It is probably something unique to those in open relationships that although you have permission from your spouse to fuck other people, they still sometimes get in the way of said fucking of other people. (Hey, sweetie, You might want to skip this entry. We've talked about it and resolved it, and everything is cool. I still wanted to blog about the experience.)
I recently opened an okcupid profile and, after the flood of straight guy 'wassup' messages, limited it to be seen only by bisexuals, queer, genderqueer, or trans people. I was hoping to find some dates, but haven't got the time or patience right now to do the necessary wading through the bulk responses. I did, however, get a message from a trans guy who seemed like a good match. He understood the reference in my username, we were really highly matched through the okcupid algorithm, and he was really cute.
We chatted back and forth through the website then moved to email so I could send some pics other than my profile photo. It seemed like we clicked really well. Particularly in a way that would end up being the problem: he was kinky and he was a dom. 'Perfect', I thought, 'my sweetie isn't into dominating me yet I like it. He can outsource that like Dan Savage suggests for partners that aren't into the same kinks as their partners.'
We continued to have chatty emails almost every day until I brought up some of the details with my sweetie who was not okay. Not only is he not okay with dominating me himself, he's not okay with any man dominating me. A woman, fine, but not a man.
There are varied and complicated issues at play with his feelings about this, which I understand and respect. He can't help the experiences he's had through his life and he can't help his feelings, but to me this seemed patently unfair. We discussed it at length and broke it down as much as possible but neither of us could truly make the other understand our disparate points of view. I felt like there was a certain amount of caveman, chest-beating "Woman is Mine!" stuff going on and I was hurt and angry. I'm a feminist and no-one's property.
But I am also a loving wife, and if we're going to make this non-monogamy thing work, I have to respect his boundaries, much like I expect him to respect my boundaries. And I know that there is a lot more at play than just the caveman brain at play here, despite the fact that I'm rankling at the invisible bonds put upon me.
So I wrote to my new friend and explained how things were, thinking that there's still plenty of fun stuff we could do. And he dumped me, not interested in playing by some other guy's rules, and not that interested in vanilla sex, even though I'm 'really kind, engaging, smart and hot.'
Sigh. So I spent a morning crying, because I'm ridiculous and brand-new to online dating, so I haven't developed the tough shell required for the quick connect/disconnect that happens (and I really liked him! *whine whine*). A poly friend said that any potential partner who doesn't respect the primary's limits isn't a good potential partner, so I probably dodged a bullet there, but it still blows. I know there are other smart, fun, hot guys out there, and maybe a wonderful female domme, I'm just gonna have to wade through a sea of "'sup" to get there.
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