"Three Dads and a Baby" book makes a splash, and three other gay male triads in the news

From left: Ian, Alan, and Jeremy with baby Piper 

The book Three Dads and a Baby is just out, and it's drawing heaps of mainstream media attention to good poly parenting. The book is the story of a triad of three medical professionals who won the right in California to be listed on their kids' birth certificates as their three equal, legal parents. Their case is apparently a first. It sets a powerful state precedent that other polyfamilies in California can cite, and it sets a social precedent that looks to be influential elsewhere.

Let CNN take it away: Three dads, a baby and the legal battle to get their names added to a birth certificate (March 6):

By Faith Karimi, CNN

Meet Ian Jenkins and his partners, Alan and Jeremy.

They're a "throuple": a committed polyamorous relationship involving three people.

And after a complicated and expensive court battle to all become legal parents, the trio are raising two toddlers in Southern California -- and proving how families come in all forms.

They're part of a unique and very modern family that includes three dads, two surrogates and one egg donor. In a new book, "Three Dads and a Baby," Jenkins chronicles their search for potential egg donors and a surrogate, and a fight to change a medical and legal system geared toward heterosexual couples.

The three men have all been together for more than eight years. Jenkins says they fought to get all three of their names listed on the birth certificates to protect their parental rights and the rights of their children. The process was emotionally grueling.

"But we are hopeful that other people benefit from the experience we had," he told CNN in a recent interview, "and that it's easier, less expensive and less stressful for them."

Two men and no baby

As a gay teenager in Virginia, Jenkins says he faced death threats after coming out and couldn't imagine he'd ever be able to openly love another man. ...

He met Alan while they were doing their medical residencies in Boston.

"He was smarter than the other students. It was obvious, even though he wasn't straining to show off his medical knowledge, like half of them were," Jenkins says.

He was drawn to Alan's calm demeanor, witty comebacks and compassion for his patients. In the book, Jenkins recalls being touched by Alan's tender care of a frail old woman who had been hospitalized. He nicknamed her "my Golden Girl."

Their first date was in 2003. Jenkins went to Alan's place with a baking stone, homemade pizza dough and wine, and made him dinner. The couple ... ended up in San Diego, where Jenkins is an associate professor of medicine at UC San Diego and Alan works at a hospital as a psychiatrist.

Three men and a baby

After almost a decade together, Jenkins introduced to Alan the idea of bringing a third man into their partnership. They met Jeremy online, and he joined them in 2012.

Jeremy works in animal medicine at the San Diego Zoo, where his patients range from apes to California condors. To protect their privacy, Alan and Jeremy prefer not to use their last names.

..."With a third voice at the table, our conversations about parenting began to change. We just didn't have the ovaries."

With egg donor Meghan

They shared their predicament with one of Alan's childhood friends, a woman named Meghan who offered to be an egg donor. ... Another female friend agreed to be a surrogate, and they were ready to be dads. But the road to fatherhood involved more lawyers, paperwork and money than they'd ever imagined. ...

---------------------------

At the hearing, the three men asked to be allowed to speak. Fighting back emotion, they explained why it was important for all three to be named as parents. They talked about automatic inheritance, ability to make decisions on medical consents, visitation rights should they split up.

Their pleas worked.

"We could just see in her (the judge's) face that something had changed, that she wouldn't feel comfortable denying one of us parenthood," Jenkins says. "And we could tell right then that she was going to find some way to make it work out for us." ...

---------------------------

The trio are settling into their roles as parents. They now have a second child, a boy named Parker, who was born in 2019 -- the product of the same egg donor but a different surrogate. Parker's birth meant another set of legal contracts among the people involved. But with Parker, there was no legal battle to get the dads' names added to the birth certificate. The court took care of it without having them come in.

...Jenkins says they're forever indebted to the egg donor and the two surrogate mothers for their gift of two biological half siblings.

...Meghan lives in Tennessee and sees the children at least once a year. They call her "Mama Meghan."

The children have different names for their fathers: Jenkins is Papa, Alan is Dada and Jeremy is Daddy.

As Jenkins notes in his book, Piper seems proud of her unique family.

She once told a preschool classmate: "You have two parents. I have three parents."

The dads and their children share a bustling house with two Goldendoodles named Otis and Hazel. They benefit from three incomes and more people to share parenting responsibilities. But in other ways their family is just like any other, Jenkins says. He compares it to his growing up as a child of divorcees with three parents in the picture.

"Day to day in our home, everything is very ordinary," he says. "There's just people making dinner, going out to the hot tub with the kids, reading books, playing with toys. It's just these three parents instead of two or one. "

While Jenkins is worried that their children may be treated differently because of their unique relationship, he says they haven't had any issues so far.

"We've had zero negative feedback from coworkers and friends. Everyone seems to just be delighted about the arrangement and that's because they know us," Jenkins says. ...

If he were to send a message to his teenage self, Jenkins says, he'd tell himself that life gets better. 

● In their hometown San Diego Union-Tribune: San Diego ‘throuple’ share their story of three dads and two babies (March 7).  

By Pam Kragen

...As for how the relationship works, Jenkins writes that the throuple keys to harmony are honesty, constant communication and a complete lack of jealousy. Arguments are rare, but any vote of two against one is always final. The book itself was a three-way negotiation about what could be shared and what was kept private. The partners agreed that what happens in the bedroom is off-limits, but Jenkins wrote humorously that he, Alan and Jeremy almost never sleep in the same bed because it would be too crowded and hot with three men and two large goldendoodles fighting for a sliver of mattress.

“Any relationship I was fated to have would be nontraditional,” Jenkins writes in the book on the merits of monogamy versus polyamory. “I picked a lifetime of nontraditional relationships before I picked a college. From one boyfriend to two, it’s just a question of human nature. ... Most of us expect to have a number of relationships over our lives. ... Why give up everything wonderful about one relationship to experience the joys of another?”

...The benefit of three dads, Jenkins said, is that the children never lack for undivided attention and no parent is locked into performing the same tasks night after night. All three men share evenly in household chores, cooking and children’s bath and bed times. But each dad also has their own specialty. Jenkins’ personal favorite activity these days is teaching Piper to read.

Jeremy teaches reading to Piper, now 3.

...Jenkins said their legal case is now a topic of discussion at judges' conferences. Sharing the story of their precedent-setting legal victory with other nontraditional families was one of the main reasons he wanted to write the book. While their case can help other families in California, it can’t be used in other states, so more trailblazers will be needed nationwide.

...In recent weeks, Jenkins has been doing press interviews for the book. Feedback from the stories and podcasts has been “95 percent strongly positive and enthusiastic,” he said, although he’s received some criticism from an unexpected place. Some members of the LGBTQ community worry that Jenkins’ book will draw negative attention to gay parents who don’t want attention drawn to their families’ lives. ...

Ian is hosting an online Zoom about their family and the book Saturday evening March 13.

He has a blog on the Psychology Today site.

Heaps of other stories about them in the media. For instance,

● Yahoo News: The rise of polyamorous parenting: ‘From the beginning, we just loved each other’ (March 12). It's a brief slide show with this provocative description: "Throuples are not only becoming parents together, but they are proudly sharing their lives with the world. It's due in part, of course, to social media, but also to what appears to be a cultural shift." 

● People magazine: Calif. Throuple Raising 2 Kids Say Their Unique Road to Parenthood Is 'Like Winning the Lottery'  (March 16).

●  She Knows and Yahoo Life: Welcoming Children Into My Polyamorous Family Was a Huge Decision, But It Brought Us a World of Love (March 1).

●  Jenkins on one of many podcasts/vodcasts:

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And while we're on the subject of gay trads recently in the media...

●  Newsweek ran a first-person story by another doctor in a trio: 'I'm in a Throuple, We're All Very Much in Love' (Feb. 20)

Left to right: Carlos, Edward and Hernán

By Edward Ribbons (as told to Jenny Haward)

...I met Carlos and Hernán around that time, but I had no intention of a relationship. I just saw these two gorgeous South American men and definitely wanted to have fun with them. ... Hernan actually designs headpieces, like tiaras, and I remember he showed them to me that night and I waltzed around their apartment wearing them for a while; the three of us just really hit it off. We had a lot of fun chats, there were some more serious conversations that happened quite quickly. 

...We'd been together around nine months when my parents and my brother came to Sydney to visit. I hadn't told my mom that I was seeing anybody, so I called and explained that I was actually seeing two guys and asked her to tell my dad. My parents are very open-minded, kind people but they had not met people in polyamorous relationships before. When they visited I could tell my mom was still a bit uncertain, but she and my dad really loved the boys; they get on so well. And my brother will FaceTime Carlos and Hernán as much as calls me. It's really nice. I knew I had strong feelings for them already, but around the time my family met them, I began to think that the relationship was something that had longevity and could be more serious.

The boys have been together for 12 years and I have been with them for about three years now and we describe ourselves as a throuple. I have a very different relationship with each of them; but neither is better or closer, they are just different. I would say Carlos and I have a calmer relationship. He's an engineer and he thinks very logically. Hernán's artistic. But it changes all the time. It doesn't feel unnatural to spend time with just one or the other, we don't do everything all together. I am a obstetrician and gynaecologist and can work unusual hours, so it's nice that the boys have each other to spend time with. There is a lot of depth and closeness to what we have. ...

...There are upsides and downsides to being part of a throuple. What has surprised me is that it can sometimes be difficult to make plans that make everybody happy. I'm definitely a social butterfly naturally, but if you asked Hernán what his dream was for our relationship, it would be for the three of us to spend a lot more time at home, watching Netflix and relaxing. I think we're all still working that out about each other. Also, with three of us, each person is only ever a third of the relationship, so you can't be selfish. There are two people there who will call you out if you're being unreasonable, which happens. It can be emotionally complicated sometimes but we love one another and I wouldn't say we argue much. 

Edward Ribbons is an obstetrician and gynaecologist currently based in London. His boyfriends Carlos Briñez and José Hernán Ávila live in Sydney, Australia. You can follow them on Instagram @eddyribbo @avilaco1 and @carlos_1mba.

●  Next: a long story about a very out gay Black triad in Atlanta, in The Reckoning ("thought-provoking, unique stories about Atlanta's Black LGBTQ+ community"):  Meet The Browns: Gay Polyamorous Triad Spills The Tea On How Two Became Three  (Feb. 23). It begins,

Que, Tye, and Martel

By Darian Aaron

Three is not a crowd for Que Brown, 28, Tye Brown, 26, and Martel Star, 27. The Tallahassee, FL and Mansfield, OH transplants are one of many Black gay polyamorous triads or “throuples” in Atlanta who are finding and creating healthy romantic partnerships outside of the traditional two-person monogamous relationship model. However, there is one distinction between their triad and others— these men are living and loving out loud, online and off, and are rejecting the stigma associated with polyamory that often pushes those within this relationship structure to the margins of society.

For Star, an entertainer and avid social media user, it was only natural that he’d be open about their relationship on Instagram since social media played such a pivotal role in connecting him to Que and Tye, who had already settled into their seven-year relationship as a couple after initially meeting in a Tallahassee nightclub. The pair were married in 2017. The Browns tell The Reckoning the discussion about adding a third partner happened early in their marriage. 

“About two years in it was something that both of us had a conversation about, and we were both really open to the whole idea, and it was something that we talked about for a while before we ever acted on it,” said Tye Brown. ...

--------------------------------

...“People are fascinated because there’s an additional person,” said Star. “Communication is still important. Being mindful of the needs of your partners is still important. Being mindful of how we deal with our friends and finances, and how we move throughout the day, all of those things are the same as you would find with a monogamous couple,” he said. 

● An older gay triad in Out Smart, "Houston's LGBTQ magazine": Three Hearts (online Feb. 1 and in Febroary 2021 print issue)

From left: John, Geno, and Brandon

By Ryan Leach

John Papagiannopoulos, 52, Brandon Bartee, 42, and Geno O’Quinn, 49, have identical tattoos on the inside of their left wrists. It is an image of three hearts, interconnected, each a different color—orange, green, and blue—to represent themselves, their relationship, and the life and love they share together.

...Bartee still recalls the moment when things took a more serious turn. “I had a 450-square-foot apartment that Geno would stay at, even though he had a townhouse. When John separated [with his ex], he asked if he could stay there more. One night, we were all watching a TV show on the sofa, all cuddled up, and I said, ‘This feels like home.’ That was six years ago on February 21.”

“We were already in love with each other,” O’Quinn adds, “but I think when John’s relationship ended and Brandon was no longer with his ex, it kind of connected one day for all of us. We knew [our relationship] felt comfortable—that it was home.”

...While the throuple cannot legally marry, the men wear wedding rings and refer to themselves as husbands—in the same way that committed male couples used the term in the days before same-sex marriage was legal. Through a combination of marriage and adoption, the three hope to one day become a “legal” family.

“Our relationship is poly-faithful,” explains Bartee, “but the trouble we get into we do together, and we have rules: don’t lie, don’t cheat, be honest. And if you do something you’re not supposed to, be up front and ask forgiveness.”

...“We all have our alone time, and we all have together time. You can’t get jealous because the other two are cuddled up and you’re not involved. You have to step back and appreciate the bond that they have, because the bond they have is the bond you have with each of them,” says Bartee.

Like the three different heart colors in their tattoos, these men have personalities that are quite distinct. Fortunately, their unique characteristics complement each other. “John and I have the whole nerd factor in common, whereas Brandon and I have the spontaneity and craziness,” O’Quinn explains. “Brandon also helps bring that out of me and John.”

The three men allow each other to be entirely themselves, and it shows through. ...

“If there have been any objections, they haven’t let us know,” O’Quinn adds. “After I brought John and Brandon over to meet my mother, I told her that I wanted her to know that I am dating both of them. She said, ‘I have Facebook. I’m not stupid.’ That was it!”

Bartee’s experience with his mother was especially affirming. “When my dad passed away, my mom called and said, ‘I have a question. How do you spell John and Geno’s last names, so I can put them in your father’s obituary? It’s the first time I have seen you happy and in a relationship that I know will last,’” he recalls.

But no matter how other people view the poly-faithful trio’s relationship, these men know that the thing that centers them is love. O’Quinn puts it best: “I love them both equally, but in different ways and for different aspects.”

-------------------------------------------------------

●  P.S.: In other triad babies in the news, you may remember California's ChaCha, Jimmy, and Summer from their past publicity episodes. The women wanted to get pregnant at the same time — but now it turns out that nature has blessed ChaCha first. Polyamorous throuple's baby news after husband plans to get both wives pregnant, in the UK's tabloid Star (March 8) and elsewhere. 

From left: Summer, Jimmy, ChaCha

Jimmy Silva, 33, ChaCha VaVoom, 31, and Summer Pelltier, 27, are expecting a little boy.

On Instagram this weekend, the trio were excited to announce that ChaCha has fallen pregnant.

They wrote: “SURPRISE!!!! We’ve had a long journey in the last 8-9 years and now our journey is going to include another person.”

The throuple, who got “married” last February, plan to raise the baby together.

...After getting hitched and jetting off to honeymoon in Thailand, their 35,400 Instagram followers were waiting to see where the relationship would go next.

So when the throuple announced ChaCha’s pregnancy, they garnered more than 8,300 likes. ...

   
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Friday Polynews Roundup — creative quarantines, 'The Bachelor' that yet could be, and more

It's Friday Polynews Roundup time — for April 3, 2020.

So this morning I was up at 5:45 for the new super-early grocery shopping hours. I was hunting and gathering for two households and hadn't been downtown for two weeks. The main street was empty when it used to be clogged with dawn commuters. The only action was the yellow road signs, which were flashing infection-control advice. The only cluster of cars was at the grocery store. I went in breathing through my old sawdust mask and wearing cotton gloves. The mask fogged my glasses. A glove fell off while I was disinfecting the shopping cart. Most everybody else was breathing through a mask, scarf, or terrorist-looking balaclava.

On the way home the radio chattered about mass unemployment, mile-long lines of cars at food banks that were bogged down filling out federal poor-harassment paperwork, and talk of whether US deaths would number 100,000, 240,000, or none of the above. A UN guy was calling this the world's greatest crisis since World War II and predicting 20 million starvation deaths worldwide. Cut to reports of hunch-playing incompetence by an angry toddler at the top of the world's top country. And we're only in the beginning.

That's when it struck me that yes, the old normal really is gone forever. When we get to a new normal, maybe later this year, maybe in 2021, it will be a different normal, a more serious normal, for better or for worse. We could try to shape it.

------------------

The polyamory in the news this week was about coping.

● Tikva Wolf reissued a Kimchi Cuddles that says it all for so many:

Kimchi Cuddles, used by permission.

● In The Guardian newspaper online, US edition, the top "Spotlight" headline Wednesday morning was Polyamory in a pandemic: Who do you quarantine with when you're not monogamous? (April 1). Excerpts:

Coronavirus is forcing people in poly relationships to make tough choices about who to be intimate with.

"Those in the poly community have had to make difficult decisions surrounding sexual monogamy and cohabitation." (Barcroft Media/Getty)

By Kari Paul

Earlier this month, after being exposed to the coronavirus, Chaele Davis had to decide if she would spend her quarantine with her primary partner, whom she has been dating for a year, or her secondary partner, with whom she just celebrated a four year anniversary.

Davis, a polyamorous woman living in Brooklyn, had arranged her life not having to make choices like these. “But when you love two people, in a time like this, you just have to make the call,” she said.

[Can I have sex? A guide to intimacy during the coronavirus outbreak]

...For people who consider themselves part of the poly community, that has meant making difficult decisions surrounding sexual monogamy and cohabitation, said Daniel Saynt, founder and head of New York City sex club New Society for Wellness (NSFW).

“It’s a terrifying time for non-monogamy,” Saynt said. “There has been a stronger consideration recently for coupling off. It’s kind of like cuffing season, but for corona season.”

Natalie Behring/The Guardian
 

...Cat, a polyamorous woman living in New York City... has spent the last 14 days in self-imposed quarantine with her roommate, who had been exposed to the virus. After she leaves the quarantine, she’ll have to decide which of her two partners to see – and if it is ethical to do so. Ultimately, she said, she is leaning towards quarantining alone to avoid hurting either.

“Coronavirus is making everyone polyamorous, in a sense,” she said. “We all have to navigate disclosure, safety, and health in similar ways.”

...A lot of non-monogamous couples are seeking to interact in a virtual way, and a rise in online events is making it more accessible.

NSFW has started to coordinate online parties for couples to engage in non-monogamy from a safe distance. Its first online “playdate” attracted nearly 100 people who met one another through group video chats and could pair off for private sessions. Like NSFW’s in-person parties, the event had a dress code and a set of rules stressing consent and privacy.

...New York City artist Olivia Jane... said they are considering moving in together to create a quad relationship as they struggle to pay rent during the pandemic....

● In Vice, How People in Polyamorous Relationships Are Navigating Lockdown (April 1)

By Daisy Jones

Bob Foster

...Who do you self-isolate with, for instance, if your poly relationship is non-hierarchical? How do you make time for multiple partners when only one of them is able to be physically present?...

With that in mind, we spoke to a bunch of people in polyamorous relationships about how they're navigating this lockdown scenario....

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..."It's kind of fucked up, really. They view me as putting more effort into the new relationship as my communication has been kind of less, but it just feels overwhelming to talk online a lot at the minute."...  — Ame, 27

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"It's actually been okay! I live with my primary partner, while my other partner also lives with their primary partner. My partner also started seeing someone a month or so before lockdown, so they're in contact too. We sustain our other relationships by making sure that we have regular phone conversations and keeping up that vital communication and intimacy. Just like pre-lockdown, it's about making sure that each person feels valued.

"I do miss being physical with my other boyfriend, but it's more important that each of us stay safe, so that's going to have to wait. We regularly remind each other that this isn't going to last forever and for now we are just valuing all this extra time we have with the partners we live with. ...We're all pretty relaxed and used to being communicative if or when any issues arise."  — Rory, 26

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"Me, my partner and his other partner have been living together for the past two years. We are quite lucky and have found a good compromise – I have a bedroom, my partner's partner has another bedroom, and our common partner can spend time with both of us separately. It's also nice to spend time with the three of us together over dinner or watching movies. It gives us 'family time,' which is healthy in a moment like this.

"We've been navigating it quite well over the past three weeks, but I feel like this week it will be a bit harder. The blues are starting to hit somehow." ...  — Riccardo, 28.

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"My girlfriend is isolating with her girlfriend, who is also my best friend. My boyfriend is isolating at his house with no partners. I'm actually breaking up with him soon, so that's going to be weird.

"I also find FaceTime really annoying because sometimes I just want to cuddle and not say anything."...  — Cai, 28

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"...I'm not going to lie, it's been really nice having so much more time with her. ... Obviously things will change in the future, but for now I feel like the cat who's got the cream."  — Alex, 28 ...

● An editor of the alt-weekly Dallas Observer reports that the region's poly and swinger communities are displaying notably good standards for infection control: Swingers Are Setting an Example in Social Distancing (March 31)

By Eva Raggio

...A young women named Sophia... says she’s not surprised that swingers and polyamorous people are taking extra precautions, as it’s second-nature to a group used to proceeding with safety.

“Most poly people I know have locked down more than anyone else, because we understand how many people's health are influenced by our behavior,” Sophia says. “If we wouldn't risk passing an STI to partners, giving them a potentially deadly virus that a condom can't protect against should be out of the question.”

...If polyamorous folks can cancel their really, really exciting plans in the name of social distancing, then surely you can cancel your lame barbecue, Karen.

● The "Life on the Swingset" podcast, episode 375, is Connection and Love During Unprecedented Times (March 31)

Ginger Bentham and Dylan Thomas get together with Swingset patrons to connect about connection, both with the people around us and in our communities. In uncertain times, we're making changes to keep ourselves and others safe from COVID-19 while still finding ways to be human to each other… and kind to ourselves.

● Dan Savage, in his "Savage Love" column in many alternative papers this week, replies to a reader asking about how best to open their marriage: Open and Shut (week of March 31)

I shared your letter with Tristan Taormino, author of Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships.... But before we dive into the specifics of your situation, MND, there's something Taormino and I want to make clear to all.

"In this time of a global pandemic, thinking and talking about non-monogamy is all you can do right now," Taormino says. "This goes for everyone: No new sex partners until public health experts say we can go back to standing closer than six feet apart. Even then, we're going to have to proceed with caution."

Listen up, people: The woman who literally wrote the book on open relationships says open and poly relationships are canceled for the time being. "Yup, canceled," Taormino says, "unless every one of your partners lives with you."

...The good news is that sexting and dirty video chats are both allowed and encouraged, kids, so we can get off online with new people as well as established partners who live on the other side of town or the other side of the world. Hell, get the whole polycule together on Zoom....

● Meanwhile in Philadelphia magazine, a glossy city monthly that clearly acquires its articles well before publication, We’ve Been Married 10 Months, and We Haven’t Stopped Seeing Other People. They're a gay couple who were together 10 years before they married. (Online March 28; in the April 2020 print issue.)

Michael: I can’t imagine a couple that has more open communication around sex and boundaries and desire. Essentially, you’ve taken the biggest, scariest thing that could ruin a marriage and you’ve made it a given, so that fear is gone. For us, “Can I go and have sex with a stranger?” is a much less loaded topic than, like, “Are you sure you want to eat that burrito without a plate?” ...

I was talking to a straight friend, and she said, “Oh my God, that’s so sad that the two of you aren’t each other’s everything.” And I was like, no, it’s the fundamental understanding that we’re not each other’s everything. It’s loving the other one enough to hopefully [let them] try to find more of their everything.

Tyler: I wouldn’t want Michael to feel like he needs to be everything for me, and vice versa. That feels really limiting and hard. I think this allows for the opportunity to be like, “Oh, you’re not getting something from me? That’s okay. You can get something from somebody else.” It sort of relaxes the pressure.

Published as a part of a “Marriage Stories” feature in the April 2020 issue.

● More gay guys, in The Guardian's online "How We Met" series: 'I think gay men are often able to negotiate an open marriage' (March 30)

‘The relationship works because everyone still wants to be in it …’ Charles, Hugh and Dan.

 
Dan remembers one evening, sitting on the sofa and talking to his husband, Hugh, about Charles. “It was the most amazing experience because we were really falling in love with this person,” he says. “And we could talk about it with each other, like: ‘Isn’t it amazing about him that he does this thing?’ I remember taking a deep breath and saying: ‘This is becoming something; this is something real.’”

...[Dan and Hugh] legalised their marriage in 2018, and this time Charles attended.

...“Before the three of us got together romantically and sexually, I remember feeling the happiest I’d ever felt with Dan,” says Hugh. “And then when we met Charlie. It was like this extension of a really positive energy. Charlie just slotted into that, seamlessly, without any of us trying to make it happen.”

...Was it strange to join an existing relationship? “In many ways, it felt completely normal and natural,” says Charles, “but there were these habits and rituals that these two people had built up over the years – things such as where you go in the morning to get your coffee and all that. I guess the challenge for me was knowing when to roll with it, and when I needed to make sure that I established my own routines and rituals – and my own stake in the relationship.”

How did Hugh and Dan navigate bringing someone else into their marriage? “I guess like we’ve navigated every other part of our relationship,” says Hugh. “By being honest about what we’re feeling, and talking to each other. And not having any expectation of how we were meant to behave and feel. Allowing each other to feel different emotions, whether it’s jealousy, resentment, anger, happiness, joy, connectedness.”

Dan says: “I always try to impress upon people just how easy and natural it was at the beginning, as any burst of love is when you first get together with somebody.”

It was “more strange”, says Charles, “for the people around us than it was for us.... Most of the people we spoke to, the first thing they would say would be: ‘Oh, I could never do that myself.’ It’s unfathomable to so many people.”

During the lockdown, Hugh and Dan are not seeing Charles in person but doing a lot of video calling. “We talked about being together for a lockdown, but we don’t have enough space,” says Dan. “That aside, we don’t think this is a good time or reason for us to begin living together.”

● Lastly, on another topic — a writer for The Mary Sue ("the geek girl’s guide to the universe") writes, If Only The Bachelor Would Embrace Polyamory Instead of Rejecting It (March 31):

By Rotem Rusak

“I think I’m falling in love with more than one person.” It’s a familiar refrain, heard on nearly every season of ABC’s The Bachelor franchise. Though the long-running show purports ideals of traditional monogamy — setting up a narrative where, in the end, there can only be one, and a lack of a fairy-tale proposal equates to failure — it engineers a situation wherein the complete opposite version of a relationship is not only encouraged, but successfully illustrated to millions of viewers and to the contestants themselves, and yet is rarely acknowledged. While The Bachelor is built on, and perpetuates, the notion of monogamy as the prize, it actively displays how, sometimes, polyamory is actually the answer.

To be clear, The Bachelor never gets closer than light-years away from representing healthy polyamorous relationships, which are built on enthusiastic consent for multiple romances and a great deal of communication between individuals. However, the show reveals what some people already know: that it is possible to be “falling in love with more than one person at the same time.”

Most recently, on Peter Weber’s season of the show, the 28-year-old pilot was left clearly torn between two women, noting to his soon-to-be-ex-fiancée during the finale of the show, “I’ve fallen in love with you, and I love you … [but] I never intended to give my heart to two people.” ...Neither relationship survived. ...

What fails, again and again, to be laid on the table — by critics, the host, and the contestants themselves — is the notion that, despite having only one final rose, the Bachelor or Bachelorette has two, if not three, very real relationships that don’t just disappear at the transfer (or lack thereof) of a flower. ... Is it any wonder the final relationships [so often] fall apart?

...For weeks the contestants are encouraged to pour their hearts, secrets, and vulnerabilities out to the central Bachelor or Bachelorette. The relationships formed are intrinsically tied to one another. ... What becomes clear again and again, is that when given the chance to participate in multiple relationships, people will find different parts of themselves, different understandings, and different loves in different people. And when that occurs, the transition to monogamy is actually highly unnatural. ...

Perhaps if, instead of burying the potential outcomes it stirs up in service of a specific societal expectation, the show actually... helped assist those involved in whatever relationship structure they choose to pursue, the contestants would no longer have to feel such a gaping lack in their final relationships, and The Bachelor could have a final product that reflected a longer-lasting, more modern, and truly, more human experience.

That's Friday Polynews Roundup for now. See you next Friday, unless something big comes up sooner.

SIDE NOTE:  In our neck of the woods, as the neighborhood and town social-media groups fill with coronavirus discussion, we see that local crazies are revealing themselves. Advice: Take screenshots and file them away. These people, a month from now or in a year or three, will be furiously denying that they ever said such things and working to erase their record. Some of them might someday run for office.

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One-hour BBC documentary: "Love Unlimited: Polyamory in Scotland"

Today [Wednesday February 7, 2018] a one-hour documentary titled "Love Unlimited: Polyamory in Scotland will air on BBC Two Scotland at 9 p.m. GMT.

The trailer looks good (click the link; I can't get it to embed here. All video clips.)

So does the blurb on the show's website:

A growing number of people are finding that traditional relationships don't work for them. So instead of just one, they have multiple romantic relationships. It's known as polyamory. Polyamory requires the full consent of everyone involved, but even then things can get complicated. Existing partners can easily feel left out, jealous or hurt. So open and honest communication is essential for polyamory to work — plus some careful timetabling.

From left: Oliver, Noni and Morgan

Love Unlimited features polyamorous relationships of many kinds. Noni is a young woman with two boyfriends, Kima and Toms are a bisexual couple in an open relationship, and Ross, Iain and Pav are a trio of gay men in a three-way polyamorous partnership. Jayne and Dom are very much in love but feel it's important to keep their relationship open to the possibility of additional partners. What they all have in common is that they have rejected monogamy in favour of a more open and fluid approach to relationships.

There is much negativity and confusion surrounding polyamory. It can be especially hard to understand for family and friends. There's also the emotional strain of dividing time and affection between partners and the stress and anxiety of opening up an existing relationship to new potential partners. Poly people insist that it's about multiple meaningful relationships and not an excuse to sleep with lots of different people — although that can happen too.

Despite the challenges, new research shows that overall satisfaction can actually be higher in polyamorous relationships. So how do you go about loving more than one person? And what can polyamory teach us all about happy healthy relationships?

The live program is viewable only in Scotland. It will be available online throughout the UK here (and worldwide if you can spoof an IP address), but only for 30 days.


● Yesterday the BBC published an article about three people in the show who are in an MFM vee: ''I'm polyamorous, why should I limit my love?' (February 6, 2018):

By Steven Brocklehurst, BBC Scotland News

Noni is polyamorous — she has two boyfriends and is committed to them both equally.

The 23-year-old, who lives in North Berwick, says she felt trapped and claustrophobic in monogamous relationships, no matter how much in love she was.

She tells the BBC Scotland documentary Love Unlimited: "There is nothing wrong with one partner.

"I just don't see why I should artificially limit the amount of love that I put out into the world."

Polyamory is having more than one romantic relationship at a time.

Noni says it could include non-monogamous practices such as swinging but for her there is an "ethical" dimension that means the relationships themselves are important.

Noni is in relationships with Morgan, a 27-year-old administrator, and Oliver, a 24-year-old drama graduate.

...Morgan had been with girlfriend Hannie for four years when he met Noni — and they are still together.

"Hannie introduced me to the idea of polyamory," says Morgan.

"When I mention that to some people they are quite surprised because they think open relationships, polyamory, that's clearly the man's idea because it's lots of sex, right?

"Lots of communication, a little more sex," he says.

...According to Morgan, Hannie, who is not currently seeing anyone else, is "happy for him" to have a relationship with Noni. He says: "She is very encouraging, she is very supportive. There is a lot of mutual joy in all of it."

...Oliver has been seeing Noni for about 18 months. [He] says Noni was clear from the start of their relationship that she was polyamorous. "That was who Noni was and it's fine," he says.

...[Noni] says there is no favouritism and the relationship she has with each is vastly different.

"I could not tell you what I liked more between chocolate and theatre," she says. "That's the way I see it. No matter how much I love one, that's not going to mean the other will fade away."

...Another "ethical" aspect of polyamory that is important to Noni is to protect each other from sexually transmitted diseases.

She says: "Using condoms and letting your partners know who you are or are not using condoms with is a necessity to practising polyamory in a way that is safe and ethical because obviously if I mess up and catch something then that risks my partner's health and that risks my meta's health and so on."

Although she is only 23, Noni insists that polyamory is a lifestyle choice she intends to continue and does not think it is incompatible with raising a family.

She says: "I know people who are polyamorous and have children.

"It is really outdated to think a child needs [exactly] one mother and one father.

..."I would not say we are blazing a trail, but we are definitely creating an environment that allows for a healthy community."

● Meanwhile, British tabloids have been exciting all over themselves about the show's gay male triad. The Daily Mail's version, with many pictures: 'I love my son's husband –and his boyfriend': Mother reveals how she came to terms with her polyamorous gay son's three-way relationship (Feb. 4). Excerpts:

A mother has told how she grew to love her polyamorous son's husband — and his boyfriend.

Debbie McKinnon was delighted when son Ross told her he was marrying long-term partner Iain Waddell, 33.

But Ross, 27, then told her a third man, Pav Gill, 24, would be joining the relationship.

"Debbie McKinnon was delighted when son Ross (centre) told her he was marrying Iain Waddell (back right). But she was angry when told Pav Gill (back left) would be joining the relationship."

Mrs McKinnon's delight quickly turned to anger but she has now learned to love both of the men in her son's life — and is now a proud mother-in-law.

Ross met fellow nurse Iain on a dating app and they had an open relationship. They married in 2014 just days after Pav had moved in to their apartment.

Mrs McKinnon, 45, of East Lothian, told the Daily Record: 'I was worried my baby was going to be lying in bed alone at night, crying because his partner was in the next room sleeping with some other bloke.

'But Ross explained that while Iain and him had a deep, deep love, it didn't mean they didn't want to have sex or relationships with other people.

'They still got married, and Pav was at their wedding. Now Pav is Ross's boyfriend — they fell in love as well — and the relationship the three of them have is very beautiful.'

...Ross says sex with other people is now just a form of exercise for him and said the trio are completely honest with each other.

And he admitted he feels sorry for people who only have one lover. ...

This story also appeared in Scotland's Daily Record, Metro UK, The Sun, the Mirror, the Coventry Telegraph, and elsewhere.

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Three men register their polyamorous marriage in Colombia. That doesn't mean they're legally married.

This story has been going all around the world for the last six days, but much of the reporting has been superficial or misleading.

Here, from Gay Star News, are the basics that you may have seen:

Three men have first polyamorous wedding in Colombia

'We wanted to validate our household... and our rights, because we had no solid legal basis establishing us as a family'

Victor Hugo Prada, John Alejandro Rodriguez, Manuel José Bermúdez. (Photo: Facebook / Manuel José Bermúdez Andrade)

By Shannon Power

Three gay men have become the first polyamorous relationship to be officially recognized in Colombia.

Victor Hugo Prada, an actor, ‘married’ sports instructor John Alejandro Rodriguez and journalist Manuel José Bermúdez in Medellin on Saturday. The thruple – three people in a relationship – signed legal documents with a solicitor officially recognizing their relationship.

The men have been in their polyamorous relationship – known as a trieja in Spanish – since 2013. They did have a fourth partner, 25-year-old Alex Esnéider Zabala. But Zabala died from stomach cancer in 2015.

‘When Alex died, we did not have any documents and it was a difficult process to reclaim his social security and assets. So these papers protects us against anyone who wants to make any claims of this kind,’ Prada told W Radio.

‘We are based on a matter of coexistence and solidarity. Here there are no powers, there are no roles, you have to negotiate. Here we all come under the same conditions.’

Bermúdez told Colombian media that they wanted to make their relationship official.

‘We wanted to validate our household… and our rights, because we had no solid legal basis establishing us as a family,’ he said.

‘This establishes us as a family, a polyamorous family. It is the first time in Colombia that has been done.’

LGBTI lawyer and advocate, German Rincon Perfetti, said the attention the thruple have received has been important for the visibility of polyamorous relationships. He said while many polyamorous couples [sic] exist in Colombia, the men’s was the first to be made official.

‘It is a recognition that other types of family exist,’ he told AFP.

Last year Colombia became the fourth country in South America to legalize same-sex marriage. Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil also have marriage equality.

The original (June 15, 2017).

Here's the catch. As the story reports, but does not explain, the three "officially registered" their relationship. This does not mean they are legally married. It means they swore out a document, and had it notarized and recorded, declaring themselves to be a family unit with shared finances. People can do this in Colombia, as in Brazil where polyfamilies have made world news by swearing out similar documents attesting to their "polyaffective union." These affidavits are intended to carry legal weight in determining rights such as inheritance and government benefits, and in the case of couples, they do.

In other words, the three have made a legal statement. The government has only recorded the statement. How much legal weight it will carry for a group of more than two remains to be tested.


A reporter for Queerty failed to get this:

I do, I do, and I do! These three men just got legally married to each other

By Graham Gremore

Actor Victor Hugo Prada and his two partners, sports instructor John Alejandro Rodriguez and journalist Manuel Jose Bermudez, just signed papers making them a legally married throuple.

...The papers were signed on Monday with a solicitor in the city of Medellin and establish the men as a family unit with inheritance rights.

They are the first legally recognized polyamorous family in Colombia.

Lawyer and gay rights activist German Rincon Perfetti tells the AFP [Agence France-Presse], “It is a recognition that other types of families exist.”

...Now that the papers have been signed, the trio says they’re planning a marriage celebration, which they promise will be an “artistic and cultural event.” Then, of course, comes the honeymoon!

Congrats to the happy trouple!

The whole article (June 14).


In contrast, the libertarian magazine Reason reported on their actual legal situation:

Colombia Sees First Gay Polygamous Marriage. Sort Of.

Three men declare themselves wed. It’s not clear if the government will recognize it.

By Scott Shackford

...If the authorities legally recognize their marriage, it will be a first for Colombia. But that's a big "if."

Western reporting indicates that the three men have signed legal papers with a lawyer in Medellin in an attempt to establish themselves as a family with inheritance rights. That's not the same as saying they are legally married, and Google Translate's version of the original news coverage from the Columbia-based Semana doesn't clear up the confusion. It's clear they've submitted a notarized document declaring themselves a family. It's unclear whether it's legally enforceable and whether a court will recognize it.

We do know they can't be punished for polyamory, and that may be driving some ambiguous reporting. Colombia struck down its laws criminalizing polygamous relationships in 2001. That's not the same as legally recognizing polyamorous marriages as valid. It just means you can't be arrested and imprisoned for it. ...

The whole article (June 15).


● The original Semana article in Medellín: Los tres maridos (June 11).

● In El Colombiano: Los 3 paisas que se casaron en notaría y formaron la primera “trieja” del país (June 12).

● Video of the three as they registered their relationship.


● Here's the Agence France-Presse article that went around the world: Colombia's first three-man marriage legally recognized (June 13).

● In the UK's Telegraph: Colombia gets first 'polyamorous family' as three men legally established as unit (June 13).

● In the UK's Daily Mail: I do, I do and I do! Colombia's first THREE-man marriage between a 'polyamorous family' is legally recognised (June 14).

● The UK Metro: Three men marry in first legally recognised ‘polyamorous wedding’ (June 14).

● Australia's Herald-Sun: Gay trio Victor Hugo Prada, Manuel Jose Bermudez and John Alejandro Rodriguez’s modern family recognised in Colombia (June 13).

● And many more.

-----------------------------------

Update June 4, 2019: Medellin judge grants pension to polyamorous husbands

A court in Medellin, Colombia’s second largest city, has granted two husbands of a polyamorous relationship the split pension of their late partner, local media reported on Monday.

Manuel Bermudez and Victor Rodriguez, the two surviving members of the relationship between four, were initially denied pension rights after the death of their lover Alex Zabala from cancer in 2014, following 10 years of living together as a polyamorous family.

The Medellin court ordered the pension fund to retroactively pay the two men.

A third member of the family of four men was denied pension rights on claims he had only been with his partners for a year when Zabala died. ...

The decision was hailed by El Espectador as a victory for the LGBT community, a sentiment echoed by Bermudez.

In an emotional statement, he praised the ruling, deeming it a “recognition and worthwhile memory of the man we love and who loved us for ten years of his life”, and acknowledged the wider significance of the ruling.

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Making a gig of telling your poly stories

On HuffPost, Jeff Leavell just published another piece about his gay triad family and its ongoing changes. He seems to have cracked the paying market (I hope?) for first-person stories about his life, especially his poly life. He's is a regular, for instance, in Vice and has written for the Washington Post's online section "Solo-ish."

Another guy who has made a go of this, writing from very similar circumstances, is Zachary Zane.

If they've made these gigs work, so can you.

Jeff (center) and family members.

How My Three-Way Polyamorous Relationship Works

“These men that I love, they are my family.”

By Jeff Leavell

We are told our whole lives that we can hate as many people as we want: whole nations, groups of people, ideologies and races, our bosses, our neighbors: we are allowed to hate freely and abundantly, but we only get to truly love one other person.

When my husband, Alex, and I met Jon, a handsome intellectual with blue eyes and the gait of an old man trapped in a young man’s body: sexy and endearingly awkward all at the same time, it was just supposed to be a hook up in a long line of sexual adventures. But then Jon came back again, and again and again. And then we were making plans to watch movies and eat pizza. We invited Jon to spend the night.

I knew the first time Jon came over and the three of us didn’t have sex that something important was happening: Jon was no longer a trick. We were falling in love. All three of us.

I had no idea what to do. I had no idea what was normal or not normal. I was like a crazy person: madly in love and jealous at the same time....

-------------------------------

...Movie style happy endings don’t exist. People we love get sick. The circumstances of life make what had once seemed so easy, so perfect, suddenly impossible. We grow older. We fail almost as often as we succeed, sometimes more.

And yet, these men that I love, they are my family. Even as some of us drift apart. They are mine. And there is a beauty to that.

...None of this is easy. But as my father likes to remind me, nothing is. It’s just a matter of whether it was worth it or not.

Read the whole article (April 28, 2017).

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Wash Post: "I live with my husband and our boyfriend. Here’s how we make it work."

The gay poly writer Jeff Leavell has finally made the MSM with a piece on the website of the Washington Post. He's not shy about his struggles with jealousy.

Poly is much easier if you're naturally a low-jealousy person, but this is not required.

I live with my husband and our boyfriend. Here’s how we make it work.

iStock

By Jeff Leavell

Among those of us who are polyamorous — meaning that we carry on committed relationships with multiple people — there is a lot of talk about jealousy. It’s regarded as an emotion for the weak and unenlightened. [No it's not.]

I must be seriously unenlightened then, because I am a jealous, territorial, alpha-kind of man. My husband, Alex, and I have been together for five years. Our boyfriend, Jon, has lived with us for the past two.

For the most part we are happy. Like any relationship, we have our ups and our downs. Some days we are madly in love, other days we’d rather be left alone to watch TV, pay the bills and go about the normalcy of life.

...[However,] I still get that kind of heart-pounding and burning sensation all over my body whenever I picture either of my men with someone else. I want to stalk their lovers on Facebook. I want to follow Alex and Jon when they leave the house. Go through their phones. If I let myself, I can go a little crazy with jealousy.

The three of us met on a gay dating app, Scruff.... Jon kept coming back. For pizza and movies, sleepovers, hikes. We took a trip to Vancouver together. The three of us had our first four-way. We said “I love you.” We introduced Jon to our family members and friends as our boyfriend.

Watching Alex fall in love with Jon was a kind of strange torture. It was also beautiful. Learning to balance the torture with the beauty was a struggle.

...I have always loved the idea of monogamy — that one man would love me and only me; would want me and only me; would sacrifice everything for me, if it came to that. I loved the idea of someone being monogamous to me, I just wasn’t able to return the favor.

So opening our relationship up to include more lovers allowed Alex and me to have our own private adventures. It was also like taking a crash course in how to handle jealousy. The first time I told Alex about another guy I was dating, our relationship almost ended. When Alex told me about a new guy he had met in Seattle, I thought my world would fall apart.

Of course, my world didn’t fall apart. Instead, I had to confront my feelings. I didn’t have to confront Alex or Jon, but myself. I had to spend time alone with my fears and insecurities. Because that is all jealousy is: fear. Of being abandoned. Of not being enough. Of being alone.

And the truth is, all the things we fear might happen.... Relationships fall apart all the time.

At least Jon and Alex and I are honest with one another. I get to share my fears and my joys with them. I get to be there for them as they do the same. And I fall more in love with them as we do this.

Read the whole article (Oct. 11, 2016). It was originally titled "I'm polyamorous. Yes, I get jealous. But it's worth it."


● Jeff had another recent piece at Vice: My Advice for People Considering Polyamory (Sept. 8):

Jeff Leavell and his partners

...Basically, we tried to treat a relationship developing between three people like it was developing between two, with Alex and I as one party and Jon as the other. This, of course, is untenable. Equality is essential to making relationships work. [Make that equality of respect, dignity, and agency, say I; not necessarily time, sex, income sharing, and most everything else. No two relationships are ever the same. –Ed.]  If we were really going to do this new thing with Jon, Alex and I would have to change how our own relationship operated. But I had no role models to teach me how to do this thing — a problem I hope to address in writing about our relationship publicly.

People reach out to me all the time with questions about open and polyamorous relationships based on pieces I've written. A disproportionate number of them revolve around jealousy and insecurity: How do you avoid becoming jealous if your partner is sleeping with other men?

I've found that if I ever feel jealousy, the root of that emotion almost always comes from not feeling good enough for Jon or Alex. Jealousy always equals insecurity for me.

...But at the end of the day, it's how we react to that jealousy that matters. I constantly have to remind myself to shift the focus of my thoughts back to me: What am I really afraid of? Why do I not believe I am deserving of all this love?

-----------------------------

People often ask me how we handled "coming out" as a polyamorous couple to our family and friends. ... Today, my advice is to use caution and not open yourself up too quickly to the scrutiny and judgment of those who love you. While they may seem normal when you're part of them, polyamorous relationships are far outside the norm, and it's hard to expect everyone to just accept what we know: that love is vast, and that there are many ways to experience and express it. Polyamory scares people. For some, it challenges everything they believe to be true about love....

● And here are two previous Vice pieces by Jeff: How I Told My Husband and Boyfriend I'm Dating Another Man (July 19, 2016), and How I Figured Out the Rules of My Three-Way Relationship (July 22, 2015).

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