After reading The Ethical slut and then passing it on to Jewelgen to read, we realized that at least in some form this idea, Polyamory, was something we had to consider for our own lives. On an intellectual level it made so much sense, but even more importantly that that we both could sense that it fit with what we believed about sex. That it did not have to be related to an emotional attachment. We also knew that as it related to our Kinky lives that moving into the area of other partners would greatly expand our ability to explore.Questions

However, the question of how, and how much to implement into our lives loomed overhead. I think we both feared that our own ideas of where this could lead would frighten the other. So for a time we knew in our head that our future would include some sort of “Poly”, we did not move forward.

That was when we began a mental exercise or game that we call “What if”. We would each bring up scenarios that occurred to us and ask the other one, “What if _____ happened? How would that make you feel?” This discussion could occur at any time but most often happened in the car when driving together or in bed, late at night or on a weekend morning.

We initially agreed to some rules that were comfortable but with the understanding that everything could be discussed. We began to refer to Kink, and Poly as “Our Journey”. That was exactly how we thought of it, as a journey with no particular destination. We decide that for the time, all we were comfortable with was Co-play. That is introducing other partners to play with both of us at the same time. It was simultaneous to this that we were coming out to each other about our attraction to other genders, so this also became part of the “What if” game.

A typical conversation may go something like this;

Me: So what if we were playing with another man and he was going down on you but then sucked my cock?

Jewelgen: Well, you know I like that idea, but I don’t think I would be comfortable with seeing you suck cock.

“What ifs” could sometime be traded back and forth for hours like that, and through this exchange we came to trust that we had a fair idea of what the other found comfortable.

It was during a particularly full weekend of these discussions that Jewelgen came up with a brilliant way to expand the discussion and further address our internal feelings about knowing the other was with someone else. Even though neither of us was comfortable at these early stages with the other having solo intercourse with someone else, we acknowledged that this was a likely eventual outcome. Jewelgen suggested that we each take a day of perusing Fetlife and pick out a top 5 people of each male  and Female that we thought would be likely someone that the other would want to be with. This was an exploration on two levels. It would see how well we understood what the other found attractive and it would force us to think deeper about the idea of the other being with not only someone, but someone the other was very attracted to.

Of course Jewelgen was far better at this than I was but after 24 hours I had done a fair job of picking out some men and women that Jewelgen said she found attractive. A very interesting side note to this particular game is that even though the people we picked were not anyone we had ever had contact with, nor did we anticipate having contact with, and the lists we made we set aside on our desk somewhere. The number one Female that Jewelgen picked for me, and at the time admitted that she had picked because of how much she was attracted to, would through a completely unrelated series of events, become the one person we have opened our relationship to. That is right, almost a year before I would meet IceEmpress on Twitter and flirting would lead to her having dinner with us 3,000 miles from her home. IceEmpress was the person Jewelgen predicted I would find attractive. Of course she was right.

We have in Baby steps and Stutter steps moved far beyond those early stages of exploring Polyamory, however the “What if” game is still played and serves us well.