealousy, not eliminate it. Or they started off with a low baseline of jealousy to begin with. Or they found one configuration of poly that’s working for them at the moment but later, you find out it exploded in an awful mess, but they don’t write about that update.

The thing is, jealousy, whether it’s biological or socialized (and my bet is mostly on biological), is hard to change.

Most people just dip their toes into poly, feel intense jealousy or experience jealousy from their partner, then go back to monogamy. Or they try for a bit, continue to feel like shit, then go back to mono.

You just don’t hear about them as much because they don’t write about it.
 

Premise #2: poly causes way more drama

Poly causes drama due to its very nature.

Which, people say, happens in monogamous relationships too.

To which I say sure, but at different scales.

It’s like saying that sure China has put approximately 1.8 million Uyghurs in prison camps, but the USA has Guantanomo (around 780 people total).

Yes, they’re both bad. But one is much worse.

Scale matters.

And my claim is that poly causes a whole different scale of drama compared to monogamy.

First off because it’s dealing with the main source of drama - humans with strong emotions.

And poly brings up strong emotions.

Of course there’s the intense jealousy. Some of my worst emotional experiences have been being wracked with jealousy and shame for even feeling jealous in the first place.

Then there’s the strong emotions of falling in love.

Which would be nice, except you’re feeling jealous because your partner is falling in love with somebody else. But don’t worry, you just need to work on yourself. Obviously they won’t leave you for this new shiny person (which, btw, is a lie. This happens all the time. People are very bad at predicting their emotions. It’s one thing to promise they won’t leave when there’s nobody to leave to. It’s a different story when they’re in love).

Then there’s all the secondary emotions that stem from these. Anger and resentment. Stress. Fear.

And poly causes more drama because there’s exponentially more moving parts.

When your partner starts dating a new person, that person can’t just have drama with your partner. They can have drama with you. And your partner can have drama with their other partner.

It gets complicated fast.

I remember once I had drama caused by my boyfriend’s wife’s boyfriend’s girlfriend’s girlfriend (my meta-meta-meta-metamour).

There’s just exponentially more surface area for drama. And it shows.

It’s actually the primary reason I decided to become monogamous.

I remember once in our polycule there was an explosion of proportions that can only happen in poly. Me and my partner at the time decided to become monogamous for a bit, to protect our relationship till things calmed down.

This was the first time in my life I’d been monogamous.

And it was amazing.

The amount of time I had to spend on relationship drama went down 99.9%.

The amount of time that I had to spend processing my own emotions or helping other people process theirs went down by about 97%.

I ended up going back to poly because I was convinced that I just hadn’t found the right poly configuration and I just hadn’t tried it with the right people and I just needed to work on myself more.

The drama went up instantly.

There were occasional reprieves where I thought I’d finally found the right configuration, and then I’d be going around telling people about the joys of poly.

Then, inevitably, a few months later, it’d be drama again.

For example, once I was in a configuration that seemed good. But then I broke up with one of the parties and it went from “wow, this is incredible” to “wow, I didn’t know humans were physically capable of crying this much”.

I’ve now been in a monogamous relationship for 4.5 years and I’ve had less relationship drama with him in that entire time than I had in almost any randomly chosen month of my poly career.

Drama is also increased by the fact that there are no defaults people can fall back to, so there’s room for disagreement and fighting constantly.

Imagine every time you started or ended a relationship, you had to establish every social norm from scratch.

Is it OK for partner to have sex with your best friend?

Is it OK to kiss somebody else in front of your partner?

What about them having sex in your bed when you're out of town?

Is it OK to have sex with another person then tell your partner the details?

Is your partner allowed to bring his lover to Christmas with your family? What about your kid’s birthdays?

If your partner’s lover is having a mental health breakdown, is it OK for your partner to go comfort her when it’s your day with him?

The list is endless, and so will your arguments about it.

That really is so much of poly.

Just so many emotionally fraught conversations.

Even if you are low jealousy and high emotional stability, that is no guarantee about your partner, your partner’s partner, you’re partner’s partner’s partner, etc.

Premise #3: there is massive bias in reporting about polyamory that makes it look better than it is

The people who write books about polyamory are the people who it works really well for. Which makes sense.

The people who had a bad experience tend to not tell the public about it.

I can’t tell you the number of times poly was making me miserable but I didn’t tell anybody but my partner.

I’d sometimes even be singing the praises of poly to people.

Why would I do something like that?

So many reasons.

People would naturally be curious about my lifestyle. They’d ask me why I did it.

And what was I going to say?

“Yes, it does look like a crazy lifestyle choice.

And yes, I’m currently spending many nights crying alone in bed while my partner is out falling in love with another woman and having sex with her.

But do you know what, I read in a book that if I just work on myself, I won't feel so bad. So yeah, I think it’s the right choice in expectation.”

They’d think that my partner was a bad person because of dumb cultural expectations. They wouldn’t be able to get past the gut reaction of “your partner’s cheating on you” feeling, especially if I’m a crying woman. Even though I’m a grown-ass adult and am making a choice.

(Which I stand by. If consenting adults try poly, it’s not cheating at all and if people get hurt, that doesn’t make any party a bad person. People are allowed to consent to do things that end up hurting them and they end up regretting.)

They’d tell me that obviously I couldn’t change my jealousy, but I knew I could change it. I just needed more time. I just hadn’t found the right technique yet. The poly culture told me I just had to do the work.

If you are doing something outside of societal norms, you have to justify it. You can’t go around doing something eccentric and say “yes, it is actually hurting me and I'm wondering if I actually hate it but don't worry. Everything is fine”

Then, when people leave, they don't tend to write about it. They don't write about it because it's not like it's this big problem that people need to fix. Polyamory is still incredibly rare.

They don't write about it because they blame themselves. They just couldn't handle it. It's fine for other people.

Which, I do endorse. In a certain sense. I do think some people actually do like poly and it is net good for them and they should do it. I just think they are the minority and most people will suffer a lot, lose a relationship or two, experience a ton of drama, and be worse for wear.

They won't write about it because they're worried about seeming prudish. Anybody who tries poly tends to be incredibly progressive and liberal, and it goes against their values to seem like somebody who's against polyamory.

They won't write about it because they're worried that people accuse them of poly shaming. I am definitely worried about this myself.

I am only writing this because I’ve become the go-to person in my community where there’s a little bit of whisper network. I’ve probably had about a dozen people reach out and say “Hey, I heard you tried poly and think it’s a bad idea for most people. I’m considering being poly, and I’d love to hear your take.”

Usually I write something up if just 3 people ask me the same question, but it took way longer in this case because I was worried that my poly friends would think I’m saying they’re dumb or unethical. Which couldn’t be farther from the truth.

I think consenting adults should be allowed to do practically whatever they want.

I think poly is net positive for some percentage of people who try it.

I just think the percentage is small and there’s a bias about how it’s written online.

Also, I have recently worked on myself such that online hate hardly bothers me anymore.

So I’m going to use my newfound powers for good and try to help balance out the poly coverage online.

Maybe consider it to be similar to my advice about running a startup. I think the vast majority of people would hate it. They will suffer a ton, then they will fail and go back and get a regular job.

Does that mean I think founders are dumb or unethical to try? Absolutely not. I think for the people who like it, it’s a massive good.

But I certainly don’t recommend running a startup to most people.

Who is more likely to like poly?

I don’t really know.

I think it’s broadly for people where the upsides are really high and the downsides are really low.

So if you’re naturally very low jealousy, this can help.

Although it certainly is no guarantee. I am actually incredibly low jealousy. That’s why I tried poly.

I didn’t even experience jealousy almost at all for the first 2 years or so. But that was because I hadn’t encountered my triggers yet.

I’ve also been with somebody who never got jealous - except for the one time they did, when it caused some of the largest drama I’ve ever seen, including multiple lost jobs, permanent enemies, and multiple ended relationships.

On the flip side, I think for some people the upsides are so high that it’s worth it to them.

Some people are 99th percentile on valuing freedom, including the freedom to have sex with and love whoever they want.

Some people value sexual diversity a lot more, which you can’t get in a monogamous relationship.

Some people appear to find the upsides of the relationships to be worth it, even if it causes more drama.

I don’t know for what percentage of people polyamory is net positive. It’s certainly non-zero.

And I’m not saying “nobody should be poly” or “being poly is bad” or “we should shame poly people”.

When people try to criticize a community by saying it’s filled with “polyamorists” and they try to make people squeamish, I jump in and tell people off.

People should be able to do almost whatever they want with consenting adults.

Even if there’s a person on the internet who thinks it’s a bad call for most people.

I mean, I could be wrong.

Or you could be the sort of person it’s net positive for.

And if you try poly and it's not for you, I hope you also share your experience. So people can make their choice and not only hear the people saying good things about it.