Today it finally dawned on me why the whole concept of primaries and secondaries in polyamory have never sat all that well with me.
Don't get me wrong; I tried them out in the beginning, rolling the words off my tongue like an expert, even getting upset at those who would dare suggest otherwise. "It's the only model that works" I would insist. You have a primary relationship, and a bunch of secondary ones. That's how it's supposed to work.
And that's where our upbringing trips us up again.
If I had a light bulb to put in here, this would be the point of insertion.
See, what I figured out today - thanks in large part to an absolutely delightful and wonderful new person who has entered my life as if by magic a couple of weeks ago, and with whom I finally got to spend a significant amount of time - is that the
whole notion of primary and secondaries (and tertiaries and so forth)
is nothing more than a softened version of the monogamy model.
It's like saying "monogamy is too harsh, things aren't so black and white, we'd like to have a bit of fun on the side, so let's just call it something else. Oh, I know! instead of you being my
wife, no you will be my
primary. There. All sorted out. Aren't we feeling better now? now there's this girl at the office..."
Baloney, I say. Because underneath the pretty words and grand theories, a simple truth resides: when polyfolk use the word primary, they still mean
someone who is primary in all aspects of their lives. It's the same deal, really. My primary is my top lover, partner, confidante, trusted person, romantic influence, shennaniganer at large...
And how, I would like to ask, is that any different than the thing we are supposedly saying goodbye to? isn't that exactly the same as monogamy? yeah, sure, the fixin's are a bit different, so now instead of saying "you're my only lover" I'm saying "you're my top lover" or "most important" or what have you.
It doesn't change a darn thing.
Thing is... for me, anyway, the entire point of going the poly route is the realization that one person cannot fulfill all the needs and desires of another. I mean, isn't that why the exploration begins in the first place? so why hold on to those old notions at all? do they really matter?
Instead, I realized today that I can have multiple primaries - in different arenas. Heck, I can be completely
monogamous AND poly at the same time; no one says I must sleep with multiple partners to "qualify". I mean, once relationships are viewed through the lens of love being more than a license for intimacy, of self-actualization and self-realization, or better yet, through the idea of interdependence as their highest form, all these boundaries lose their meaning. It truly becomes a new paradigm.
And it solves many mysteries. Loving two people just as intensely. I've been struggling with this one, because the chemical and hormonal effect of infatuation IS pretty much exclusive. But I can love my spouse as the amazing partner, confidante and trustworthy person she is, my
primary source of stablity, emotional and mental support, and yet at the same time love another as the
primary source of my daily emotional well-being, excitement and desire. They are both "primary". They do not contradict.
Where things do overlap - which can happen, and often - is when, I suppose, folks get ranked instinctively. But trying to maintain the ranking artificially, saying my "primary" must be so in all things - just for the sake of maintaining some vesitge of old beliefs - is... well, silly I suppose. A crutch. It IS simple though, which I suppose is the big attraction.
