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PLAB Group
FAQ
These are some of the most frequently asked questions about the PLAB-Group.
- How did we meet?
- Who sleeps with whom? How do we decide which bed to end up in?
- Kids and families of choice...are you having any?
- Budgeting
- Do you live together?
- Coming out
- Did you ever consider just switching partners?
- Do we think we're better/more evolved/advanced than traditional monogamous couples?
- Holidays and/or family of origin issues
- Are we all going to keep our names?
- What does PLAB stand for?
- What do you guys look like?
- Are you still swingers?
- How do you know you're right for each other?
Did you ever consider just switching partners?
Answered By: C
C's Version: – 16 October 2003
>Assumption: (incorrect in our case, but still something important to be thought about): the cross-partners are "better for/more suited to each other" (whatever that means) than the current primary partners.
IF the Assumption were correct, why not just switch partners?
In thinking about this question my first reaction was just to say to myself that we’ve put too much work into our primary relationships to give them up glibly now, for something that seems better but that we haven’t known as long.
My internal devil’s advocate responded that if a relationship is not right it doesn’t matter how much work is put into it, and that working to maintain an inherently mismatched relationship is futile.
But I responded to my devil’s advocate, thinking, what is a relationship besides the work that you put into it?
Thinking more about this, I’ve come to a point where I definitely think that a relationship is more than the work you put into it - I realize that there are relationships that can’t work regardless of how much work you do. Nevertheless, I also think that time and history and knowledge of each other and the growing you’ve done together is worth more than we might realize. It’s certainly not everything, as anyone who has stayed in a relationship out of not much more than habit and fear of being alone can attest. But it is worth something.
Additionally, I’ve realized that I believe that a relationship is more than a tally-sheet. Similar likes, dislikes, and desires are important, but aren’t the only things that make a relationship stand or fail. We have been so grateful to find in our cross-partners people who have some personality qualities that are in many ways more like us than our primary partners. But this does not mean that our primary relationships are not worthwhile. Rather, having cross-partners who are similar seems to enhance the complementary natures of our primary relationships. We gain strength and self-knowledge from our cross-partners that in turn strengthens our primary relationships. Seeing ourselves in our cross-partners helps us to see how our primary partners see us.
Learning more about our primary partners from our cross-partners
When there is something that frustrates us or something that we don’t understand about our partners, sometimes it’s easier to figure this out with our cross-partners. We don’t ‘talk dirt’ about each other, but we do vent our frustrations in what can be a more constructive way, and we learn strategies from each other that we might not have thought of. Having four brains to think through a problem is much better than two, especially when those two can be so deep inside the problem it’s difficult to see it from all sides.
How do you know if a lifetime relationship commitment is right, and with the right person?
Unfortunately, there is no objective way to evaluate a relationship much beyond the surface/clinical level (B may have some insight here, I’m sure there are probably inventories and whatnot that can be quite helpful, but I don’t think that they really can ultimately answer the "is this a good relationship?" or "should this relationship continue?" or "is this the best relationship for me" questions), there is no way, mystical or scientific, to know for certain what the future holds for any relationship. So the will and commitment (and tools/strategies to support these) to continue through difficulties and happiness is a large factor. I don’t know that I can answer "is this [my primary relationship] the right relationship for me?" But I can say that I think it is and I want it to be. It’s difficult not to know the future, but we shape it with our actions every day, and if those actions are positive and supportive of each other, I think that the future has more potential to be good. I thought (and think) about a lot of these things when thinking about whether or not I wanted to get married to G. Besides all of the social, cultural, and political problems I see with marriage (see our wedding website for a little essay on this) I also want forever to mean forever not just for romantic reasons or for security, but because I don’t want to fail or be wrong about the relationship. I have resolved that there is no way of knowing exactly what the future will hold, but that our mutual commitment to want the relationship to be forever try our best to work to solve any problems is a good enough foundation that I’m as confident as I can be about an unknown future.
So, even though I don’t think that our cross-partners are ultimately "better for us," at least not right now, I do think that they provide us (and we provide them) with an invaluable resource (a "safety valve" as it were, for our primary relationships and a familiar personality to talk to), in addition to love and affection and support and comfort, that makes them essential to our lives.
Rather than thinking about one or the other of us being "better at" something, which can be difficult and dangerous, especially if the person is not the thinker’s primary partner, we believe that our skills and strengths compliment each other. B can do things (tangible and intangible) that I have trouble doing. I want G to have access to those things, and I’m glad that B can do them because they not only take the pressure off of me but because G’s experience of her/them helps my relationship with him.
