I am a bisexual woman in an (almost 8 year!) relationship with a straight man. We are engaged. I was in denial about my sexuality until about a year ago and it caused a massive amount of chaos for me mentally— I had panic attacks, intrusive thoughts, body pain, and OCD compulsions all centering around the idea that my sexuality was going to implode our relationship. It went on and on and until finally we moved to a new city, discovered the app Feeld— and he pushed me (with love!) to explore my sexuality with other women. It was important to me that he be present and experience this part of my sexuality with me— so we’ve had a fair amount of group sex— over 10 threesomes/foursomes in the past year. I would describe our situation as technically ENM or monogamish (though at present he’s not allowed to have sex with other people without me present and I’m not having sex with men without him present.) To say this has been healing for me would be an understatement— my body pain is gone, panic attacks are gone, OCD compulsions are gone— I can finally say with a great deal of relief that I’m bisexual with confidence and with a great deal more peace than I had a year ago. Some of the people we’ve connected with have become actual friends, I’m slowly finding some queer community etc.

HOWEVER.

Exploring together, has brought up MORE emotional stuff for me, which I would say is pretty normal— the fear of abandonment, the fear that I’m not pretty/smart/sexy/attractive enough you name it I’ve worried about it. Despite of most of these sexual experiences ultimately being positive for me— I often completely meltdown beforehand and feel VERY stressed, though in the moment (having sex, actually hanging out with someone) it is usually fine. I never saw non-monogamy as a path for me, was never interested in it, and still struggle to understand how I feel about it. My partner however, decided last year that he is in fact, non-monogamous— he agrees with the philosophy, the ideology, and ideas surrounding non-attachement to others especially sexually. He argues that this is fun, freeing, something joyful, realistic— and even though I can logically see where he is coming from I find that emotionally I am having a really hard time adopting ENM as a mindset and feeling at peace with his desires for others. Sometimes I am on board, sometimes I’m not— often within the span of an hour or a day I flip flop in terms of what I think I want or need. It seems impossible to go back to full blown monogamy, when I think about him having separate experiences or even liking people other than me it makes me want to barf, the thought of me never having sex with anyone else again ever just seems idiotic…. like obviously I will have sex with other people…

He simply doesnt think practicing non-monogamy is a big deal, and I think it is. With the way things have been going, neither of us (myself included as much as I hate to admit it) feel like we can go back to full blown monogamy, but the pressure of accepting non-monogamy into my life makes me spiral for days. I am between a rock in a hard place, unable to go back, terrified to move forward, and unhappy with how I am handling everything. In reading this sub I came across the term poly-under-duress which is often how I feel about our situation... except that I dont know if I can go back to monogamy either… I just feel so insecure. He’s a musician and last year was touring a lot— during that time he was tempted to cheat a number of times, though he did not— I think he sees the freedom to explore if he wants as insurance so that we can stay together forever, because he’s clearly feeling limited by our more monogamous life. I’m afraid of having feelings for other people, sometimes it all just seems so complicated…

I think too, he gets really excited by the thought of me hitting on other women and checking/commenting on other women out together… recently we were at a party and a woman came on very strong to the both of us, he clearly was excited and hopeful that it would result in sex and I completely shut down, I guess because it all felt so out of my control and I still feel so new to actually acknowledging my queerness at all. It sometimes just hurts. I hate to even say this online because I know how insecure it reads, but throughout the course of our relationship other women have consistently hit on him, flirted with him, etc. and it’s bothered me, I struggle to trust others and their intentions though AGAIN the actual experiences we’ve had have mostly been positive, like I’ve watched him have sex with someone else and been genuinely fine with with it. I know this is not necessarily a poly question but I’m hopeful that someone with more experience might be able to offer wisdom. I’m reading the books, listening to the podcasts. I feel like I’m ruining our relationship, as I vascillate between being ashamed that I’m not more keen on being ENM to feeling like too much is being asked of me to just being horny and wanting more experiences.

I think I get so sad sometimes lately because all of this makes me feel unspecial to him— the thought that other people would get the most fun and sexiest parts of him where it feels like I’m walking around picking up our fucking laundry and washing the dishes, paying the bills. I think too— and this is maybe unkind but honest, I’ve been financially supporting both of us for the past year and a half or so. He hasn’t made any money at all since he’s starting a new business and it’s taken all his time to get it off the ground— and who’s been funding the business? Me. I’ve spent the small inheritance I got from a grandparent on his business. I’m paying for everything, working two jobs, literally asking my parents for help financially, gone into credit card debt. I know someone unkind will comment and say something along the lines of “Just break up” not only would it be financially ruinous for me, but the truth is— I don’t want to. I love him. Our life together is truly amazing except this is truly something we cannot seem to get on the same page about and it’s starting to get really dark.

Do I just need to change my mindset? What questions am I not asking myself? I’m obviously on the fence, which I feel like is the hardest place to be. I feel so vulnerable. Kindness and wisdom appreciated.