535 - How Do You Maintain Equity Across Multiple Relationships? Listener Q&A

Today’s episode is focusing on one question from a listener:

Dear Multiamorists,

For the past year I’ve been in my first polyamorous relationship. I have two metamours who I have never met or spoken to. While my metamours live within an hour of my partner, I live 2.5 hours away. I understand that distance and money are a big factor in long distance relationships of any sort. But my partner will see his local partners weekly and sometimes I am unable to see him for 6 weeks or so. He says this is a financial issue but he pays for a weekly hotel room for him and one of my metamours. When he comes here it’s just the cost of gas. When I go there I pay my gas and half the hotel.  Money is an issue for both of us. But I feel hurt that he says he can’t afford to see me but will still always prioritize seeing my metamour weekly despite the cost.  It’s his money and time and life and I cannot dictate to him how he spends it. But, it’s terribly painful to be in my position.  My partner does make time to call me most days of the week but due to opposite work and sleep schedules it’s becoming more and more challenging to connect by phone. How can I feel more prioritized by my partner?  Is there a way to encourage more equity between myself and my metamours?

Sincerely,

3rd Class Citizen in California

Join our subscribers on Supercast at www.multiamory.com/join if you want one of your questions answered on a future Q&A episode!

Transcript

This document may contain small transcription errors. If you find one please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.

Jase: On this episode of the Multiamory Podcast, we're looking at when limited resources get in the way of creating equity for multiple partners. We're changing things up a little bit. We're doing a listener question, but we're doing more of a deep dive into just one question this week. When there aren't enough hours in the day or dollars in the bank, how do you maintain equity across multiple relationships? The listener feels like they're constantly getting the short end of the stick compared to their metamours.

Today, we're going to dive into what could help everyone feel like they're being treated fairly. If you're interested in learning more about our fundamental communication tools that we reference on this show, check out our book, Multiamory: Essential Tools for Modern Relationships. You can get it in print format, ebook format, as well as audiobook format read by Emily. You can find out details about that at multiamory.com/book or wherever you like to get audiobooks or print books.

Emily: Quick disclaimer before we start. We have spent a lot of time studying healthy relationship communication, but we're not mind readers. Our advice is based solely on the limited information we have, so please take it all with a grain of salt. Every situation is unique, so we encourage you to use your own judgment and seek professional help if needed. Ultimately, you are the only true expert on your own life and feelings, and your decisions are your own. In addition, this question has been edited for time and clarity.

Dedeker: "Is there a way to encourage my partner to increase equity among myself and my metamours? Dear multiamorists," which I really love as a title for the three of us. I'm digging it.

Emily: Yes, we are.

Dedeker: "For the past year, I've been in my first polyamorous relationship. I have two metamours who I have never met or spoken to. While my metamours live within an hour of my partner, I live two and a half hours away. I understand that distance and money are a big factor in long-distance relationships of any sort, but my partner will see his local partners weekly, and sometimes I'm unable to see him for six weeks or so. He says this is a financial issue, but he pays for a weekly hotel room for him and one of my metamours. When he comes here, it's just the cost of gas. When I go there, I pay my gas and half the hotel.

Money is an issue for both of us, but I feel hurt that he says he can't afford to see me, but will always prioritize seeing my metamour weekly despite the cost. It's his money and time and life, and I can't dictate to him how he spends it, but it's terribly painful to be in my position. My partner does make time to call me most days of the week, but due to opposite work and sleep schedules, it's becoming more and more challenging to connect by phone. How can I feel more prioritized by my partner? Is there a way to encourage more equity between myself and my metamours? Sincerely, third-class citizen in California."

Jase: Gosh. That is a tough one. I think that, in general, feeling fair and equitable in multiple relationships is always hard. Adding a distance discrepancy there, I've definitely seen that frequently make that feel harder or feel more imbalanced. Have you two experienced that as well?

Emily: Sure. I do think that it is challenging when you factor in the time spent that it takes to get to a place, versus somebody who is more proximal, it doesn't take as long, and because of all of those factors, money may not be as big of an issue.

Another thing I wanted to point out was just that this person has not met their metamours, which I know is okay. It's not necessarily a deal-breaker or the worst thing ever by any means, but I do, again, think it's always a nice idea to at least have some sort of connection with them at some point, even if it's just a text or a Zoom call or maybe even a quick coffee get-together, which, of course, might be more difficult if you are living far away from them. If you've been with this person for a little while, for a year, then it might be worth it to at least acknowledge and meet these other metamours, just to maybe make the whole process a little bit easier.

Dedeker: Assuming that's what everyone wants. Not everyone is down for that-

Jase: That's true.

Dedeker: -Having contact with their metamours. First, I want to acknowledge that there's a lot of talk about money in this question. I want to put a pin in the fact that this could have actually nothing to do about money. Money could be the excuse, but it could be about something else, some other reason why this partner is not able to show up or whatever. I'm just going to put a pin in that for now because I do want to talk about the money piece.

I think this is a situation, because what I noticed the question asker doing a lot is this comparison. There's nothing wrong with that. Our brains want to compare, but this sense of like, "Well, he just pays for gas when he's coming to see me, but then he spends money on a hotel, and then he says he can't see me more often," or whatever. I guess I would just want to validate the comparison, and feeling like you're getting the short end of the stick, that totally makes sense. Also, I would want to warn this person that if you come to your partner trying to play a numbers game, that's probably going to be a losing game for everybody.

I think unless you and your partner have sat down with each other and been like, "Let's show each other our bank accounts, and let's talk about the way we spend and how much we have in savings, and how much we want to budget for discretionary spending together versus another partner," unless you have done that, it's going to be hard, I think, on just a transaction by transaction basis to be like, "Hey, you spent what I perceive to be a lot of money on a hotel room, versus you're spending what I perceive to be not a lot of money on gas."

It's just the kind of thing that I could see setting the two of you up for a not good conversation if it's about that. Also, as I said earlier, you don't know the full breadth of this person's financial situation, potentially. Also, you're probably setting them out to just be defensive either way.

Jase: Absolutely. I think a fairly common piece of advice when it comes to relationships, or even just family discussions about money, is as much as possible to avoid talking about the actual dollars and cents, and to focus more on the other parts, like what are the things that actually matter? What are the feelings underneath this? I think you've hit some of that in your question, for sure. I would just second what Dedeker said of avoiding trying to make it about the numbers, because that's just not going to get you as far and get you as much of what you're looking for, I think.

Emily: Money is absolutely one of the things that they tell you in early relationships or in first dates to not talk about, because it is really emotional, and I think it's a challenging thing for people to talk about even later on in their relationships. You can look at money, especially when you are in multi-partnered relationships as you're spending more on this person, and so therefore that means that you care about them more than you do me. I guess I would encourage you to try to look at it not in that way, if you can. It's tough, and I get that, but try to focus on the things that you have control over.

That is not necessarily how much money your partner is spending on anyone else, but rather what can we do within the confines of our relationship to make it feel fair and equitable and like we are setting aside some time and space and effort and being collaborative in the ways in which we are going to spend the limited resources that we have, including money, maybe, but also including emotional labor or time spent planning a date, for instance, planning are we going to choose to maybe take a longer vacation or something, or a little getaway weekend, and that'll feel like we are actually collaborating and choosing to do something that is a little bit bigger, perhaps, than the weekly things that you're doing with your other partners.

Just make it a little bit more collaborative, and then also figure out the ways in which it can feel a little bit more equitable because you are doing a lot of things, like spending emotional labor or figuring out time constraints, and how those can feel a little bit more equal to potentially other partners as well.

Jase: Yes, I think to touch on this thing about money is emotional, and just accepting that fact. I almost want to go back to the question asker and say, "If you wanted to come back and ask this question again without referencing money at all." I know that's not coming from you in the first place. Supposedly, it's this partner who's saying it's a financial issue of like that's why he can't see you as often. For you, thinking about, how do you feel? What is it that you feel like you're lacking? It sounds like time, that makes sense, but what's the emotion underneath that?

Is it like, "I don't feel like I'm important enough or that I am valued enough, that he's not putting enough of his resources?" Whatever those are, whether it's money or time, or energy. I guess digging into that question a little bit to see if bringing any of that to a conversation could help. The reason why I'm saying this is that I think there are situations where money could be very intentionally not equally shared between different partners, but that it would actually feel more equitable and more fair because of it.

The example would be, if I have two partners, let's say one of them is Dedeker, and maybe we make comparable amounts of money to each other, but then I'm dating someone else who makes very little money, or they're in between jobs, or they're just starting out in a new career, and so they're making a lot less, I might pay a higher percentage or maybe even a higher total amount to have dates with that person who makes a lot less than me because I want to be able to do the things that I want to do, but I also don't want to burden them extra financially in order for us to do those together.

I might take on more of that versus with the partner who makes closer to a similar amount of money that I do, maybe we would split things more evenly, or maybe I'm dating someone else who makes a lot more money than me, and they're more likely to do the opposite and treat me. I think that in those situations, if we tried to make the money fair from a numbers point of view, it would actually end up feeling very unfair in those situations.

I know that's not necessarily your situation here. I don't know what the financial situation of everyone in this story is, but I think the point is that the money being equal and the spending of it being equal is not really the part that matters, in my opinion, in terms of that emotional feeling of, "I'm not getting something that I want to be getting," because I believe you on that part. I do believe you're not getting what you would like to be getting in this relationship right now.

Dedeker: Yes. I think it is important, if you're going to have a conversation with your partner about this, to come from a place of how-- Okay, if we can, first of all, agree on like, "Hey, we would like to spend more time with each other." First, make sure you're on the same page about that. Again, like I previewed at the beginning, this could be about something else entirely. This could be about the partner actually doesn't want to spend weekly time with their long-distance partner. If you can get on the same page around like, "Yes, it'd be great if we could spend more time together, see each other more frequently."

Then, if we can come from a place of, "Okay, with the limitations that we have, which is limited money, the limitations of distance, what are the ways that we can try to make this work? How can we be creative in order to see each other more often?" Then, hopefully, find small experiments that you can do with that. Again, to just repeat what we've said six billion times, which is what may make this difficult, is the fact that money is emotional.

What I mean by that is that if you come to your partner saying, "Hey, I would love for us to see each other more often," if your partner hears that, and what they hear is, "I need you to empty your bank account on gas so you can see me more often," they may be more likely to be defensive and shut down, and not be ready to collaborate with you. Just some advice to tread lightly here because of that.

Jase: I do like the idea of approaching it as a team, of looking at, "Okay, we'd both like to see each other more often." Again, assuming that's true, and that's a good conversation to have, but yes, doing experiments. I love doing something like a radar, where you're having a regular check-in, because it's a place where you get to decide what are the experiments we're going to do.

Then we have a time to check back in and say, "How did that experiment go?" "It was still hard, or "It was fun, but it was expensive," or "I don't know, I didn't really feel like it solved the problem." I love that idea of trying things, doing experiments instead of feeling like, "Oh, we've got a math out the exact right answer and then we'll have it."

Emily: Something that I know the two of you did once upon a time, and maybe less now, but you would stay in locations that maybe would've been fairly expensive for you to do so otherwise, by pet-sitting or using something like trusted house sitters to find a house sit or a pet sit, and then you could stay at a place for free, but still be able to experience the cool parts of a new city, for example, or even do something in your city or close to the city in which you live just to get away for a while.

That's another alternative way in which to get to see each other and do something fun and do something that's collaborative, but that doesn't necessarily cost the same amount of money that spending $300 or something at a hotel room might cost. Even if you get a shitty hotel room, those costs still add up over time. If you're able to instead find like, "Okay, we want to get away for a weekend. Do something that's really fun." Do something that feels like, "Okay, we're getting to have this special experience together." As opposed to just doing the mundane, like, yes, okay, we meet up and see each other in a hotel room, but this is something that we've done 15 or 20 times.

Instead, we're getting to really do something very special, but do it in a way that is cheaper than it might be otherwise, even than those normal get-togethers in a hotel room might cost.

Jase: The other piece with the pet-sitting thing is that it could also allow you to have longer things. Like Emily mentioned, it could be a whole weekend, or maybe it's even you find a pet-sitting gig, if you're able to work remotely, that you could go do that for a week in his town and then could see each other a little more often during that week, make it a special thing, or vice versa, if he's able to work remotely.

Either way, it opens up some other options of maybe you still can't see each other as often, and that just practically is how that's going to be. Maybe there are things you could do to make it so when you do see each other, it's a little more special, and you can take advantage of, "We've traveled a longer way, let's really dedicate some nicer, quality time, more of a full day, and not just like a night in a hotel room."

Emily: Instead of focusing on the comparison aspect with the metamours, which I know is really easy to do, and that's part of the reason why I was like, maybe if you can meet them, maybe do that just because sometimes it makes that comparison aspect feel a little bit easier when you're actually putting a face to a name and getting to meet someone as a whole individual as opposed to just an idea, and the fact that you've never spoken to them either. That's interesting. It's something that maybe you can confront or think about at some point, if, again, that is something that you all want to do.

Now, back to the comparison standpoint, I would ideally try to look at making things more equitable within the relationship itself. What I mean by that is if, for instance, your partner is coming to your home and they have to pay for gas, you might have to clean up your apartment or do some emotional labor or do various things to get ready for them to come into your space. That, while it may not be a monetary value thing, maybe it is something like, "I decide what it is that we're doing while we're together." Things like that.

I've talked with one of our old research assistants, Kiana, about this, just about the emotional labor and the time involved in all of those things, and how you're trying to make it feel a little bit more equitable from that standpoint. That maybe you can decide together, "Okay, it would be more equitable if you came to see me, but then I was the one who did the planning, getting the place together or whatever, and did all of the planning and stuff for that."

I just would try to find specific ways in which the two of you can make it feel a little bit more equal within your relationship. As opposed to looking at they're doing all of these things for other people, let's figure out what are the things that I can focus on and what are the things that I can change within the confines of the relationship that I'm in.

Dedeker: I think Emily's take on this whole comparison piece is very measured and very enlightened and very aspirational.

Emily: I don’t know about that.

Dedeker: I think for me, if I were in this position, I'd be making a much more unenlightened stink about this, personally.

Jase: I see.

Emily: Listen, if I were in this, I may not actually be doing as well as what I'm hoping I would do or what I'm saying I would do. I hear you, and I don't necessarily think that I would be perfect in this by any means if this were the case, because, yes, that comparison is so easy to have happen. I do think that-- The ways that I've dealt with metamours in general is just to realize the only thing that I can do is change my own behavior, at the end of the day. I can do anything about anyone else.

I can have discussions with my partner, I can tell them how I feel, I can tell them all of the ways in which this might be challenging for me, but I think ultimately I have to look inwardly at what is the thing that I'm longing for? How does this make me feel? Is it something that I can deal with if this behavior doesn't change? Is it something that my partner is willing to be collaborative on with me? If all of those things are the case, then that's it. That's all that I can do.

You can't change his behavior about how he deals with your metamours in any way. Yes, you might be able to throw a stink and have a rough time with it, but I think you have to be honest about your feelings and hopefully he will be honest about his as well.

Dedeker: Yes. I think that's the rub, is then we're coming full circle to what I put a pin in earlier about that this could be also not at all about money. Money could truly just be the convenient excuse and there could be something deeper going on here. Again, like Emily said, hopefully he's able to be honest about that, but there's not a guarantee that if you try to open up a really deep conversation about this, there's no guarantee that-- if your partner truly actually isn't interested in spending more time with you or escalating in that way, there's no guarantee that they'll be totally honest about that.

Jase: Something that I think in this vein is worth bringing up too is the time piece and the driving piece. I know for myself having a long drive to get someplace makes me just much less likely to go there, whether that's a class that I want to take, or a gym that I want to go to, a friend I want to see, or a partner. I don't think that's everybody. Some people don't mind those longer car rides like that, but I really struggle with it.

This is something that comes up with that even seeing one of my best friends, is he lives just far enough away and it's just trafficy and inconvenient enough to get there that it's hard to do that as often. We'll only tend to see each other once every month, or two. It sounds a little bit similar to the rhythm you found here. That's not to say that that's fair or that's hard, and I would hope that I wouldn't treat a relationship that way if it felt like they really wanted more than that.

I guess that's where I think it's a little tricky and where I'm hoping that coming together to have more of a collaborative discussion about it could be beneficial to get a little more real about that. It's like, yes, it's also inconvenient. Having to get a hotel in your own town is also inconvenient. It's not like the other ones are super easy, convenient, and you aren't, but of acknowledging, yes, this does take a different amount of commitment of time out of someone's day and that they're out of the town they're in. They're farther from if they did have to quickly go home to do something with their family or had to run into work or got out of work late or whatever it is. I don't know the circumstances.

I think, again, that could come back to this idea of maybe we come to the conclusion that it's just not practical to see each other more often, but let's try to do something to make it feel a little bit more special when we do. Maybe that is emphasizing more him coming to you since you live alone so that you can both spend time together and not have to get a hotel room while you're together, but planning some things, making it a little more special when you do.

Then also, something that came up for me a lot in long-term relationships is planning ahead when the next one's going to be so you have that sense of, "There's an event I'm looking forward to that we can chat with each other about our anticipation of it, maybe collaborating on the ideas of things we want to do when we have that next time together."

I just want to throw that out there as there's a very probable reality where seeing each other more often is just not practical, not sustainable. There could be other creative ways to also still have a fulfilling time that feels more equitable. Just thinking about that, worrying less about the exact one-to-one comparison and more, "What can we do that's fun for us and that feels good?"

Dedeker: It's funny. I think that this is-- maybe for anyone who's listening, if you're in a newish relationship or newly dating somebody, just bear in mind that we financially entangle ourselves with people, even if we're not officially financially entangling ourselves with people. We do enter into a financial relationship with somebody from the moment that we have to figure out how do we split the check, or who pays for the tickets to this thing, or how much am I going to spend on groceries for my meal in? What that means is I get that it's probably too socially weird to, from your first date, be talking about money and what it means to you and how you like to spend or not spend or whatever.

I do think people should probably have conversations about money earlier than they think that they should. Don't wait until you're literally getting legally married or something-

Emily: Oh, God, no please.

Dedeker: -or signing a lease together. Take the risk to have some vulnerable conversations around money. It doesn't have to involve, "Here's a spreadsheet of my my bank accounts," and what's in them or anything like that. It can start from that emotional place of, "This is what money means to me. These are the times when I feel nervous about money. These are the times I feel good about money," and take it from there.

Emily: I think, Dedeker, from what it sounds like, and honestly, your money situation and the way in which you handle money, I feel like it's not particularly transparent, even though I think-- in my mind, I have this idea that you're the best money person I know, period, and that you really, really have just done a fantastic job figuring out where to put your money, and then also putting aside money in order to do fun things, or in order to buy gifts, stuff like that. You're very good at that kind of thing, very planning ahead. I anticipate that your relationship with Jase also, the two of you are able to talk about money in a similar fashion or, I don't know, that you bring some of that to your relationship.

Dedeker: I would say yes, but that's not always been historically true in our relationship.

Jase: It took us a while to get there.

Dedeker: I think that from early on, especially in the early days, we sussed out very easily that both of us were broke and that made it easier to get on the same page around how much we wanted to spend on dates. That wasn't necessarily explicitly said, but we sussed that out very early, though, we didn't have any real money conversations until several years later. It's funny you talk about the lack of transparency thing, because on the one hand, I would disagree, but on the other hand, Jase's paranoid that I have secret million stashed away.

Emily: I know he does. There's a reason for that, Dedeker, because-

Dedeker: There is. Let me just say for the record, anyone listening, I do not have secret millions stashed away anywhere.

Jase: Which is exactly what someone with secret millions stashed away would say.

Dedeker: At the same time, especially on one side of my family, that's a very strong move that my mom's side of the family would pull. I am the type of person who would do that, and I need to tell you that I'm not.

Jase: That's a tricky one to convince someone else.

Emily: The reason that I bring it up is just because I applaud both of you in the ways in-- like your generosity around money, but then also the fact that you're able to be measured about it with yourself and with others. I will say, in my long-term relationship, money was a really big, big issue. It was like a nickel and diming situation. I felt really shitty about money and about how little I could contribute in comparison. Then when a lot more was contributed, I honestly felt like I was made to feel shitty about my lack of being able to do so.

In the current relationship that I'm in, my partner's like, "Oh, I got this one, don't worry about it." Then I'm like, "Hey, you've been getting a lot. Let me get this one." He's like, "Great, but we will figure it out." Today I even said to him, I'm like, "You've been getting a lot. I'm going to get this one because we haven't figured it out. We haven't sat down and really seen how many things you've gotten recently versus me." He was just like, "Don't worry about it." That mentality is also extremely refreshing.

All of this is to say that it would be nice to bring a little bit of both, I think, to the table, because I don't want to get in a situation where he ever feels like, "Oh God, you're not paying enough," or whatever, but it's so nice to be like, "This person's just being generous and being chill, and that's awesome."

Jase: Look, they're being generous because they just want to be in because they can and not because they're going to get something from that.

Emily: He and I probably make about the same amount, but it's fucking chill. I don't know, if you can have a sense of chill and a level-headedness about it all, do that instead of making somebody feel shitty about it.

Jase: Yes, definitely.

Dedeker: Yes. Well, weirdly, I think something that helped was there was a day that Jase came to me, and, Jase, what you said to me was you were like, "I read," or maybe you listened on a podcast, I don't know, but like, "I heard that rich people are really good at just talking very plainly about money."

Emily: Are they? Okay. Maybe some are.

Dedeker: "This is how much money I make." I don't know if that's quite where the conversation went. It's not like you pressured me to also disclose that, but you did set this up of like, "I want to be good about talking about money, and so let's talk about it in a very plain and nonjudgmental way." We were able to. I think that set us up on a really good foundation of just opening the closet doors.

I think in America, especially, we're so trained to be so weird about money because it's so emotional, and we're so expected that we're going to feel ashamed about it, whether you feel ashamed that you make too much or feel ashamed that you make too little or whatever it is. I don't know, I felt that there was just enough trust developed between us to open that conversation. Then opening the conversation, I think, helped develop a lot of trust for me, too.

Jase: That was great to hear that was your experience of it.

Dedeker: There was one time with a former partner of mine where taking that same mentality of like, "Let's just be very frank about money and how much we make because we are in this financial entanglement where we're splitting the cost of staying places and food and all those things," and I said how much money I make. Well, he was so nervous. He was immediately not comfortable with this conversation. Was like, "Okay, like we can do that." He was so nervous. Then I said how much money I make. Then he was like, "Oh, thank God." That's because I made less money than him, was why he was so nervous. He was nervous that it would come out that I made more money than him. In that moment, I was like, "Okay, I really don't feel great about this."

Jase: There is a challenge with that, that money is emotional. Being able to talk more frankly about it is, I still believe, very important, but you do have to be careful with those conversations because that shit's implanted so deep in us to feel whatever shame or expectations or something, and also to realize that the amount of money someone makes is not the whole story either. When Dedeker and I met, we both were not making very much money, and I also had quite a bit of debt from having not made money for quite a while while living in an expensive city of LA.

Then, even later, as I started to make more money, still, I was having to put a lot of that toward paying down that debt, versus someone who might've been making less than me, but didn't have any debt. There can be more of a sense of freedom there. Then there's also, are you paying for children? Are you supporting somebody else? What's your living situation like? There's a lot of other factors that go on there as well. It's not just as simple as how much you're making, but being able to be more upfront and honest about that whole conversation, I think, is very valuable, but also challenging, especially because we're not used to it.

Dedeker: That's a great segue into the recommendation that I want to make, which is all the way back in 2020, we did an interview with Hadassah Damien, who's this amazing queer woman who creates specifically these, this is going to sound weird to say, but I guess, capitalism critical money resources for queer people, specifically. That's episode 273. It's titled Money and Multiple Partners. Again, this is a few years ago. We could definitely use a refresh on this.

Jase: That's be great.

Dedeker: I think that's a great place to start if this is a topic that's relevant to you.

Emily: We did do an episode recently on equity and equality, and that was 521. That was quite recently. I know this episode went in a lot of different directions, including money, and then also equity within a relationship. If you want to check that out as well, it does touch on some of the stuff that we discussed today. Again, that's 521.

Dedeker: Thank you, third-class citizen in California. I hope that you're on your way to feeling like a first-class citizen, actually. I hope you're able to have some of these conversations with your partner, that they're receptive to it. For all of you out there, I'm really curious to hear when do you know it's the right time to talk about money with a new partner?