553 - What Can Swingers and Polyamorists Learn From Each Other? With Mr. and Mrs. Jones of the We Gotta Thing Podcast

Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Jones!

Mr. & Mrs. Jones are the hosts of the We Gotta Thing podcast. They are social swingers who place the highest importance on their primary relationship while seeking friendships and meaningful sexual experiences with others, together as a team. Their podcast chronicles their journey into and through this lifestyle over the last decade.

Everything they share is based on the perspective of their own personal preferences and experiences in the lifestyle. They believe there are many valid ways to approach non-monogamy that differ from theirs—they respect that even while sticking to and talking about what works for and appeals to them.

We’re doing some interview swapping during this episode, asking Mr. and Mrs. Jones some questions about swinging, then answering their questions about polyamory. Lastly, we have a collaborative discussion about new relationship energy and how to manage it.

Questions for We Gotta Thing

The questions Mr. and Mrs. Jones tackle during this episode are:

1. You’ve been hosting your show for a long time; what’s the biggest thing you think has changed within the lifestyle community over the last decade? 

2. Is there anything that you wish would change within the lifestyle community? 

3. What elements of swinging do polyamorous people most commonly get wrong (or misunderstand)? 

4. Which forms of swinging non-monogamy intersect with polyamory?

5. How have your personal views and experiences evolved over the past decade?

6. How important is community when exploring non-monogamy? How have the two of you grown and nurtured your community over the last decade? 

7. What do you see and hope for in the future of swinging?

Questions for Multiamory

Mr. and Mrs. Jones pose these questions to the hosts of Multiamory:

1. What are people searching for when they find non-monogamy (and/or polyamory or ‘moresomes’ as we call it)? Or, are they sometimes not searching and simply ‘bump into’ a form of non-monogamy/polyamory when they experience feelings for or an attraction towards others?

2. What is their perception of what they are looking for? Are some people just wired to ‘get it?’ Where do these differing perceptions often come from?

3. What are they finding when they arrive? Do some miss out on or misunderstand the potential benefits due to distortion from excitement, confusion, hormones, etc.?

4. How is it changing their relationships?

5. What are they learning about themselves?

6. What does it take to shake the social norms that we've been programmed to believe and live by?

New relationship energy (NRE)

If you haven’t heard the term before, New Relationship Energy (NRE) is the euphoria that occurs in new relationships due to hormones, lust, brain chemicals, and more. In our opinion, it causes the most missteps when feelings come into play. We need folks to understand what causes NRE (chemicals, hormones, addictive personalities, lust, etc.) so they can begin to distance themselves from the emotion to logically process.

We go over the following points about NRE:

1. How can NRE be detrimental to existing relationships? 

2. How have you (Mr. and Mrs. Jones) seen NRE challenge people in the swinging community?

3. Can existing relationships get anything positive from a member of the relationship having NRE with another person?

4. What are some actionable tools to make sure NRE doesn’t blow up the existing relationship?

Make sure to check out We Gotta Thing on Twitter and Instagram, and give it a listen on your favorite podcast app!

Transcript

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

Mrs. Jones: I think the word swinger just has a really negative connotation. I don't like the word. I don't like to call myself a swinger. We tend to say the lifestyle a lot.

Mr. Jones: I'll give you a little story behind it. We'll get emails from listeners and they'll say, first sentence, we are not swingers. Now, we have had a threesome before, and my wife has had a single guy before, but we're not swingers. I'm like, well, can you define for me what you think it is? And it's the perception of the word. The reason we use We Gotta Thing, a Swinger Podcast, is because that's how people find us. It's almost like we're forced into using that label, but then we have to help people understand that the definition of it is changing and it's evolving. And that's one of the things that we're trying to hopefully, along with you all, educate people.

Mrs. Jones: I think the words ethical and swinger, you just never hear those two words in the same sentence, and that's problematic.

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 talking to the hosts of the We Gotta Thing podcast, Mr. and Mrs. Jones. Their podcast chronicles their journey into the swinger lifestyle over the last decade. And so this episode is going to be a little bit of a special one. We're going to do an interview swap where we'll be talking to Mr. and Mrs. Jones about the state of swinging today, and then they'll be interviewing us about the state of polyamory today, and then we'll have a third section where we're going to talk a little bit about NRE, new relationship energy and how to manage that. If you're interested in learning about our fundamental communication tools that we reference on this show, you can check out our book, Multiamory: Essential Tools for Modern Relationships, which covers some of our most used communication tools for all types of relationships. You can find links to buy it at multiamory.com/book or wherever books are sold. Mr. and Mrs. Jones, thank you so much for joining us today.

Mr. Jones: Jase, you've got the terminology down already. Swap, swap, yeah. Nice. Nice.

Jase: Is this an episode hard swap or a soft swap?

Emily: Wait, what does that mean?

Mr. Jones: Well, you know what? We don't know you guys well enough yet.

Dedeker: We might have to take this off air.

Mr. Jones: Ask us again.

Dedeker: So we're in the pre-swap phase of the relationship.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, you're potential swap.

Jase: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, okay, great.

Emily: Okay.

Mr. Jones: Okay.

Dedeker: So the two of you, you've been hosting your show for a long time. It's been, what, 10 years plus now for the show?

Mrs. Jones: 11 years.

Dedeker: Yeah. Oh, so we're very similar. We're also 11 years.

Emily: Yeah, Wendy.

Dedeker: Wow, things were really happening in 2014.

Mr. Jones: Seriously.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Mr. Jones: Yeah.

Dedeker: What's the biggest thing that you've seen shift or change within the lifestyle community over the last decade?

Mr. Jones: It just, it seems to be touching mainstream a little bit more than it was in the past. I'm not saying that it's touching it accurately, but we are, we're seeing it more in television plots. We're seeing it more on talk radio shows. And you guys know this. When we started our podcast, I think there were two or three other lifestyle non-monogamous podcasts at the time, and now there's hundreds. So I think that's a good thing. The more content that's out there, the more people that are reached. And however that is, we've seen that definitely accelerate in the past few years.

Emily: Can you go through a couple terminology phrases like the hard and soft swap? Because I actually didn't know what you meant by that. And now I feel kind of silly that I don't. But are there any additional phrases like that that most people whip out that I probably should know or maybe listeners should know?

Mr. Jones: Well, Mrs. Jones, as she said, she used to be a teacher, and there are no silly questions, Emily.

Mrs. Jones: Thank you.

Emily: I appreciate that. I appreciate that.

Mrs. Jones: Well, I mean, just to keep it like quick and simple, soft swap just means there's no penis in vagina sex.

Emily: Okay.

Mrs. Jones: That's what full swap or hard swap, those are kind of interchangeable. That's basically what that means. There's also what we call parallel play. Where you might really have a connection with a couple, but you haven't really decided that you want to interact with other people yet. For example, if you're in a sex club, or even if you have somebody over to your house, you can have sex with your partner right next to that other couple. So you still have that energy and that chemistry there, but you have those guardrails up.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, and another thing too, I think a lot of people misunderstand is, it's not hierarchical. A lot of people think you graduate from one level to the next. And I think maybe that comes naturally just when people get comfortable. But what we've learned is that it really depends on the situation. It depends on the couple. It depends on the connection. It depends on what people, what their boundaries are, what they enjoy doing. And so we've learned that it's not a goal-oriented sport as much as it is learning to connect with other people.

Mrs. Jones: Right. It's situational. Like every time you kind of have to assess, like, what are you in the mood for, like, what fantasies are going through your mind as you're thinking about interacting with this other person or this other couple? I think it goes back to like middle school, first base, second base, third base, that kind of stuff doesn't really lead to that.

Mr. Jones: Let's say high school.

Emily: There you go.

Dedeker: Yes. Well, it's interesting you put it that way because I think as a culture, we're already having to unlearn even looking at sex as a goal oriented sport. And so that's interesting that it seems like some of the work that you do is trying to disabuse people of that notion as well.

Mr. Jones: It is. And a lot of it we had to figure out between the two of us. I mean, we really, we had a good sex life, a great sex life before we decided to try non-monogamy, but everything unbeknownst to us, I mean, we got married young. We didn't have many partners before each other. We only knew what we knew together. And it often was goal-oriented. It was good, but it was goal-oriented. And now it's not a goal anymore. It's an experience, and it should be fun, and we should do it in a healthy way. And there needs to be consent, and there needs to be conversations about safe sex and all of that, prior to what I think a lot of misperception is about swinging, is that we'll just have sex with anyone, and there's no connection with the other people. And I'm sure, and it.

Mrs. Jones: Can be done that way. I mean, again, it goes back to like what you're interested in. Like, what are your fantasies as a couple? So there's so many ways to do it, but I think everybody, when you hear, oh my gosh, those people are swingers, it goes back to the whole 1970s key parties where it's just very random.

Mr. Jones: Right.

Dedeker: Well, so speaking of misperceptions, I did wanna rewind. You know, you mentioned how you're starting to see it touch the mainstream more, though not necessarily accurately. And it is kind of funny, 'cause I think we would say the same thing about the way the other forms of non-monogamy and polyamory are portrayed. What are your biggest complaints about the ways that in this day and age swinging is still portrayed?

Mrs. Jones: Well, it seems like the shows, like if you're watching a TV show, for example, the shows always end up with a unhappy ending, right? It's like people can't do it right and still have fun swinging and still have a great marriage or a great partnership. That's just a huge misconception. And maybe that's just the producers' idea of what makes good drama.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, that's what it comes down to.

Dedeker: That's where the drama is.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, it's funny because we, our goal is to eliminate drama. But if it's gonna be successful on the screen, producers and writers and directors are used to, there's gotta be drama somewhere. So what do they do? They choose jealousy. They choose misbehavior. They choose lack of consent. They choose all of these bedrock issues that we don't acknowledge or we do in a different way, and they inject that into the show. And, and there's, believe me, there's a lot of other ways to put drama into this besides besides something so negative.

Jase: Yeah, I've often said in the past, when we're talking to people who are more in the TV or film world, where I'm like, if you made an accurate show about healthy polyamory, it would be a really boring show to watch.

Mr. Jones: Exactly.

Jase: Because there wouldn't, right? If that were the focus of your show, and that's always something I wish for, is that, like, we could have more shows, more movies, where various forms of non-monogamy show up, and they don't have to be the central plot element. They don't have to be the part that holds the conflict, right?

Mr. Jones: Exactly.

Jase: There could be other things.

Emily: I have gotten over the last decade the idea that a lot of polyamorous people feel like polyamory is over here and swinging is over here, and the two are not necessarily going to meet as much as perhaps they actually do in some senses. So if there's anything specifically that you've felt like polyamorous people get wrong about swinging, can you talk about that a little bit?

Mr. Jones: Yeah, I think I've touched on it briefly, but just the a couple of times, well, we had an experience of being outed publicly. And when people tried to handle this in the very wrong way, they were almost indignant that, oh, we've been in your house and we've hugged you like they were fair game.

Dedeker: Dare you sleep with someone else after I hug you?

Emily: Yeah, that's so strange. Wow.

Mr. Jones: Yes. Yeah, and it's almost, they come across as it's really, it's offended them that for some reason, I must have been sexually attracted to you, and I must have just been lying in wait for this opportunity to jump my wife's bones. And these are people that are intelligent people that we've known for a long time. And so watching them behave that way really was kind of shocking to us. Like, what do you think this is about? But, and I think the other thing, Emily, is feelings. I mean, feelings are so complex and, there's such a different level and depth of emotions and connections with people. I think in the swinging lifestyle, we use the term connection, but that certainly could equate to caring for or loving, in a certain way. And so there is a lot of, we have deep friends that we don't say we are polyamorous with, that we would trust with our lives, we love them. We don't live together, but we certainly have a deep affection for them. So I think there's a lot more in the blurred lines area of this than a lot of people on both sides of this issue really imagine.

Mrs. Jones: And honestly, that was a very unexpected outcome for us. We didn't expect to develop these like really caring, long term, like loving friendships with people. We thought you either had friends or you had play partners and that those two things shall not intersect. And lo and behold, they do. And it's actually such a unexpected blessing that's come out of this.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, and I think typically what happens when, and we were like this too, but a new couple in a relationship will decide they want to give this a try. And they'll say, I don't want anyone to know my name. I don't want them to know my kids. I don't want them to know my profession. This is just a taboo thing that we do as a couple, and we enjoy being with these people, but they don't need to know anything about us. But then once people get into it and they get into the community and they start meeting people and they're like, wait a minute, these people are just like we are.

Emily: Totally.

Mr. Jones: They're in healthy relationships just like we are. They care about their families just like we do. And so it was unexpected for us. And I think to a certain degree, more and more people are discovering that that's not only okay, that seems to be becoming the norm.

Jase: I feel like that's not the first time I've heard that kind of arc described like that. So that makes a lot of sense.

Dedeker: Yeah, I remember when we had Kate from Swinging Down Under on, this was several years ago, I always remember her phrase, pants on, pants off friendships. That has just stuck with me ever since then, and I think is really beautiful.

Mr. Jones: Yes. And you can switch between the two through life, as we've learned as well.

Emily: Do you have connections that have lasted for almost the entirety of the time that you've been in the swinging community or for many, many years?

Mr. Jones: You mean do we personally? Yeah.

Emily: With other couples.

Mr. Jones: Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I think it comes down to, I don't know if you all have that illustration of your core friends and your, what is the, you know, the concentric circles, right? The connected, the community. We only have enough time in our lives for a certain number of meaningful relationships. And so there have been some that we've been close with that have drifted away, just like any other friendship. But then there are some that have lasted. And if we don't see them for six months or eight months, it's like we see them and we pick right back up. We know their story. We know their family. We know their kids. We know where they live. When you know somebody sexually, it gives you so much of a stronger connection with them that the time that goes between the opportunity to see each other really evaporates when you get back together.

Emily: Sure.

Mrs. Jones: I think one of the things I really like about this whole arena of non-monogamy is that when you are connecting with people, it's like there's very few topics that are off-limits, except your typical religion and politics, right? We don't have time to talk about that stuff. There are way better things that we can talk about. That you normally can't talk about with friends. So I think that just having that freedom to have conversations about very intimate personal things with people really expedites how close a friendship can get.

Dedeker: Well, I'm wondering, you know, how important do you think it is for someone who's new to the lifestyle to be doing that friendship building, connection building, community building? And I I could take a guess that the two of you, similar to us, are biased in the pro-community direction, right? Like, being very connected to community and building community and things like that. But I'm imagining, if there's a couple who's like, yeah, we just want to go to the local club, get in, get out. Like, we're not interested in trying to maintain any kind of friendship. Like, do you think that that is sustainable? And like, people can pull that off and like, that's totally fine. Or do you think that, no, like a part of actually making the sustainable is having these like connections and friendships and community support?

Mr. Jones: Yeah, I think the stronger the relationship, the more you're gonna stay connected and it's sustainable. And typically what happens that occur is that people get into this and look, I mean, we were interested in non-monogamy for a whole year before we could wrap our heads around it and we were interested in it. So to have an expectation somebody's gonna come through the front door, day one is a couple, and they're gonna get it. That's not really possible. In most cases, they have to come in, do some experimenting, connect with some other people. Oh, these people aren't so weird. They're just like us. Oh, oh my gosh, they're similar in ages. They have families. And there's a progression that occurs that allows people to become more open and vulnerable. And once that starts to happen, then there's a realization that I can choose my friends now based on things other than the fact that they live next door to me or the fact that they go to the church that we go to or that we're colleagues. Friendships that we had before were based on geography and opportunity. Now we're choosing to be with people who we want to be with who are like us, who have the same ideas, the same open minds, the same sorts of relationships that they want to try to explore and grow.

Mrs. Jones: I think it also has, it depends on what season of life someone's in. You know, if this is a, if it's a younger, let's say we're talking about a couple and they're younger and they are like still doing the weekend soccer tournaments and dance and all the things, like they don't have time to really get out there and nurture these friendships. Like our kids were already out of the house when we found the swinging lifestyle. So we can get on an airplane and go visit people or get on an airplane and go to events where people with younger kids at home, as just one really common example, they don't have that luxury. So maybe they do need to limit themselves to going to the club one Saturday night a month and just having like, sexy fun together. And if they meet a couple to hook up with, that's icing on the cake. And maybe that's where they're gonna stay for a while, and then maybe it'll just kind of fade away. But I think season of life really has a lot to do with it because we know some younger couples that are juggling kids and stuff, and we're like, oh my gosh, how do you have the emotional energy to do this?

Mr. Jones: On the other hand, we do see that the next generation seems to be a lot more open-minded.

Dedeker: This is true.

Mr. Jones: With opening their minds to different to owning their own relationship. It's like, just because our parents did it this way, our pastor told us to do it this way, we were coached to do it this way, society... I think it took Mrs. Jones and I longer to get through all of those layers that had been draped over us by society, but I think the next generation down, they seem to be a whole lot more accepting to the possibility of what a relationship looks like. Sure.

Jase: Yeah, I think we've definitely noticed that as well. I wanted to quickly ask a little bit of a clarifying question about more terminology. So something I've found is that, I always called it swinging and, you know, swinging or maybe the swinging lifestyle, but I find that with younger people, they tend to avoid using the word swinging and will more often just say lifestyle. Is that accurate? Or are there other terms out there that we should know to clarify?

Mrs. Jones: No, I think you're right. I think the word swinger just has a really negative connotation. I don't like the word. Like, I don't like to call myself a swinger. We tend to say the lifestyle a lot.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, I'll give you a little story behind it. We'll get emails from listeners and they'll say, first sentence, we are not swingers. Now, we have had a threesome before, and my wife has had a single guy before, but we're not swingers. I'm like, well, can you define for me what you think it is? And it's the perception of the word. The reason we use We Gotta Thing, a swinger podcast, is because that's how people find us. It's almost like we're forced into using that label, but then we have to help people understand that the definition of that lifestyle or ethical non-monogamy, it's changing and it's evolving. And that's one of the things that we're trying to hopefully, along with you all, educate people.

Mrs. Jones: I think the words ethical and swinger, just you never hear those two words in the same sentence, and that's problematic.

Dedeker: Fascinating.

Jase: Interesting, yeah, yeah.

Emily: But it's consensual, right? Like everyone involved knows what's going on, and everyone is okay with the situation that you're in.

Dedeker: I am pro-reclaiming the word swinger, because to me, and it is the weird thing, where like, I've never identified as a swinger, and I've never identified as a lifestyle person, despite, like having gone to clubs, having gone to parties, having gone to events, having participated in all the behaviors, right, that we tend to associate with these things. And yet still, I consider myself like not a total outsider, but maybe like an adjacent outsider to the world. And when I hear the word swinger, I just think someone who's much more relaxed than most of my polyamorous peers. Like, I'm ready for a reclamation. That's just me as someone who's like kind of on the fringes here because, yeah, I feel like we need your voice out there. There you go. Yeah.

Mr. Jones: Yeah. I think what this has done is it's a means to an end. And what I mean by that is at the atomic level, we're all human. This is a human connection. But if we, when you can have a, and because we're also sexual beings, most of us, that's another atomic level, a part of who we are. And when we connect at that level, everything above that becomes less important, whether it's a label, whether it's your career, whether it's your age, whether it's your gender, your skin color, all of that kind of falls away the closer we get to that human connection. And so I think that's what we've kind of stumbled upon. We didn't really, we weren't able to wrap our minds around that when we started this podcast, but that's what we're learning. And as we listen to Multiamory and we listen to other people talk about their sexuality, it's almost like at the atomic level, we're all the same, but we need these little labels to help meet people where they are, but then bring them into a closer relationship with their sexuality and with their partners, and then it all starts to blend together.

Dedeker: That's very well said.

Emily: Absolutely. Do you feel like you have specific aspirations for the swinging or lifestyle community? Like, what do you see and hope for the future of this community?

Mr. Jones: Well, it's probably gonna be not in our lifetime that we see a lot of this because we're also realist. So, you know, we do what we can. We're just two voices. We do have a virtual community and so it, and it is growing and people are learning. But we have a long ways to go. And I guess our hope would be that in a community like we have where people can be vulnerable, they can feel free to explore, they can share knowledge, and they can learn, and they can connect with other people. It's almost they're finding their tribe, and they're finding that, and I think this is really important. When we first started, we didn't have anybody else to talk to about this. It was just the two of us. I couldn't go to my dad. I mean, I could have, but I didn't. You can't go to your friends without the fear of judgment. And so we feel like, gosh, it's just the two of us trying to figure this out. So in community, when you can come and in our community, we have a group for just for ladies and a group for the guys. And every other week, the guys meet and we talk to other guys about what this is like. And the ladies do the same thing. So it does give you a good, a healthy community gives you a forum that you at least have other people that are not going to judge you, that are not going to, you're not going to feel shameful. And you can share the most vulnerable things and people aren't going to, they're not going to laugh at you or not take you seriously. So that kind of feedback and that kind of community, I think, is just gonna accelerate all of us, having a better understanding of what this is.

Mrs. Jones: Because I think once you can start talking about it with your friends, vanilla friends, so to speak, there's another vocabulary word, right?

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: We use that one too, so we.

Dedeker: Work with that one.

Jase: Definitely.

Emily: Definitely.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Mrs. Jones: If you can start talking about your sexuality just in general with your vanilla friends, not necessarily co-workers, that's not always the most appropriate thing to do. But just to be able to kind of make that part of what you converse about in everyday life, that just opens up the different types of relationships that you can be involved in. You don't necessarily have to lead with, oh, you know, I wanna have sex with, you know, two other girls this weekend or, you know, whatever it may be. But just talk about your sexual, first of all, sexual health, sexual fantasies, you know, I got this new toy, like it is fantastic. I think women are still afraid to talk about that with other women a lot of times.

Dedeker: So it sounds like what your wishes would be that you see a world where essentially there's just more of a normalization of ourselves as sexual beings, that it doesn't necessarily have to be siloed into these very particular spaces.

Mr. Jones: Yes, exactly. And I think we've learned that through our careers when we have to take sexual harassment training or you know, as a man, don't look below her neckline and don't say anything inappropriate and, and don't, no fraternizing. I mean, society has tried to suppress this by making rules and making us sign a piece of paper, but really, we're wired to be sexual beings. It's so freeing to be able to talk to a woman now the way that I talk to a man and the way, and to be honest with her and to enjoy her whole self, whether that's sexual or not. There's no longer this fear that, oh, no, she's gonna think I'm creepy or I'm not supposed to do that. So again, we have to retrain ourselves to understand that other people are human. Let's be human together. I can get to know you now. Women are, I still don't claim to understand, but are fascinating.

Mrs. Jones: I don't understand myself, so we're in the same boat.

Dedeker: Well, it's like, Jase, it reminds me of that line from the Last Action Hero, where Arnold Schwarzenegger is like, I've never talked to a woman before. It's neat.

Mr. Jones: Yes, exactly. Exactly.

Mrs. Jones: Yes.

Mr. Jones: And then, you know, and then when people are together for 10 or 15 or 20 or more years, and then all of a sudden they're back in this environment, a lot of us feel like we're back in high school. How do I talk to a woman? How do I flirt? You know, my wife has been-- I've been with my wife. I've been faithful. How can I do this? So really your whole world is turned a little upside down. So again, to have an expectation that everyone else is going to understand what this is by a sound bite or a single podcast episode is a little unrealistic. So I think we need to change our expectations to let's take it one step at a time. Let's, let's be the voice out there that people can listen to. And the more voices that are out there, the more communities that are out there, then I think the better for everyone.

Jase: Before we go on to the next section, we wanna 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.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, first of all, we appreciate you guys reaching out. You don't know how the timing is just perfect for you to reach out and for us to have a conversation with the three of you. And it's gonna get to the first question that we wanna ask you, and it's very similar to what you asked us. There are these labels out here, non-monogamy, polyamory, in our community we call it a moresome. So that's anything more than two in any way that you define it. And what our community is learning is that we don't necessarily understand this to begin with. We don't necessarily feel we're wired this way, but all of a sudden we're bumping into people that we have a connection with. And then all of a sudden the F word comes out, which is feelings. A lot of us don't really, we didn't expect that. We don't understand it. And so maybe you all could help dispel some of the myths or explain to us and our listeners, our community, how do you define polyamory?

Dedeker: Oh, wow. I wasn't expecting that one actually, weirdly. I can take a crack at that.

Emily: Great.

Dedeker: First, yeah. And I'll start by putting so many asterisks in front of it because of the fact just to say, get the caveat that language and terminology is shifting and changing constantly. And I think over our decade of being in this community, we've seen definitions change and we've seen arguments over definitions change. So that's all of my caveats and asterisks. But I think the textbook definition that I tend to get is that polyamory is the practice of maintaining more than one concurrent romantic and/or sexual relationship at a time, and that these relationships can run a spectrum from being very heavily entwined and entangled emotionally, financially, logistically, to being not very entwined or entangled. I'll put a period on it there because, of course, I could probably talk for four more hours about all the ways that that looks, but that's where I would start. Do you feel like I missed anything major, Emily and Jase?

Jase: I think something that's worth clarifying, because this kind of goes into what are some of the common misconceptions that show up in terms of how it's shown in media and what kind of news article coverage there is, is that while polyamory leaves a lot of room for different types of connections and different ways that can look, the way that it actually looks in practice most often is still two person relationships, but that are just kind of interlocking with each other. Like you might have your wife and then your wife has another boyfriend and that boyfriend might have another girlfriend and another boyfriend or whatever, right? That it's kind of like this interconnected thing versus what tends to be portrayed on TV is the like, oh, we all live together in a house, you know, all three of us, four of us, five of us, whatever. That that's actually rare. It does happen, but that's actually much more rare than kind of the interconnected relationships like that.

Mr. Jones: You know, what if you closed your eyes and almost like they described our community and how we defined that too? Do you think, you know, early on, Mrs. Jones and I went to, gosh, this was the second year of our podcast. We went to a conference called Catalyst Con. And it was though all the whole spectrum of sexuality. And honestly, I was there just to get podcast content. We got into a party. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I told Mrs. Jones, like, what could possibly go wrong? If it's a disaster, it'll be fun to talk about. We were in a room with a bunch of people. There was a whole lot of stuff going on in this room. A lady walked in and she introduced her, and I'm gonna get the wrong terminology, her metamour.

Emily: Metamour.

Mr. Jones: Metamour. Thank you. And maybe in a minute you can you can define all of this for me. Sure. So I went into interview mode and I said, oh my gosh, how does this work? Like, tell me, how do you do this? Why do you do this? And she basically had a spreadsheet and she said, well, I've got four different types of needs and my primary provides this and this and somebody else provides this and this. And it was almost a mechanical map.

Mrs. Jones: Well, it was a matrix. She said, there's five types of intimacy and I get this one from this person and... Wow. Yeah, it was very logical for her.

Mr. Jones: So, and then of course since then we've come to realize that that's probably not the accepted, definition of what it is. But early on, to get back to what our perceptions may be of polyamory, that's what we were exposed to and that's what we thought. So do you, I guess my question for you is, do you all believe that people are can be pre-wired for polyamory? Or do you think people stumble into these connections and relationships and then realize they have the capacity and the need to be close to somebody else?

Dedeker: Wow. Okay. That's a great question. But Emily, do you want to take defining metamour first?

Mr. Jones: Oh, sure.

Emily: I can define metamour. It's essentially just your partner's partner. So we often will talk about that it's similar to if your spouse had a brother and that in-law basically is somebody that you don't choose. They just are somebody that is related in some way to your partner. You might have a friendship with them, you might not, but somebody that is in your partner's life that is important. And so in this sense, it would just be another partner, another loved one, or another person with whom they're having a relationship. Generally, I like meeting my metamours, for example. I think there are people out there who prefer not to, but I do think that it's great to be able to have some sort of relationship with a metamour more just so that everyone can kind of be on the same page. Everyone can be understanding, we're all in this together to some degree, or just, I see the humanity in you and let you see it in me kind of thing, and not just, oh, there's this person out there that is a little scary to me, the idea of them being with my partner as well.

Jase: Yeah, I would just add kind of the point of having a term for it at all. Because I know, like, in swinging, in the lifestyle, you'd have the same sort of thing, right? It's the spouse of the person that I'm hooking up with right now. That I have a relationship with, but I think that having a label for it of Metamour kind of gives you that way to express, this person's significant in my life, but not necessarily directly to myself. Gives a little extra nuance to that relationship.

Dedeker: Right. Well, it's interesting that you met someone who, yeah, I wouldn't say that the whole keeping track in a spreadsheet is necessarily typical. However, that was representative of the fact that like polycules, I think, have been God's gift to the whole Google suite of productivity tools. In that this is a community that loves a Google Calendar, that does love a spreadsheet, that loves a shared Google Doc, right, for keeping track of so many things. Your question about certain people being wired to get it right out the gate, that's a really interesting question because, I mean, I think at least what we know from the research is, no one's pinned down a particular, like, polyamorous gene or genetic profile or stuff like that. That they have been able to pin down that the people who, you know, whether tracking like the big five personality traits, so it's like people who score higher in openness, in adventurousness, and low in neuroticism are more likely to be people who choose a non-monogamous relationship. But in saying non-monogamous in the research that I'm thinking of, it's not necessarily specifically polyamory, they roped swinging in the lifestyle under that umbrella as well. So it's like those are things that we know is that yes, like we could be seeing personality variation that might leave someone more predisposed to perhaps be more interested in a non-traditional relationship or perhaps more comfortable exploring a non-traditional relationship. But even within that, of course, there are those situations like you described where, yeah, people bump into this, people stumble into this. And sometimes realize, oh, actually, this is really interesting, or I can see myself really thriving here, or this has hooked me in a way I wasn't expecting. Something that I've increasingly started to notice in my practice with clients, and I would say that this has started in the last five-ish years or so, is I've gotten more people coming to me, people who are single, and they're coming from a place of, I'm not sure what I am. I'm not sure if polyamory is right for me. I'm not sure if an open relationship. I'm not sure if it's swinging, like, I'm really not sure what it is that I want. I just know about myself that I'm, I never want monogamy again, right? Or I just know about myself that I don't think I'm capable of doing monogamy. That's been something I've started to see. And I think that that's a product of, again, like the positive parts of things like swinging and things like non-monogamy and polyamory, again, touching the mainstream and more people being aware of the fact that, oh, there are options for how I conduct my relationships. But yeah, I think that's what I've seen. Emily and Jase, I don't know if you have any opinions on this whole, being wired for this or not.

Emily: It's the question everybody asks. And I think there's a research point.

Dedeker: That will probably get a lot of grant money.

Emily: Yeah, I don't know if it is pinnable, really, but maybe.

Mrs. Jones: Yeah.

Jase: But it's definitely a thing where for some people, like I would put myself in this category of like, once I learned this was a thing that that people can do and like do it ethically and learn about it and learn how to do it better. There was no going back after that point. It was just as like, oh, okay, like I found the place where I belong or like the thing that makes sense. Almost like a, like finding a belief system or something. Whereas for other people, it's like, okay, yeah, I could see that, you know, maybe for a while, maybe forever, maybe I dip into it and out of it throughout my life. And then other people who can't, can't get there are just like, I can't, I can't get past that. And whether that's a mental block thing or it's a personality thing or it's built in?

Mr. Jones: I don't know. So thank you for that. My next question, if I can get this out the way in my mind through my mouth the way I want to ask it. So let me give you an example. In a relationship like we have, if feelings crop up with another person or another couple, we talk about that first as a couple and how we're going to manage that. Can you either tell from your personal experience or from people you've given advice to, how does the conversation go when you're in a relationship with one other person? And as you all described this one-to-one relationship, this is not necessarily a couple-to-couple relationship. How does the conversation go with the person who develops feelings for someone and then has to convey that information to their primary partner to get them to understand what's going on before they even can process a lot of this themselves? I mean, how do you how does that go?

Jase: Are you imagining this like the very first time that you start realizing you have feelings for someone else and you haven't, you're not polyamorous yet, you're okay.

Mr. Jones: Gotcha.

Dedeker: Oh, so as in like, this is before a couple's even broach any kind of subject about being non-monogamous or being polyamorous.

Emily: Yeah, because the feelings- I think the very initial conversation.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Mr. Jones: Yeah.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: There's a lot of different ways that it can go.

Dedeker: Well, so I mean, the first thing I want to say right at the top is that, from my personal experience and also the experience of like working with clients, starting a relationship where both people maybe already identify as polyamorous or already identify as some type of non-monogamous, the conversation is gonna go down very differently in that relationship, right? For obvious reasons, because opening a relationship that has up to this point been monogamous is a whole different ballgame. And it's also a lot harder, in my opinion. And I mean, I'm sure people go through that when like they've been monogamous for most of their relationship and then decide to like start sleeping with other people, right? Or playing with other people that there can, it has to be a big mindset shift. Somebody has to be the freaking brave one to bring up the conversation first, right? Or like start to ease your partner into it. that it, yeah, it can be really, really scary. The conversation around, hey, I'm interested in this whole polyamory thing. I've seen that conversation be much more successful when it's starting from a place where somebody doesn't have, like, someone they have a crush on waiting in the wings, because then that can create this, like, hyper focus on, oh, like, you already have this person you're targeting, and now all of a sudden, like, we need to get on this accelerated timeline to open up our relationship so that then you can pursue this person. And it doesn't tend to set up the relationship for success necessarily. That doesn't mean that people don't pull it off, right? I think it just requires a certain amount of care for sure.

Mr. Jones: Yeah.

Jase: And I think if it's coming from a place where you've already got some non-monogamy going on, right? Like if you're already in the lifestyle, that conversation might be a little easier because there's a sense of, okay, we've already opened up this area of conversation. But I do think it's what Dedeker is mentioning is those situations where it's a lot harder is where it is just that, you know, I've developed all these feelings for a coworker that that kind of can come out of left field to your existing partner and feel like, oh gosh, there's been this whole thing going on behind my back that now you've got all these feelings and getting the trust and feeling of safety there in the first place is so important. And that can make that more difficult. I mean, it's still possible, but it's not easy.

Mr. Jones: And I think we'll touch on that when we get into new relationship energy, too. But the way I look at this is, okay, I stumble across the Multiamory Podcast and I start listening and I go, oh my gosh, that's me. Then what do I do with that? Then I've been with a partner for X number of years and now I've got, Hey, listen to this. Well, it may not mean anything to them. So it's more of, yeah, I realize that what they're talking about is really attractive to me, but do I keep it to myself and live this way or do I talk to my partner and risk losing the relationship? And this is kind of a rhetorical and it's very similar to the conversations that we have and the conversations that we have that people in the lifestyle have. And like Mrs. Jones said, you gotta have somebody that you have to have a trusting relationship to begin with to even sit down and say, Hey, I got something that we need something. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Emily: I think that's trust is the big factor there because again, like Jase said, if you have somebody kind of waiting in the wings, that almost feels like a breach of trust because the paradigm for so long has been we are monogamous, we are not going to be with anybody else. And then it's almost as though this thing is happening behind your back that, oh, I'm interested in somebody else and developing feelings for them without your knowledge. And now I'm going to tell you about it with the intention of, I will get to eventually do something with them. That feels far more challenging than just, I stumbled across this podcast, or this is something that I've been thinking about for a while. And I'd really like to bring it to you because I think that this is something that could enhance our life. Not just mine, but also yours, and maybe even enhance our relationship in some way as well. I think that's a very different place to come from than the other, in my opinion.

Dedeker: But way back, like I'm thinking about way back in the day, you know, the last time I was in a monogamous relationship and like my first foray into non-monogamy where we opened up our relationship, for me, it came from a place where I was noticing that I had a pattern of developing feelings for other people. And then feeling really, really bad about it. Like, I never cheated. Like, I never acted on it, but, like, I would feel really bad about it. I would spiral. I'd get really depressed and felt like I was trapped in this no-win situation of, like, either I do decide to act on it and cheat, which I didn't wanna do, or I have to just have this crush and then just, like, wait for it to go away.

Emily: Unrequited.

Dedeker: Yeah. And so, for me, I did that. I mean, I didn't have a podcast to stumble onto, but it's like I stumbled onto, you know, like, the Ethical Slut and Sex at Dawn and, like, all of these books and it really resonated. And I started looking at people's live journal entries and was just like so amazed. And then I all but created a PowerPoint presentation for my boyfriend at the time. I've thought about all these things and I've read all this and this is what we can do and yada, yada, yada. And so I pitched him on it. And so like that part went okay. The part after it that didn't go okay was like we didn't have any of the important follow-up questions, right? Of what does this actually mean? And how do we manage feelings? And how do we manage time outside of the house? 'cause also we were like in our early 20s and didn't know how to communicate and stuff. We didn't really know what we wanted out of this anyway, but that was the last time I've ever had to tackle that sort of situation. It's very different. And it's been different for me ever since then, where, like, all of my relationships have often started from a place of, like, we're both polyamorous or we're both open to developing romantic connections with other people. So we already know that that's a given. But then there is a trickiness of checking in with your partner and being open about the fact that. Hey, actually, this person that I've been going on dates with, I actually like, I really like, and I kind of want to spend some more time with them, right? Or eventually letting your partner know if it's like, yeah, I exchanged, I love yous with this other person, right? That sharing that, it's not like it's necessarily, oh my God, it's this big betrayal because I wasn't expecting it, but it's like, it's still delicate. These are still things that we don't have social scripts for handed to us and that we kind of have to carve out on our own.

Mr. Jones: And here's something that's changed. Talk about 11 years ago, that occur at the end of your PowerPoint. Didn't you have a list of resources that he could use to go learn about this?

Dedeker: No, I do. I had the same two books that I had read and some dusty live journal entries.

Mr. Jones: But I mean, now we do have so many more resources that we can pass out to give people. So I think it's one of the big changes. And I wanted to, before we move on, that you talked about, one of the things that we say is that this enhances our relationship. Our communication skills are better. Our sex life has certainly evolved, and is better between the two of us. We've had more fun with sexual relationships. How does it change the relationship when you're polyamorous? And I think, Emily, you just did mention, and it could be better for both people in the relationship. So what does that look like?

Emily: Yeah, for me, at least, because we contain multitudes, as it were, there are so many different facets of self. It is such an amazing thing to get to kind of discover different parts of yourself through the lens of others. And I think that that's something, especially as you said earlier, in sexual relationships and in romantic relationships, sometimes that accelerates and makes those things known more quickly than if you're just developing kind of a slow burn friendship with someone. And so it's really fun, in my opinion, to get to go out with a new person and have all of the exciting, fun things that come with being in new relationship energy, which is something we'll talk about even more in the third part, but then also be able to go home to an existing partner and have all of the lovely things that come from that relationship and from the things that the two of you do well together. And I think that when it's consensual, when both of you know that this is a thing that you'll both get to do, I mean, that just just offers for, like, personal expansion in a way that sometimes, at least in the monogamy that I've had in my life, it often, like, almost limits me into this sort of box that I expect my partner wants from me.

Mr. Jones: I've.

Emily: I've had not great monogamous relationships in my life because often I just sort of limit myself to my perception of what it is that they want out of. Instead of allowing myself to be an autonomous human who can exist without needing to limit myself in the eyes of another human?

Mr. Jones: So last question, and if you can answer this question, we can just stop. This can be our last episode. Okay. We don't have any more questions.

Mrs. Jones: We've solved all the non-monogamy problems of the world.

Mr. Jones: What does it take to shake these social norms that we've all been programmed with to believe over however many years or decades to get to a point where we can even give ourselves permission to think outside of what we've been programmed to be.

Dedeker: Yeah, well, I think that role models are a big part of that. And we've been alluding to the fact that even not that long ago, we didn't have a lot of resources and a lot of role models to turn to. That is changing. And I still think there's so much more room to grow in that the thing that I am often craving is I want an abundance of role models that I can look to for how people are living their non-monogamous lives. As in, you know, I want the person who is the queer person living their best relationship anarchist life on their compound code who are parenting their children. And I want the poly elders, you know, I want the older women who have been polyamorous for a long time who are the role models, right? And, and like, again, this is changing as more and more people are more comfortable with being out, with taking ownership of who they are, of being out and proud for lack of a better term. But for me, I still feel like we just, we just need more, right? We just need more. And I know a message that we often try to drive home on our show is this sense that, like, you're not alone. You know, you're not a horrible weirdo. Like, you're not alone. There's actually a lot of people who think this way and who share these values. And, you know, the image that I always think about is the fact that, like, when you are swimming against the mainstream, that's tiring work, right? To be constantly swimming against the mainstream and coming up against oh yeah, here's another shitty depiction of swinging or of polyamory, or here's another like unintentionally rude question from someone who's close to me, or here I have to explain myself 1600 times. Like all that takes energy and it takes effort, but like when you're able to have other people swimming with you, it means that you're able to have those moments where like you don't need to fight so hard, right? Because other people are helping to carry you along and we can all kind of like splash in the water as we swim against the mainstream together. So that's my take. What do you think, Emily and Jase?

Jase: Yeah, I think I definitely agree with having more role models, more people we can look to. I always make the case that, and I think this is a little bit different with the lifestyle, because with polyamory, often the relationship kind of becomes defined by the fact that it is polyamorous now. And so there can be this pressure to be sure that as a polyamorous person, you're always portraying only the good, shiny, positive parts of it. Because as soon as anything goes wrong in your relationship, everyone's gonna go, oh, well, it's 'cause you were polyamorous, obviously. That's why it all fell apart.

Mr. Jones: Right.

Jase: When we see monogamous relationships break up, no one ever says, oh, well, it's 'cause you tried to be monogamous. What'd you expect? Even though those two things happen just as often, right? And so, I think getting to that point where, we can have both the good and bad examples. Like, I can look at monogamous friends and go, they seem like they have a cool relationship and definitely don't want to do what they're doing, right? That we can kind of have that variety. I think it'd be nice to have that with non-monogamous people. But as far as your actual question about, like, what does it take to shake those societal norms, what I've found is that it's like unraveling a sweater. It's like it's hard to kind of get it going and, like, find where to start pulling from, but once you pull out one thread, out a little bit, it all just starts to come undone. It's like finding what your gateway in is to kind of questioning all the assumptions that you had and all the ways that you just did because you assumed everyone did it that way. There's no other choice. I think that's how most people approach monogamy and fidelity and stuff is just there is no other choice. This is what you have to do. If I might wish there were something else, there's just not. But like once you find whatever piece it is, whether that's the swing lifestyle kind of thing, or if it's about having romantic relationships with other people, even if they're not sexual, or it's about exploring your queerness or something. Like, the other pieces start to come with it. And maybe that's why we see some of this overlap between the communities as well, 'cause it's like all the social norms start to fall apart, or at least have a weaker hold.

Dedeker: And then eventually you're topless.

Jase: And then you're topless.

Emily: Once you've unraveled the whole, which is awesome. But as you said, the kids are starting to become more okay, I think. Like the younger generations absolutely are questioning the societal norms more and caring, I think, a little bit less maybe what people think about them in terms of, oh, it needs to look a specific way, or everything needs to stay as it always was. I am hoping that as time goes on, that'll become the norm and not just all of these monogamy-centric, monogamy-focused ways of living that we've had for so, so long.

Mr. Jones: Okay, so you're saying it's possible. It's just gonna be a lot of work.

Dedeker: Hopefully.

Jase: Yeah, maybe not in our lifetimes, like you said.

Emily: We'll hopefully. But we're on the way.

Jase: We'll hopefully.

Emily: But we're on the way.

Mr. Jones: We're on the way.

Jase: 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 multiamory.com/join. 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.

Mr. Jones: Okay, now you've given Mrs. Jones and I a little therapy. I'm gonna open you up to our entire community so you can give the rest of us therapy. So let me describe to you what we think is happening. People say you shouldn't be surprised that people in your community are developing feelings for each other because we say we're social first, we're social and then we're sexy. We wanna get to know the people, we wanna get to know connections. Typically though, what we're running into is that we come into non-monogamy as a team, It's Mrs. Jones and I against the world. And anything that we go through, we go through together. So we meet a couple. There's a four-way connection. We really have a good time. Then all of a sudden, one of the-- or two of the four begin to have feelings for each other. So already, I think you're at a little bit of a different intersection with polyamory than you all would normally experience.

Mrs. Jones: I think this is the delineation point. Like, typically in the swinging lifestyle, it's just all good, clean, sexy fun, and you're not really supposed to catch feelings. Like, you can be friends with people, but don't fall in love with them. Like, you're in love with me, and you're not supposed to fall in love with anybody else. That's kind of like the mindset of what the swinging lifestyle kind of is about or what we thought it was about.

Mr. Jones: And then once that, people open up.

Jase: To polyamory with that assumption too, of like, oh yeah, we can do this, we can have relationships, but they're always gonna have to be casual and you can't fall in love with them. Like maybe you can like them, but not love. People do come in with that same idea sometimes.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, so what we see is, gosh, I hope my partner falls in love with the other person so we can continue to do this, because we're a team, right? We don't branch off and do this individually. So there's a little bit of pressure on the last one to the buffet, so to speak. But then, and then over a period of time though, we don't realize how new relationship energy has impacted the way that I'm behaving, the decisions that I'm making, how I'm treating my primary partner, my spouse of X number of years, and it causes, as you would imagine, a lot of difficulty. But other people talk about how much fun it is and how they love these feelings, and then people don't really know how to handle or identify new relationship energy. And so over a period of time, well guess what, whether it's a year or 18 months later, that seems to settle down. I got my wits about myself again and hopefully I've learned a little bit about what that is, which is a different feeling than a deep commitment of love for a lifetime for somebody. So I guess where you could help us is how do you all manage? How do you all define? How do you all work through? Get your arms around process new relationship energy? Because we need a lot of help there.

Dedeker: Yeah. I always think of head in the clouds, feet on the ground. So how do I allow myself and also allow my partners, right, to to experience, honestly, one of the best natural highs we can get in this lifetime. The high, that chemical high of falling in like or falling in love or whatever it is that you want to call the experience of new relationship energy, right? Because I do think that it can backfire when we go in from a state of denial, right, of maybe thinking that's not going to happen to me or I'm not capable of being got like that, right? Or if it does happen, I can shut it down really quickly. Like, it's not helpful to go in a state of denial because often when it's repressed, it can kind of punch through even stronger. So, like, I do think it's important to have a sense of allowance around, like, letting yourself feel those things. But then there's the feet on the ground part, right? Which is like, how do I not blow up my life and my relationships because I'm all hopped up on brain chemicals over this new person, right? I wanna make a callback to you said something much earlier in the episode about when people are new to this, like if they've been in a monogamous relationship for a long time and then all of a sudden they're going to parties and flirting with people, how they can feel like a teenager again, right, with the excitement and the insecurities. And that's literally what happens on a chemical level too. It's like you think about if you were sober, for 20 years, and then all of a sudden you take a shot of tequila for the first time, that that's gonna hit you really, really hard. And that for some people, it is literally, your brain has not experienced this chemical maybe since you were first falling in love with your spouse. And so it can hit different when it's been a while. And our culture also does encourage us to put a lot of like really magical thinking on it. And so, yeah, so sometimes people can blow up their lives gonna be like, oh my God, I haven't felt this in 20 years. This must mean this person's actually my soul mate, right? Or I need to like really manufacture this whole situation, like try to get my spouse to fall in love with their spouse that I can still fall in love with them and stuff like that. And it's something we see on the show all the time is like, don't sign anything in the first year of NRE. Don't sign a rental agreement with anybody. Don't sign a shared cell phone plan. Don't sign adoption papers on a child together.

Emily: For a child.

Dedeker: Like the best that you can do, just like don't try to make any life altering decisions within that first year. And not in the sense of don't let yourself enjoy this person, don't let yourself love this person, but just, don't make any major decisions. And then another part of keeping your feet on the ground, the resource that I recommend to people all the time is Martha Cowley. She's been on our show a couple of times. She's a therapist, and she put out this book that's called Polyamory: A Clinical Toolkit for Therapists and Their Clients. And I think some people might wanna skip over it because if they see polyamory, they're like, oh, that's not for me. But in it, she has this wonderful exercise that's called how I plan to handle NRE, where she essentially walks you through with a series of prompts around things like, what are the things you value most? What are the activities you value most? Like, who are the people that you value most that you want to stay in contact with? How do you want your partner to feel about your non-monogamous relationship? Basically letting you tease out what your value system is so that you can have a sense of, even if I'm really excited about the new shiny, me, I know the actionable ways I'm still gonna be showing up to maintain my integrity and maintain my relationships.

Jase: One piece that I just wanted to add to this, I don't know how much you've already talked about this in your recent episodes, but I think for me, and maybe this is just being the son of a neuroscientist, but to me it helps to understand a little bit about the chemical and hormonal stuff that's going on in my own brain during that to kind almost like give me a way to have a little bit of a reality check or something. And so like Dedeker was saying, you're experiencing these flood of hormones and chemicals in your brain that are exciting and make it so you feel all fluttery and vibraty when you're around that person. But another part of it is that it actually causes symptoms of withdrawal when you're not around that person. The theorized explanation for this is that these hormones evolve to happen this way to try to help us fall in love with each other so that we constantly want to be around a person early on in our relationship so that we can develop enough shared history and understanding of each other to then bond, but then we can stay together longer term. And so we're in a situation here where we need to be aware of that and understand what those chemicals are doing. And I say this also as someone who who has depression, that I found that understanding the neurological part of that actually can really help me with that too. There's this sense of I feel a certain way, but I also understand a certain amount of that is chemicals that are happening in my brain. And so it gives me just this little bit of being able to step back from it and kind of observe the feelings instead of just being right in the middle of them and swept away by them.

Mr. Jones: So what you just described is what we're trying to help people understand. The separation between reality and the energy that you bring to the table.

Jase: Definitely.

Mr. Jones: And the book that you recommended will definitely recommend as a resource. But what we're also looking for is, for example, in the swinging lifestyle, if you as a husband have given your wife permission to have sex with somebody else and you're enjoying that, but all of a sudden you have a new love interest with new relationship energy and you don't want her with anybody, that's a clue. There's a little bit of an indicator there. Or if the person that you have this energy with wants to also play with other people and you have a problem with that, there are these behaviors that the situations that come up that we try to help people understand. This could be a red flag that your neurons, your brain, is taking, is holding you hostage.

Dedeker: Yeah, something I find myself saying to people a lot is NRE can create this sense of urgency. I have this feeling and like I have to act on it or I have to confess or I have to manufacture some kind of situation. And urgency in general is pretty much never your friend. Like unless you need to get out of a burning building, in most situations, urgency is not really your friend. And so, so it's funny that sometimes it's actually really important to think about emotional regulation. And we're often talking about emotional regulation in the context of you're really angry or you're really sad or you're really stressed or you're really anxious. But I think that feeling all hopped up on NRE can also be a situation where it's like you might need to regulate a little bit. And again, not in the same way that we don't want to take anger or anxiety or sadness and just like squish it down, pretend it's not there, try to distract. It's like you wanna acknowledge the feelings while also not necessarily letting them be in the driver's seat of your life and your behavior.

Mr. Jones: Yeah. And I wanna, I think Dedeker, I think it was you that said earlier that this glorious feeling that it's not drugs or alcohol, it's naturally produced and why not be able to enjoy that? So I don't wanna come across as being all negative about it, but can you talk from that perspective? What are the positive things about this and how can a relationship benefit from an energy like new relationship energy?

Dedeker: Yeah, I mean, the ways that it's played out in my own life and the ways that I've seen it play out in other people's lives, that there really is something magical about, I think about there's this comedian that I like a lot, Mike Birbiglia, and he describes falling in love, like this idea that, you have this secret, and then you discover that somebody else has the same secret. And the secret is that, like, you're both awesome. And it's like, oh my God, you're awesome. I'm awesome too. Did you know I'm awesome too? Yes, you're awesome too, right? And it's just like, it's so wonderful and wonderful, like, what it can do for things like your self-esteem and your confidence or your sex drive, right? To have this experience anew, potentially many times throughout your life of, oh my God, like, somebody else sees me. And they like what they see and like that feels really, really good. And I find it's really hard to keep that separate from bleeding into your other relationships, right? That sense of feeling energized and feeling alive. I know a lot of people report that they, I think similar to the lifestyle, that it's like you can get this energy, this sexual energy boost, right? Of being desired or perceiving that you're attractive, that then you bring back into your more established relationships that they get to enjoy that juice as well. But for myself personally, I know a really important piece of being on the other side of it, right? Of like having a partner who's experiencing NRE is for me, it's really important again to have that sense of trust and also to especially, Jase and I have been together for like 200 years. And so I've gotten to experience him dating other people multiple times. Sometimes that results in a really strong NRE connection, sometimes not. But like, I have the benefit of having experienced him fall in love with other people and then like still be here, still show up to the relationship, like me not feeling betrayed or feeling dropped in any way by him experiencing NRE. And that's something that like I also try to do. I've been better at sometimes in the past and worse at other times, right? But I do think that's also really important, like for my time, for myself personally, when I've gotten really anxious and insecure in relationships has sometimes been when I'm with a partner where the relationship is still relatively new and I don't know how this person acts if they fall in NRE with somebody else. I don't know if they're gonna catch feelings for somebody else and then completely drop off the face of the earth and like stop communicating with me or stuff like that. So like there's definitely still a riskiness that is part of the developing trust and attachment and getting to know somebody that you're dating is like how are they gonna act when they're addled on brain chemicals, right? Like, are they still gonna show up for me?

Mr. Jones: And I think you blew right by a very important point, and that is, you said you've experienced this over and over and over again. Boy, when we get to be mid-career, mid-life, we've mastered our education, we've mastered our career. We're parents, or we're successful at whatever we do, or mature adults, we have mature friendships. And then all of a sudden, we're thrown back into this middle school, high school emotional cauldron of excitement, confusion, all these emotions, these hormones, and we're not used to having to go all the way back to that point in our lives and say, I'm an adult. Like, I should be able to handle this, but I've not seen it before. So I like the fact that, and I think what we tell people is, if you're gonna give this a try. And Mrs. Jones and I had this conversation extensively. Like, are we in this for the long haul? Is this just a blip or something that we're gonna go try? And a lot of people will email us and they'll say, Hey, we had our first experience and it was great. Or, Hey, we just had our first experience and it was terrible. We're gonna quit. And I say, look, both of those data points are bad because if you had a great experience, your expectation is they're all gonna be great. And they're not. And if you had a bad experience, your expectation is gonna be they're all going to be bad and they're not. So give yourself a chance, work through what you need to work through. And it comes back to your relationship and trust. Like we said at the outset, what what am I going through? I mean, when I had experienced jealousy at my age, I'm like, I'm not a jealous person. What is this that I'm that I'm feeling? And it took my wife to slap me around a little bit to really understand what was going on.

Mrs. Jones: Well, I liked what Emily said earlier. You said something about it. It, the personal growth that you experience, right? Opening your relationship can create, you learn new things about yourself, right? So now your partner's learning new things about you and in return, the partner's learning new things about themselves. But, but I think what it does for your relationship is it just some of this new relationship energy is positive because it comes into your relationship. Like we always say reconnection sex is best. So after we have a play experience with others, when we come back together as a couple, that sex is just a little bit sweeter.

Emily: Yeah, I've absolutely found that to be the case as well, that it's really fun to, after my partner has an experience with someone else, or vice versa, that we're able to come back and have sex together and have that really be a sense of reconnection. And yeah, talking about, having some of those feelings that you didn't recall were there or never knew were there or having these new experiences. I mean, I think it is kind of beautiful that throughout the course of our lives, no matter how old we are and how much we've been through and how well we think we know ourselves, that we can have new experiences and learn new things about ourselves and our partners. And I think NRE is a part of that, just figuring out, okay, I can have these experiences again. I remember, like, Jase, I feel like I heard you say a few, maybe a year ago or something, you were like, God, am I ever gonna feel NRE again? And, the fact that I think absolutely you will, and that we all have the capacity to do that, and that that is a really beautiful thing, and that even if your partner is the one who is experiencing it now and that's putting a strain on you because all of this is new and feelings of jealousy may come up, there's always the possibility that you're going to be in that seat as well, and you're gonna have the opportunity to feel these amazing things too. And then hopefully from the experiences that you've had, you'll get the opportunity to more easily help your partner through any challenges that they may have.

Mr. Jones: Yep. And I think lastly, the inverse, like when you're with another couple, sometimes we look at another couple and we only see their exterior. We get to know them a little bit. Again, they're successful. They're mature in life, you don't know what's going on inside their head. You don't know what kind of energy they're dealing with. And so we have this misperception that, oh, they got their shit together. Look at them like, no, if something doesn't seem right, other people are likely struggling with a lot of the same things that we struggle with as well.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: I think that that kind of desire to compare ourselves to other people can come up in a lot of different ways, right? In that sense, it can come up couple versus couple kind of like comparing our mess to what we perceive as them having it all together or you know, or in polyamory often this will come up of like I'm comparing myself to the other person that my partner's dating, right? Of like, oh, well, he's more successful than I am or he's taller than I am or whatever it is, right? That's easy to do. Or I think that this can be hard if you're looking at people who are just more experienced than you are. That I think sometimes if people are talking to, like, if guys are talking to me and they're newer at non-monogamy polyamory, and I'm kind of talking about how like, oh my gosh, I love when Dedeker, you know, has a solid relationship where she wants to go on trips with that person and like spend the night over at their house, 'cause I love getting my space to myself sometimes. And, you know, I get to catch up on my shows that she doesn't like to watch, and I just have a great time, I love it. Like, I kind of like it when she's dating more people than I am. And for them, because they're newer in this, and more of the thing at the forefront of their mind is the fear, right? Because they haven't had that repetition of seeing, okay, I can trust this partner. I can trust them to not just leave me at the first sign of excitement somewhere else. That that can feel like I could never get there, so I should probably not try. Like, this isn't meant for me. Like, we can kind of overly compare that way too. So, yeah, I mean, anything we can do to both acknowledge everyone's got problems, but then also, even if they don't, that doesn't mean that we can't get to that point eventually too.

Mr. Jones: Right. Yeah.

Jase: Something that I did want to toss out there when you were talking about NRE, just like a couple big ones that come up for the person who's experiencing the NRE, because often you're the one who's the most befuddled, right? Like you're the one who's got all the chemicals going on. That a couple things to keep in mind. One is that what Dedeker said is that don't sign anything in the first year. Think about kind of the thing we've seen a few times is the person who does blow up their life because they open up their relationship, maybe they've dated a few people, and then they finally find someone they really connect with, and they feel all that NRE, and then it's like, I'm gonna divorce my wife, move out of the house with my kids, like be with this person, 'cause they must be my soulmate, kind of like Dedeker was saying, like we've been socialized to overprioritize that feeling of falling in love. It's all the Disney movies that all you need is that, and then everything's easy from that point on. Is just to kind of keep that in mind. Like, don't do that. Don't blow up your life. Don't, you know, jump and make a change. Let that feeling wear off, you know, and you'll, you'll get to experience it for what it is. But the other one, just from a more practical point of view, is if you are at the point where you're seeing someone separate from your partner, right? So there's this experience of I'm going off on a date or we're having sex in the other room or whatever it is, and that's that person who triggers those NRE feelings in you and you're all excited about it. It's to realize that you're kind of buzzing after that. And if you go straight from that to reconnecting with your partner who's not been experiencing that, there's like a big disconnect in the energy you're coming in with. And they're like, Whoa, I'm not ready to handle that. All my feelings, I've been sitting here feeling alone, feeling scared, whatever. Now you're coming in with all this. Oh my gosh, isn't life amazing? This is so great. That is a tip that I give people sometimes is, is find some way to give yourself a like come down period. So if you've gone out on a date somewhere else, it's like don't go straight home from that, depending on time of day, I don't know, stop at a coffee shop or go for a little walk or just do something to.

Mr. Jones: Kind of like- Decaf, yeah.

Jase: Right, yeah, decaf coffee.

Mr. Jones: There you go.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Jase: Or like listen to some music in your car or something before you come in or like something to just kind of like regulate, get back to a little bit more of a normal state so that you can meet your partner where they are. And if you're, you know, at a club or something and you just did this in the other room, maybe that could be a little harder. I don't know if the two of you have any tips for how you might do that, but just something to like keep in mind, you wanna meet your partner again closer to the same wavelength. It just makes that easier.

Mrs. Jones: No, I think that's really valuable advice. And like you said, you know, if you're a couple and you're at a club and you just had individual experiences, you don't have that opportunity to have that conversation. Just have the awareness that you're bringing a lot more to the table than your partner is at that moment and just try to dial it back a little bit or build in some forgiveness that they're not as happy for you as you thought they would be in that moment.

Jase: Yeah. And sometimes they might be, but not always, right?

Mr. Jones: I think one of the things that we've learned, whether it's new relationship energy or it's a situation, a play situation that didn't go well, we've learned to think, you know what? Let's talk about this in about three days. Or, we'll do a Sunday morning walk. And usually on our Sunday morning walk, that's when we give each other permission to, kind of unload or comment on how things have been going. But it really does give both of us some time to process what's going inside of our heads so that when we do talk about it as a couple, we're not talking at each other.

Emily: Not emotionally charged.

Mr. Jones: Yeah, we're not as emotionally charged, right.

Mrs. Jones: I'm a slow processor, and it took Mr. Jones a while to figure out that I wasn't pouting, I was processing. And sometimes, like, I would be, I'm way more emotional than he is. So I knew that I needed to keep it in until I could logically convey my feelings instead of just, like, vomiting all out my emotions, and then he'd have to come up with a shovel and, and, like, clean up my.

Dedeker: Yeah, we call that chewing. Chewing versus spewing.

Emily: Yeah, there you go.

Dedeker: Some people, some people are the spewers, right? That it's like they need to process in real time and, and, like, their partner needs to be skilled at catching the mess. And then, yeah, the chewers that we need to digest it first.

Jase: And here, Dedeker is the chewer and I are both spewers.

Mr. Jones: Yeah. Much more.

Dedeker: Yeah.

Mr. Jones: Well, first of all, again, I want to thank you guys for giving us the opportunity to chat with you. I've learned a whole lot since, listening to your couple of your podcast and the conversation that we've had tonight has been really helpful. But more importantly, I think a lot of our listeners and a lot of our community are going to learn a whole lot. So thank you very much for taking the time, to have us on. It's been a lot of fun and it's been very enlightening. So we appreciate your time. Thank you.

Jase: Yeah, I hope the same for our audience to kind of get more of a range of perspectives and see like maybe that's a better fit for me. Like that's what we're always trying to get people to is just look at their options.

Mr. Jones: Yeah.

Dedeker: I'm so glad that we can make this work. Where can our listeners find more of you two and your work?

Mr. Jones: So the best thing to do is go to our website. We got a thing.com W-E-G-O-T-T-A-T-H-I-N-G.com that's where you can always find us. You can also find our podcast on Apple Podcasts or anywhere out there. You can follow us on X at wegotathing and also on Instagram, wegotathing as well. So thank you for that.

Jase: And we'll be cross-posting each other's stuff when this episode comes out. So if you go to our Instagram, you'll find them and vice versa.

Emily: Absolutely. The best place to share your thoughts with other listeners is in the episode discussion channel in our Discord server, or you can post on our private Facebook group. You can get access to these groups and join our exclusive community by going to multiamory.com/join. In addition, you can share with us publicly on Instagram @multiamory_podcast.

Emily: Multiamory is created and produced by Jase Lindgren, Dedeker Winston, and me, Emily Matlack. Our production assistants are Rachel Shenewerk and Carson Collins. 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.