~Out~

What that means for me, is that my children, who know know him as my almost-two-year-boyfriend, would have to reconcile the fact that I am very much in love with him…and that his wife is okay with that. Not just okay, but supportive, just as SMF is with her and her boyfriend (who also happens to have a wife.)

I don’t quite get the urgency in declaring our alternative relationship dynamic to the masses, because believe me, my family is huge, and this will be The Gossip for a long, long time. And for what? Authenticity? Honesty? Why is not knowing this piece of information a bad thing?

Why?

I have a fantasy of entangled lives. Living openly, in and out of each other’s houses, family dinners, birthday celebrations. (I also have a fantasy of winning the lottery, but I never expect that to actually happen.) Metamour is SMF’s wife, and I would love to be able to have a sister-wife relationship with her. That would be my happy place. And if I was lucky enough to find another love, with another man, I would want us all to live happily ever after. Don’t laugh.

Yes, I said it. Sister-wife.

I know of no other word to effectively describe this desire. Of course, the fact that I was born and raised a staunch Mormon surely has spawned this vocabulary choice. Regardless, this is not something I think that Meta wants. We have coffee occasionally, and we have had some good conversations. But I believe she prefers to compartmentalize. She supports SMF in his relationship with me, but she doesn’t necessarily want to cultivate a friendship with me. Sometimes I look at certain women, who I feel a kinship with, and I wonder how different things might be if Meta and I could be close. (Metamour: a partner of a partner. This term has become popular in the poly community, and though I don’t love it, there’s no other word that I can find that is specific to this situation.)

Which brings me back, full circle, to this notion of Being Out.

On this day, at this point in time, my only motivation for full disclosure to my children and my Big Fat Mormon Family…would be hypothetically, if Meta was going to overlap our lives more. If she wanted to be present in the lives of my children and myself. Special Man Friend and I have been together for a significant period of time. My children know him. SMF is worried that the longer we wait to put this fact on the table, the harder it will be for the kids to understand. To be okay with something that is just downright weird. Their mother loves a married man. And his wife is okay with that. Some days that seems weird even to me.

Hell, most days, that seems weird to me.