The Door

Love and loss

It’s all around us, it’s almost continuous, it permeates life

Why is there so much pain, so much emptiness

Why love, if only to lose

People say it’s worth the pain

But is it, really

The pain can be shattering, numbing, unending

Isn’t it easier to live in the ordinary, day by day

Than to have mere glimpses of the extraordinary, which never lasts

I know what “they” say

But today I’m not sure what I believe

I see the dark torturous hurt all around me

A mother loses a child, that black sickening pain never goes away

A friend betrays another, a friendship has ended, a hole remains

Love is misplaced, it has to be left behind

A husband leaves his wife, her heart is empty and forever her shield is up

Love, loss, friendship, betrayal, sickness, heartache, pain, death

Is this the cycle of life

Is it worth it

Someone once said that with every loss comes a new beginning

We just need to open the door and find out what or who is behind it

My life needs to hang on to this hope

I need to keep opening the door

I choose to open the door.

How NOT to Embark into the Non-Monogamy Journey…

About 10 years ago my husband (let’s call him Jack for the purposes of anonymity), broached the topic of opening up our marriage. He and his best friend came up with this idea while framing a house together and were quite proud of themselves for this ingenious, no strings attached and everyone wins idea 😀 It was mostly a suggestion made in jest but it started the discussions. I knew enough about myself, even then, to know I was not a casual relationship person and I likely could never embark on a sexual journey with someone without falling in love. I wasn’t even sure I could do the sex part without the love part first. My husband and his friend figured they could do it all and remain detached. Stay tuned for how that idea panned out a few years later 😉 The idea was brought up here and there as a fun discussion topic among our group of friends but that’s where it stayed at the time. A theoretical discussion.

About a year later everything changed. Jack found out I’d crossed the line between friendship and more with with my best friend (a guy) at the time. It was more of an emotional affair than a physical one, although physical boundaries were crossed as well. There were many reasons this happened. None of them make it ok. But this situation didn’t happen in the vacuum of a happy fulfilling marriage either. Needless to say, this was devastating all around. I broke Jack’s heart. I ruined our closest friendships. We lost many people over this situation much like what would happen in a divorce because our families were so intertwined. Our kids lost people who were like family to them.

IT WAS BRUTAL!

I was a broken person for a long time. Crossing some very avoidable lines made me lose my best friend and that was the greatest irony and tragedy. I missed him in the worst way! Almost overnight, my person — my friend, my confident, my support, the person who knew me in ways no one else did — was gone. We didn’t want to, but we severed all ties to work on our marriages and focus on our families.

Jack graciously forgave me and we started putting the pieces back together. We dissected the situation endlessly. We changed our patterns, spent more time together and talked about — “what now?” Jack brought up opening up our marriage again within a couple months. He figured it was a natural progression at the time and I said a tentative yes because I felt like I couldn’t say no after what I’d done to him. I personally wasn’t even close to ready for the kind of change that was about to lambaste me. But I was consumed by guilt and pushed through and tried to ignore those voices in my head. For any of you who have been down the affair path, do not do what we did! Don’t make a decision this big out of guilt! Trust me! Healing needs to happen on both sides so that you can be in a solid place together, or it will come back to haunt you. At the time I felt like this was the only way to hang on to my marriage. I didn’t know what other options I had. Don’t get me wrong — my husband didn’t “force” me into anything. I was curious about this path as well. The timing was just bad and it was my own guilt that kept me from standing up for what I needed.

Very quickly I discovered our ideas of “ok let’s explore this non-monogamy path” meant very different things. I assumed explore meant to learn, think, discuss and repeat — for months or longer, without actual action. Within weeks Jack had his first make-out session during a trip he was on. I found out after the fact, and was utterly devastated. I wasn’t ready at all. But he pushed on and a month later he slept with someone (again without me knowing until after the fact) while we were on a family vacation. I was completely thrown and spiraled into a depression over these actions I wasn’t ready for. I was trying to read things and learn about the concept and what others before us had gleaned from their experiences. We tried to talk, and I mean endlessly, but I felt constantly behind whatever was going on and I could not function that way. Even though Jack wasn’t hiding anything deliberately, it felt like he kept having affairs I’d find out about after. And every action he took, no matter how minor, chipped away at my psyche.

Jack is an adventurer and will try anything at least once. I am the complete opposite. I’m a thinker. I do things slowly. I weigh consequences and I scare easily. This path was not working for me even a little bit. Jack heard me and knew I was being wrecked by all this and tried to slow down. But, he didn’t understand my pace and what I needed. The way we are wired is fundamentally different, and to this day, the hurt we cause each other is because of this and never, I believe, a deliberate action on either side.

We ran into new issues when he started falling for and pursuing a friend of his, because I knew that this would not be a simple fling. She was a person who might be in my life in a major way. Even though the idea of polyamory made more sense to me, I knew this was potentially huge and harder, long term, than simply opening up to short term flings. He tried to go slowly on this one but I still kept getting surprised and freaked out. Honestly, at this point I felt like I was drowning. There was no way to make progress on this concept and figure out how it could roll out in such a way that could work for us both, because all I was doing was surviving. No matter what I tried, I could not get ahead of my overwhelm. I wrote a lot of poetry at the time and it was all very dark — drowning, falling off cliffs, slipping off the edge….you get the point. I was a wreck. And I was doing all this without a social network or support system to keep me grounded and stabilized. I felt desperately alone and scared. Thankfully things did not stay in this dark place, but trust me — this is NOT the way to embark on the non-monagamy journey. But I’ll save more for another day 🙂

Please stay tuned — I promise the story gets a bit more optimistic from here 🙂

Slipping

Darkness encroaches

I feel myself slowly, steadily, suffocating

My fingers are slipping off the ledge I fervently cling to

One by one they are causing me to let go

I cry out in desperation!

Only silence answers

I look around me, spinning in circles

But fog is all I see

Where are you?

WHERE ARE YOU?

I’m a Mom! :)

Being a mom is the best thing that’s ever happened to me!

Maybe that sounds cliche but I am dead serious. My boys are unreal 🙂 I have 2, ages, 18 and 16, and they are the light of my life. They have supported me through things I could never have imagined they’d have to support me through. 

A few years ago something changed. I was most definitely their caretaker in every sense of the word. And then suddenly they started taking care of me as much, if not more, as I was of them. It was a shock when it dawned on me. Things were ugly around here for a while, as far as my marriage. We didn’t drag the kids into it, but we live in a small space. They knew. And they held me up as best they could through some of the hardest struggles I’ve faced. 

As opposed to my last posts, I am very much jumping to my current reality. This topic is on my brain at the moment because my oldest son has recently graduated from high school. It’s been a tumultuous time of fierce pride mixed with terror about him going into the world, and yes, as hard as it is to admit, me being left alone. Being a mom has been the primary focus of my life for…well….18 years 😄  And I’m scared. What will I do with myself when I don’t have humans who “need” me? Life has been going in this direction for a while but I still feel ill prepared and I’m still scared. I’m feeling more alone than I probably ever have in my life. Nothing is as it was supposed to be or at least is not like I imagined it would be at this point in my life. 

I am in a poly relationship and despite it being a wonderful committed relationship, his hands are full with his own large family, consuming career and other relationships. My husband and I are amicable but we are not the duo we were even 2 years ago. I am floundering. I feel alone. And I feel scared. And man, it’s humbling to admit that because I feel like I’ve done something wrong that lead me to here – this place of uncertainty when I thought I’d know it all by this age! No idea if I did screw up somehow or not but I definitely have not taken the road frequently traveled either. 

So back to my kids….. 😛

My oldest has graduated. He’s brilliant. He’s sensitive. He suffers from OCD and has since he was a little guy. He has dealt with the accompanying challenges in ways that make me proud and humble. He’s graduating with a French immersion certificate and the world is his oyster. He’s chosen to take some time off before pursuing a psych degree like his old mama did many eons ago. He’s a natural with animals. He can fix anything mechanical he puts his mind to. He puts friends’ needs before his own almost to a fault. He is a hard worker. And he values choice, the environment, relationships, family, learning and exploring. He’s an avid and very accomplished rider (motorcycles and dirt bikes). We actually did our motorcycle course together a couple years ago which was awesome! That boy made me a mom. He was not an easy baby but he was a human I loved fiercely from day 1 and respected and liked immediately. He’s unique. And quite frankly he’s amazing. The way he supports me and life choices he wouldn’t necessarily make himself, is something I’m grateful for every day. 

My baby has been a gift in a whole other way. He’s been my smiley happy boy from day 1 and was precisely what I needed. The year he was born was one of the hardest in our lives. My husband lost his job, my pregnancy was very tough and we weren’t sure the baby or I was going to make it, and our house and property burnt down, due to a forest fire, when he was only 2 months old. But through it all, I knew I had received a very special gift that year. He helped get us through times that were brutal and that has never changed. Despite challenges that life has thrown him, socially, academically, etc, he has always been able to find the bright spots. That has served him so well. Just today he told me he’s probably in the best place he’s ever been in his life and he’s so grateful for that. This kid has a generous heart, he is incredibly kind and is a gracious friend. He does not judge and he loves openly. He’s quirky and funny and doesn’t care what other’s think. He is mechanically inclined and is a hard worker. He can ride anything with any number of wheels, with or without a motor 🙂 He is a refreshing spirit every day. And to top it off, this kid knows me almost like no other. He sees my emotions almost quicker than I feel them and even better, he know’s how to handle them. The support I have had from my boy, especially being so young, is almost unbelievable. He has a simple wisdom beyond his years and he knows how to take care of people when they are hurting. 

My boys took off on a solo trip tonight further than they have ever gone and it was a moment of pride and sadness. My chickies are flying the coop. It’s a matter of days for the 18 year old. I’m so proud. So unbelievably proud. But I’m hesitant and scared and full of worry about the future, probably more for me than for them 😄 They are ready. They know themselves and they aren’t afraid. I feel lacking and confused in so many ways these days. But my boys are not part of that uncertainty and I am grateful for every day of the journey I have been on with them. They are amazing! And hey – I think I did A-ok in the mom department 😄  

My Sister Saved Me

As my life was crumbling around me, my oldest sister stepped in and saved me from certain lifelong insanity 🙂


I was hesitant, scared, and worried about judgement, but I was also desperate and falling apart and didn’t know where else to turn. She knew something big was up and gently prompted me to share and she quickly became the person I opened up to. It didn’t take long for the information to pour out and once it did, I relaxed into that fact that she hadn’t bolted. Despite all odds (our faith background, age difference and how we fundamentally saw the world through different lenses), my sister became my greatest confidant.  


I grew up in a Christian household. German Baptist to be specific 🙂 This was a positive force in my life. I never felt stifled or held back in any way. It was a place where it was ok to question and explore (up to a point, but I didn’t test that theory until my 20’s). It was a place of encouragement. It was a place I could use my talents for the good of others, as well as myself (this was mainly through music – I am a trumpet player). It was an extension of my family. I was part of meaningful community. Until some dramatic events unfolded in my life (home loss due to forest fire – more on that one day) and forever changed my relationship with my church and the people in it, this was my happy reality.  But growing up in the church and identifying as being a Christian has it’s unique challenges when you you’ve just cheated on your husband and you are trying to navigate alternative relationships. Suddenly you are wondering who your friends really are? Where is it truly safe to confess who I am? And not just the shiny side. I still don’t have all the answers to that one, but what I have found is that community and support can be found in places you don’t expect. It’s arguably been harder, but I don’t need church walls to experience authentic community. 


My sister was my first test in taking that terrifying leap. Despite our shared upbringing and the moral code that came with that, together, we found room for new thoughts and experiences, totally apart from judgement. I expanded those sheltered parameters I grew up with and found people along the way who were doing the same. 


Hope came back. 


As I mentioned above, there is a large age gap between my sister and I. Almost 13 years. We’ve always been close considering that, but we are very different humans and all along the way have chosen to experience life in very different ways. She’s the oldest, a control freak, has always lived in “perfect” manicured neighborhoods or condo’s, and is beautiful and always well put together – including the matching shoes and handbag 😄  I’m the youngest, rather laid back and I live off grid where chickens are my main daily companions. I dress accordingly and regularly get into trouble for my shoddy purse choices 😄 Before this time of my life, we rarely spent much more time together than family events and the odd coffee or wine hang out. Then suddenly my world changed. Overnight. And I didn’t know where to turn with my loneliness and guilt and confusion about the future. My sister had gone through a marriage breakdown a few years before this and was just starting to put her life back together. She knew something of heartache and understood a lot of the complexities I was facing at the time. She was primed and ready to be my rock. 


She didn’t agree with everything I’d done and thought opening our marriage was downright ludicrous. But… she listened. She discussed. She was a shoulder to cry on. An escape when I needed a break from my life. A place I could confess anything and everything I was feeling and thinking. And she even helped me pick out clothes as I tentatively went on those first dates 🙂 


One of the most profound lessons I’ve learned on this journey is that most people I get real with are often holding on to their own deep dark secrets and are happy someone else finally started the confession ball rolling. My sister was no different. Truth and honesty can be so liberating! Who knew?! 😄  In the course of my life reveal, she had a few reveals of her own. To this day she is good at giving the outward impression that she has her life fully together. But looks can be deceiving. We will always be very different people, but we both had stuff that was crying out to be in the open with somebody. In the end, our life circumstances, despite being full of darkness, drama and endless questions, brought us together in a deeper and more authentic way than if I had chosen to keep that door closed, maintain the “I’m ok” facade, and stay in that darkness by myself.  


My sister became my best friend and I will always be grateful to her for how she took care of me, especially in those first few years of this tumultuous journey. And yes, the purse I now use as my daily, was a gift from her 😉 

The Cold, Hard & Somewhat Ugly Past…

About 7 years ago my husband (let’s call him Jack for the purposes of anonymity), broached the topic of opening up our marriage. He and his best friend came up with this idea while framing a house together and were quite proud of themselves for this ingenious, no strings attached and everyone wins idea 😀 It was mostly a suggestion made in jest but it started the discussions. I knew enough about myself, even then, to know I was not a casual relationship person and I likely could never embark on a sexual journey with someone without falling in love. I wasn’t even sure I could do the sex part without the love part first. My husband and his friend figured they could do it all and remain detached. Stay tuned for how that idea panned out a few years later 😉 The idea was brought up here and there as a fun discussion topic among our group of friends but that’s where it stayed at the time. A theoretical discussion.

About a year later everything changed. Jack found out I’d crossed the line between friendship and more with with my best friend (a guy) at the time. It was more of an emotional affair than a physical one, although physical boundaries were crossed as well. There were many reasons this happened. None of them make it ok. But this situation didn’t happen in the vacuum of a happy fulfilling marriage either. Needless to say, this was devastating all around. I broke Jack’s heart. I ruined our closest friendships. We lost many people over this situation much like what would happen in a divorce because our families were so intertwined. Our kids lost people who were like family to them. 

IT WAS BRUTAL!

I was a broken person for a long time. Crossing some very avoidable lines made me lose my best friend and that was the greatest irony and tragedy. I missed him in the worst way! Almost overnight, my person – my friend, my confident, my support, the person who knew me in ways no one else did – was gone. We didn’t want to, but we severed all ties to work on our marriages and focus on our families.

Jack graciously forgave me and we started putting the pieces back together. We dissected the situation endlessly. We changed our patterns, spent more time together and talked about – “what now?” Jack brought up opening up our marriage again within a couple months. He figured it was a natural progression at the time and I said a tentative yes because I felt like I couldn’t say no after what I’d done to him. I personally wasn’t even close to ready for the kind of change that was about to lambaste me. But I was consumed by guilt and pushed through and tried to ignore those voices in my head. For any of you who have been down the affair path, do not do what we did! Don’t make a decision this big out of guilt! Trust me! Healing needs to happen on both sides so that you can be in a solid place together, or it will come back to haunt you. At the time I felt like this was the only way to hang on to my marriage. I didn’t know what other options I had. Don’t get me wrong – my husband didn’t “force” me into anything. I was curious about this path as well. The timing was just bad and it was my own guilt that kept me from standing up for what I needed. 

Very quickly I discovered our ideas of “ok let’s explore this path” meant very different things. I assumed explore meant to learn, think, discuss and repeat – for months or longer, without actual action. Within weeks Jack had his first make-out session during a trip he was on. I found out after the fact, and was utterly devastated. I wasn’t ready at all. But he pushed on and a month later he slept with someone (again without me knowing until after the fact) while we were on a family vacation. I was completely thrown and spiraled into a depression over these actions I wasn’t ready for. I was trying to read things and learn about the concept and what others before us had gleaned from their experiences. We tried to talk, and I mean endlessly, but I felt constantly behind whatever was going on and I could not function that way. Even though Jack wasn’t hiding anything deliberately, it felt like he kept having affairs I’d find out about after. And every action he took, no matter how minor, chipped away at my psyche.

Jack is an adventurer and will try anything at least once. I am the complete opposite. I’m a thinker. I do things slowly. I weigh consequences and I scare easily. This path was not working for me even a little bit. Jack heard me and knew I was being wrecked by all this and tried to slow down. But, he didn’t understand my pace and what I needed. The way we are wired is fundamentally different, and to this day, the hurt we cause each other is because of this and never, I believe, a deliberate action on either side. 

We ran into new issues when he started falling for and pursuing a friend of his, because I knew that this would not be a simple fling. She was a person who might be in my life in a major way. Even though the idea of polyamory made more sense to me, I knew this was potentially huge and harder, long term, than simply opening up to short term flings. He tried to go slowly on this one but I still kept getting surprised and freaked out. Honestly, at this point I felt like I was drowning. There was no way to make progress on this concept and figure out how it could roll out in such a way that could work for us both, because all I was doing was surviving. No matter what I tried, I could not get ahead of my overwhelm. I wrote a lot of poetry at the time and it was all very dark – drowning, falling off cliffs, slipping off the edge….you get the point. I was a wreck. And I was doing all this without a social network to keep me grounded and stabilized. I felt desperately alone and scared. 

Stay tuned – I promise the story gets a bit more optimistic from here 🙂

Here I go!!

I am a writer.

If you took the time to read it, you may have noticed this was my last statement in the “about me” section. Ironically perhaps, it was hard for me to write that down because all my life I have identified as someone who wants to write, goes in spurts with writing, but does not settle into anything. You know how many chapter 1’s I have written?! 🙂 I start, I get overwhelmed. And I “take a break”.

For years.

So…I’m not sure if I can say I’m a writer or not. But, I have always dabbled and as all my people will attest to – I write the longest texts in the world 🙂 Well, I’m now 44, and life isn’t necessarily offering me endless time, so I’m doing it. I’m calling myself a writer and dammit, I’m going to write! 😀

My current and main motivation for embarking on this written adventure is my struggle in living a polyamorous lifestyle for the past 5 or so years, and having the desire to share the knowledge I have gained about myself and others. It has been a roller coaster of a journey to say the least and I personally feel better when I know I’m not alone in these struggles. So I figured maybe putting my story out there might help others feel less alone or weird or at least help start dialogue where we can offer advice, be an ear, or simply encourage each other in a safe place absent from judgement.

For all of you out there shrugging your shoulders wondering what the heck polyamory even is, dictionary.com defines it as ” the practice or condition of participating simultaneously in more than one serious romantic or sexual relationship with the knowledge and consent of all partners.”  

Some days I truly wonder how I got here. I was such a “normal” person! I grew up as a German, Baptist for crying out loud 🙂 But in retrospect, I’ve been on this journey my whole life. Hindsight is 20/20 right?

As also stated in the “about me” section – there are many other parts that make up who I am. This blog will not be only polyamory focused, despite the fact that it’s been front and center much of the time in the last bunch of years.

I’ve been married almost 23 years. I have 2 boys aged 18 and 15 who are the light of my life. I’ve lived off the grid for over 20 years and with that lifestyle choice has come many adventures possibly worth sharing. I’ve raised 100’s of chickens. I’ve lived without power or water or indoor plumbing, not usually by choice. I once had to melt snow for a week to take care of all of the water needs of my family and animals in the height of winter:) Who knew how much water you needed to live with just the basic water needs (no baths or showers).

My life is full and it’s never dull 🙂 And most days that fact makes me happy! 🙂 I’d like to share aspects of it all and I welcome you to take this journey of discovery with me.