The Ethical Slut Part 6

Some people like to express their feelings with their bodies, and might like to run, or work out at the gym, or clean the kitchen, or dig in the garden. Try finding music that fits your mood, angry or sad or frantic, and dancing your feelings out. When you express yourself, you get to know yourself better and work out some of the most intense stress constructively. The least you could wind up with would be a clean kitchen, and you might actually feel good after a self-indulgent afternoon on the beach.

POOR BABY.

Try focusing on the feelings in your body: where do you feel these emotions, in your throat, chest, gut? Turning your attention to the physical sensations can intensify them, and might bring up tears, but they will move on through even more readily if you allow yourself to feel them on the physical level. If rage comes welling up, you can pound on a pillow. If you start to cry, let it flow, remembering the sense of relief that comes after expressing intense emotion in tears.

Catherine likes to seek out a tear-jerker book or movie to help her get tears out when she feels stuck. ("Terms of Endearment" has never failed her yet.) Some people have trouble doing this because they've been taught that it's wrong to feel sorry for yourself. So who else should you feel sorry for? Stay in sympathy with yourself: you feel bad, so be kind to yourself.

You can talk to a friend, or your other lover, presuming you have made agreements about confidentiality with everybody who might care if you gossip. Catherine has a deal with a good friend of hers for telephone support. She can call her friend up and ask for five minutes of "poor baby," and if her friend is available, she pours out her feelings and her friend says, you guessed it, nothing but "poor baby" till she is through. This may sound silly, but dont knock it till you try it.

Comfort is a good thing in hard times.

WHO'S TO BLAME?.

As you get skilled at finding and expressing your feelings, you can try a more challenging task- see if you can write about or talk to your friend about your feelings without blaming anybody not your lover, not his lover, and especially not yourself. This is not an easy exercise: you will be surprised how readily we all slip into that blaming mode, but it is very very worthwhile to learn to have your feelings without foisting them off onto someone else's account.

Remember, it might be easier in the short run for me to dump my feelings on you when I feel bad, it sure is tempting to make how I feel all your fault. But when we blame others for feelings that truly belong to us, we disempower ourselves. If it's your fault that I feel bad, I guess there's nothing I can do about it, so I'm stuck. Only when I am willing to own my emotions do I have the power to change and grow.

ONE TINY STEP IN THE DIRECTION OF...

When your emotions are overwhelming and chaotic, it can help to ask yourself if there is anything that would help you feel just one tiny bit safer. Let go of the big picture- maybe it's too big to figure the whole thing out right now, so start by taking a tiny step in the direction of safer. A few deep breaths, conscious relaxation of some muscles, soothing music- try wrapping yourself in a soft blanket. It may not seem like much, but once you manage to do anything that improves your lot even the littlest bit, you are moving in the right direction to build some confidence that you can learn to deal with your jealous feelings.

baby yourself Give yourself permission to take good care of yourself while you learn to work through jealousy and other hard feelings. Learn to nurture yourself. What are the things you find comforting? Give them to yourself. Hot chocolate? Warm towels after a long soak? A long session with your most beloved movie or computer game? Your favorite teddy bear? Effective self-nurturing often happens on the level of body awareness, so nice physical experiences ma.s.sages, bubble baths, skin lotion, flannel nighties- can give a sense of comfort and security even when your mind is anxious and your thoughts are a mess. Give yourself permission to take the best possible care of yourself. You deserve it.

When you antic.i.p.ate feeling jealous, make plans to occupy your time. It may be too much too ask that you always have a hot date at exactly the same time as your lover- most people's schedules are too complicated, and what do you do when one of your dates comes down with the flu? Do you cancel the other one? The people you make these dates with might be counting on you, the time they have with you might be important to them, their feelings might get hurt. Third parties have a right to some predictability in their lives too.

But even if you can't round up a hot date for yourself, you can probably find a friend to go to a movie with, rent a video, talk obsessively on the "Net, grind your teeth, eat sugar, chew your fingernails, whatever works. We do not recommend drinking and drugging, as getting high might very well increase the intensity of your disturbance, and disinhibit you enough that you might forget your commitment to experience your jealousy without acting on it. Besides, although a certain amount of escapism is fine, to anesthetize yourself so that you feel nothing at all will never give you the opportunity to develop skills at dealing with all the feelings you have that are inspired by jealousy.

BiTE THE BULLET When no better plan is available, there is nothing wrong with gritting your teeth, biting the bullet and hanging in there till it's over. For now.

Dossie remembers her first challenge after she decided to never be monogamous again: I had been casually dating a young man, and had told him at great length that I was not available for partnering, and had no intention of ever being monogamous again. He came over to visit at my home when my best friend was there, we all got a little stoned, and he came on to her. She thought he was neat, and didn't know I was involved with him, so they started necking right in the middle of my living room. Eeeek!

My thoughts went racing as I watched them, thinking- well it's not like I want to marry him, and I dont think I feel like joining them, and I dont think my friend is bis.e.xual anyway, so what do I do? Amy Vanderbilt has said nothing on the appropriate etiquette for this situation. For a while I sat doing nothing, frozen, to tell the truth, and finally I thought to myself. Okay, so there's no script. I'll have to make one up. What would I be doing if my friend and my new lover weren't rolling around on the floor with their braces locked? I guessed I'd be finis.h.i.+ng taking the notes from that Tarot book I'm reading, so I went upstairs and studied, gritting my teeth, but focusing on my notes gave me at least a little relief by occupying my mind. Eventually they left, and I got through a strange and lonely night, not feeling necessarily great, but at least proud of myself that I had survived. I was particularly proud that I hadn't thrown my soup at them. I felt not at all damaged, really okay. Later I got to talk to my friend: our friends.h.i.+p survived, the dating relations.h.i.+p did not, which was fine by me. What I got a grip on was my own strength, so funky as it was, this was my first successful run through jealousy.

GO FOR THE IT.

A good Question to ask yourself as you seek to understand your jealousy is, "What are the specific images that disturb me the most?" Chances are you are already imagining along these lines, so you're not likely to make yourself feel worse by thinking about the scary stuff on purpose.

Those disturbing images, the ones that really bother you, are not telling you what your partner is doing. You actually dont know what your partner is doing. The images you see in your mind are the perfect reflection of your own fears. One way to come to terms with your fears is to acknowledge them: "Yes, I'm afraid of that." You can take it even further, and work through the fears by envisioning the worst possible scenario that you can imagine. Go ahead, wallow in it.

Elaborate it until it becomes ridiculous. Maybe that other guy has a d.i.c.k three miles long, that girl is a perfect replica of a living Barbie doll. Maybe you can laugh at your fears: that'll take the power out of them.

Pay attention also to your imaginings that are less dangerous, less anxiety-ridden. This is where you feel safer. You may be surprised to find that imagining your lover in the midst of s.e.x with someone else is less scary than you thought it would be, or maybe images of kissing bother you more than intercourse, or whatever. Try writing down your imaginings on index cards, then putting them in order from the most to the least scary. Then you will know what parts scare you the most, and what the safer-feeling parts are. Now you have a direction to turn your mind that will help you feel a little bit safer, which is your first step on the road to becoming perfectly comfortable.

Reality is less terrifying than fiction. You can counter your fears with reality testing. Our minds, like nature, abhor a vacuum. We get nervous. Think of the last time you were waiting for someone to return a call, or a family member was significantly late coming home. It may rea.s.sure you to know that the Highway Patrol is now computerized, and ready to deal with all of us who call and want to know if our beloved Joe Blow had an accident between there and here. We all do this.

Catherine and her partner have an agreement to call each other before they leave a lover's house for the trip home, just to help prevent this kind of worry.

When we dont know what's going on, few of us are able to just say "I dont know" and stop thinking about it. We fill in the blanks, and in order to do that we make something up. What you see when you fill in the blanks has nothing to do with reality- what you see is your own worst fear. So now you know what you are afraid of, and nothing about what is really happening.

This is why your authors are biased in favor of full disclosure in free love. We are particularly in favor of multiple partners having a chance to meet each other, or at least hear about each other, to dispel our self created mythology that that other person is younger, thinner, s.e.xier, etc. You might be surprised, when you meet your lover's lover, to find the experience downright rea.s.suring. The truth is that different individuals are apples and oranges, each with faults and virtues, and each one unique, which is why we like to relate to lots of them in the first place. Difference is wonderful, and remind yourself: this is not a contest, this is not a race. We all get to win.

remember the good stuff Make a list of everything you value about your relations.h.i.+p, and put it aside for a rainy day. Be an optimist, turn your mind to the positive end of things. Value what you have, and what you get from your partner; the time, attention and love that he shares with you, the good stuff that fills your cup. Avoid being the pessimist who focuses on what is not there, the energy that goes somewhere else. That energy is not subtracted from what you get- relations.h.i.+ps are not balanced like checkbooks. So when you are feeling deprived, remember all the good stuff you get from your partners.h.i.+p.

sharing You and your partners need to practice talking about jealousy. When you try to pretend that you're so perfectly enlightened that you never feel jealous, you deprive yourself of the opportunity to work with your feelings and share support with your partner. And when you try to protect yourself and your partner from jealousy, you are engaging in a deception that can only lead to more distance, and can never bring you closer.

A couple we know tell us that they have developed a convention in their relations.h.i.+p that each can ask the other for what they call a "jelly moment." In your jelly moment, you get to say what's bothering you, that you feel scared and jealous, nervous about saying goodbye for the weekend, small and silly and your knees are feeling like, well, jelly.

The other partner's commitment is to listen, sympathize and validate.

That's the response- not "Okay, I'll cancel my date with Blanche," but "Aw, honey, I'm sorry you feel bad. I love you."

When we tell our partners that we feel jealous, we are making ourselves vulnerable in a very profound way. When our partners respond with respect, listen to us, validate our feelings, support and rea.s.sure us, we feel better taken care of than we would have if no difficulty had arisen in the first place. So we strongly recommend that you and your partners give each other the profoundly bonding experience of sharing your vulnerabilities. We are all human, we are all vulnerable, and we all need validation.

repertory drama Your strategies for surviving periods of jealousy will stand you in good stead for the rest of your life, and you will use what you learn about yourself from this practice over and over. All of the techniques listed above are applicable to other difficult feelings, so now you not only have a repertoire of ways to deal with bouts of jealousy, but also to handle whatever other painful emotions may come your way. So when you get this far, congratulate yourself. Celebrate your successes: write "I am a genius!" two hundred times with lots of bright colors.

Buy yourself something nifty. You've done a lot of hard work, and you deserve a reward.

A FINAL NOTE ABOUT LOVE.

One remedy for the fear of not being loved is to remember how good it feels to love someone. If you're feeling unloved and you want to feel better, go love someone, and see what happens.

CHAPTER 4. s.l.u.tS IN LOVE.

We hear too often of folks who enjoy a joyously s.l.u.tty lifestyle until they fall in love. Then, perhaps prodded by cultural messages that love must equal marriage must equal monogamy, they suddenly skydive into an attempt at a conventional lifestyle, often with disastrous consequences. At least one of your authors you can insert Catherine's rueful grin here- is not immune to this kind of programming.

There is no reason why wedding bells, or the equivalent thereof, need to break up that old gang of yours. Many s.l.u.ts find it possible to combine the committed stability of a life partners.h.i.+p with the multifarious pleasures of s.e.x and intimacy with others.

However, there is no question that being a s.l.u.t within a committed relations.h.i.+p has some special challenges. So much of our cultural baggage tells us that commitment equals owners.h.i.+p that, as the old bitter joke has it, a ring around the finger equals a ring through the nose. Even people who know better often find that their expectations of a committed relations.h.i.+p may include the right to control many aspects of their partner's lives.

As you can probably guess, we dont much like the idea that a relations.h.i.+p commitment specifies anybody's right to anything beyond mutual respect and caring for each other. Yet once you divorce romantic love from the concept of owners.h.i.+p, what happens? Dossie's partner.

who has never been in an open relations.h.i.+p before, was startled to find that many of her old habits have become irrelevant: "Why should I bother to look for stray hairs or inconsistent stories, trying to sniff out any trace of infidelity, when I know that if she has s.e.x with someone else she'll simply tell me about it?" Yet there are still issues of boundaries, of responsibility, of courtesy, that override the owners.h.i.+p issue, and must be dealt with.

So, how do two s.l.u.ts in love (or more- we'll write this chapter based on a two-partner agreement for the sake of simplicity, but the issues involved come up in multi partner arrangements as well) build a life together?

Our friends Ruth and Edward remember: "We had a monogamous relations.h.i.+p for about sixteen years, then opened it up and started interacting with other people. Now we're trying to figure out what we're comfortable doing with other people, and what we want to reserve for our own relations.h.i.+p. Sometimes, the only way to locate the boundary of our comfort zone is to cross it and feel the discomfort. We try to take small steps, so that the pain is minimal. We're definitely committed to each other, and are each willing to stop doing things that the other finds threatening."

Mostly, you take care of your own stuff, recognize and protect your boundaries, and make agreements to help yourself and your partner feel safe but we've already talked about that. Here are some special problems that may come up for partnered s.l.u.ts.

THE ACCIDENTAL COUPLE.

We've said before that each relations.h.i.+p seeks its own level. For some relations.h.i.+ps, that's a life partners.h.i.+p, which may include sharing living s.p.a.ce, possessions, and so on. Others may take other forms: occasional dates, friends.h.i.+ps, ongoing romantic commitments, and so on.

Yet many folks find that they've gotten into a habit of letting their relations.h.i.+ps slide inexorably into life partners.h.i.+p, without much thought or intent on their part. Well-meaning friends and acquaintances may aid in this process by a.s.suming that you and your friend are a couple before you've ever decided to become one. In addition, many people get coupled by accident, by virtue of an unplanned pregnancy, an "eviction romance" where one partner loses a housing situation and moves in with the other, or simple convenience.

Catherine remembers: In my freshman year of college, I met a guy I liked a lot- quiet and shy, but when he said anything I really liked what he had to say. Fred and I wound up going out together a couple of times, and having s.e.x a few times. When school ended, we wrote to each other over the summer.

Then fall came and I began looking around for a place to live outside the dorms. The only room I could find was a double-sized room which I could only afford if I shared it with someone. So I called Fred and proposed that we share it, putting up a part.i.tion across the middle and sleeping on separate mattresses, and he agreed.

The first night there, Fred had already gotten himself a mattress, and I hadn't yet so I shared his. Somehow, we never did get around to getting another mattress. We wound up living together for a couple of years, then getting married. That missing mattress led to a fifteen year marriage and a couple of kids.

While we're all for coupledom for people who choose it, we like to see folks make their choices a bit more mindfully than this. We suggest that before you let yourself slide into something that you dont really want, you do some serious thinking and talking, alone and together, about what is the best form for this particular relations.h.i.+p. Talk to each other about what love means to you, and how you fit into each other's lives.

You may discover that while you enjoy one another's company and have fabulous s.e.x, your habits regarding housing, money, possessions and so on are wildly incompatible. In such a situation, you could do what generations of people have done- move in together and spend years trying to change one another, getting frustrated and resentful in the process. Or you could reconsider some of the implicit a.s.sumptions you have brought to the relations.h.i.+p. Do you have to live together? Why?

Why not instead enjoy your friend for the things you like about him, and find someone else with which to share the other things? s.l.u.thood means, among other things, that you dont have to depend on any one person to fulfill all your desires.

If you know that you're a person who tends to slide into coupledom, we suggest spending some serious time trying to figure out why you've fallen into this pattern and what you hope to get out of being a couple. It's a very good idea for everyone to learn to live single -to figure out how to get your needs met without being partnered, so you dont find yourself seeking a partner to fill needs that you ought to fill yourself. You might also consider experimenting with some relations.h.i.+ps unlike those you've tried in the past- instead of looking for Mr. or Ms. Right, try dating some people you like and trust but dont necessarily love, or maybe love in a quieter way than chills running up your spine.

In this, as in just about everything else we've told you in this book, the key is to build your own sense of internal security. If you like yourself, love yourself, and take care of yourself, your other relations.h.i.+ps can arrange themselves around you, as perfectly as crystals. We hope that if and when you get coupled, you do it on purpose.

s.l.u.ts in compet.i.tion One problem that often arises between partners is compet.i.tion to be the most popular, a concern most of us have carried around in the bottom of our psyches since junior high school. Sometimes partners compete with each other, to see who can score the most, or the most attractive of conquests- an ugly picture.

We cannot reiterate often enough: this is not a contest, this is not a race, and no one is the prize. One strategy to cut through any feelings of compet.i.tiveness is to play matchmaker for each other, to invest yourself in your partner's s.e.xual happiness as you do in your own. Remember the climax of "The Big Chill," in which a woman character sets up her best friend with her husband so that the friend could have a baby? Catherine recalls meeting a new Internet acquaintance for coffee, and hearing her describe a pet s.e.xual fantasy that was startlingly similar to Catherine's partner's -Catherine set up their first date for later that week.

Dossie remembers being out with a long-time lover of hers when she noticed an attractive person trying to catch her eye behind her date's back. As they were leaving, Dossie explained this to her friend, who had a stroke of genius. He strode over the young man in question, and with great dignity announced, "My lady would like you to have her phone number." Dossie has made use of this strategy repeatedly since then, and recommends it highly: they always call!

crushes We have pointed out before that it is impossible for anyone to predict what depth of feeling may potentially exist in any s.e.xual relations.h.i.+p.

Many people new to open relations.h.i.+ps try to limit outside s.e.xual encounters to a casual, recreational level to avoid the terrifying specter of seeing your partner in love with, or at least crushed out on, another. And it is true that sometimes an outside relations.h.i.+p will threaten to become primary and supplant the existing partner, and when this happens everyone involved will feel horrible, particularly the person who may lose his partners.h.i.+p. Especially when that person has struggled to own their jealousy, and worked hard on his fears of abandonment, only to find himself actually abandoned and left out in the cold.

It is not possible to predict when or with whom a crush, or any other deepening of feelings, might happen. We certainly do not want to draw the boundaries of our agreements so tightly that we exclude everybody we like. There is no rule that will protect us from our own emotions, so we need to look beyond rules for solutions and for a sense of security.

It can help to do a reality check on your fantasies and expectations.

New relations.h.i.+ps are often exciting because they are new, glowing with s.e.xual arousal, and too new to have uncovered the inevitable conflicts and disturbances that come with true intimacy over time. Every relations.h.i.+p has a honeymoon phase, and it is a true, if tragic, fact of life that the honeymoon cannot last forever. When we refuse to figure this out, we can wind up flying from partner to partner, always imagining that the next partner will be the perfect one. We may never stay with anyone long enough to discover the deeper intimacy and profound security that comes with confronting, struggling with, and conquering the hard parts of intimacy together. Our friend Carol wisely notes: s.e.xual time is connected with intimate time for most of us; we come to depend on our partners for various kinds of emotional support. So we get into this pattern where we share all our hard emotional un-s.e.xy needs -all the work of living together, the sickness and health, richer and poorer stuff- with our life partner, and we're on our "best behavior" with our other partners. It can be important to remember that, while you may be trading away some of that juicy excitement of a brand-new unknown partner, the intimacy you get in return is valuable too, and you can't have that with a person you met two weeks ago. The trick is to find a way to manifest both possibilities- the intimacy of sharing and the heat of novelty- in your own life.

Remember, please, that fantasy is not reality, and enjoy your fantasies while you maintain your commitments. When your expectation is that a crush is a brief, if wonderful, experience, you and your partner can live through one with relative equanimity, and more important, without destroying your long term stability and love with each other.

relating to third parties Your relations.h.i.+p with your lover's lovers brings up points of etiquette that Miss Manners never dreamed of. One couple we talked to noted.

"It's important that we not be totally grossed out or disgusted by one another's lovers- especially if it's going to be long term, it helps if we can all be friends."

Dossie has a story to tell about this.

I was once in a relations.h.i.+p with a man who had a primary partner whom I had not met. I had asked to meet her, and she was considering if she felt safe enough to do that. Their arrangement was that when Patrick had a date with me, Louisa would make a date with her other lover, and everybody would, hopefully, feel safe and taken care of. Unfortunately, Louisa's other lover frequently stood her up, and then Patrick would stand me up, which I began to find unacceptable. This was the first time I had a.s.serted any right to consideration of me as the outside lover- we are so used to seeing the outsider as the home wrecker that we rarely think to protect that person's feelings. With much back and forth, and the promised meeting, Louisa finally agreed that Patrick could see me whether or not she had a date, and we would make sure that she got plenty of advance notice, that he got home on time, and that she got lots of support from both of us. As we worked through this.

Louisa and I got closer and closer particularly remember one night when we were worried about Patrick, and sat up late talking about him while he slept in the next room. Louisa and I became best friends and went into business together, putting on workshops and theater presentations.

We all three traveled together, and had a wonderful time.

Patrick and I wound up growing apart as lovers, but the friends.h.i.+p between me and Louisa carried on. What was important for me is that when we allowed ourselves to determine what boundaries fit for us at any given time, that freed us up to evolve through a series of changing relations.h.i.+ps that made us close family for many years. Should you meet the "third party"? We vote yes: if you dont, you'll almost certainly wind up imagining someone cuter, s.e.xier, more predatory and more threatening than anyone could be outside a Hollywood erotic thriller. Besides, who knows? you might wind up liking him. Some of our best friends are people we met because someone we were f.u.c.king was f.u.c.king them too. Catherine and her partner's commitment ceremony was performed by a priestess who had first been a lover of her partner's, and later a lover and close friend of Catherine's. If you are gay or bis.e.xual, you may, as Catherine did, find yourself considering forming a liaison with this person yourself- we talked to one woman whose first experience with open relations.h.i.+ps took place when her girlfriend was f.u.c.king another woman, and our friend wound up falling in love with the other woman. ("My girlfriend got kind of cranky about this," she remembers wryly. "We're all tight family now, but it took a decade to get here.") We suggest a few moments of soul searching to make sure your motivation is loving or l.u.s.tful rather than vengeful or compet.i.tive then, if you "test clean," go for it. It's really not too surprising that you like the same people your partner likes, and mutual attractions like these can form the nucleus of a long-lasting and very rewarding little tribe.

On the other hand, we sometimes see s.l.u.ts who feel like they have to be s.e.xual with their lover's lovers. In some cases, both parties in a partners.h.i.+p have an agreement only to play with a third party together.

Such agreements require that both partners have "veto power" over potential thirds being s.e.xual with someone who you find unattractive or unpleasant is a very bad idea for you and for them. On the other hand, basic s.l.u.t ethics should not allow you to abuse this power to prevent your partner from having s.e.x with anyone at all by vetoing everybody: a strategy which may seem tempting, because until you unlearn jealousy, all outside engagements can look very threatening. Sometimes you need to gather up your strength, face down your fears, and unlearn by doing.

Or you may simply feel that since your partner likes and l.u.s.ts after this person so much, you should too- to a.s.suage your partner's guilt, to confirm her excellent taste, or to satisfy some obscure sense of fairness. Please dont. If you simply dont feel hot for this person, dont let yourself be driven into a position where you feel you have to f.u.c.k out of politeness: there are many other excellent ways for people to relate to one another. Cook her a nice dinner, go to the movies with her, play cards together, or find some other way to help her feel accepted into your life.

Which brings up an important question: how much responsibility do you have for helping your lover's lovers feel secure and welcome?

Catherine has spent many long telephone conversations rea.s.suring her partner's lovers that, yes, it's really okay with her, and have a great time, honey. We think that your own needs should be of primary importance to you, and if you really just can't be welcoming and supportive then you shouldn't. On the other hand, we also think it's gracious to be as friendly as you can without having to grit your teeth and force a smile. At minimum, we suggest that you at least try to provide some rea.s.surance that this is not a compet.i.tion, that you are not being harmed by anything that's going on, and that you are able to take care of your own emotions- in other words, a promise to own your own stuff and not blame the third party. After all, he's doing this because he feels the same way you do- that your partner is the hottest thing on legs- and not because he wants to destroy your life.

After the crush is over, some people will find a long term place in your life, often unexpected, like the lover who has become your kid's favorite uncle, or your partner's business partner. Others may leave, and when they leave with warm feelings, they may come back again in the future, when once again there is a place for them in your life, or for you in theirs. Thus the infinitely connected polyamorous s.l.u.t builds his web of extended families and tribes. And we feel there is some truth in the notion that a family of lovers cannot fail.

Some very capable s.l.u.ts maintain more than one primary relations.h.i.+p.

Dossie has known one such couple, Robert and Celia, for twenty-five years. They have been married twenty-four years, and have together raised two children from previous relations.h.i.+ps. Each has another primary partner, both usually women, and family relations.h.i.+ps with all their exes. Robert's outside partner May was originally lover to Celia's lover Judy back in 1985, then became lovers with Celia, and finally with Robert from 1988 to the present, and, they intend, on into the future. Some years ago Miranda and Celia lived upstairs, and Robert and May lived downstairs. Currently Cheryl, another of Celia's previous girlfriends, lives upstairs and helps with the grandchildren; Miranda, another of Celia's exes, visits two days a week since she lives out of town but attends school nearby. All of these people, plus many other friends and lovers of various degrees of intimacy, both present and historical, and most of their friends and lovers, form a very long-term extended family that has lived, loved and raised children together for almost thirty years, and plan to care for one another in their old age. We are impressed.

The Ebb and Flow of Relations.h.i.+ps We observe, with much delight, the number of our old lovers we count among our present friends, and how s.e.xual relations.h.i.+ps can develop into family members.h.i.+ps. There is a reality limit here- you only have twenty-four hours a day to devote to your love life, and presumably you need some of those hours for work and sleep and so on, so you have a finite amount of time to devote to each of your lovers. You can only fit a certain number of people in your life and expect to do any of them justice.

We find that most people do okay letting their partners come and go as it feels right for each of them. Extended family s.e.xual relations.h.i.+ps are more likely to grow apart than to break up. One of the very wonderful things about building s.e.xual friends.h.i.+ps is that, while past relations.h.i.+ps and smaller affairs may come and go over the years, each pairing has its own characteristic and unique intimacy. You create this intimacy the way you learn to ride a bike- by trial and error, slipping and falling, and ultimately zooming along together. Just like riding a bike, you'll never forget this particular intimacy, or your own role in it. Even after the most bitter of separations, when conflict is cleared and time has healed the wounds, you may find that you can slip that connection right back on, like a comfortable old glove.

On the other hand, sometimes conflict in an intimate relations.h.i.+p goes on so long, or seems so impossible to resolve, that it threatens the very foundation of that relations.h.i.+p. We hope you will bring the same high level of ethics and concern to a conflicted relations.h.i.+p that you brought to a happy one.

It is always tempting to respond to a major relations.h.i.+p conflict by a.s.signing blame. In childhood we learn that pain, in the form of punishment from our all-powerful parents, is the consequence of doing something wrong. So when we hurt, we try to make sense of it by finding somebody doing something wrong, preferably somebody else. We have discussed the disempowerment of blaming before. What is important to remember is that most relations.h.i.+ps break up because the partners are unhappy with each other, and no one is to blame: not you, not your partner, and not your partner's lover. Even if someone acted badly, or was dishonest, your primary relations.h.i.+p probably isn't falling apart for that reason- relations.h.i.+ps tend to end due to their own internal stresses. Even your authors have trouble remembering this when we are in the middle of a bitter breakup.

When you find yourself blaming a lot, it may help to remember a truism of relations.h.i.+p counseling: the "client" is the relations.h.i.+p itself, not either of the people in it. If you start looking at conflicts, problems and so on as problems of the relations.h.i.+p, instead of trying to decide whose fault they are, you have taken an important first step in solving them.

Traditionally in this culture, women often bear the burden of being responsible for everybody's emotional well-being. A woman's inability to magically make pain and trouble disappear is rarely at the heart of a relations.h.i.+p conflict, although she may feel as guilty and inadequate as if it were. In this pattern, one partner takes too much responsibility for the problem, so it becomes important to distinguish what each partner's responsibilities are.

On the other hand, it's also common for one partner to take too little responsibility. Women (and sometimes men) who have a lot of their self-esteem connected to their ability to maintain a relations.h.i.+p may feel the need to make their partner into the "villain," in order to justify their own desire to leave. This strategy is unfair to both of you: it gives the "villain" all the power in the relations.h.i.+p, and disempowers the "victim": deciding that you have no choice but to leave because your partner is so horrible is denying the fact that there are always choices. Our experience is that relations.h.i.+p troubles are almost always two-sided: if you can acknowledge your own contribution to the problem, you can work toward solving it.

We should note here, however, that if your relations.h.i.+p problems include anybody being physically violent, or emotionally or verbally abusive, it's not time to waffle over whose fault it is- it's time to get professional help in learning to resolve conflict in a nondestructive manner. The Resource Guide in the back of this book will tell you how to get in touch with groups in your area that help both battered and battering partners.

breaking up It happens. Good relations.h.i.+p skills and high ethics dont mean you get to be with the same partner or partners forever and ever. It is our experience that relations.h.i.+ps change, people grow out of them, people change. They may acquire new desires, new dreams. Some breakups The ten great lies of s.l.u.t hood (A tongue-in-cheek guide).

I never get jealous.

f.u.c.king other people doesn't diminish my s.e.xual frequency WITH MY PRIMARY PARTNER.

I'd stop this if she really wanted me to.

I always tell the complete truth about my outside partners.

I'm never tempted to leave my primary for one of my other partners.

We never compete for the same person.

n.o.body's keeping score here.

I dont mind if they use our bed, our car, our s.e.x toys.