Hi! I’m not sure what I really need advice about but I feel stuck in the mud when it comes to relationships at the moment and talking to non poly people usually ends in confusion unfortunately…

I’ve been poly for a little over a year now (21/f) but I only got out of my first poly relationship a couple months ago and during most of it I didn’t have any other partners. I like poly because I appreciate being able to focus on more than one person / I like the room it gives me to think more about boundaries and how to be healthy, especially because I have a tendency to get a little too obsessive in relationships.

My first poly relationship was healthy for the most part, ended amicably. Both of us were pretty busy so pursuing outside relationships wasn’t the first priority (I’m in college so that takes up a majority of my time tbh). Other than that my polyamory really sorted itself into having an unhealthy limerent relationship with someone I know sort of well / talk to sometimes. I don’t know that the polyam was the healthy part of that relationship tbh. This week he told me that if he had a poly relationship in the future he would essentially just want to be a unicorn hunter which really gave me the ick and is starting to make me feel like I don’t know what a real poly relationship is like …

Now I’m starting to pursue someone else more casually and I’m really questioning how to have better boundaries around relationships. We had okay sex for the first time a couple days ago and like almost no communication since. Normally I want to talk about my relationships with friends but this time I’m trying to come at it from a place of more peace and calm. The casual thing makes me feel crazy because the NRE my ADHD makes me seek constant validation. Is this just normal growing pains?