548 - Conversations to Have Before Moving in Together

Throwback to episode 209

This episode is a remastered version of an earlier conversation about cohabitation, over 300 episodes ago. We discuss harmonious living and cohabitation for both romantic partners and platonic roommates or friends. Co-living is becoming more and more common, and not just for romantic partnerships. Housing cost makes up a larger percentage of income for millennials than the generation before them, leading to more necessary cohabitation.

Before you move in with anyone, though, make sure you’re asking yourself these question:

• Do you get along with the person? 

• Do you have conflicting work hours or schedules? 

• Do you have conflicting social lives?

• Is this person financially reliable? 

• Do your housekeeping styles mesh? 

• If living with a romantic partner, be cognizant that sometimes cohabitation is a path to getting married, having a baby, or other relationship escalator steps. It is often much more difficult to let go of a relationship that is not serving you when you are cohabiting. Many people may stay in a relationship when they are cohabiting instead of ending a relationship early, even if they want to de-escalate.

How can I be a good roommate?

Whether you’re living with a partner or a platonic roommate, being a good cohabitor is vital to a harmonious living situation. Here are some actionable ways you can prioritize being a good roommate, and some things to look for in your own potential roommates:

1. Establish some a code of ethics within your household (have intentional discussions, maybe even put it in formal or informal writing).

2. Respect each other’s personal space (even if you are in a romantic relationship). 

3. You are accountable for your own messes. 

4. Respect the need for separation/autonomy (personal space, alone time, independent plans with friends).

5. Deal with issues quickly when they come up and don’t let them fester.

6. Don’t gossip about the person with whom you are cohabiting. This is related to respecting the privacy of home space.

7. Have intentional discussions about the environment you want - feeling, decor, space, sound, cleanliness - as well as creating an action plan for how that will be created and maintained, like division of chores.

8. Have intentional discussions about how date time, sleepovers, scheduling is going to work.

   • Do we give keys to partners/can partners be at the residence without me?

   • How much clothing is expected to be worn around the house?

   • How loud can we have sex? At what hours?

9. Seriously consider before you combine finances in a permanent way. Example: Don’t co-sign for a credit card or loan. If you open a joint account, also maintain individual accounts.

Some special considerations for non-monogamous cohabiting situations could include:

1. The bed you share with a partner might be a charged concept. Have discussions around multiple partners in the same bed, how to be courteous about it, etc.

2. Discuss metamours or non-cohabiting partners interacting with your space, what you want that to look like or not look like, etc.

3. Consider logical or descriptive hierarchy that occurs within non-monogamous relationships.

Remember, it’s okay to not want to live with a romantic partner! Platonic roommates may be necessary in the current economy, but your living space is important, and it’s okay to de-nest with a partner if you feel as though your relationship will be better served living apart.

Transcript

If you find any transcription errors, please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.

Jase: Welcome to the Multiamory Podcast. I'm Jase.

Emily: I'm Emily.

Dedeker: And I'm Dedeker.

Emily: We believe in looking to the future of relationships, not maintaining the status quo of the past.

Dedeker: Whether you're monogamous, polyamorous, swinging, casually dating, or if you just do relationships differently, we see you and we're here for you.

Jase: On this episode of the Multiamory Podcast, we're bringing you a hit from the ancient days of 2019. The long, long time ago in 2019, this was an episode that we recorded about cohabiting or cohabitating. We had a little bit of a debate actually about how you're supposed to say it, which we'll get to in the episode. But what I really like about this one is that the three of us were all in very different living situations then as we are now. And I actually found when I went back and listened to this that I really appreciated getting to have that perspective from the me from five, six years ago compared to the me that I am now. So what we're gonna do is do a little bit of a re-edit as well as including some of what was in the bonus episode originally that was just for our Patreon subscribers that now will get included into this episode where we're discussing not only what to consider if you're thinking about moving in with a partner or even a roommate, but also how to make that experience positive. And a lot of that has to do with having the conversations that we don't normally think about having of actually getting into the weeds a little bit about how you expect a household to be run. And what I think is interesting is at the time, I had a roommate that I was living with, a platonic roommate, actually two of them. And so I was coming at it from that point of view. But prior to that, I had been living with Emily. And then Dedeker at this time was not living with anyone and talked about that. And then Emily was living with her long-term partner. Fast forward to now, Emily's living alone. Dedeker and I are living together most of the year now. And I don't have those roommates anymore. So it was really cool getting to listen to this and hear those perspectives. And as I was listening, kind of nodding along as if these were strangers that I was listening to giving advice, but I really appreciated it. And so I wanted us to dust this one off, give it a fresh coat of paint, and then send it out there for all of you in case you didn't listen to this one the first time around. So check out this episode, which was originally episode 209, but now is episode 548, talking about to cohabit. Or not to cohabit. How to decide if it's right to live with someone. So I hope you enjoy this one.

Dedeker: Well, my first living situation wasn't until I was out of college, different from most people, I think. I somehow managed to get through college not living in a dorm, not...

Emily: Not living with a partner?

Jase: So not at all.

Emily: You were totally alone?

Dedeker: I was totally alone. And it sounds really sad when you put it that way.

Emily: No, it sounds amazing. Are you kidding me?

Dedeker: I was very strong and independent and badass, but yes, I was totally alone.

Emily: I apologize that you felt that that was like a bad thing that I was saying.

Dedeker: No, no, no, no, no.

Emily: I was literally like, what? You had your own place all through college?

Dedeker: I loved it because I was just renting a mother-in-law unit from some family friends. So they rented it to me for super cheap.

Emily: What is a mother-in-law unit?

Dedeker: It's like a standalone little studio that was in their backyard that was detached from the main house. It was pretty cool. It had a tiny little kitchenette and it was two stories actually, like a real, a real staircase that went up to a real second bedroom. It was quite spacious.

Emily: I bet it was awesome.

Dedeker: But obviously once you lock that down, I wasn't giving that up. I stayed there through all four years of college, just me and my cat. It was great.

Jase: But okay, this episode is not about living alone in college.

Dedeker: It's about, oh, right. I totally skipped the whole purpose. I just love living alone so much anyways. But after that experience, my first cohabitation experience outside of just with my family, when I was a child, was moving in with a romantic partner at the tender age of 22, maybe even 21, actually, I think. Yeah.

Emily: So tender.

Dedeker: And we moved into a place that I think was smaller than the place that I lived by myself in college. So that was all kinds of rough. Yeah.

Emily: You were in Los Angeles, right? So that makes sense.

Dedeker: It was also my first time moving to Los Angeles.

Jase: Yeah, well, there's a lot at play there for sure.

Dedeker: There was a lot there. There was a whole lot there. Yeah, first time even having a roommate in general and then also first time living with a romantic partner and also thinking it was going to work in a super teeny, tiny, dinky little space. It was something I learned a lot, that's what I'll say.

Jase: I mean, when I was much younger, my brother and I shared a room, but not in a long time. So I think that was the first time sharing a space, especially a small space like a college dorm. But that freshman year roommate, we had this kind of relationship where we would sort of talk but didn't really interact very much. It was just sort of the bare minimum necessary to function in the same space with someone else. But yeah, anyway, and then had some other roommates in college. But then my senior year is when I moved in for the first time with a romantic partner. So that definitely was a very different sort of thing. At least for me at the time, I thought about that very differently than I had with living with roommates and things like that.

Dedeker: I guess I felt more adult at the time, even at the tender age of 22, it was like, this is a very adult thing, moving in with a romantic partner.

Jase: Oh, yeah, for sure. Definitely that was a factor for me, too.

Emily: I'm also adult now.

Jase: Yeah, feeling very adult, yeah.

Dedeker: What about you, Emily?

Emily: Well, I accidentally moved in with an ex-romantic partner my sophomore year of college.

Dedeker: So, how do you accidentally move in with someone?

Emily: Accidentally is not really what happened, but we were dating all through the first year of college when we both just lived in the dorms because we went to school in Cincinnati and had to have a dorm situation for the first year, as many colleges make you do. And then we signed a lease before we left for the summer and then broke up over the summer.

Dedeker: And we're like, oh no.

Emily: We'll be fine. We're just buds. It's a two-bedroom. No problem, which, you know, was a problem.

Dedeker: It was a problem.

Emily: So that was not ideal.

Dedeker: And how long did that lease last?

Emily: The whole year. It was a year.

Dedeker: But I mean, how long did you survive?

Emily: Nine months, the year of school.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Emily: I mean, we stuck it out. It was not pretty, but we stuck it out. And then I ended up moving upstairs. It was like this huge, eight-bedroom house in Cincinnati that was two basically doors. So, two bedrooms below which is where I lived my sophomore year, and then five bedrooms above, I guess that's-.

Dedeker: But it was like separate- Bedrooms, not a suite. Is that what you're saying about the two doors? Exactly. There were only two doors in the entire house. It really made things difficult.

Emily: No, no, yeah, two front doors. And so then I moved upstairs with a bunch of foreign exchange students, and then one other guy from my class.

Dedeker: Did your ex still live below you?

Emily: No, he moved to his own place, and it was a really cool place. So I could go over there sometimes and we became good friends after that.

Jase: After a while. Okay. So yeah.

Dedeker: It did work out actually.

Emily: It worked out but when we were living together, not so much. That was really rough. But after we stopped living together then we became really good friends. Yeah, he still lives in the city and we still hang out sometimes. So nice guy.

Dedeker: Oh, it's a happy ending. I was expecting a much worse ending to that story.

Emily: No, totally. And then yeah, pretty much from the time that I moved to Los Angeles on, I've either been living with a roommate or living with a significant other. I had two brief moments of living alone and that was it. And they were six months or less.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Emily: Wow. Jason and I lived together, what, for how long? A long time. Two and a half years? Three years?

Jase: Yeah, I thought it was more like three or four years, but yeah.

Emily: Four years?

Jase: For a decent amount of time.

Emily: It was a while. Now I live with Josh, so there it is.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Emily: Living with everyone.

Jase: Yeah. To bring it back to the topic and talking about all of this, we want to talk about questions to ask yourself before moving in with someone, and then also things you can do to make that better. We did want to look at first, though, some statistics and things about cohabiting, and then also all pointing back to this question of why do we choose to live together? I think that's a pretty central question to ask yourself, not because there's necessarily a right or wrong answer, but I think that having an honest answer of why you're thinking about moving in with someone or why you are moving in with someone or planning to or have already moved in with someone is important. So Dedeker found this study by the CDC, which I'm confused about why the CDC would be studying this, but I...

Emily: I guess they, oh, yeah, the Center for Disease Control.

Dedeker: That is really, well, you know, when people live together, you know how it is when you're living with someone and they get a cold and then you get a cold. And then especially if you have multiple partners and they come over, then they get a cold. CDC is aware of this. And they're like, We need to get this under wraps. We need to know who's living together, why, how long, how we can prevent Dedeker from freaking out and wiping down every knob and light switch with alcoholic wipes whenever a cohabiting partner gets sick.

Jase: Yes, which she does do. The CDC wanted to understand that. They're like, why does Dedeker do that? Let's do a study. So we do want to preface this by saying that as so many of the studies that we talk about on this show, unfortunately, it is focused purely on heterosexual romantic couples living together. It doesn't also take into account roommates or same-sex couples or non monogamous couples or anything outside of that. So it is limited. And essentially they came up with a bunch of statistics from this study. But at least from us looking at this data, a lot of the data doesn't say quite what you think it says, because it really depends how you interpret it and how you compare it to other factors and things like that. And so you'll hear people kind of toss out lots of statistics like, oh, if you live together before you get married, you're more likely to get divorced, or things like that, right?

Emily: That statistics- It just seems very puritanical.

Dedeker: Right.

Jase: And the thing is, if you look at the numbers, you go, yeah, okay, that checks out on some of these studies, but it's leaving out a lot of details and a lot of factors and things that go into that. But one thing that we did notice about this that is kind of relevant to what we're getting to about this question of why we move in together is that one of the big takeaways is the fact that people who choose to cohabit without getting married first are more likely to be economically disadvantaged than the people who do get married first.

Dedeker: That makes sense. As in they are... You have less money. In a context of being economically disadvantaged when they choose to move in together. It's not that cohabiting makes you economically disadvantaged versus being married.

Jase: But that's a great example of how you could look at those stats and go, ah, living together before you're married makes you more likely to be poor instead of going, actually, people who are poor are more likely to cohabit. That that's the- Or maybe you just...

Emily: live in Los Angeles and it's, you know, $2,000 for a one bedroom apartment.

Dedeker: Right. Yeah.

Jase: And so all of these are factors in terms of these changes too, that There's things like the fact that housing costs are much more expensive now relative to inflation than it was for previous generations. So if we're looking at younger people or older people who are now looking for a new place to live or their living situation has changed, it is a lot less feasible to live on your own. And then that on top of the fact that more and more people are living in cities rather than rural areas, which also makes that price go up.

Dedeker: Also among Millennials, we've definitely seen that as a general trend, Millennials are waiting later and later to get married. Also, the divorce rate among, or not at all, the divorce rate among Millennials is also significantly lower than it's been in previous generations, previous decades. However, they are looking at the fact that Millennials are much more likely to also have gone through an experience of cohabiting with a significant other before getting married. Either to that same significant other or to someone else. And so it is kind of like while our parents' generation may have gone through the start of the quote unquote starter marriage and then to the next marriage that it seems that among millennials there's much more likely to be a chance of the quote unquote starter marriage was that first cohabiting experience.

Jase: Or the first several cohabiting.

Dedeker: Or the first several cohabiting, because outside of the legal ties that come with marriage on the surface choosing to cohabitate with a romantic partner, there's a lot of overlap with our traditional image of marriage. You are figuring out the living space and sharing possessions and

Emily: Without the strings attached to a degree.

Jase: Without some of the strings.

Emily: Yeah, but you don't have the financial and legal ramifications that you would if you were to sign a marriage certificate. Yeah, not in the same way. It's like marriage lite a little bit, maybe.

Dedeker: Yeah, for some people, I think it is kind of like a marriage. It is weird for me to look back and think about the partners that I lived with. And I've only technically had two experiences of long-term cohabitation with significant others. And it is kind of funny for me to look back and think about if this was 30, 40, maybe even 50 years ago, that these would have been maybe two marriages, two different marriages that I would have had and then divorces, and then I just shudder and then I can't get to sleep and I stop thinking about it. Gosh.

Emily: And then you travel the world and get rid of all of your possessions and are like, Nope, not doing that again.

Jase: Oh boy. But so the reason why we felt like it was interesting to bring up this statistic about people cohabiting without being married are more likely to have lower income, I think that is an interesting thing to think about in that question, because I feel like, correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like if I went into a room of People from their 20s through their 30s, maybe 40s, and said, show of hands who has moved in with a romantic partner where saving money was a significant portion of that decision to do it. I know my hand would go up, and I feel like a lot of other people's would, too. You feel like that makes some sense?

Emily: Well, yeah. I mean, when you and I Jase, you and I each had our own studio apartments.

Jase: Right.

Emily: I had my own for six month period, and you were over at my place every day anyways. And I was paying $1300 for this frickin studio apartment in Studio City. And it was like, why am I doing this when this person is already over here and we could get a way sweeter place and split it? And so that's exactly what we did. And it makes a lot of sense.

Dedeker: Yeah. It does seem that with rising housing costs just being ridiculous, both the cost of purchasing a home or renting a place, that it makes sense that the pressure on that does increase, right? And so it does become more and more economical or it makes more and more sense to choose to split the cost of that either with a significant other or with a roommate as well.

Jase: Well, and that's the funny part is that I feel like when I say this about like, well, saving money is a significant portion of your decision to move in with your romantic partner, I feel like people get a little uncomfortable with that and they're like, I don't know if I want to...

Dedeker: I understand people getting uncomfortable with that.

Jase: But then you say, why did you move in with a roommate that's a platonic roommate? And you ask the same question. Everyone's like, Of course, why else do you have roommates?

Dedeker: Right?

Jase: I mean, not always, but for most people, it's like, yeah, of course. And I think that's worth examining. Like, why? And it's stuff we talk about on this show a lot, like attaching... Money...

Emily: gets tricky with romance.

Jase: Yeah, especially when you attach meaning to it, or you attach this idea that a decision can't be logical if there's also romance involved, or it can't be practical or anyway, so I just kind of bring this up as like, try to be as honest as you can with yourself and ideally with your partner or your financial advisor or, you know, whoever is sort of giving you advice.

Emily: My financial advisor.

Jase: Yeah, right.

Emily: I have one.

Jase: That thing that exists. Yeah.

Dedeker: That thing that everyone has. Yeah.

Emily: No, but we'll definitely be talking more about that specific thing, being honest with yourself regarding this question, like why to move in at all. As the show goes on.

Dedeker: Yeah, and I think that's a good segue to talk about when we were putting this episode together, we curated the talking points with the intention of these things ideally being applicable both to a more quote unquote platonic living situation or a roommate situation, as well as being applicable to choosing to live with a romantic or a sexual partner. And I think I would like to invite people as they listen to this episode to take the challenge to apply our favorite filter of the relationship anarchist slash fromance filter when thinking about cohabitation situation?

Jase: Cohabitation situation.

Dedeker: I don't know if that's even correct, but I like it. It sounds like it could be a Sesame Street song.

Jase: Yeah, I was thinking like a Schoolhouse Rock. I was thinking Schoolhouse Rock.

Dedeker: Oh yeah, schoolhouse rock. Okay, all right. We'll have to workshop that one. But choosing to live with specifically a romantic or sexual partner, that's so wrapped up in the relationship escalator and so wrapped up in this idea of this is just kind of the next step on the path. I think for a lot of people it's been baked into this idea of that's just the next step on the path to maybe marriage or whatever comes next. But I think it is really interesting to apply the filter of thinking about what are the behaviors that you would or could tolerate from a roommate but not from a romantic or sexual partner? And vice versa, what are the behaviors that you tolerate from a romantic partner that you live with but maybe not from a roommate? We'll talk about this a little bit more, but I think that is an interesting thought experiment to try on that can really kind of change your perception of sharing a space with somebody.

Emily: Yeah, because we do tend to give our friends a little bit more of the benefit of the doubt at times than we do our partners. I know that I've done that in the past. And it really truly is just okay to prioritize living with someone who's not a romantic partner if it is ultimately a better fit for you. So, I think that that's a takeaway that we want people to know when they listen to this episode. And understandably, people might be like, well, but I need to live with a romantic partner because that's going to move the relationship forward in a way that I want it to. However, if that's not serving both of you, then we urge you to maybe reconsider that.

Dedeker: Yeah, I just wanted to jump in on that. Just to, there is this growing trend of couples or married couples who choose to be together but live separately. And that's great. I'm totally in support of that. Definitely comes from a place of privilege that not everybody has the ability to afford their own separate apartments totally. But I also want to invite into the discussion the idea of like, okay, maybe you can't afford to have two separate houses or whatever, but you can still have roommates that are not each other. You know, you can still kind of find a way to negotiate this. And just because you choose to have a roommate that's not your romantic partner doesn't necessarily mean that the relationship is failing or the two of you are not meant for each other romantically. That's my opinion.

Jase: I'm going to yes and this even a step further and say, or even if you do end up saying, gosh, finding good roommates is hard, because obviously that's fraught with peril sometimes as well. You're a romantic partner, I know I get along with you. This makes financial sense. Let's do it. I would actually argue too that just admitting that and understanding the fact that we're doing this not because we have to in order for our relationship to be real, or that this is something we always have to do or else it means we don't love each other, rather than attaching that meaning to it, that if you were more honest about, yeah, this is gonna save us money, this is practical, and by approaching it that way, I actually think you could set yourself up for a better, more romantic, more fulfilling, communicative relationship that way. So that's my throwing that out there. That's my hypothesis.

Emily: I like it.

Dedeker: Yeah. We've tossed our soapboxes into the ring or some kind of metaphor.

Emily: I like that.

Jase: We tossed our soapboxes into the ring.

Emily: Into the ring.

Jase: Before we go on to the next section, we want to let everyone know that we have an amazing community of subscribers who get access to ad-free early releases of episodes, monthly video processing groups, as well as exclusive locked subscriber-only channels in our Discord server, where there's amazing discussion and support going on. If you'd like to be part of that and join for a sliding scale, go to multiamory.com/join. In the meantime, take a moment to listen to our sponsors for this episode. They directly support our show, and if you find them interesting, use our promo codes or the links in our episode description, and that directly helps support our show.

Emily: Okay, let's get into the actual listicle part of this conversation. We have a couple. And the first list that we're going to talk about are the questions to ask yourself and the conversations to have before moving in with someone, with a partner, with a friend, with a random person, anyone. So the questions to ask include, do you get along with this person? And see, this is tough because sometimes I've definitely heard people who I work with say like, well, I put an ad out on Craigslist, And I'm interviewing people to live with me, which seems really hard and intense. Best of luck to you if that's what you're doing. But I think it might be challenging just from one interaction to know, Am I actually going to get along with this person if I live with them? I think that's a very, very fundamental thing that someone should ask themselves. Can I live with this person? Do I get along with them? And then also another one is, Do you have conflicting work hours or schedules? Does someone work a 9 to 5 and the other person work a night shift? Are you ever going to be able to sleep because one person is up all hours of the night and the other person is up during the day when one needs to sleep? Things like that. Just do the schedules. Are they hugely conflicting and therefore cause major disruption in our lives?

Dedeker: I think that's also a good conversation to have, even if it's with someone that you're much more intimate with, such as a romantic partner, because I found definitely when sharing spaces with romantic partners, I will assume that I know this person's schedule in and out. And I'm like, yeah, they work on these days and then they're usually home around this time. But so many times it's not until you're living with them that then you realize, oh wait, there's this thing, or wait, they actually get up at six in the morning to do this. Or in the case of anytime I'm sharing a space with someone, it's like, well, I need to have a private room in order to do client sessions. So if there's not a private room, I need to kick them out. And it's for some reason these are also always things that slip my mind or slip the other person's mind until we're actually in that space.

Jase: So I can't even tell you how many times we've been in a space and it's like, oh, this place is nice, this will totally work. And then it's like Dedeker says, I have a client coaching call at, you know, seven in the morning tomorrow and I'm like, oh, get out. Right, I need to go find someplace to be for an hour or two.

Emily: I need to wander the streets of Tokyo when nothing is open at 7.

Dedeker: A.M. As a vagabond.

Jase: Nothing opens before like 11 a.m. in Japan.

Emily: There you go.

Jase: Anyway, a little bit of a tangent.

Dedeker: Okay, but to be fair, Jase, we have, and with my partner Alex as well, we have definitely learned now that for instance, if we're staying in a friend's place together or if we're booking an Airbnb together, something that we're like, okay, this is something we definitely need to pay attention to because we burned ourselves too many times not paying attention to that.

Jase: Yeah, and that for us it's now a regular part of our radar. It's talking about upcoming travel plans, where we're going to be staying, and do we have separate workspaces? Or some other way to give each other space.

Dedeker: Or can we hack together a separate workspace?

Jase: Or like having a convenient other place to go during that time.

Emily: Yeah, right. Yeah, I mean, I often work at night for this show where my partner has to be in a different room from me. He has a 9 to 5, so we have to kind of work that out because often I will be working nights and that sometimes can be challenging. So, yeah. All of those things are a consideration. What are some other ways?

Jase: So, yeah, so that's work hours and schedules and just kind of being very real about other parts of your schedule that might not be so obvious upfront. So the third one here is about, Do you have conflicting social lives? And this doesn't mean like one of you is a Montague and one's a Capulet or something like that. This is- But it could mean that, could you imagine? It could mean that.

Emily: But we decided to live together anyways.

Jase: Yeah, one's a jet and one's a shark or something, and you have your friends over at the same time where they stab each other. No, what we mean here is, for example, this, again, roommate, partner, friend, whatever, that one of you loves having people over. Like, you love hosting, you love having people over. You want to have this open door policy of like, People can always come into my space, and that's what I love my home to be. And then the other person could be someone who's like, My home is my cave, my sanctuary, away from people. This is the place I want to be and not deal with anyone. Obviously, those two might have a harder time being compatible, right? That's something to talk about and to figure out, ideally beforehand, before all of a sudden you moved in and you thought you had this peaceful little apartment, and now all of a sudden there's people over all the time and you're hating it. Or on the other side, you might be disappointed because you're always having to shush all of your friends that you want to have over because your roommate.

Emily: Is- I'm super introvert.

Jase: Well, because your roommate's a loser and they don't want your friends over and they don't want to be bothered, right?

Dedeker: Okay, I'm going to speak up in defense of, of quote unquote, lose their introverts. I see you subtweeting me right now, Jase.

Jase: I'm actually not. I feel like I'm usually the one who's more on the side of like, Ugh, can we not? Can we not all be single?

Emily: The only time when Dedeker has ever rained on my parade is when we were on tour and she really wanted to leave when I wanted to karaoke some more.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Emily: But she had a good point because I was super hungover for the next day of our tour and I fell down a hill.

Jase: Yeah, I don't know. I remember that. That was terrible.

Dedeker: Okay, so the moral of this story is listen to Dedeker sometimes, even if you think she's being silly, but not social.

Jase: But right, do you have conflicting desires for your social lives? And yes, this is a good thing to think about and to address. Next one is, is this person financially reliable? Yikes.

Emily: Yeah, that's a big one.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Emily: That is a very important one.

Dedeker: Well, it's also, okay, I guess I'd want to dive into what counts as reliable, because that may differ for different people. What counts as being financially reliable.

Jase: I feel like in this context, though, it is a little more clear-cut. And what that means is, do you really evaluate that this person is financially reliable enough that they will pay their part of the rent or mortgage and utilities and other costs associated with living here? Because the truth of the matter is, if you both sign a lease, your roommate doesn't pay their rent, You either have to pick up that slack and pay it yourself or take a hit to your credit and potentially have collections come after you because the lease agreement doesn't say they pay half, you pay half. It just says you both owe this amount of money. So this is a very- Does it...

Emily: ever happen to any of you?

Jase: I have picked up the slack for partners who couldn't pay it sometimes.

Dedeker: Yeah, I've picked up the slack. Yeah. Yeah. And I've been on the receiving end of someone picking up the slack for me for rent, but it's never gone that far as in, yeah, that's a big, you know, collection. Had some late rent payments, for sure.

Jase: But, but anyway, that is a serious thing to think about.

Dedeker: Right.

Jase: Is I feel like sometimes we just assume, like, oh, yeah, they're always going to pay their half of the rent. But think about it. Ask that question.

Dedeker: And it's also, I think it's the kind of thing where it's, it's not that it's necessarily good or bad. It's just, like, have the awareness that, like, you may be in a situation where you got a cover for someone else. And, and I think actually, like, it's good, especially with a romantic partner, to just have that conversation of, like, what are we going to do in the situation where maybe one of us we can't pay our portion of the rent. Even if you're from the assumption of thinking like, oh, that's never going to happen, but at least ask the question and talk about the feelings that come up around that and things like that. Yeah. So another conversation to have is do your housekeeping styles mesh or are they in conflict? What's kind of the level of cleanliness that you're comfortable with, that your partner's comfortable with? I feel like this can also be a good segue into a deeper conversation of like, what was kind of the housekeeping style of like your family of origin and you know, what feels the most comfortable to you? And again, I don't think that it's necessarily a case of like if one of you is, you know, a very, very clean, tidy person, if one of you is Marie Kondo and the other one of you is not Marie Kondo, the opposite of Marie Kondo.

Jase: Yeah, yeah.

Dedeker: I don't think that necessarily means you can never live together. It is going to be a deeper conversation of like Is there a compromise here? Personally, I lean more on the Marie Condo side, and I'm trying my best to kind of let go of some of that and be more relaxed about when things are out of place.

Emily: None of us will be able to put the dishes in the dishwasher as well as Jase.

Jase: Gosh.

Dedeker: Yeah. You're never gonna live down that dishwasher thing, Jase. I know.

Jase: Let's move on from that. No.

Dedeker: Okay.

Jase: I do want to say, though, that this is something we're thinking about, too, that even if you both you both consider yourself to be relatively neat people, it's different when it's your clutter or your misplaced things compared to someone else's. And just...

Dedeker: True. Think of that. Yeah. And then our last one, very, very important. I don't know how to phrase this into an actual question. This is kind of just more something to think about, a topic of conversation. And it's about what's known as the inertia effect. And so sometimes, as we mentioned, living together, especially with a romantic partner, it's considered the next step in intimacy. It's the next step on the relationship escalator and maybe it's the next step on the path toward getting married or raising a child together or owning property together or something like that. And so I think it's just important just to bring some awareness into the conversation and examine like are our reasons for living together is that an influencing factor that like we feel like this is just the next step or this is gonna be the next step on a pathway to a particular goal. And another thing to bear in mind is just the fact that that sometimes after you have chosen to move in with a romantic partner, it does make it exponentially more difficult to let go of that relationship if it's no longer serving you. Because for, you know, all the reasons we've talked about previously on this show, it's like fear of change and being comfortable and maintaining the status quo. It's all wrapped up into especially your living situation. You know, if you've created a living situation that's comfortable for you, but the relationship is sour, or living with this particular partner is just not working out, it can just make it even more difficult to walk away from that relationship, especially if it's like, well, we signed a lease or we are saving money and neither of us could afford to go somewhere else or whatever. So that's just something to bear in mind. And it may seem unromantic to talk about it, but I think it can be important to talk about that very plainly with a romantic partner of, like, if we're realizing this isn't working for us, either it's just not working for us to live together or our relationship is not working and not serving us, How do we feel about that? How do we want to go about that? That's a scary and vulnerable conversation to have, but it can be so important to at least open the door to that conversation as opposed to waiting until everything's falling apart and you're fighting over the Tupperware. I've been there to be talking about these things.

Emily: All right, so once you've asked yourselves those questions about, Can I do this? Is this a good person to move in with me? Am I a good person to move in? With, once all of that has happened.

Dedeker: I'm sorry, I've never asked myself that question.

Emily: I'm sure you're like, I'm amazing and I'm such a good roommate.

Dedeker: No, no. No. That's correct.

Emily: No, it's fine. So once that happens, you have some actionable steps that you can take for being a good roommate or for cohabiting with a significant other. And the first one is to establish some sort of code of ethics within your household. So what that means is just probably sit down with your roommate or your significant other and have a really intentional discussion about your boundaries, about just things that you are comfortable or not comfortable with in terms of like running a household, being in a household together. It's a time to compromise, but also a time to potentially put some of this in writing. Maybe put it on your refrigerator, maybe just have it in writing because because that's better sometimes than just like nebulously saying something out loud and then forgetting about it later. So I definitely encourage people to like actually write out sort of a code of ethics, if you will, for what your household is gonna look like, because then you can refer back to it as time goes on and then really be like, okay, listen, I am and I'm not okay with these things. Like let's work on that a little bit here.

Jase: Even some sort of like a household radar, I think would be a great way to do that.

Emily: I've heard of people asking me regarding that, yeah.

Jase: Yeah, even if you didn't do it as often, but something like maybe every six months. Yeah, every three months, every six months, whatever, we'll have a check-in so that there is that opportunity to bring up things like, oh, well, actually it always kind of bugs me when coats get hung over the back of chairs, like that's something that bothers me, that you get to bring it up before that point where you're throwing chairs across the room and being like, these fucking jackets on the backs of chairs.

Emily: Oh, wow.

Jase: You know that it gives you the.

Dedeker: Opportunity to that is a point for Jase. That is a point.

Emily: Do you not like jacket shares? Is that a thing?

Dedeker: He doesn't like jacket shares.

Jase: I do it sometimes too, but it bugs me. I try to not do that.

Emily: Yeah, I'm like, I've seen you do that.

Jase: Oh, yeah.

Dedeker: But I mean, in case you've forgotten, we do include household as a standard topic to come back to with a monthly radar as well, which I personally find really helpful anytime I am sharing a space with a partner to be able to, I mean, like you said, Jase, to have that opportunity where I can bring stuff up in this kind of safe and less emotionally charged space instead of, yeah, waiting until I'm like pissed off the sixth time that I've had to pick up like someone's socks or something like that.

Jase: Right. Real quick, before this next section, did you know that you can get ad-free early releases of this show, as well as access to monthly video processing groups and exclusive private channels on our Discord server, all by becoming a subscriber at a sliding scale pay what you can price. If you go to multiamory.com/join, you can read more, get access to that. We would love to have you as part of our community. In the meantime, take a moment to check out the sponsors on this episode. If any of them seem interesting to you, use the promo codes or the links that we have in our episode description, because that also goes a long way to supporting this show. All right, so with all of these things we're going to talk about in this section, these would be good things to bring up in this and to kind of continue that conversation about in case they change over time. So this next one here is to respect each other's personal space. And this is, I think, especially important to keep in mind if you are romantic or sexual partners, because that's where we tend to forget the fact that we need personal space as well. So just being respectful of that, giving each other that space maybe establishing some spaces, even just from a decor perspective, that each person has a place where they get to have more of the final say of how that's decorated, even if it's just a half of a room. Whatever you can do for you, find some way to have that space and respect that space for each other.

Dedeker: Right, it doesn't have to be that you have to shell out for a six-bedroom place so that you can each have a private office and and a meditation room. And as much as that would be cool, that would be awesome. It could just be like, this is my chair in the corner and this is where I go when I want to read and not be disturbed. It doesn't have to be purely all these separate rooms, but still even just little things, even if it feels ritualistic or codified, to be able to find that personal space.

Jase: Okay, the next one is the fact that you're accountable for your own mess. And this is true for both of you to keep in mind and to have these conversations about it because it can be tricky if you are doing things like preparing meals together or you're both having snacks on the couch watching a movie together or something like that, like establishing kind of how do we pick up these things? When do we pick up these things? Is one of you okay with waiting till the morning to do it? And the other person is like, I don't want to wake up to that. We need to do it now, having those conversations as you go and understanding that someone isn't doing this necessarily to spite you, but probably they just have a different way that they would do that or a different standard for that and kind of looking at how can we both be responsible for our own messes?

Emily: When I was living alone in Shanghai for two months, I definitely felt as though my messes would be cleaned up more quickly than if I'm living with a partner just because, like, I'm the only one accountable for them. And I need to deal with them instead of letting like, well, we might use that pan tomorrow to do something so it can like just stay there for a while and then clean it if we decide to use it kind of thing. You are the only one who has to deal with it. And if you want to clean space, then you have to actively deal with it. So it is interesting. Just try to be as courteous as possible, I think, in these moments, especially I mean, yeah, if you're with a significant other or not, it is incredibly important just try to live like you are living on your own and be responsible for your own things.

Dedeker: I think it's also an interesting exercise. Again, I'm always going to bring it back to the deep dive into your past and the things that formed you and shaped you. But I do think it is interesting to think about the home that you grew up in and just think about who cleaned up the dishes. Who did the laundry, who was responsible for hanging the laundry on the line, who was responsible for like taking care of the dog. Just to think about like how did these things play out? How is that informed the way that I approach my own space or I approach dividing chores with people that I live with? I'm just like, it's just more grist for the mill. It's just more interesting stuff to bring to the conversation. You don't have to, geez.

Emily: No, no, I like that. I just, the idea of like hanging stuff on a line felt very like 1950 to me.

Dedeker: Oh, God.

Emily: I was like, we live in America with giant dryers.

Dedeker: Oh, except that we were poor growing up and so it's like in the summertime you didn't want to just rack up the electric bill and so you'd hang stuff on the line.

Emily: All right, Dedeker, thank you for checking my privilege. I appreciate that. No, you're absolutely right. So, okay, the next one is going to be to respect the needs of separation and autonomy. So we talked about this a little bit before, but just really allow for your own personal space and your alone time. And other plans with friends and people who are not your significant other, or your roommate. If your roommate's a friend, you may want to do everything together. You may become this super tight duo, but at times it is good to do things outside of that relationship and really respect that time and not be jealous or upset when your partner wants to go off and have a night alone. That's super important.

Jase: Yeah, I just want to second that. The importance, whether it's a friend or a romantic partner or whatever, Of even in a subtle way, of not guilting the person for wanting to do something without you. Of not the like, oh, okay, fine, I'll just be here by myself. Or just even if you think you mean it jokingly, that can be a really hard thing for another person. I know that they- yeah, and be.

Emily: Like, oh God, I feel guilty now.

Jase: Yeah, I've done that to people, and I've had it done to me. And when I kind of realized that that was something that I was doing, even when I did not mean it, mean it or when I really needed it to be, but knowing how sometimes guilty or bad I would feel when someone would do that to me, really. So just, yes, really respect that time and encourage that time, honestly. Like, for me now, especially with romantic partners, I'm like, they want to go do something on their own. I'm like, Yes, definitely. You go do that. That's awesome.

Emily: Get out of here.

Jase: Because I know that the quality- I.

Emily: Want to see you.

Jase: No, because I know that the quality of the time that we spend together and their mood and both of our well-being and our relationship gets better. Better when they do that and when I do that. So I'm like, I try to make an extra effort to be encouraging of that and supportive of that rather than falling into that habit of like, okay, even if I might be a little bit like, oh dang, I did want to hang out tomorrow, still just be like, yes, definitely, because I know that in the long run that's better for both of us.

Emily: The next one is to try to deal with issues quickly when they come up. Don't let them fester. And Dedeker, you kind of touched on this before, like with the hanging the coat over the chair thing. If it does irk you when somebody does something in a household capacity, bring it up. Don't just be really angry about it and then all of a sudden you blow up and say, how dare you do this thing? Just bring it up in the moment and be like, hey, I'm not super okay with you leaving dishes in the sink all night long for multiple days at a time. Do you think maybe you could You could do a couple at a time or get them done now, right now.

Jase: Or maybe plan a time to meet and talk about it.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: To avoid having them be like, I don't know, I can't talk about that right now. Or like, I'm in the middle of something. To be like, well, let's set a time and have this conversation then. This idea of let's work together to make this good for both of us rather than you need to do a thing for me.

Dedeker: Yeah. Yeah. So the next one is, I think this applies often to a situation when you're living with a platonic friend or someone who's not necessarily a significant other, but it could apply to that as well. And especially if you're living with multiple roommates, not just one other person. But do your best to avoid gossiping or kind of sharing the personal details of the person that you are sharing a living space with. Because to a certain extent, it's like when we come into our homes, we do expect a certain modicum of privacy. And sometimes that's privacy that extends beyond just, it's not like your privacy is only within the bounds of you closing the door to your room or something like that. The privacy also extends to your home. So I think this relates to just respecting the privacy of home space in general. And so just avoiding, you know, gossiping about the, like, who they brought home or what kind of argument they had with this person that you overheard or things like that. I mean, of course, it's like, if there's some kind of situation where it's like there's conflict between you and your roommate and you're needing to get outside help or something like that, then, yes, talk about it. But just for the sake of courtesy, you know, it's good to just avoid spreading the details of someone's personal life because they are kind of buying into this idea that home is also like this. Private safe space where they can expect that. Moving on to the next one, you know, related to some stuff that we've talked about earlier is sit down either with your roommate or your nesting partner or romantic partner, whoever, and have some intentional discussions about the home environment that you want. Like, what's the kind of feeling that you're looking for? What's the kind of decor that you're looking for? What's the level of sound that you're both comfortable with? I'm definitely someone where I'm like, even if I'm in party mode, I want the music to be super quiet. And I've lived with people who like, no, like as soon as I need to do chores, like I blast that music up as high as I can, you know, so talk about like the level of sound that you want in your environment. Again, about the cleanliness, create an action plan for how that environment will be created and also maintained. And so that's things like whether it's, oh, let's go together to go to Ikea and pick out silly cheap things to decorate the place with, or it's like, let's actually codify a way to divide chores for maintaining cleanliness or find a way to collaborate with the person that you're living with with actionable steps, like specific things, in order to both create and maintain the kind of space that the two of you want to share.

Jase: Yeah, the next one is also having intentional discussions about your schedules. And this is a little different from what we talked about before, which is about what's your work schedule, what's your routine like, And this is kind of more about how are you going to schedule things like having people over, having sexual partners over, things like that. And this, I think, applies whether you're in a non-monogamous relationship or whether you're living with a platonic roommate and you're both dating people, or maybe you're with a romantic partner and you have friends who you like to stay up late with sometimes. Like anything that's kind of outside of the normal routine How do we communicate about this? How do we plan things in advance? How do we do this in a way that's respectful to each other? Some questions to ask that would come up with either in non-monogamy or with a platonic roommate is things like, Is it okay for me to give a key to a romantic partner? That to you might be like, well, of course I trust this partner. I'll give them a key. And to your roommate that might be like, what the fuck is wrong with you? Why are you giving away keys to our place? I don't feel safe in it. Anymore. It could be something like, Can my partner be here without me? If they spend the night and then I leave for work, can they hang out for a while before they leave? Or are you not comfortable with that? Just having those conversations beforehand instead of it just being something that one or the other of you assumes. Another one I love, this one is, How much clothing does everyone need to wear when they're in the house? This one's, I guess, not quite related to scheduling, but related to having people over, things like that. How much clothing are you each expected to wear? If you're going to have someone over, does that then change the rules for how much clothing you need to wear or that your guests wear, things like that? How loud can we have sex at what hours?

Dedeker: Right?

Jase: Like, these are very real, very real things.

Emily: Maybe not in the bedroom.

Jase: Very real things. Yeah, exactly. Maybe work out a way to communicate that of like, yes, it's fine if you have loud sex, just like try to let me know a little bit in advance and I will find somewhere else to be or put my headphones on and be doing something else. Whatever it is, have those things.

Dedeker: Or do whatever you want to do, but put on some music so that.

Emily: It's- Throw it on, we're gonna have sex again.

Jase: Right, something like that. Just to find a way for you to communicate about that. And I think it's great to do beforehand rather than when someone is over and you're trying to have this secretive conversation while the person that that you're kind of trying to figure this out on behalf of is there, right? Okay, next one. Last one in this list of actionable things for being a good roommate and for cohabiting is seriously, seriously, seriously, I'm going to say it three times, seriously, seriously, seriously consider before you combine finances in a permanent way. So, for example, not co-signing for a credit card or a loan, or if you do decide to open a joint bank account, account to also maintain individual accounts. Don't have that become your only account or make one of your accounts into your mutual account, something like that. And this is something that I know people do and you may still do and you may already have done and that's done. But this is something that I am hearing this advice from more and more financial advisors, no matter how old you are and whether you're married or not, right? Of really like having some autonomy in your finances, of not completely making these all together where neither of you have access to any of your own money without that directly pulling from an account that's taking money from the other person.

Dedeker: I just want to drop this into the conversation. I don't mean to be a bummer about it, but just wanted to bring to light the fact that like financial abuse is a real thing that people experience. Often it's wrapped up in many other forms of abuse or sometimes it's a standalone thing, But, you know, if you have a partner or someone who's insisting that you can't have an individual account or insisting that they be the one to like take care of all the financial things or even limiting your access to your own independence as far as like your own finances go, like that counts as financial abuse. So that's just something to think about as well when having these conversations or evaluating kind of what your situation is with the person that you live with.

Jase: Yeah, thank you for bringing that up.

Dedeker: So we're going to talk briefly about particularly special considerations for people who are in special relationships. And what I mean by that is just anyone who's not in like a monogamous relationship, because so much of the advice out there about cohabiting with someone is making that assumption, right? That you're monogamous or maybe married, you're not having to navigate either of you leaving to go on dates or bringing other people over to have sex with them or whatever. So a couple things to bear in mind specifically for people in non-monogamous relationships. We've talked about this on episodes before, but specifically like the bed. The bed.

Emily: Our bed.

Dedeker: Yes. It's a charged thing, the bed that you share with someone. And there's definitely a lot of potential conflict that I've seen arise around how you feel about your partner sleeping with someone else in the bed that you share. Some people don't care, some people think it's hot, some people are really turned off by it. So that's definitely going to be something, again, ideally that you discuss before sharing a space with somebody if you can. Or if you're already living with someone and you are choosing to open up or explore non-monogamy, have a conversation about it before it happens. You know, some people, if they're able to have a guest room or a guest bed, sometimes they find that's just the easiest solution is just like, well, whatever, like anyone new that we bring home, we, you know, sleep with them in the guest bed, and then we kind of keep those spaces separate. Obviously, not everybody has access to a guest room or a guest bed, and so sometimes it does mean that you're going to have to negotiate How do we make other people in our bed feel okay? Some people do make the decision of like, we just don't bring anyone home to be in our bed, which works for some people but doesn't work for other people.

Jase: I feel like more often that one doesn't become sustainable.

Dedeker: Yeah, that's a more often decision. Yeah, it does become hard to maintain for people, especially if people are seeking out like more, you know, emotionally intense long-term relationships. Some people just decide, like, great, you know, have sex with other people in our bed, but just please change the sheets before I'm sleeping in it again. Or sometimes it's about, like, I'm okay with, like, people I don't know sleeping on my partner's side of the bed, but not my side of the bed. Or sometimes people are like, I don't care. Like, use my iPhone charger, use my chapstick, use the condom. I put condoms in the drawer for you. Have fun. None of those are necessarily wrong. It's just really, or right, or whatever. It's just really important to make make sure that you give it the weight and time and space to talk about those things. And it's also okay if that develops and changes over time as you get more comfortable with the concept or become more used to things.

Jase: That one definitely changed over time for me. And when Emily and I were living together, that definitely changed a lot over time too, as we got more used to it and just kind of had ongoing conversations about that.

Emily: Absolutely. And kind of to piggyback off of that, the metamours or non-cohabiting partners that you have, just how they interact with the space that is yours. Try to have conversations about that as well. That is yours or your partner's. Because again, like Dedeker said, someone may be super okay with like, yeah, use my chapstick, use my condoms, use my iPhone charger, no probs. But others may be like, no, that is a sacred space to me. And I really have an issue with you coming in and infringing upon that space. Again, just have a conversation regarding, like, is it okay for a metamour or someone who comes into this space to use those things? Or is it not? I have at moments, you know, seen people come into my space and, like, use a whatever, a blanket of mine or any. I don't even know. I just, like, threw that out there or, like, drink my kombucha. And I'm like, whoa, not cool, you know, like, in that moment. And so it is, like, something to think about. About just having that conversation with your significant other in those moments.

Jase: Yeah, I think an example of this that comes from some friends of mine is about dishes, actually. And that's that it's one thing if- It would be.

Dedeker: It would be, Jase.

Emily: Tips.

Dedeker: This is about the dishes.

Emily: This isn't about me.

Jase: This is someone else. I'm sharing someone else's tips.

Dedeker: But it would make sense that it would resonate with you so much.

Emily: Yeah, it's gorgeous. You would have to bring it up.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: So here's what it is. That obviously it's annoying when your partner leaves dishes in the sink, but for this particular couple, that's sort of a like, well, it's a little bit annoying, but it happens sometimes. It's not a big deal. However, if the other partner had spent the night the night before and then there's dishes left over from then cooking together the next day, that feels extra hurtful of like, oh, you had a person over in our space, used our stuff, and then left it for me to clean up. So that is a much bigger deal.

Emily: That would be not cool.

Jase: Then if the exact same amount of dishes were left, but it was just your partner by themself that night, right? So kind of realizing that. And so for them, that's something where, you know, after one of them has the partner over, it's like, oh, shoot, I better get up early this next morning and clean all these dishes, or like, I better do this tonight because when my partner comes home, I don't want them to be upset by these dishes here. Just as an example, this could be anything. It could be about kombucha, like Emily mentioned, but just as a sort of a real life example.

Dedeker: And I just want to remind people to please don't weaponize this discussion. Because I just don't want to see people turn it into you're only allowed to use this pillow if you sit on the couch and you're only allowed to sit in this chair because that makes me safe if you only use this chair and this pillow or whatever. I'm just like, please, everybody use some compassion here.

Jase: Totally.

Dedeker: And some understanding.

Emily: Understanding is the name of the game, and also a meeting of the minds in a sense, just being like, Hey, I would appreciate if X, Y, or Z happened, and if your partner is like, well, can we maybe have a little leeway on this, this and that? And then being like, okay, that'll slide. No probs.

Jase: And that it can change over time, like we talked about. Hopefully those things will change. Hopefully they'll change in a direction of causing less stress for both of you and being able to relax on some things over time. But it may take you a while to get there. And then the last thing here in terms of that is just about hierarchy, about kind of being aware of the fact that by living together, there is sort of a hierarchy that's being established there, whether you are hierarchical or not, that that is something that at least other partners would perceive, oh, this partner is more important than me, or maybe they get more say in your life than me, or just kind of be aware of how that can affect your other relationships. And that again doesn't mean that's necessarily wrong, it just means that's an important conversation to have. That's an important thing to be aware of. And then also just the logistics of that, that if you do live with a partner, the fact that if I do want to have someone over, my partner needs to either find somewhere else to be or they need to be okay with me having this partner over while they're here. That there is some logistics to figure out. And these are things that that do require some very good communication all around from all the parties involved. And just, I really urge people, I know I haven't always done a good job of this in the past, but of being very aware of that and making sure that your partners that you don't live with don't feel like that they're not taken as seriously or that they don't actually have access to you unless it's kind of convenient for this third party, things like that. There's not a one-size-fits-all answer for that, but it is something to be aware of and to try to be very conscious of that.

Dedeker: So, gosh, we've covered a lot of ground here. I feel like there's such a wide variety and potential of so many different possible living situations. We don't want people to think that it's either a platonic roommate or a romantic partner. You could live with multiple romantic partners or multiple roommates or by yourself or spend part of the year living with one partner and then by yourself. There's such a wide variety of ways, and so of course, like we're not going to be the experts on like every single possible situation. I can guarantee we'll get an email of someone being like, but my living situation is this. What do you suggest for that? And so just bear that in mind, you know, kind of take these principles and see how they fit with the situation that you yourself find yourself in. Kind of ultimate takeaways that we want people to have is just to know that it's okay to choose to not live with a romantic partner if it's not, if you just, if you don't make good roommates, you know, you can still have a romantic and fulfilling relationship. Ship, even if you choose not to share a living space together. Or if you have chosen to live with a romantic partner or significant other and you're realizing it's not working out, it's okay to change that as well. Again, it doesn't mean that, like, you failed in some way or that your relationship is less serious. You know, it just means that the two of you are kind of trying to find a way for you each to have access to, like, a home life that's going to make you feel the happiest and the most fulfilled. And ideally that means that your relationship gets better as a result of that. And then I think ultimate, ultimate, ultimate takeaway. Just talk about this stuff. Talk about it. Talk about it. Talk about it a ton before it even happens. Ideally, just talk about it all the time. Revisit it in your Radars and just. Just do that.

Jase: That could be our tagline. It's like multi-emery podcast. Just talk about it.

Dedeker: Yeah, just do it. Yeah.

Jase: Co-habiting or co-habiting or co-habitation? Which is it? So we got into kind of a long-ish conversation about this earlier. And we actually did also a couple of years ago and we did an episode on this topic before of this question of, Is the word co-habiting or is it co-habiting for the thing that you do? And for all of you who really want to know, No, the correct answer is cohabiting.

Dedeker: Okay, so not cohabiting. Not cohabiting. Okay.

Jase: Right, so it's confusing because cohabitation is like the noun of this thing that people do, but cohabiting is the actual correct verb for doing it.

Dedeker: Like inhabiting, but cohabiting. Yeah. Okay.

Jase: Yeah, so that was the thing that we saw that I'd never thought of that, but it's the same as the word inhabit. You don't inhabit hate something you inhabit.

Dedeker: I mean, maybe you don't.

Jase: Well, yeah. What's interesting is that actually you technically can use the word cohabit the same way you use inhabit. For example, a correct sentence would be to say, this person and I cohabit this apartment.

Dedeker: Okay, so as a verb?

Jase: Just in the same way that you inhabit an apartment. We've never actually used it that way. We usually talk about, oh, I'm cohabiting with this person. Where we tend to not actually specify the direct object of the thing that is being cohabited, which is the apartment.

Dedeker: Are you in a cohabiting? Are you in a cohabitat for humanity? Wow. Do you think you can use it that way?

Jase: Would you ever be in an in-habitat?

Dedeker: I don't know. I don't know. My mind is blown.

Jase: Yeah. One of my favorite comments when looking into this was on Reddit where someone was saying, that cohabitate isn't really a word, it's the equivalent of conversate, like we were conversating, where we all understand what you mean, you could use it and the language isn't gonna break, but it's technically not correct. But apparently, though, cohabitating is becoming more of an accepted word just because so many people are saying it. Really?

Dedeker: Wow.

Jase: See, now I just wanna do a podcast about language. I hope you all enjoyed this episode and getting to see what our six years ago selves were like. Yeah, hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did when I listened back through it. We'll be posting our question of the week this week on our Instagram, multiamory underscore podcast. And the question this week is, have you ever had a situation where there was a deal breaker that made you not move in with someone? Or maybe what's a deal breaker that would make you not want to move in with someone? Curious to hear what people have to say about that one. And you can post about that on our Instagram stories and we'll repost some of those answers. If you'd like to discuss this further, the best place to share your thoughts with other listeners is in the episode discussion channel in our Discord server, or you can post about it in our private Facebook group. You can get access to those groups and join our exclusive community by going to multiamory.com/join. In addition, you can share with us publicly on Instagram.

Jase: Multiamory is created and produced by Dedeker Winston, Emily Matlack, and me, Jase Lindgren. Our production assistants are Rachel Schenewerk and Carson Collins. The original version of this episode was edited by Mauricio Balvanera, and this updated edit was done by Emily Matlack. Our theme song is Forms I Know I Did by Josh and Anand from the Fractal Cave EP. The full transcript is available on this episode’s page on multiamory.com.