Today we're fielding another question from one of our Supercast subscribers. We'll be discussing how to handle your metamour not wanting to meet you or be a part of your life.

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Emily: 00:00:03

I think often you have to figure out, does my version of non-monogamy look like my partner's version of non-monogamy? And is my partner okay with, you know, there being bad blood between metamours? There being the potential that, oh, this person just doesn't ever want to talk to me. And I understand that, you know, that gets a little messy and that you don't want to say, like, oh, I don't want to date this person because their metamour never wants to meet me. But I don't know. I think you have to look at a perspective of what is it that I want to have in my life and what is it that I don't? And if this is a constant burden, then maybe there's a misalignment there about the type of relationships the two of you want to be in.

Jase: 00:00:48

Welcome to the Multiamory Podcast. I'm Jase.

Emily: 00:00:51

I'm Emily.

Dedeker: 00:00:53

And I'm Dedeker.

Emily: 00:00:54

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

Dedeker: 00:01:00

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: 00:01:24

On this episode of the Multiamory Podcast, we're gonna do a deep dive into answering a listener question. And that question is, what to do when a metamour just doesn't want to meet you? We'll get into some more details about that and also look at some research relevant to it in this episode, so stick around for that. If you're interested in learning about our fundamental communication tools that we reference on this show all the time, you can check out our book, Multiamory: Essential Tools for Modern Relationships, which covers our most used communication tools for all types of relationships. You can find links to buy it at multiamory.com/book or wherever fine books are sold. It's also available on audiobook now.

Emily: 00:02:05

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

Dedeker: 00:02:35

Okay, here is our listener question. My metamour doesn't want to meet me, and we've started to build resentment toward one another. Hi all. I've been dating a partner for a little over a year, and about six months ago, we began making the shift from monogamy to polyamory. Things have gone very well overall, in part thanks to you all. We'll take so much credit for your relationship successes. We'll take all the credit.

Speaker D: 00:02:59

Yeah.

Jase: 00:03:00

Love it.

Dedeker: 00:03:00

And I've started dating another person who is in a similar situation of making the shift from monogamy to polyamory. This new partner of mine has been dating her other partner for about eight months, and I'm happy that my partner has her other partner. However, my metamour does not want to meet me. Furthermore, my metamour and I go to the same gym, and our common partner has asked me not to say hi to my metamour should I see them there, as it makes them uncomfortable. Upon further conversation, this partner confided in me that my metamour has built resentment toward me because of missteps of our common partner in learning to be an effective hinge. It causes me stress to think that not only does my metamour not want to meet me, but seems to have an unjust, negative view of me. I've communicated to my partner that I think a meeting between us metamours could be beneficial, but it's something my metamour is still not open to. I know research points to positive metamour relationships as being a potentially important factor in maintaining healthy polyamorous relationships. My question to you all is, can anything be done on my end to maintain a healthy relationship without meeting my metamour? I've asked our common partner to tell me some of the things she values about my metamour and their relationship in an effort to not build resentment back towards them. But I'm wondering if you have any additional advice as we navigate this new situation. Thank you for your help. That was sent in by Metamour Meaning well in Minneapolis.

Emily: 00:04:23

I was just there. Great, thanks.

Dedeker: 00:04:26

Did a metamour give you the cold shoulder when you were there?

Emily: 00:04:29

Not there, no, but...

Jase: 00:04:32

Okay, good clarification.

Dedeker: 00:04:34

So it's not a Minneapolis-specific problem, is.

Emily: 00:04:37

What we've ruled out. Not that I know of. I can imagine that this is a problem for a lot of people in a lot of different places.

Dedeker: 00:04:42

Yes.

Emily: 00:04:43

And I do think this is definitely something that happens in the beginnings of opening up a relationship or transitioning from monogamy to non-monogamy. Or getting into a relationship with somebody who is monogamous and you tell them, actually, I have another partner. It's okay that we see each other, but just so you're aware, you're essentially engaging in non monogamy if you choose to engage with me in some sort of relationship and that that can cause a lot of tension that can be really challenging. And I definitely have been in a scenario where I am the more experienced partner. And my partner, who is less experienced, may have relationships with other people who don't really necessarily know much about non-monogamy as well. And that creates some potential tensions there. It can be definitely challenging.

Jase: 00:05:34

Yeah, there's a lot of different dynamics that can come with that. And I think what's interesting about this question is that everybody's new. It's, what, six months ago for the question asker and It says that this new partner has been dating her other partner for about eight months and that they're new to it, I guess. We don't know how new, but yeah, that's definitely adds to the challenge, right? Because you're more likely to make little missteps and it sounds like there's been some of that. And then also there's that whole like, this is a new relationship to a person that I've never had to think about before. So I have no guideposts or no role models of what's normal, what's acceptable, what's unreasonable. And yeah, I have definitely seen this so many times.

Dedeker: 00:06:21

Yeah.

Jase: 00:06:21

Some variation on this.

Dedeker: 00:06:22

I'm trying to think back to like my very early days of non monogamy. And I feel like even though I read all the books, right? I read ethical slut and ethical slut.

Emily: 00:06:32

You wrote a book.

Dedeker: 00:06:33

Well, that was not the point. I wasn't there yet. I wasn't there yet when I was reading the book.

Jase: 00:06:37

Back in time.

Dedeker: 00:06:38

Back in time, way back in time. Even though the ethical slut, at least from what I recall, is like fairly pro Metamours, meeting, crossing paths, fairly pro kitchen table. I read that, but I even then was still like, well, I'm not gonna do that. Oh, really? Yeah, I was like, I have no interest in that whatsoever. You know, I'm like, I get this is like, sure, maybe some people practice nonmonogamy this way. I don't think that's for me. I'm more interested in dating multiple people. And this whole issue of metamours, I don't really wanna deal with. So like, yeah, I didn't even think about it in the early days. It was the combination of, I was in this mode where I'm like, I'm just focused on one thing. I'm kind of just focused on what I can get out of this combined with I have not been presented with any models for how to deal with a relationship like this, as in like a metamour relationship. Like literally most of the models that are shown to us is like, if your two lovers get together, that's just a disaster, either a hilarious disaster or a really dramatic disaster. And so I really was not motivated at all towards trying to actually meet my metamours in the early days.

Emily: 00:07:45

I think, Dedeker, you might have been the first real, true metamour that I met. Maybe? I'm trying to remember, and Jase, perhaps you can correct me if I'm wrong there, but I think the very first person that you kind of went on a date with, Jase, I met that person, but you didn't really date for that long. It wasn't particularly, I guess, long-lasting or meaningful, but Dedeker, obviously. Here we are. And it is.

Jase: 00:08:13

She's still here.

Emily: 00:08:13

We can't get rid of her.

Dedeker: 00:08:15

Yeah. You may have, now that I think about it, you may have been my first, like, maybe healthy metamour, like healthy intentional metamour meeting.

Emily: 00:08:25

If I'm being honest, everyone, this is why it's important, okay?

Dedeker: 00:08:28

You want your own podcast.

Emily: 00:08:31

And you can't get out of a relationship for 11, 12 years.

Dedeker: 00:08:35

I haven't talked about this a lot on the show or with the two of you, but, I had some pretty toxic early metamour relationships. Again, born out of just like, no one really knows what they're doing. And everyone's just a little, I don't know, a little misguided. Like, I dated someone for a while who would sort of would introduce me to his other partners, but only in situations where it was like a weapon. God. Like, if he was on the rocks.

Emily: 00:08:59

What does that mean?

Dedeker: 00:09:00

If he was on the rocks with.

Emily: 00:09:01

A partner, he would use you as the weapon.

Jase: 00:09:03

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:09:04

Like some, like, yes. And this is stuff I didn't even put together until years later. Like, man, that was fucked up.

Jase: 00:09:10

Like, years later.

Dedeker: 00:09:11

Wow. Yeah. You're not even aware of it. I wasn't even aware at the time, yeah, he would be on the rocks with somebody and like without telling them, he would bring me to an event where they were basically.

Emily: 00:09:20

Awkward.

Dedeker: 00:09:21

Right, without warning them, you know, he would roll up with this other lady that he's dating.

Jase: 00:09:26

To show them he's got other options.

Dedeker: 00:09:28

Yes, yes.

Emily: 00:09:30

And like- that doesn't sound very ethical at all.

Jase: 00:09:32

Yeah, it doesn't.

Dedeker: 00:09:32

He was really messed up and like some really messed up things happened, like as in like I saw some really messed up reactions to that as you can, understand.

Jase: 00:09:41

Absolutely. Yeah. But it's like the worst possible way to introduce yourself.

Dedeker: 00:09:45

No, seriously. But like, if you think about it, it further disincentivized me for a few more years away from thinking this is like a good relationship to be in because most of my experiences were like people are very unhappy with not only the arrangement, but like often very directly unhappy with me.

Speaker D: 00:10:01

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:10:02

You know, so yeah, bad, bad times. And then. And then like after that period, my first, I guess, real metamour, as in like my partner was also having like an emotional entangled relationship. That was also complicated because this woman was much more monogamous leaning.

Speaker D: 00:10:20

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:10:20

Emily got all the deets later.

Emily: 00:10:22

Well, this person was also my metamour for a while.

Dedeker: 00:10:25

Yeah. And like our shared hinge partner again, kind of like the question asker is talking about was not doing a good job managing the communication.

Speaker D: 00:10:33

Right.

Jase: 00:10:34

Like, was that was not me, by the way.

Dedeker: 00:10:35

That was not Josh.

Speaker D: 00:10:37

No.

Emily: 00:10:37

It was not.

Dedeker: 00:10:38

Yeah, our shared hinge partner was-- Chace was great.

Jase: 00:10:41

Was, yeah, telling all of them.

Dedeker: 00:10:43

I made my mistakes too, but I was not this responsible. Yeah, I was like telling all these lies of omission and like all these concessions for this person. And so, yeah, like resentment built up very quickly. I will say, I do think one of the mistakes that I made, which is a classic mistake, is that like I projected a lot of, like I think I blamed this metamour for a lot of problems that were actually a.

Jase: 00:11:04

Hinge problem, which we've talked about in other episodes.

Emily: 00:11:07

And we'll probably talk about more on this episode. Yeah, probably. That metamour, like, saying something that our shared partner had said to her about me that was like dunking on me.

Dedeker: 00:11:16

Oh, no.

Emily: 00:11:17

And, yeah, it was really... What did she say?

Dedeker: 00:11:19

Are you comfortable sharing?

Emily: 00:11:20

I don't actually remember the content of it.

Dedeker: 00:11:23

No, we just remember it was a dunk.

Emily: 00:11:24

Clearly. Yeah, it was definitely a dunk. It was, she was, you know, basically dissing me. But it was a diss that he had said to her about me.

Speaker D: 00:11:34

Oh.

Jase: 00:11:34

And so... That she then said to you.

Emily: 00:11:36

Correct, while he was sitting there.

Dedeker: 00:11:38

Oh, my gosh.

Emily: 00:11:38

And he, it was.

Dedeker: 00:11:41

A.

Emily: 00:11:45

Don'T say shitty things about your partner to your other partner. But B, if you are going to, then as the metamour, don't weaponize that. Don't repeat it while the partner is right there. That's insane.

Dedeker: 00:12:07

Well, okay, saying all this is really making me appreciate My relationship with you, Emily, because I do think that was very healing, right? Because it was like served as like the first reminder of, oh, actually this could be a really good form of relationship with somebody, you know? When, as I'm saying all this out loud, I'm like, wow, that's a bad track record of metamour relationships. That could have had me off this whole meta thing for the rest of my polyamory career.

Emily: 00:12:34

But I think since then also, it kind of laid the groundwork for future metamour relationships as well. And I'm not sure if all of yours have been great, but I think that a lot of mine have been really good. Not that I've done it nearly as long as you have. And getting back into it, I do think though that if you have a sense of this can be a really meaningful relationship that can enhance your life as opposed to detract from it, that that kind of allows you to, even if things are a little scary, go into a first time meeting being like, hey, I just want to recognize the human in you. You recognize the human in me. And let's like have a mutual understanding here.

Jase: 00:13:16

I know I've said this before, but I always love to use the metaphor of in-laws when we're talking about metamours. Because I think I still think that's the closest proxy that we have, right? Where it's a relationship that you have with someone else just through who your partner is, right? So like your sisters and brothers in law or your mother in law, father in law, like these are people that you didn't choose to have a relationship with them, but by being with your partner, you have kind of peripherally gained this relationship with them and that they can run the gamut. And I think that at least people can kind of wrap their heads around this idea that, yeah, sometimes you'll have a brother in law that you just hate and you just think is a jerk and you don't get along. Sometimes you have one that you get along really well with and they become a really close friend. And I'd say most of the time it's just sort of, you know, neutral, cordial. Yeah, we see each other at family events and it's not a big deal. It's not a relationship I think about a ton. And I think that sets a really good example for, you know, what a metamour relationship can be and maybe a way to categorize it for, especially when you're just starting out and it just, I haven't had this relationship before. I don't know, like, mentally, emotionally, where to put this relationship. And then I think that also the metaphor can be used as kind of a way to give yourself some landmarks for what's normal behavior and what's maybe getting into weird sketchy behavior. So if we go to this, like, yeah, imagine that you started dating somebody and something happened early on in your relationship that they relayed to their sister that made you look bad or that the sister interpreted that way, right? You could end up with that similar kind of triangulated thing where now your relationship with your sister-in-law is kind of poisoned a little bit or is starting off on the wrong foot because of some miscommunication involving your hinge, right? That wasn't directly from you at all.

Dedeker: 00:15:15

Your partner told their sister a dunk on you, and then the sister repeated the dunk back to you, and then it's just we've really poisoned the well.

Jase: 00:15:22

And in that situation, I could see that sister being like, I don't really want to meet this person. I'm kind of like, I don't know, man. You gotta earn that first. You've only been dating them a little while, whatever. I don't want to meet them yet. I think that that's, you know, it sucks, but it's reasonable. Obviously, when we say sister-in-law, we're implying marriage, but I mean more like the concept of that relationship. Maybe just like the siblings or parents of someone you're dating. Maybe that's a way to think about it, not necessarily in law. But then there's the part of this question that while Dedeker was reading it, if you watched the video version, you may have seen Emily and I both make faces. The part where they say, Furthermore, my metamour and I go to the same gym, and our common partner has asked me not to say hi to my metamour should I see them there, as it makes them uncomfortable. To me, that's like, if you imagine that with an in-law or like a sibling of someone you're dating, if they're like, Hey, you go to the same gym as my sister, But if you see her, like, do not say hi to her. Like, that feels weird. And that's the part where Emily and I both made a face of, like, that crossed a line into, like, this is entering some territory that's a bit weird. It isn't just, oh, we're not comfortable, we're not sure what to do. But it's kind of like taking the whole triangulation problem and almost reinforcing that even harder. And what I mean by that, the triangulation problem, right, is when I don't ever communicate directly with this person, instead it all has to go through this intermediary, which is that shared partner. And that's just not a good way of communication. It's a shitty burden to put on that hinge partner. Often they put it on themselves though. We've all been there. We've all done it. But this is almost kind of saying like, and it has to stay that way. It's not just I'm doing that because that's how everyone wants to communicate, but it's like I'm imposing this restriction to keep it that way. And I don't think the partner's doing this on purpose necessarily to make themselves be this go-between, but that's what they're creating. And that's something that we've pretty universally seen go badly.

Dedeker: 00:17:20

So I want to talk about this research that the person cites. However, before we get into that, Jase, have you ever had a situation where a metamour just, like, refuses to meet with you?

Jase: 00:17:31

I actually have had relatively good luck with that part of metamores. I think usually the curiosity has worn out, even if people are new to it. Like, I'm dating someone and they date someone who's brand new to non-monogamy. I think the curiosity of them has generally won out.

Dedeker: 00:17:48

Like they're curious about you.

Jase: 00:17:50

Like how does this whole thing work? Because I think that I was a little bit lucky in the sense that people I dated very early on when I was the newbie tended to have partners who had been doing it longer and they'd been doing it longer. So on their side was more of that this is a normal thing, whether we meet or not, fine, I'm not going to make a big deal out of it. And then as time went on when I dated people who were newer to it, or they were dating people newer to it. Because I was the more experienced, established one, it was kind of this, like, yeah, this doesn't have to be a big deal. We can meet each other. It's okay. I do remember the one time, though, that Emily- Yes, that you're gonna say.

Emily: 00:18:27

Yes. No, there was one time when this guy that I had slept with in San Diego, and then he came up to hang out.

Jase: 00:18:35

And this was really early in our opening.

Emily: 00:18:38

It was really early, but you went over to see Dedeker that night. So it was...

Jase: 00:18:43

Okay, so not too early.

Emily: 00:18:45

It was not too early, but pretty early. But yeah, he was definitely like, I don't wanna meet him, I don't wanna meet him, but then Jase had to come back to get some clothes or.

Jase: 00:18:55

Something that he forgot. Yeah, this guy like sat out in his car waiting until you told him that I had already left to go to Dedekers. He met you anyways. Right, and then I got to the car and realized like, oh shoot, I forgot something and had to come back in, and there he was.

Dedeker: 00:19:08

Yeah, okay, hold on. So this guy's sitting in the car, like waiting for the go-ahead from Emily, and then the minute that Emily's like, yeah, Jase just headed out, this guy booked it into your apartment, like in the time it took Jase to walk to the car and realize he forgot something. At the front door.

Jase: 00:19:22

So he wasn't like inside yet, but he was inside Emily.

Emily: 00:19:25

Correct.

Jase: 00:19:26

He wasn't inside Emily yet.

Speaker D: 00:19:28

Yeah.

Jase: 00:19:28

So I came back to pick up whatever it was that I'd forgotten and, you know, said, said hi to him. We shook hands or whatever. I was like, oh, hey, good to meet you, Jason. And I didn't know that he'd been hiding from me.

Emily: 00:19:41

Oh, that might have changed my impression a little bit.

Jase: 00:19:44

Would you like hide in the bushes and be like, boo? But yeah, and I went and did my thing and said bye and left. And then Emily, you told me that after that happened that he was really.

Emily: 00:19:53

Like, he was like, oh, that was fine. I'm like, yeah, I'm like, he's great. Chill out. Okay.

Jase: 00:20:01

Yeah, he's gonna be all right. That wasn't weird at all.

Emily: 00:20:03

That was totally fine. I'm like, that's how it's done, sir.

Speaker D: 00:20:09

Yeah.

Emily: 00:20:09

And then he, you know, got married like pretty soon after that and had a kid. But that was his- Unrelated to the.

Jase: 00:20:15

Metamour part of the story.

Emily: 00:20:16

A small amount of non-monogamy and having to deal with metamours and stuff.

Dedeker: 00:20:21

I just remembered another story. Sorry, now we're on a roll.

Jase: 00:20:24

I want to tell this story.

Dedeker: 00:20:26

Yeah, okay. Do it. All right. Okay. Okay, yeah. So this was a little further along in the non-monogamy journey. Yeah, okay. So my partner I was living with at the time, Brad, He had newly started dating a woman and big surprise he's dating a woman who's like pretty monogamous, you know, like, come on.

Emily: 00:20:43

Not, he does.

Dedeker: 00:20:44

Like he does like, or he did anyway, not down with the whole non monogamy thing, having a hard time wrapping her brain around it, right? So like I'm set up in this situation with a metamour again, right? So we planned like, okay, this is the situation is I'm at my, at our house and I'm hanging out with my other partner, Jake, right? And we were going to hang out and then we were going to head out for a date. And in the meantime, Brad was out with this woman, let's call her Teresa. And it was like, okay, I'm gonna bring her back home, and maybe we can organize it and like communicate it ahead of time that it's like these two couples will kind of be like ships passing, which I think is actually not a bad strategy for a first metamour meeting, right? Like low pressure, five minutes, kind of like this whole situation with the guy hiding from you, you know, unintentionally, right? Right, a quick hello. A quick hello, like see if it, you know, whatever. And like no one's forced to hang out or be sociable or whatever. And so, and so we also thought like, okay, so we can coordinate the ship passing in the night meeting. Plus, like, maybe if you, Dedeker, are there with your other partner, maybe that takes some of the pressure off that, like, the meeting, the new person doesn't. This new woman doesn't feel like she's jockeying for my partner's attention.

Speaker D: 00:21:50

Right.

Dedeker: 00:21:50

You know, like, maybe that'll make it feel a little bit more balanced and, like, great. You know, I ran this by Jake. He was in. You know, you totally get it. Like, sure, let's go. So Jake and I are hanging out at the apartment, and then Brad walks in and brings in this new person, Teresa. And it's immediately clear that she is so uncomfortable and so pissed off also at the same time.

Emily: 00:22:10

Oh, really?

Dedeker: 00:22:11

Like, so uncomfortable, so pissed off. And like, Jake and I are sitting here, hanging in the kitchen, right? Chatting and like trying, like all four of us, like trying to have conversation and like talking about music. And for some reason, like the topic of Kissed by a Rose by Seal came up. Like, for some reason, Yeah, me and Jake and Brad were able to kind of joke and talk about it, and this woman is not having it. She is visibly getting more upset, right? And I'm like, How can you rationalize this? No, I'm like, I need to go to the bathroom. And then Brad is like, Call. Hey, Teresa, you want to go see the rooftop? The rooftop's pretty cool. And so we'll pick, he whisks her away to the rooftop. I go to the bathroom, I come back, and then as Jake and I are leaving, Jake is like, You left me in there to just talk about seal? You left me in that situation?

Emily: 00:23:04

You're like, I understand now that that wasn't maybe the wisest.

Dedeker: 00:23:07

It's funny, 'cause I always think about that whenever I'm kissed by a rosebloom.

Jase: 00:23:11

Wow.

Emily: 00:23:11

I love it. How could you not?

Dedeker: 00:23:13

Anyway, so yeah, yet another not great-- I would not recommend-- I would not recommend a situation like that if not everybody's on board.

Jase: 00:23:21

We don't know what happened on their side, right? Maybe they had a fight right before that. Maybe.

Emily: 00:23:25

Oh, maybe.

Dedeker: 00:23:26

Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I think if I recall getting the context, like it had been maybe a little bit heated before that, because again, I think this person still was not super jazzed about the idea of non monogamy or of meeting a metamour, right? So like, to be fair, it's like she wasn't excited about that situation. And then, yeah, that same night, like it all imploded. So anyway, would not recommend with that. Let's take a quick break. And when we come back from the break, we're going to talk about research. We're going to talk about like, what's actually actionable here? What could you do? In this situation to maintain a healthy metamour relationship with someone who doesn't want to talk to you.

Jase: 00:24:02

We're going to take a quick moment to talk about some sponsors of this show. Please do give them a listen. Giving them a listen and checking out any links or using promo codes really does help support our show, helps us keep this going. And then of course, if you would rather support us more directly, you can become one of our [email protected]/join where we have an amazing private community that you get access to, as well as things like video discussions, early releases of ad free episodes, and extra materials with certain episodes. And we would love to have you be part of that. It's available at a sliding [email protected]/join.

Dedeker: 00:24:40

So this person knows how to write a question to Multiamory because they mentioned research, which of course perked up my little ears. So yeah, I looked into what this research is. And I don't know if this is the specific study they're referring to, but it is probably one of the more recent studies on this topic done by Sharon Flicker, who has been on the show before, called youd Happiness is My Happiness: Predicting Positive Feelings for a Partner's Consensual Extra-Dyadic Intimate Relations. That's the long term for metamour. Yeah. Essential Extra-Dyadic Intimate Relations.

Speaker D: 00:25:16

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:25:17

This was published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior in 2024.

Speaker D: 00:25:21

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:25:21

So if people want to go back to episode 386, we interviewed both Dr. Marie Thouin and Dr. Flicker on our episode titled, Is It Really Necessary? So this study was a cross-sectional survey with 255 participants recruited from online communities that were focused on polyamory and consensual non monogamy. They used this specific Compersion Scale questionnaire to assess three subtypes of compersion. So type number one, positive feelings toward a partner's metamour. Type number two, excitement about a partner forming new intimate connections. And type number three, sexual arousal related to thinking about one's partner and metamour together. And their key finding in the study was, quote, those who liked their metamour felt close to them and who knew more about their partner's relationship with the metamour experienced higher compersion. These findings also applied to a subtype of compersion that manifests as sexual interest in their partner's relationship with their metamour. You know, this is fascinating. Yeah, I suppose this supports the stuff that we tend to say on the show is like in most situations, not every situation, but in most situation, like, if you naturally like this person, or if you actually feel intimately close to them, whether that's emotionally intimate or sexually intimate. But also, the more you know about the relationship they have with your partner, the more likely you are to experience sensations of joy or excitement around this relationship. So that's, you know, why I think we tend to encourage people, like, if it's appropriate, meet your metamour, right? You don't gotta be best friends. You don't have to become lovers, like with in-laws, right? That you don't have to, make it the most intimate relationship you've ever had. But if you can find a way, I think way back in the ethical slut, they called it, quote unquote, falling in like, making the effort to fall in like with your metamour, then that's probably going to make things go a little bit easier for you. But how do you do that when someone won't talk to you is the issue.

Emily: 00:27:11

Well, good question.

Jase: 00:27:12

Yeah, boy. Something that I think is worth discussing a little bit with this, too, is we've talked before in the past, and I think we even talked about it on this episode with Marie Thouin back in the day. But that you don't have to be best friends or be close. Kind of that falling in like, it could even just be falling in, not dislike and fear, right?

Emily: 00:27:34

Of just neutrality. Like you often say.

Jase: 00:27:39

Yeah, neutrality, like the in-law thing.

Emily: 00:27:41

I was going to ask you, Jase, maybe with the exception of a couple metamours, like Jake, for example, I don't know how many of you are metamours. You've actually, like, gotten really buddy-buddy with a couple you've had not great relationships with, but even others that you tended to kind of have more of a.

Dedeker: 00:28:00

Neutral time with them?

Emily: 00:28:01

I'm not sure.

Jase: 00:28:02

I've always been the whole variety. Yeah, I mean, been doing this quite.

Dedeker: 00:28:06

A polyamory at this point of it.

Jase: 00:28:07

For 13 years or something.

Speaker D: 00:28:09

Yeah.

Emily: 00:28:09

Yeah.

Jase: 00:28:10

Where, yeah, like there's Brad, who is the bad metamour. And also we were all still kind of learning at the time, so I don't think any of us were the best at figuring out all of that because that was really on.

Emily: 00:28:21

Sure.

Jase: 00:28:22

But I've had a fair number that were more just kind of neutral of like, oh, okay. Hey, yeah. Good to meet you. That's it. We didn't really stay in touch. We didn't text each other or chat or whatever. But then I've had some where we'll kind of be buds occasionally for a specific occasion, like it's our shared partner's birthday. Oh, let's coordinate on the party for that or something. And then, yeah, I've had a few also where I've been quite close and have had my own relationship outside of, you know, through our shared partner of just like, oh, let's go hang out. Let's go get a drink. Like, oh, I'm going to this discussion group. Do you want to come with me to that? Like, yeah, let's, let's do things together. So it's really been the whole range. I will say though that I do think it's interesting in this Compersion research that they did breaking Compersion into these three separate parts is just that they don't all have to go together. Like, I have personally never felt any sexual arousal about my metamour being with a partner, regardless of gender or anything like that. It's always been just this sort of neutral, you know, sometimes threatened, especially earlier on, but that's never been a part for me. And yet I've had really positive metamour relationships because I just want to press.

Dedeker: 00:29:36

On that though, because I've had group sex with you. And so, even in that situation, no sexual arousal?

Jase: 00:29:42

I mean, I did with that was that was me. I was involved in all of that. Sure.

Dedeker: 00:29:46

Okay.

Jase: 00:29:47

You're talking about thinking about your partner. Okay.

Dedeker: 00:29:49

Sure, sure.

Jase: 00:29:51

Like that. I know for some people, and honestly, I think it'd be cool to feel that. I just don't. And I never have. And that I think that's fine. And it doesn't mean I don't have compersion. It doesn't mean I'm not happy for my partners or I'm excited for them to have relationships. But it is this, like, I just want to clarify for the listener, if you're like, God, that seems like way too far to ask. I can barely meet this person, much less you want me to be. Sexually excited about that. I'm like, no, no, no. That's not a requirement at all. I do want to clarify that, take that pressure off of just kind of feeling neutral of like, oh, okay, cool. My partner's happy.

Emily: 00:30:24

I'm happy. Sure. Cool. I do want to pivot slightly to this quote that really got me as you were reading through it, Dedeker. Upon further conversation, this common partner confided in me that my metamour has built resentment toward me because of missteps our common partner in learning to be an effective hinge. It causes me stress to think that not only does my metamour not want to meet me, but seems to have an unjust negative view of me. Now, to me, that's the fault of the common partner. That is the fault of the hinge that all of this happened. I'm not exactly sure what to do about it, but I do think that some healing or some understanding needs to happen. From the hinge on both sides of the aisle here, not only with the person who is writing in the question, but potentially with this metamour as well, because some stuff clearly happened that is outside of the control of the person who is writing in the question. And that seems to be the fault of that common partner. Something that the two of you talk to me about a lot is that while sometimes it feels nice to say, oh, the metamour is the one who is in the wrong here. Actually, the person that you should be focused on is your partner and what it is that the two of you can be doing in order to make the relationship better, not anything that that other person is doing, essentially. So I think that that's something to at least look at here and to hopefully try to repair, because I think it starts with that. Core relationship and the relationship that that person has with their two partners.

Dedeker: 00:32:04

Yeah, it seems like a situation where it's very important to have an understanding of like, what can I actually do as an individual? What actually belongs to me? What belongs to this metamour and what belongs to our shared partner as far as fixing, right? So, for instance, as far as the stuff that you can do, like, I think about things like, any way that you can directly communicate, even if it is not reciprocated, it could be, if you know their birthday is coming up, right? It could be like writing a nice note and just like writing whatever's honest, right? Where it might be just like, Hey, Happy New Year. Let's start off on a new foot this year, right? Or it can be like, Happy Birthday. Like, I wish you well. I hope that you're doing well. And it doesn't even have to be that intense. Or like, you can take the approach of like, I just think what's important here is for this person to be able to do and communicate what they feel is the most important to communicate and then step back and have compassionate distance because what you don't want to have happen is over-functioning for the hinges sake, which I see happen all the time. And this is something that I tend to see happen more in women specifically of this sense of I really need to make sure that this metamour relationship is good. I really need to make sure this person likes me. Right? And so I'm going to make up for all of my hinge partners like mistakes and missteps and neglect sometimes and I'm just gonna like really overreach and like really try to make sure that this works. Like this way it's really tricky to figure out sometimes of like where you stand and what actually belongs to the hinge partner. But I think that any work you can do and maybe it could be journaling right to like really get a sense of like what do you actually wish this person knew? About you and where you stand that you think would create the greatest good. Find a way to communicate that directly without any expectation of how it's going to be received or, like, what you're going to get back, and then step back and stay in your lane. That's my take. I feel like I see faces of disagreement on Jace.

Speaker D: 00:34:08

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:34:08

Okay, give me your face. Give me your face of disagreement.

Emily: 00:34:12

I liked it, but go for it, Jace.

Jase: 00:34:14

I mean, I'm not disagreeing in general. It's more that I think where my mind goes to in terms of where to put your energy and effort first is more on your relationship with the hinge, with this common partner, because to me this feels like that's the relationship you have control over, or not control over, but that you have influence in. And that with this metamour, I feel like sometimes if we let ourselves worry too much about what we think someone might think about us, that we have no way of really knowing because we don't have any direct communication with them, it's like we could end up doing something like reaching out, which to them feels like, wow, now they're like threatening me and like moving in my turf or being weird.

Dedeker: 00:35:03

Yes, I totally get that, but Jace, the gym, the gym, Jace. What do you do about the gym?

Jase: 00:35:08

What do you do about the gym? Okay.

Speaker D: 00:35:09

Yeah. Yeah.

Jase: 00:35:10

And that's why I think that the place to start here is because Emily brought up this point that there's been some damage done by the hinge partner here in that relationship. And they've seemed to have admitted it of like, yeah, I made some missteps and that's what's caused this person to start from a place of dislike with you. And I think it's good that they have admitted that, but I think there's also something to, like, having more conversations with them about, do you see how maybe you trying to be the one in between us and, like, controlling our relationship this way is not helping, that it's actually just making this worse and kind of having, because you're both new, right? That having some of these conversations and figuring this out, I do think is important, because with the gym, I think the idea of, like, Knowing that somebody's there and seeing them and willfully ignoring them, not speaking to them, not because you two hate each other, not because you have some principled reason for it, but just because your shared partner said don't, because they don't want to meet you, like that to me feels super yucky and weird. And feels like it would just be a way to- well, so then what.

Dedeker: 00:36:19

Do you recommend then, though?

Jase: 00:36:21

Well, my hope would be to talk to your partner, to kind of be like, that's not reasonable, actually. And if this person, I meet them and They tell me to fuck off, then sure, I can respect them telling me that. I hope that they don't, and I hope that you can help us in repairing whatever missteps happened with you that like, I don't have any ill will towards this person, and I hope that they know that. I don't need to be best friends, but I would like to be able to say hi to this person and not feel like we're having to hide from each other or be hidden from each other. My hope would be you'd have that conversation. And yeah, it might not be easy. Everyone's new. It's a little harder. Everything's scarier. But that they would go, yeah, that does make sense. You're right, and that you can kind of work together on it. And then you have your second problem to deal with, which is the metamour, right? Because you don't have control over that. You don't know how they're going to react. But at least you've kind of tried to remove some of the triangulation that's happening. I just keep coming back to, like, I feel like that's the important part. Because otherwise, what do you do? You either ignore them or you do talk to them, and then your partner's pissed off that you talked to them.

Dedeker: 00:37:28

Okay, so, okay, but what you're suggesting is, like, yeah, go to your partner and explain, like, I'm not comfortable with this, I'm going to say hi to this person, right? And if they are the one who wants to tell me directly to my face, to not talk to me, I can respect that, right? But I'm not going to do this triangulation thing anymore. Your partner hopefully is like, okay, yeah, great, totally understand that. And then you go to the gym the next day and you do what? You say hi.

Emily: 00:37:51

Can I say, maybe this is silly, but I'd be interested in writing them a note and just maybe they have a locker.

Speaker D: 00:38:00

In the gym.

Dedeker: 00:38:01

Slide it into their locker.

Emily: 00:38:02

In the locker gym. So you're still not saying hi to them.

Jase: 00:38:06

Most gyms don't really work that way. That feels weird to me. I wouldn't advise that.

Dedeker: 00:38:11

I'm pro, I don't mind the note, right?

Emily: 00:38:15

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:38:15

It doesn't have to be a note.

Jase: 00:38:16

How would you deliver the note? How would you deliver the note?

Emily: 00:38:19

Carry your point. I mean, I guess you would have to go up to the person and be like, listen, I'm really sorry that things are so tense between us. This is an invitation to potentially have a talk, just you and me, so that we can get off on a better foot than we're currently on. I have no ill will towards you whatsoever. I wanted you to hear that from me. And I really would just like to get to a place where we could at least be cordial to one another, because we have somebody in our life that is shared, that we care about. And to me, I don't want to feel weird about somebody that my partner cares deeply about. And I would love if the same were extended to me. That, to me, is it. Like, thank you. Beautiful.

Jase: 00:39:06

No, that was a great speech. That was like a movie.

Dedeker: 00:39:08

Everyone in the channel was like crying. Dropping their weights.

Emily: 00:39:12

They're like, what is going on?

Jase: 00:39:13

Everyone's like, say yes.

Dedeker: 00:39:15

Say yes.

Emily: 00:39:18

No, but truly, I mean, some of the best times in non-monogamy that I've had have been in community with multiple partners together at a party or at a gathering. And you just can look around and be like, this is a group of people that I care about, and nobody's weird. Everybody's just being chill.

Jase: 00:39:37

Or everybody's weird.

Emily: 00:39:39

Well, or everybody's weird. But I mean, nobody is acting like they don't like each other. Everybody is acting as though this is a great time and we all care about each other. And that is like, the highest pinnacle of what non-monogamy is to me. And to not be able to go through that because of some miscommunication, and maybe you'll never get there, but if you can get towards that place in some way, that would be really nice.

Dedeker: 00:40:06

I think the important piece, though, is that if it's not like a triumphant romantic ending of a movie, and like your metamour spits in your face and is like, I can't, how dare you speak to me, I'm not interested in trying. Right, at least. Exactly. It's like you have to know, like, I stood my ground, I said my piece, and then don't overfunction and then keep trying to poke at it, right? Then it's in God's hands. Actually, it's not in God's hands.

Emily: 00:40:31

It's like in your hinge's hands, kind of. But that's telling, I think, about their decisions as well, about who they're choosing to align with. And, you know, I think we did an episode recently on agreements with self, I think often you have to figure out, does my version of non-monogamy look like my partner's version of non-monogamy and is my partner okay with, you know, there being bad blood between metamours? There being the potential that, oh, this person just doesn't ever want to talk to me. And I, and I understand that, you know, that gets a little messy and that you don't want to say, like, oh, I don't want to date this person because their metamour never wants to meet me, but. I don't know. I think you have to look at a global perspective of what is it that I want to have in my life and what is it that I don't. And if this is a constant burden, then maybe there's a misalignment there about the type of relationships the two of you want to be in.

Speaker D: 00:41:26

Sure.

Jase: 00:41:27

And I think that goes along with why, in my mind, it keeps coming back to your relationship with this partner. That's the thing that I think needs to get fixed here. That's the part that in all of this feels yucky is that, and I'm not blaming anyone for this, I don't mean to say like your partner sounds yucky, I just mean the situation that's happened here, this idea that they're triangulating so much to this degree of forbidding contact between you, even if they say that's coming from the other person, that's where it gets into the territory that feels weird, which is why my mind goes to rather than focusing on I need to make communication with this metamour, focus on the relationship that I do have and let's have that conversation to kind of get some clarity about this and that this is stepping into a territory of them controlling your relationship with this person that just doesn't line up with our values and healthy relationships and things like that. Like, you wouldn't put restrictions on who they can date, so they shouldn't put restrictions on who you can talk to. That's just weird, right? That just feels wrong. And so I think that's why I keep coming back to focusing on that relationship first. But if we go back to the question they asked at the end here is, My question to you all is, can anything be done on my end to maintain a healthy relationship without meeting my metamour? And they mentioned asking the common partner to share things that she values about the metamour so that I don't build resentment back toward them. I mean, like, wow, kudos to you. I think that's, you're really doing a lot of work on your side. And I think that's great that you're conscious of that. What do you two think? Like, is there more that this person could or should be doing to maintain this healthy relationship without getting to meet the person? Or is it kind of like the work should really be on either if I truly can't meet this person, they don't want to speak to me, and now I know that for sure of that kind of like, I've just got to find a way to be okay with that and know that it's their loss and that's not something that I've done wrong or some failure on my part. Is there something else there? Because I I'm not coming up with anything. I feel like it's more like, don't let this person bother you. Like, find ways to be comfortable and like, yeah, this sucks. They're hopefully it's just because they're new to this and they don't understand how this could go. We've all been there, but you got to let it go. You can't keep chasing this thing or letting it haunt you or talk to your shared partner and be like, no, let's solve this. I will say one thing, and that is when I had a very trying metamour relationship with Brad, who we talked about earlier in the episode. Oh, Brad. That I would sometimes do meta meditation, like love and kindness meditations, where usually you'd start on someone who's easy to love, which for me was my puppy at the time, Freddie. You know, you start on something that's very easy, and then you kind of gradually start thinking about people a little bit further and further removed from you. And then, you know, kind of offering that same love and openness to them. And then I would work my way up to finding what version of that I could find to offer to this metamour who was being really like actively aggressively mean in my relationship. So it was, you know, kind of an extreme case, but I did find that was helpful to feel like I'm kind of doing my part to keep my side of the street clean as much as I can. But I would just encourage you not to take responsibility for trying to single-handedly, one-sidedly maintain a relationship that you don't actually have.

Dedeker: 00:44:59

I think that's a good note to end on. And Metamour, Meaning Well in Minneapolis, do some extra reps for us in the gym.

Jase: 00:45:07

Oh, at the gym. Yeah, just work it out.

Dedeker: 00:45:09

It does help.

Jase: 00:45:10

I did a lot of that at that time, too.

Emily: 00:45:12

I really worked out a lot. I'm in great shape. Actually, yeah. I felt like all of us, I was doing yoga like five days a week, and that was therapeutic. That was just the therapeutic element.

Jase: 00:45:22

Yeah.

Dedeker: 00:45:23

So it was, it was a lot of fun.

Emily: 00:45:22

It was a time to be alive.

Dedeker: 00:45:24

All right, everybody, our question that's going to be on our Instagram stories this week, what's your first move when making a connection with a meta? Do you put a note in their.

Jase: 00:45:32

Locker at the gym? Do they have a locker at the gym? Maybe write them a poem, sing them a song? I like that. Flowers.

Dedeker: 00:45:41

Please don't do that.

Emily: 00:45:42

That would be really weird to start that relationship. That's going to be on our Instagram.

Jase: 00:45:47

Stories where you can share publicly, but.

Dedeker: 00:45:49

This question is also going to be posted on Discord, Facebook, Instagram, @multiamory_podcast, Rachel Schenewerk, Carson Collins, Josh, Anand, Fractal Cave EP. Is posted in our episode discussion channel, where you can share with others in our private Discord server. Or you can also post in our private Facebook group. You can get access to these groups and join our exclusive community by going to multiamory.com/join. Or you can share with us publicly on Instagram @multiamorypodcast. Multiamory is created and produced by Jase Lindgren, Emily Matlack, and me, Dedeker Winston. Our production assistants are Rachel Schenewerk 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.