by Jessica Fern
CHAPTER TEN
COMMON QUESTIONS AND FINAL THOUGHTS
BEFORE WE END THIS BOOK, I want to cover a few questions that I am asked frequently enough to make them worth addressing. Then I will offer my final words to you.
How many nonmonogamous attachment-based relationships can I have?
I get this question a lot, and, probably to your disappointment, I don’t have a single quantifiable number to give you. Maybe in the future, there will be research that indicates the ideal number of attachment figures you can have while nonmonogamous, but I’d still be cautious of this because what I’ve seen is that it really depends on circumstances. There are many factors that will impact how many partners you can fully enter into a secure attachment– based relationship with. How demanding of your time and attention is your work? Do you have kids? If so, how many and how old are they? Do you care for elderly parents or other adults? Are you in school? How stable is your living situation? How’s your health? Do you or your partners have any special needs? Where are you in your healing process regarding trauma and attachment insecurity? Are there certain hobbies or passions that are very important for you to pursue or make time for? Are you in a major life transition (e.g., divorce, moving house, a career change, gender transition or leaving an organized religion)? Are you in a certain phase of life that makes it easier or harder to have partners? These are just some of the factors that can impact how much emotional bandwidth a person has for secure relationships. It’s not just about how polysaturated you are, but how life-saturated you are.
In the nonmonogamous world there is a popular saying that love is infinite, but time and resources are not. This saying highlights the paradox of ultimate versus relative reality—love is not a finite resource, so it is possible for us to love more than one person at a time, but we are all in bodies that are limited to the relative realities of space and time, so having infinite partners is not actually possible. When thinking about attachment-based relationships, this phrase is extremely relevant and can be adapted to say that love is infinite, but secure attachment is not. Since not all of your relationships have to be attachment-based, you may have several, even many, romantic or sexual partners. But it is important to be honest and realistic about how many people you have the time and resources to invest in the HEART of being polysecure with before you begin to compromise or dilute your other attachment-based relationships. Additionally, if you prioritize secure attachment with yourself, does this change, whether through enhancing or reducing, what you can offer others?
Should we close our relationship when there are attachment problems?
Again, it depends. I’ve seen both ends of the spectrum—closing an open relationship can cause damage both inside and outside of the relationship, but staying open when there are clear attachment problems can also cause irreparable damage to the people or relationships struggling with attachment insecurity. Some people are quick to advise a struggling couple to close up, to just focus on each other and to take the time to heal their attachment issues. If that feels like the right decision for you and your partner, then great! There are times when I have seen this as the best option for an individual or couple, but be cautious of applying monogamous advice to a polyamorous context. Attachment issues do not just show up in the early stages of a monogamous couple opening up, but also with people who are solo poly and with people who have been practicing forms of nonmonogamy for years, so please beware of jumping to closing a relationship as the attachment cure-all.
Through working with individuals, couples and polycules, I have seen people try many different courses of action when there is attachment insecurity in a polyamorous context. These options range from completely closing up a relationship, to taking a temporary dating pause or having certain relationship limits, to staying completely open. Each of these has its pros and cons, with certain restrictions and certain freedoms. While it is extremely difficult to experience polyinsecurity, is also difficult to be asked to change your behavior to support your insecure partner. When deciding which of these potential options would be best for you and your relationships, it is good to remember that attachment work is more about the marathon than the sprint. Two important factors to consider are:
How severe is the attachment insecurity? Is it mild, moderate or severe to the point of interfering with functionality, well-being or mental health?
How much damage could be caused for the partners who are not experiencing attachment insecurity, based on how open or closed an individual or pairing of partners decides they are going to be? There is an important distinction here between damage and discomfort. Some of the below options might not be comfortable for everyone involved, but they should not be damaging. Even if some of these options are uncomfortable and not what you would necessarily choose in your ideal situation, they should still be considered as temporary choices or compromises that you are willing to make because they feel worth it for the health of your relationship or polycule, versus options that are damaging to you, your partners or your metamours.
Closing Up:
When attachment insecurity is at play, one option is to temporarily close up. Closing up typically looks like both you and your partner getting off the dating apps and taking a complete break from seeing any people you have been talking to or even dating. Basically, you’re going back to monogamy for a moment. Temporarily closing up to focus on healing your attachment can be helpful, especially when there is more severe attachment insecurity. The caveats here are that attachment healing does not happen overnight and there will probably never be a point where you are 100 percent healed and feel absolutely ready to open up again, so at some point you will have to face the discomfort of moving forward into nonmonogamy. Ideally you will only do this when you and/or your partner have enough inner foundation and interpersonal strength to weather the storm. I’ve seen closing up work best in the following situations:
You are currently single and you decide to refrain from dating or entering into a relationship until you feel more capable and ready to relate from a secure place.
You are in a relationship that is new to opening up where one or both partners are experiencing attachment insecurity and neither of you has any other relationships that you would be deserting or harming by closing up.
You are not new to nonmonogamy and you and your one partner are in a phase where you don’t have other relationships.
You are not new to nonmonogamy and you have multiple partners and metamours, but they are genuinely alright with taking a break while you do the attachment work needed in your primary relationship. Typically, these other relationships are not as attachment-based.
Taking a Pause:
A few steps further along from completely closing up is taking a pause. Unlike when an individual or a couple completely closes up and stops pursuing any other relationships, a person or a couple taking a pause may maintain some of their current connections, but press the pause button on progressing in those relationships for a certain amount of time. In this scenario, a person might still talk and message with partners as friends or spend time together in person, but they are temporarily stepping back from the more romantic or sexual dimensions of those relationships. For some people this can be a very supportive option since you don’t have to completely let go of certain connections that may be of importance to you, but you can also temporarily have a rest from the added attachment stress of multiple partners. One person I worked with called her version of a pause her attachment sabbatical. She informed all of her partners that she had no intention of ending or changing their relationships, but she was choosing to be out of contact for six weeks to do her own inner attachment work. After six weeks, she planned to return to the relationships as if she had just been away on a retreat during that time. In her case, all of her partners were able to accommodate her sabbatical and they agreed to only make contact in case of an emergency. I’ve seen a pause work when:
The person initiating the pause is doing so
with partners who they are less entwined with or committed to.
The person initiating the pause does have partners who they are more entwined with or committed to, but these partners are able to fully consent to the pause, usually because they have other partners to turn to for romance or sex, they are in a very secure place themselves and/or the pause is temporary enough that they are willing to wait.
People are more oriented to relationship anarchy or relationship fluidity and everyone involved is able to smoothly shift back and forth from being more or less romantically/sexually involved.
Creating a Vessel:
When there is attachment insecurity within a polycule, I’ve seen people adopt a form of temporary polyfidelity where all current relationships stay as they are, but no new partners are added to the mix. This may mean either that all partners are polyfidelitous for a certain amount of time or that just some are. A married polyamorous couple that I work with coined their version of this “the vessel.” In their case, the husband was experiencing a more severe form of attachment insecurity that was rooted in his childhood, but was getting repeatedly triggered by his wife having two other partners and several potential suitors in the wings. When he and I first started our sessions together he wasn’t sure if he could do any version of polyamory, but as we identified the root of his struggles, the idea of a temporary vessel became a more preferable option than scrapping polyamory all together. In their own words:
The husband:
Coming to polyamory from swinging, I was accustomed to the safety of sharing experiences with my wife. The first year of polyamory left me floundering. Instead of bonding with my wife, I felt abandoned by the ease with which she could navigate polyamory and the difficulty I had in finding the sensual and sexual experiences that I also craved.
My anxious attachment style was fostered during my traumatic childhood, but definitely tickled by the multi-weekly dates that my wife was going on, as I stayed home with the children and tried to put a good and supportive face on. One image that kept occurring to me was two birds in flight, with the difference in their altitude representing the difference in their polyamorous experiences. My wife constantly soared higher than me, and at times I felt as though she’d lose sight of me, abandoning me for others and other experiences.
The concept of a vessel came about during one of my therapy sessions with Jess. I realized that it was the expansion of the number of partners that my wife had that was more anxiety-producing than the depth and closeness that she had with her current partners, which for me was beautiful and non-threatening. It was the anticipation of the breadth of partners that was triggering me, not depth.
The vessel that my wife and I negotiated was four months long, where she continued to be with her two other partners in addition to me, but she would not add any new partners to our polycule. The idea was she could experience as much depth in those months with the two partners as she wanted, but she wouldn’t look to expand her breadth with new partners during this time.
When she fully consented I immediately relaxed. With her on board, I stopped trying to manage her polyamory, and I was able to in earnest do the hard emotional healing and attachment work that I needed to do to better ground and align myself. I entered into a short, but beautiful, relationship of my own, and spent much less time worried about the distance between us in flight, and focused on keeping my flight steady and with less turbulence. That said, the negative aspect of the vessel was the truth that I had put rules around how my wife could practice poly, and I had to sit with this. On balance I’d say the pros definitely outweighed the cons. Before the vessel I wasn’t even sure if we could stay married.
There was definitely some angst on my end when the vessel’s period came to an end, but having an end time was important for a few reasons: it gave me the opportunity to test my newfound alignment, which lifted my self-esteem; it allowed for us to practice polyamory in a less hierarchical way that is important for my wife’s ability to have her own agency; and it gives us a moment in time that we can reflect back to with gratitude. It was a very helpful tool, not a permanent design.
The wife:
Coming up with the vessel was an important turning point for us. It gave us a temporary container to get into a secure place, which was highly needed. For me the pros of the vessel were:
The vessel allowed my husband space to catch his breath, which had a big impact on me.
It gave me a concrete way of showing my husband I care about his needs and feelings. It was a way for me to show him that he is a priority to me.
I was no longer crossing unspoken boundaries and therefore triggering my husband. So, for the first time, I had clear boundaries to follow!
It increased the security of my husband and my attachment to him.
The vessel made a dramatic decrease in my husband being triggered, which was the most amazing thing.
We were losing each other, and with the vessel we were able to be “us” again.
For me the cons of the vessel were:
When my other relationships were not going as great and my husband’s other relationships were going fabulously, I struggled with resentment in having the vessel.
It was challenging for me interacting with people who were outside the vessel, but whom I already had varying degrees of an established romantic or sexual relationship with.
Given the pros and the cons, in the end, it was the right choice for me, him and us.
Staying Open with No Restrictions:
When polyinsecurity is at play, another option is to not change anything, staying completely open to current and potential new partners while simultaneously working through attachment insecurity. To be honest, I have not yet seen this work in more severe cases of attachment insecurity, but I have seen it work when people are experiencing mild to moderate attachment insecurity. I’ve also seen this work when:
Individuals and partners are getting professional support for their attachment struggles.
Partners are highly motivated to work on their own attachment insecurity and are willing to do the HEARTS of being polysecure together.
Partners are able to prioritize time together to do the needed healing work.
Final Words
Thank you for coming on this journey with me! While this book has now come to an end, I hope that your journey has not. For all the things that I have included in the book, there are just as many things that I have not, and I know with certainty that as the book finally goes off to print I will undoubtedly wake up in the middle of the night tormented by additional edits I should have made or entire sections that I should have added.
We have covered several different aspects of attachment, trauma, nonmonogamy and what you can do to become more polysecure. It is my hope that this book will have an influence on our understanding of attachment and trauma by articulating the different levels at which they are experienced. The nested model can be applied to many other areas of identity and marginalization.
I hope that this book will challenge the monogamous presupposition that attachment theory primarily functions under and that some of the concepts covered are beneficial to people both monogamous and nonmonogamous. Cultivating secure attachment with ourselves is a universally applicable concept, not just for people wanting to be polysecure, but for anyone wanting to have more fulfillment, security and empowerment with themselves and in their relationships, whatever their form.
There are still many questions regarding the attachment experiences of polyamorous partners that need to be researched and answered. In particular, I hope that this book will encourage others to pursue further research into how early childhood attachment does or does not correlate with being nonmonogamous as an adult, how long-term polyamorous partners experience attachment throughout the lifespans of their multiple relationships and how the initial attachment challenges that we face when transitioning to nonmonogamy possibly create post-attachment growth, similar to how trauma can initiate positive post-traum
atic growth.
I know this book is not a panacea for everything related to attachment, trauma or nonmonogamy, but my hope is that it has given you enough insight, perspective and guidance on how to move forward from here. I also hope that you were able to see yourself reflected on some of these pages and that you have more clarity and compassion for yourself, your partners and your metamours. Although the wounds of your past may run deep and you may have had experiences that left you feeling broken, worthless, invisible, unloved or unaccounted for, healing is not out of your reach. I will not lie: the work to heal our personal traumas and attachment wounds and the effort needed to build polysecure relationships are not easy. It takes courage, devotion and perseverance, but please trust me in knowing that it is worth it. As we heal our past, we open up new possibilities for our future, and so it is also my hope that you are able to forge a new path forward, seeking any further support you need and relating to yourself and your loved ones in ever more polysecure ways.