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Sometimes it seems that some irresistible force draws us into a new relationship, although we are not at all ready to destroy the old ones. We want to keep both ties without sacrificing either. What is happening to us and why? Is it love or something else, like tender friendship? Romantic infatuation? Sexual obsession? Personal confessions and expert opinions.
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Heated debates flare up whenever it comes to love relationships involving three. Whether an intimate relationship outside of marriage is discussed in the press or in a narrow circle someone admits that he is attracted to different partners, someone will surely notice that a split of feelings is a self-deception that only one can be truly loved.
And for the other – to feel anything: sympathy, respect, admiration, but not the same great feeling sung in poems and novels. Such arguments confuse the one who actually feels: two are important and dear to him at once. What’s this? Need or whim?
chemistry program
We are all polygamous by nature, not just men.1. Studies show that women can be attracted to different types of partners almost at the same time.2.
“I would not talk about the need or whim to love two, but about the thirst for love as a program that is embedded in our brain,” says Olga Dulepina, a Gestalt therapist, an expert in the psychology of love and sexuality.
– According to neuroscience research3, it has three components: romantic delight, sexual arousal and a feeling of deep affection.
There comes a time when we want to feel alive again, and then we fall in love again
Euphoria and passion push us to find and choose a partner so that we lose our heads and want to have a baby, and emotional attachment to a partner gives us a sense of security necessary in order to raise a child. And then romance is replaced by intimacy, friendship. This is also a love affair, but more often without chemistry, without a strong surge of hormones.
The stormy delight of love is replaced by a feeling of intimacy. But sooner or later there comes a time when we again want to feel alive, sexually attractive, and then we fall in love again. Sometimes – in your own husband or wife. But often – in someone else.
If the stars are lit
The psychoanalytic approach offers many explanations for this relationship phenomenon. The first has to do with the fact that it can be difficult for us to put up with losses, past, present or future.
“Losses are any important changes that occur in our lives,” explains psychoanalytic psychotherapist Konstantin Nemirovsky, “for example, the transition of romantic passion into mature, companionship; growing up of children and loss of habitual parental roles, age-related crises and illnesses.
For some, these losses are so unbearable that they are unable to cope with them themselves or with the help of a partner and seek on the side, with someone else, a feeling of excitement that temporarily eliminates anxiety or mental pain.
“Those who find it difficult to combine sexuality with affection may have two objects of love – for intimacy and for passion”
The second reason is related to the “mother-whore” complex. Experiencing his strong and integral attraction to his mother as dangerous, the boy can split her image into two parts: one offers him support and demands veneration, and the other allows the satisfaction of his love aspirations.
The same thing then happens to the partners of an already adult man. “Those who find it difficult to combine sexuality with affection can have two objects of love in order to experience intimacy with one and passion with the other,” explains Konstantin Nemirovsky.
– In addition, in a couple we can be torn apart by conflicting desires: the desire for unity and the fear of being absorbed by another. The attempt to cope with these anxieties through the splitting of complex desire leads to the search for parallel relationships. This is the third explanation of the triangle.
“Making love on the side, the one who feels superfluous is, in fact, engaged in hatred”
The fourth reason is unresolved oedipal conflicts: the painful experience of one’s own exclusion from the parental couple. “Attraction to a third person in this case can be an unconscious way to express aggression, hatred to a partner who unwittingly (for example, taking care of a child or building a career) revived a feeling of uselessness, abandonment in a husband / wife,” says a psychoanalytic psychotherapist.
“It seems that while making love on the side, the one who feels superfluous is, in fact, engaged in hatred: he destroys relationships in his couple, thus acting out his early and unresolved conflicts associated, for example, with jealousy or envy.”
“I translated my throwing into the language of poetry”
Roman, 51, IT specialist, father of three
Sonya and I met at a music festival. We accidentally ended up in the same company, although from different worlds: she is an aspiring artist, and I am a techie and a bore. But Sonya for some reason noticed me, agreed to meet. She is amazing – gentle, thin, cool draws and reads a lot, writes poetry.
From our meetings, I grew like wings. Every dewdrop on the grass, every cloud in the sky made sense. Home life, repairs, a small child. And with Sonya, I even began to write poetry. More precisely, I came across an English poem on social networks and decided to translate it. Sonya liked it. In general, the roof was completely blown off to me.
Then we had some kind of stupid quarrel, Sonya stopped communicating. I fell into despair, wrote her huge letters. He confessed to his wife in treason and went to Sonya to put up. She forgave, but it became very difficult to live in two houses. My wife did not make scandals, she did not ask questions, but I saw how she suffered, and the feeling of guilt was the hardest. Because we actually always felt good together, we matched in temperament, and I was still drawn to her.
The children were divided: the eldest daughter sided with Sonya, made friends with her, and the son stopped talking to me. This went on for almost a year, and then … I suddenly realized that Sonya was not particularly needed, she had her own young life, different hobbies. She was simply flattered by the attention of a grown man who threw his life at her feet.
We began to see each other less often, soon became just friends. We go to festivals, walk in parks, congratulate each other on holidays. And he begged forgiveness from his wife, and we even got married. The novel that I am currently translating helped in this, it is about love. I’m thinking of dedicating it to my wife.
Find integrity
“I love both of them”, “I can’t imagine tomorrow without both of them”… Leading parallel lives for years with a sense of guilt, pain and shame is a heavy burden for many victims of the “autumn marathons”, fraught with neurotic disorders. Why are we not always able to choose between two partners?
“In the Jungian approach, the main question is not “why”, but “why”, what is the meaning? – notes the Jungian analyst Yulia Kazakevich. – Our psyche in any way, even immoral, seeks to gain integrity, to fulfill various needs, the main of which are: eros (extroversion, maximum self-disclosure) and security (introversion, predictability).
Partners value each other so much that they believe: communication on the side will not destroy their relationship, but rather give new energy
The love triangle signals a lack of some important component of the soul. I can choose a suitable partner in search of stability, but if the security mindset is too rigid, it is offset by an unconscious attraction to the opposite – a change of impressions, thrills, eros.
So an armchair scientist is drawn to a windy neighbor, and an enterprising business woman gets a chance to get to know the dreamy part of her soul, falling in love with a poet. “Feeling the fullness of life, we are sure that thanks to a new love we have found ourselves,” notes Yulia Kazakevich. – But this is a projection of internal processes: the feeling only indicated the direction. And our task is to appropriate this energy, to make it an assistant in knowing ourselves and the meaning of our being.”
The love triangle doesn’t always turn out to be Bermuda. Some manage to avoid the destruction of relations – if the partners are able to conduct an honest dialogue and are interested “not in finances, not in status, not in the housing issue, but in relations with each other,” emphasizes Olga Dulepina.
When we give our love to several people, it only grows.
This happens if there is a solid foundation in intimacy, deeper than sexual connection: intimacy, emotional comfort, shared values. Partners value each other so much that they believe: communication on the side will not destroy their relationship, but rather give new energy.
Another thing is also possible: “The fear of losing a husband or wife, the awareness of the damage done (the lover inevitably deprives the main partner of time, money, eros) pushes us to action,” says Yulia Kazakevich, “to go to a psychologist, talk, try to understand each other.” What can we change? What would you like? What can I do? And then it turns out that these needs are quite modest: to walk together more often, take the children to their grandmother, sometimes give flowers.
“I learned to talk about my desires to my husband”
Tatyana, 35 years old, two children
A year ago, as a girl, I fell in love with a personal growth coach. There was great confusion. I did not understand how to live on, when my husband and children are dear, and I am so drawn to another man. I felt sorry for my husband and kept it a secret: to hurt him with a confession seemed unbearable.
But love for Sergei filled me completely. And also a strong guilt, because the feeling was so huge, exciting. Like in the movie Envy of the Gods. And, fortunately, unpromising: Sergei is married, and I was so shy that I would not dare to open up to him. The stress was the strongest, I stopped eating, forgot how to enjoy life.
After several months of exhausting uncertainty, I simply asked my husband to leave. He was confused, thought for two days, and then said that he would fight for the family, and called together to be like psychotherapy. We worked together and separately. It became clear to me a lot – that my husband and I had been living by inertia for a long time, that I absolutely do not know how to talk about my desires, but I live in the “necessary” and “correct” mode and thereby drive myself into a dead end.
I tried to tell my husband more often what I want and how I want it: to have sex, spend the weekend, run the house. My husband went to meet me, even rejoiced that he would master the preparation of complex dishes. We started going out more often. For the last three months, Sergei has not figured in my life in any way, it becomes easier for me. It’s like I forget him until I see his photo.
Relations with my husband have changed, we both know that in addition to the “rules” there is another, more interesting life, where you can “order” romantic dates and talk about desires. We have become more tolerant, more gentle. It seems that “Tanya is back.”
Will you be the third?
When we give our love to several people, its quantity only grows: new relationships can generate new portions of joy and euphoria that capture all partners. This is the position of supporters of open, non-monogamous relationships. At the heart of polyamorous unions is the consent and achievement of agreements between all participants. And besides – honesty, denial of possessiveness, respect, emotional comfort and continuous dialogue.
Gestalt therapist Olga Dulepina, author of More than Two. Polyamory, open relationships, alternative love, tells who such relationships are shown and who are not.
Polyamory suits:
- Free from stereotypes, residents of metropolitan areas who want to maintain meaningful relationships without giving a monopoly over their sexuality to one partner;
- Those whose partners share a similar lifestyle and worldview, match in temperament, or, if there is no match, feel quite calm when they let go of a partner;
- Men and women who in their development have achieved autonomy, independence and who do not see new contacts as a threat to themselves: their self-esteem, stability.
Ethical non-monogamy does not fit:
- Couples who are in financially and emotionally dependent relationships (and hostile-dependent): there is a high risk of traumatization;
- Unequal unions, where a man and a woman have different rights in everything, including the realization of sexual desires;
- Those who see the appearance of a third person as a threat to self-worth and who are not able to cope with fear, jealousy, with a feeling of their less attractiveness and significance for a partner.
1. R. Martin “How We Do It” (Alpina non-fiction, 2016).
2. К. Дюранте (K. Durante) и др. Ovulation leads women to perceive sexy cads as good dads. Journ. of Pers. and Social Psychology; 103(2), 2012.
3. H. Fischer “Why do we love?” (Alpina non-fiction, 2019).