Poly Parents

January 2, 2019 10:39 AM

My partner and I are gradually exploring a new relationship with a third person, whom we are both dating. Do you know of resources to help us think about how this might impact our small child?

This is all going relatively slowly and carefully so far. But the issue really is there isn't a lot of stuff available on our specific set up.

posted by anonymous to Human Relations (10 answers total)

This is not specifically about your set up, but there's an episode of Louis Theroux on polyamory and some of the couples in the episode have children and talk about how they have approached the issue. It's fairly surfacey, but I thought it was an interesting episode.
posted by monologish at 11:06 AM on January 2, 2019

Here are some research findings from Elisabeth Sheff on children in poly families. Lots of other good info on her blog as well.
posted by gingerbeer at 11:27 AM on January 2, 2019 [2 favorites]

Also this: Children Raised in Polyamorous Relationships
posted by gingerbeer at 11:29 AM on January 2, 2019

Answers above courtesy of my favorite poly parent, who also runs poly parenting events in the SF Bay Area, if you're nearby and would like local support.
posted by gingerbeer at 11:38 AM on January 2, 2019

The Sexual Freedom Legal Defense and Education Fund is, like the name says, partly a legal defense fund (mostly for divorced parents facing poly-related custody challenges). They have some resources about that on their website.

But more to the point of your question, I recently had a long conversation with two of their volunteers who were tabling at an event, concerning the legal aspects of poly parenting in a family with no divorce involved — things like "how many of us can be legal parents?" and "how many of us can have the right to do X thing?". I bet if you got in touch with them with specific questions they would be helpful.
posted by nebulawindphone at 12:05 PM on January 2, 2019

I don't know what kind of information you are asking for here, but I'm a member of a poly family (different setup than yours) and would be happy to talk to you about it.

I will say that more parents makes raising a kid way easier in our experience (she's only 4 so far, and requires a LOT of energy). But all of our relationships were quite stable before kiddo came along. She's known us since birth as family. I don't know much about introducing a new partner into a family with kids. Of the four adults in our household, two have casually dated other people. Those people were not introduced to kiddo as anything other than friends.
posted by mkuhnell at 2:13 PM on January 2, 2019 [2 favorites]

Alternatively, they start with good intentions, quickly realize that they're way more into one partner than the other, but feel like they *have to* say they're into both partners in order to keep access to the partner they're into.

I have been hit on by a lot of (straight-passing) couples for sex. It is ALWAYS the situation that I'm more interested in one of them than the other and also ALWAYS presented as not something I have options about - take the package deal or leave it. Please make sure you are not doing this to the third person, and also since three people means that at least one of you is LGB+, please discuss issues around how visible and active in the community each of you expects all of you to be - treating someone like the dirty little secret to your more privileged/recognized relationship is not cool. However you handle this is going to have an impact on how your kids understand relationships to work and how it's okay for them to treat other people.
posted by bile and syntax at 3:32 PM on January 2, 2019 [7 favorites]

As a counter argument, I dated a married couple, and I asked *them* out (both of them), and was equally interested in both of them-- part of what made them both so attractive to me was their individual qualities and also their great, stable family relationships, with each other and other members of their family. They broke it off with me after a while due to some reasons of incompatibility, and while the breakup itself wasn't great for me for communication reasons (that had nothing to do with them being poly), neither of them was interested in seeing me without the other one and their relationship survived intact and happily. I also know very stable triads who have been together for many years. So it can and does happen, which is not to say everyone above does not have a point about making sure you talk things through (which is especially important with a child around) and leave space for a different arrangement if that's what's wanted, just that I wouldn't necessarily write it off completely. In general, I think bile and syntax makes a great point-- model the behavior you want your child to see.
posted by WidgetAlley at 4:39 PM on January 2, 2019

N’thing to look into the legal ramifications for your jurisdiction. For over a decade Canada has recognized polyamous parents, which grants them the right to acces/custody even if not biologically related.
posted by saucysault at 8:54 PM on January 2, 2019

I don't know about resources exactly, but my mom was poly for most of my childhood, including a time period of two step-parents via her, and I'm happy to answer questions about what it's like growing up with it (in as much as I can tell the difference).
posted by Margalo Epps at 6:10 PM on January 3, 2019