What Non-Monogamy Taught Me About Relationships

As a sex and relationship therapist, I’ve studied relationships. I’ve taught and given lectures about them. I’ve hosted dating events. Gossiped endlessly amongst people at parties, and I’ve held and been held through many relationship highs and lows.

I know a lot about the science and the art of relationships. But my greatest classroom has largely been in non-monogamous relationships. It’s in non-monogamy where I’ve had to challenge my assumptions and expectations about love, commitment and what it means when we therapists say “relationships are hard work”. Those learnings can happen within monogamy, of course. But the process and journey of non-monogamy has provided a platform for me to dive deeper. Here’s what I’ve learned…

1. Romantic love is not enough.

Regardless of relationship structure, much of our current culture sets up romantic relationships to be one of the most important relationships in our lives, if not the most important. And often at the cost of many others.

We all have different definitions of what love means. For example, love can mean sacrifice, passion or loyalty. What non-monogamy taught me about relationships is that these static definitions of romantic love don’t equip us with the skills that come with building deep and meaningful relationships.

Non-monogamy can put us in situations that test the edges of our comfort zones. This can be experiencing jealousy, meeting your partner’s partner, or going through a break-up while maintaining another relationship. Romantic love will seldom be enough if you don’t know how to listen or communicate, how to repair after arguments, or if you don’t have a community to lean on.

Healthy relationships start with you.

This does not mean that you have to be ‘healed’ in order to be in relationships or do non-monogamy. But you do have to face your relationship patterns. Whether it’s how we manage conflict, how we deal with big emotions, or how we avoid asking for what we want, we tend to repeat these same patterns until we learn how to do things differently.

Non-monogamy often speeds up this process by making these patterns increasingly clear because you’ll be getting data inputs from not just one relationship, but multiple relationships. And often at the same time.

It’s a common mistake in some early non-monogamous relationships to attempt to ‘control feelings’ through rules. Rules like “don’t fall in love with others”. You’ll quickly learn that no such control exists and all that you do have control over is yourself and your own behaviours.

Relationships are their own creative practices.

Non-monogamy does away with the traditional Relationship Escalator. You know, the one that says “you date, you move in together, you get married, you have children and you live happily ever after”. It gives us the opportunity to ask ourselves at each step if this is what you truly want. Or just something you’ve been taught to want.

It also gives us the autonomy and the choice to create something else entirely insofar as everyone that you’re in relationship with is on similar pages. When you start to pull this thread, more questions often come up. For example, how do we personally define cheating? How important is it that we know everything our partners are up to? Or what differentiates a friendship from a romantic relationship?

Non-monogamy can allow us to take inventory of our unique wants and values when we aren’t fixated on following what everyone else is doing.

It’s not that personal.

We all need and want different things, and we all move at different paces. We spin many stories about what it can mean for ourselves and our relationships because our brains are meaning-making machines. For example, “it means I’m not good enough if I feel jealous”. Or “I’m a bad partner for wanting more”. Sometimes it’s just not that personal.

This doesn’t mean our feelings aren’t valid. But it’s the stories we create about our feelings that can keep us stuck in more unhelpful patterns in our relationships. Especially when navigating the social stigma around non-monogamy, you can learn to separate what is your baggage and what’s everyone else’s that they are projecting onto you.

Sharing your needs, wants and desires is a gift.

This is incredibly important when we consider communication, boundary setting and agreement making in non-monogamous relationships, and if anything it becomes a requirement to the process. It’s sink or swim.

Whether it’s a specific kink, an open relationship or some other burning desire, stating what you want requires us to lean into vulnerability and to be known. To share these parts of yourself can feel exposing. But it allows our partners to love us in the ways we want to be loved. And for us to have sex in the ways we truly want to.

Read more: Desires, fears, and boundaries with Morgan Penn.

Whether you’re casual or committed, polyamorous or swinging, or monogamous or non-monogamous, these foundations of relationships mostly stay the same. And I’ve found that to be true inside and outside of the therapy room. Yes, non-monogamy requires us to think more fluidly and to consider more moving variables at any given moment. But we all have much to learn about how to do relationships well regardless of how many people are involved.