If you don't feel a connection to any nominogamous concepts, and you've looked into it and you really make that choice to be monogamous with your partner, that's a beautiful thing, and that can be a wonderful and fulfilling and rich way to live your life. But for us, the most, you know, the authentic way that we can live our life with ourselves is to be non monogamous.
Welcome to the heart of it. We would like to acknowledge the gartical people of the or nation, the traditional custodians of this land, and pay our respects to the elders, both past and present. Today's episode is a conversation about non monogamy, conscious relationships, and sexuality. We are joined by the hosts of the Evolving Love podcast, Abby and Liam.
They still have been together for over thirteen years and have been consensually non monogamous for eleven of those years, and they are loving parents.
They are And it was a chat that I was really really surprised by because I know we've had somewhat similar guess some before, and it is a bit of a touchy subject for a lot of people. You know, it feels very dangerous. It feels wrong to some people, and I really understand that point of view in one sense.
But after talking to Abby and.
Liam, it's not that I now want to be non monogamous, but the way they talk about it with so much love and care and consideration, and they why they are in an ethical non monogamous relationship, it really makes sense. And I think it's just in the it makes sense for them, do you know what I mean? And I think it's just about staying curious and open to all
sorts of relationships. And that's something that I know you and I really want it encourage people to have, just to had the curiosity to what other people's lives are about.
Indeed, indeed, well we got into the heart of it with.
This, we did.
We did.
Let's let's have a listen to Abby and Liam.
Okay, well, welcome you to the heart of it. Thank you so much for coming in and just exploring this really interesting topic.
We've we've had a couple of other couples on that.
Have explored non monogamy and been very positive about it. They have very much felt felt so so we just want to kind of get your journey into it. How did it begin for the both of you. This this ethical non monogamy B n M.
Yeah, it's part. That's part of when I've looked you guys up, I'm looking at the all these new terms. There's lots of there are a lot of the specificity of it fascinating. Anyway, how did it go? How did how did how did it begin?
Well, first of all, thank you so much for having us the way that this unfolded FILEAM and I was when we first got together, we were in a monogamous relationship, and that was back in twenty twelve, and from the early days of our relationship we were very just open with our communication and sort of we wanted to cultivate and build a relationship where we could essentially talk about anything, So anything that might come up, or if in the future somebody might get a crush on somebody, or if
there's some sort of fear or you know that you want to raise, or if there's some desire or kink that maybe you can't you know, you might feel a bit shy to talk about. We've always wanted to have the type of relationship where we could at least have those conversations, whether or not we act on them or not.
And it was actually from that place of sharing and connecting and being really open with our communication that we just sort of created a space where we could start to, you know, have these conversations and then we just sort of organically started cultivating our own type of relationship. But the thing that was really interesting, I think for us was without having the language and the terminology, we both found that we were very compursive people, which compersian. It's
a big word in nominogamy. It's like often positioned as the opposite of jealousy. It's like this sort of excitement.
The first time the other day, that's so interesting.
Yeah, great.
It's sort of a it's kind of a foundational sort of emotional feeling where you feel, you know, if there's a scenario that might often cause jealousy, instead of feeling that jealousy, you might feel excitement or happiness for your partner's you know, connection with somebody else, or pleasure. So even though we weren't acting on that, we didn't have the language around it, you know, certain scenarios that I
thought of that might make me jealous. I was like, actually, I'm finding this to be quite a positive thing that I'm experienced and then when I shared that with you felt similarly.
Yeah, we both really felt on the same page. As soon as we started to have those initial conversations, it was amazing how aligned we actually were, and I think from that kind of from that point, we started to then look at how it would look actually exploring these things with other people.
Does it do you think it comes from your upbringing? Did you Did you have an upbringing that was extremely strict or perhaps the opposite, like, where does that come from?
With the both of you?
For me, I've I've had a very like I wasn't brought up in a you know, a religious family or anything like that, and I've always had very clear lines of communication about things with my parents, so I didn't feel sort of concerned, you know, too much. And I think because it was Liam and I together that I didn't have a sort of an element of shame for thinking about this. It felt like something just different and interesting that we could explore.
And for Liam, you had Yeah, I never really had this kind of a strong religious back, so there wasn't anything that I had to unpack when it comes tom like a religious standpoint, And I think I grew up in a very kind of judgment free household about different relationships, So I didn't necessarily feel any kind of strictures around you know, it's a bad thing to think about these things or so it really just allowed us to have these very open conversations with each other without that element,
as Abby was saying, of that kind of any shame pieces.
Yeah, yeah, And how has your relationship changed since you decided to be non monogamous? Has what's happened for the both of you?
Well, a big thing for us was when you start to explore these types of things, it's a very tempting thing to kind of jump into the deep end of non monogamy, so to go, I'm going to start dating everyone.
We're going to do all the things.
We're going to go to all the parties and just be really explorative. But what we wanted to do was very consciously move into those spaces. So for us, it was actually very important to kind of talk about all the theoretical things, like different kind of almost like game planning what it would look like if we were to invite someone else into the relationship or to have these
experiences with other people. So for us, it was like we were trying to kind of temper some of our initial excitement, because it isn't a really exciting thing when you start to open up and to just have this like very open line of communication so that we could really, you know, get into the nitty gritty of how we were responding, even hypothetically to situations that might arise, because.
At that point it would be hypothetical. And always when you're faced with the actual truth of it, it's one thing to say, yeah, honey, I'm fine with it. You go and suddenly Barries in the picture. Yeah, or maybe it's not Barry, maybe it could be Birthny, you know, you know, and you're going, now, I'm actually, oh, this is actually happening, and I haven't done it yet, but I'm watching my partner do it. That's a different thing to go from hypothetical to action.
Yeah, and sometimes it's hard to meet the right Barry.
You know. It's one of those things where like we had a kind of a very solid unit with each other, like a very monogamous unit, and then we were living in New York at the time, and part of the thing was like, how do we meet other people in a really ethical way so that we can explore some of these ideas, so to meet a barrier or a
birth or you know, whoever it might be. You know, we were kind of initially started going to different events and talks, and we went to some Estaprel talks and she was talking about and we love esteprel and so there was a lot of kind of meeting people organically who also practice this type of relationship, which opened the doors for us.
And that was something that really surprised us as well, because it's when you hear about non monogamous relationships, you can often think, oh, you know, it's looking out outwoods,
or it's only about sex or this or that. But for us, it was like really looking deeper into our own relationship and who we are and all of the different things that come up when you're starting to explore this and have these conversations, and it sort of, you know, let us down the path of just being so curious relationships in general.
So you've been together thirteen years, yes, and you're eleven years of that has been non monogamous, and you're still clearly together very much, So yeah, what is it about you that you want to stay together, you know, and not just go off and be with those partners that you have been with. What draws you back to each other all the time?
Well, we have a deep companionship and a shared life together, and we are lovers, we are a married couple. Like we are very very close, and like we still hold a lot of those like I want to grow old with Liam, Like that is something that we treasure, that is like very very dear to our heart and important to us now because of who we are and because
we can, you know, navigate this in this way. I feel like we can actually you know, we can hold the space for non monogamy as well, and you know, there is that deep commitment to each other that in many ways, I feel like I'm very committed to Lim, I'm not committed to monogamy, and that it's actually this sort of the way that we navigate it, navigate our relationship sort of reinforces that closeness. It's sort of like not that it's an antidote to anything, but it's sort
of it For me. It brings us actually a sense of deeper security into the relationship.
And in preparation for this interview, I was listening to one of your episodes and Cam you made the point that you every day you wake up and choose to be married to each other. It's like a very conscious choice. And I think for us any non monogamous explorations, it's a very conscious discussion. We don't just fall into these situations. It's very deliberate, and even our commitment to each other, we're just consciously choosing every.
Day we wake up and go, this is great, this is beautiful.
You know, we have so much love and support for each other, like, let's just keep writing this beautiful thing out.
I can find it hard to get my head around because the eye idea of sharing a physical or sex sexual life with somebody else or having Ali do the same thing, ow's my person, you know. So basically if you're bringing someone else in like Aby, I'll use you as an example. So Mel Barry is going to come come in and come into the relationship. Do you how do you how do you work on on being that emotional intimacy? How do you do you temper that? And then do you tell Barry stuff that you don't tell Liam?
And I would find that very hard and and and then say if there's another one, you know, let's Chris has joined as well. I mean I don't know how that you can explain to me how that works. But but that sort of sharing your heart and being there clearly it's with you too. Is it also with Barry and could it be with Chris?
Yeah.
So the way that we practice our non monogamy, it's we're not in we're not full on practicing polyamory where we're maintaining these you know, very in depth like partner building relationships in the same way that we have our marriage.
Like we have our marriage, we have our partnership and our connections with other people whilst very meaningful and quite you know, long lasting, it's more like a deep friendship that does have an intimacy element to it as well, you know, and we're very honest with you know, anybody who would potentially be dating with partners where it's like I'm not going to be building a life in the
same way. And I think it's really understandable that you would feel like you can't understand how we you know, how to comprehend this because when you're in a monogamous relationship and that sort of the framework that you understand, sometimes people can think that it's like having double of that. So it's like how do you have the time, how do you have the emotional bandit? How do you have double of that? We don't have double of this? Yeah, yeah, this is our marriage.
Okay, do you feel the same way.
Yeah.
I mean there's so many things to talk about when it comes to this, in particular with the masculinity piece as well, because I think there's so much social conditioning that teaches us to be super possessive of our partner, you know, like the most in love we can be is to fight off any possible suitors, Like if someone looks at Abby in a weird way to you know, there's this like kind of trope of chasing after that
person and proving your love for your partner. And I think once you start to really interrogate some of those things, you can start to think about, you know, like what of that is like down to kind of patriarchy potentially, or kind of the social conditioning of monogamy. Like we grow up and we're just told, you know, you should be in a monogamous relationship, and whether that's down to
religion or just society conditioning. And I think once you start interrogating some of these things and trying to kind of decouple it a little bits were saying, like we think about things, we start at everything as a friendship level, and when you were saying, you know, like you can probably you probably have really beautiful conversations with your close guy friends or female friends that you have in your life, and for us, like you probably might not necessarily feel
threatened by those really beautiful emotional friendships that you have with others, and for us that the sex or intimacy on top of that is just really an extension of that connection. So we're just open to that extension. I guess I think.
It's probably it probably gets a bad name in the sense that when you've got like the cults where it's like one man, you know what I mean, the polyamory cult where it's one man with twenty five sixteen year olds, where it's like people immediately would probably go, oh, this is what you're into, you know what I mean, Where you're talking about something very very very different to that.
It's like the complete opposite end to that.
So yeah, it's getting past, you know, being open and getting past what what the idea of it is in a lot of ways, because.
People you get one chance at the first impression, you know, and if the first impression is some Culty movie that you've watched Jim Jones and think and the cordial the look cool aid, you know, it's sort of that sort of thing. Well, that's what this is. And it's a lot easier, I think it's a lot easier to reconcile something by throwing it into a label, throwing into that. So what you're talking about, it's a lot more nuanced and collaborative and collaborative, and the language is very specific.
Like when we talked to you, you said a lot of acronyms, a lot of do you find yourself going, oh this are you thinking about it a lot? Because there's so many things that sort of we talk about it all the time.
Look, we don't talk about it all the time. We have other things happening in our life and parents as well.
So you want to see how that works.
So we don't talk about it all the time, but it is something that we enjoy talking about and we like to, you know, push our edges a little bit and you know, see where things are at. And in the context of non monogamy, there is always something to talk about. So you know, even if it's revisiting something, you know, in our mind, a memory that happened years ago, and how we would sort of connect with that now if we were to do it, you know, if we were to be different or not. So there is always
an interesting aspect of it. And I think you know as well as you know, there is that cult association as you were saying, I think that there can also be that resistance to hearing about non monogamy too, because often the only sort of framework that a lot of people have for nonmennogamy is if there is you know, it's a story of infidelity, it's a story of pain.
We only sort of hear about these specific types of you know, scenarios where there's some sort of betrayal, and I think it is one of the It is a type of it is a way of being where when people do hear it, they put themselves in that situation and sort of imagine or just how they might feel if it was them. And because they don't have that compersian and they don't have that understanding and that point of reference, it can it can feel uncomfortable. And that's why I think it is good to have a chat
about these things. Because nothing is black and white.
And it is important for there to be representation of different relationship structures. And this is why we talk about it through our podcasts and why we're really interested in talking to people with you know, all across the spectrum.
We've had biblical scholars that we've talked to about non monogamy and how they would feel about it, and you know, we've talked to people who are monogamous because that's That's another thing is the misconception that because we're talking about nominogamy, we're like crusaders for like everyone joining the cult of non monogamy, which is absolutely not the case. It's a great name for a band that would Yeah, maybe our next band, Oh there we go, We're going to steal
that for our new theme tune. But I think it is really important that we say that because there we know so many wonderful monogamous people in beautiful monogamous relationships, and the thing that we really care about is that
people are consciously choosing monogamy. It's like you were saying, like, if you don't feel a connection to any nom monogamous concepts and you've looked into it, and you really make that choice to be monogamous with your partner, that's a beautiful thing, and that that can be a wonderful and fulfilling and rich way to live your life. But for us, the most, you know, the authentic way that we can live our life with ourselves is to be non monogamous.
We had an amazing sex historian on the podcast, her and her mum who wrote this amazing book like Sex through the History, and they were both like, nothing is new. What's happening now? Everyone thinks that like this is new, this is a hot this has been going on, Well, monogamy, isn't you monogamy? Yeah? Right?
Has the kinks have all been happening?
I mean those romans, Yeah, they were doing some crazy things, super stuff.
So it was it was so interesting hearing them talk. It's like everyone thinks that this is this brand new idea of this that or whatever, and it's like, no, there's been.
All of this stuff happening.
And I mean they found you know, dil those that were like two thousand years old that they're not usable still, but you know they've been doing oh they'd be dusty.
Yeah. So it's it's interesting.
I find the whole exploration of it really interesting that it's like people are thinking it's it's like, what's this new idea. It's like it's been around a really long time. Yep, that's very true.
I think I know the answer to this already. Can you ever see a time when you might turn round to each other and and go, you know what I think? I think I just want you for sure? And what if the other one says, yeah, I'm not ready for that?
Well, yeah, I think it's like anything, it would be a conversation. You know, it would not be something that would take us off guard, Like we wouldn't accidentally end up in a situation where we were not really seeing I do I about talking about these things because it is a communication we.
You know, in like the name of our podcast, Evolving Love. It's like, evolving doesn't mean evolving to become more and more and more open to the point of, you know, having very separate lives with separate partners. It's just that it's an unfolding, changing thing, also dependent on circumstances, what's happening in life, how busy we might be, health, hormones, like all of these things, you know, play into things.
So like we definitely have periods of time where we do, you know, close up a bit and we become a bit more monogamous, you know, during pregnancy and during you know, having a newborn and all of that was a very us time. And then as things felt a little more you know, coming into a little bit more independence again, in very slow ways, we started opening up again. So you know, we're not always expanding to the point of being extremely open. It's it's a very flexible, fluid situation.
And what's your how old is You've got a boy? Right, yeah, he's six, he's six? What is you know, obviously you're very open communicators. How is this something that you will feel you need to share with him at some point? I mean, does he meet your other partners or how does that work in a parenting style.
So we have a very monogamous home. We don't live with other partners. We're not really we're not affectionate with other partners in front of him. It's not really, that's not really what it's about for us, Not that we're deliberately trying to keep people at bay. He has met different partners of ours, but in the framework of you know, there's a group of us with our friends and we're getting together with their children. We're having a barbecue, we're
having that gathering. So everything is always age appropriate, you know, Like Leam and I don't stand and make out with each other in front of him, and we wouldn't do that with other people in front of him. You know, as he gets older, we will share with him in gentle ways. You know, there's many different ways for people to have a relationship, but to us, the important thing is to be honest and to be in your integrity
and to also be who you are. So he knows that, you know, he has he has a gay auntie and her partner. That's just normal to him. He doesn't have any shame on anything like that. So you know, we're hoping that would be the same for relationships.
Yeah, So have you have you had any challenging situations with like even well I'm sure not so much with the teachers, but certainly family members and possibly other parents or caregivers. You know, there have been situations where you've had challenges and even felt the need to explain or how do you deal with those sort of things?
Well, I think because we have a public profile and we do appear in the media, like people know, you know, it's school drop off. They probably go, those are the no monogamous parents.
Yeah, and Canberra is a small town.
It is a small town.
But what you start to realize with us speaking publicly is people are much more open minded than you would think, you know. And sometimes it's the people that you think would be the most close minded, like some of the parents of our son's friends who are very religious. Once they found out we've had those discussions, we go, oh, we have a podcast, you know, it's about non monogamy
and alternative relationships. They are beautifully inquisitive and they know us as parents and they know that we are caring and loving parents, and our son comes first. And the fact that we talk about this, you know, it's it's not our whole life, you know, talking about nom monogamy isn't our whole life. And because they already have a frame of reference for us as parents, they go, oh, they just do things a little bit differently and kind of move along with their day.
Yeah.
Yeah, we haven't come up against anything negative in our day to day life.
Yeah, that's good.
It's online. That's where the craziest online.
Yeah, well, you know, people were sitting in the dark on the keyboard stuff.
Do you get? What sort of stuff do you get? Like does it really have?
Like you shouldn't be parents, This isn't love.
I'm Jesus without the morals, Without the morals, that's the thing.
That's a good one. That was a good one.
Sometimes let's go with that.
We'll support your band.
Yeah, I mean sometimes sometimes the online commentary does range from very sad to like, you know, funny and so and the witty kind of takedowns of the other funny ones like like we.
Were on the project.
We were on the project, and as part of the filming, I had to play soccer with us son. But the producer for the project all you could find was a basketball and I was like, oh no, that's going to look super weird playing basketball. And then so they filmed it and then they put it on the project and then all these comments were like this idiot doesn't even know what a football.
Is, and I was thinking, I know what a football is, like so I do yeah, yeah, And I was like madribl.
I know.
I was trying to like do I combat these comments? And at a certain point you just have to and I think it did affect like I'm a sensitive person and that the criticisms on me.
As a father were very hard to hear, sure.
And because I really do that's a huge part of my life and something I care deeply about. So I think those were, in all seriousness, quite quite difficult to kind of come across.
Who do you find it the most outspoken? Is it the women or the men?
Is there? Or is it fairly balanced in a negative way?
In a negative way, Oh, I feel like it's quite balanced.
I think it's I think it's fairly even handed. But there is a demographic like kind of shift. So it's so in particular like on Facebook, I guess because it captures a lot of you know, some older demographics. There was you know, I would say a lot of the people were fifties plus. And this is also because they don't necessarily have a frame of reference maybe for non monogamy.
So just seeing the title non monogamous Mother, I think was the title of the video, just triggered them so much, even without watching it, they would engage with it almost as if they knew who we were, how we approached things. And then they just have this kind of really intense reaction because you know that maybe they had never had examples of this before.
Yeah, and I would imagine it's going to hit a nerve for those people who've been cheated on. They're going to go, oh, yeah, well my husband was non monogamous too, because he cheated on me, which is very different to your yes talking about in your agreement.
So yeah, for sure.
What inspired you to start I.
Think I kind of know this the Evolving Love podcast.
Well, I started sharing with some other mum friends of mine when we moved back to Canberra.
And when you said back and where did you move back from?
We were in New York City.
That's a big shit.
It was a big it was New York City to camera, yes there's no slot on camera, but just moving from America to Australia is a big shop.
Sure for sure.
Yeah.
So so moving back to Canberra, which is essentially a wonderful, fantastic cultural town. You know, it's it's not a big city. But yeah, just sharing with other mum friends and of course, you know we're with the babies, we talk about relationships and marriages and everything sort of comes up. And you know, I had a few friends that were like do you and Liam like things seem really good, like what's sort of happening? And I decided to just be honest and
share a little bit about our non monogamous relationship. And I thought that I would be quite heavily judged, you know, these were the sort of the high school friends, and instead I was met with a lot of curiosity, in a lot of harh that kind of makes sense the way the way you explain it, or I'd never considered
it like that. And then I started writing about it, and I started a little private Instagram page, you know, initially for women, and then that sort of grew and you know, the thing with it was you could follow if you were a friend of a friend. So I liked the idea that a conversation would have had to have happened to be able to sort of follow along. Yeah, And I just started writing about it and sharing about it.
And I think the more that you can be yourself and share about these things than other people who were, you know, also non monogamous and just keeping it quite under wraps, you know, felt like sharing as well and reaching out. And there is a big community of non monogamous people and non monogamous parents, but it's very underground because the judgment is very high and people feel protective of their love, they feel protective of their parenting.
But the community aspect is a big thing for us as well. And you know, we run regular conversation nights in Canberra and in Sydney as well, and we did one last night actually in Newtown and what was incredible was that we deliberately kind of capped them to about twenty people come along and people it's for some of them it's the first time they've ever been able to share about their non monogamy in public without the feeling
of being judged. And it is a really powerful thing, like people going you know, I grew up in the church. Some of them are still involved in the church, but they have this side of them that they feel they can't really live authentic lives and it's such a shame and I think it is really important and the work that Abby does with her writing on sub Stack and all this type of thing, like to destigmatize these alternative ways of doing things and to make people do it
just to allow them to feel seen. You know, it's such an important part of why we started Evolving Love as well. I think, you know, just having these conversations with people and just you know, allowing people to kind of share these really unique experiences, it's been really powerful.
And I look, I imagine that through these sort of evenings and the other community experiences with what you're talking about with the Mother's group, that you've inspired people to open up and bring that into their bring it into their lives.
Yeah, there have been people that have you know, decided to open up their relationship or they challenging their sort of ideas that they'd had about monogamy because they can be you know, when you start talking about this stuff, then you can also turn to the well, why are we monogamous? Is it because mum and dad were monogamous? Is it because you know all of the couples on TV monogamous in Disney and all of that. So there can be a lot of Yeah, there can be a
lot of sort of questioning that happens. But our conversation evenings also attract monogamous people as well who like the idea of the sort of emotional work or exploration of like, you know, emotionally exploring non monogamy within the context of their relationship because you know, sort of like living in that fantasy land because it's like, just because something you like, the idea of something, or it's a fantasy of that you might have, you don't necessarily have to then bring
that into reality. What sometimes works in the fantasy doesn't translate.
So yeah, because my fantasy is always end that very bad. I go down the road, and I'll go down that road and go what would happen if me go, Yeah, that's not good?
Yeah, but it's enjoyable. Is it enjoyable going down the road?
Though?
Sometimes for a little bit and then and then it's like, yeah, no, that's not what I want. Yeah, I want that. Yeah, I want that, you know because.
Even if the fantasy is like me playing golf with.
You, Oh no, that's a definite. That's that's I stay on that road. That's a strong fantasy, that's what we might do. What we might do up in the bushes on the thirteenth when we played that might be fun. I can go with that one all the way.
Have you had any with the podcast? Have you had any sort of surprising or particularly challenging guess that you don't have to name them, but anything that's been really hard or challenging to deal with.
Yeah, we had we had a really profound conversation with a guy called Andrew Gerzer. He's a disability advocate and he's kind of a queer disabled. He's got multiple sclerosis, so he's wheelchair bound, he's in carry and cerebral palsy. Sorry, and so you know, it was quite an arresting conversation for us to have talking about his ability to access you know, sex workers for his mental health, because that's the only way he can have these sexual interactions because
of his disability. And I think conversations like that, I think we broke down in tears afterwards, like it was such it was just so you know, affecting on an emotional level and just kind of highlighted the importance of talking to people who have very different experiences from your own. I think that for me was a really big conversation.
And he also identifies as somebody who is non monogamous but isn't practicing non monogamy, so it was very Yeah,
so many interesting insights from him. I would say some of it hasn't happened often, but I think less so on the podcast, but sometimes with some people I think where I sort of struggle sometimes in the conversation is if there are people who sort of say that this is a better way, you know, if there are people who are like, polyamory is a more evolved way of being, it's a better way of being in a relationship, And I just don't connect with that at all, you know,
it's such a Having a relationship is such an individual experience. You bring your whole history into it, and everybody it's going to be different for everybody. So yeah, I don't connect with that.
Let's just assume for a moment that this is this is one I one first episode. Can you can you just you just mentioned because you're only I'm asking this speech, you mentioned polyamory for me, who's not very well studied in this certainly not experienced in it. What is the difference between polyamory and non monogamous relationship?
So they all fall under the umbrella term of ethical non monogamy, but people often use ethical non monogamy or E and M now as this sort of way of like having friends where you might be intimate like you'd have lovers, but it's not necessarily full on building a life together committed relationship. Polyamory which is like polyamory, is
like many loving relationships, like many ongoing loving relationships. So the umbrella term is ethical non monogamy, but people casually use it as something that's a little bit not as escalated as polyamory as well, so different to swinging, like a bit more of an ongoing connections. I would say, yeah, okay, but not full on polyamory. And then there's open relationship, and then there's don't ask, don't tell, And then.
I guess that's that's certain. Don't ask, don't tell. Is that's there's an agreement there isn't there. It's just I guess the shit hits the fan when someone finds out don't ask, don't tell.
Well, I mean it's an arrange.
Weird, wouldn't it what?
It's an interesting arrangement, and I mean it is very ethically done in the sense that there's an agreement between the couple.
Well that's the hope that they will get.
To experience this, you know, these relationships, but there's just no kind of conversation directly dressing that with the partner. So it is a very complex landscape to navigate, and we don't practice that. Don't ask, don't tell obviously, Yeah, we're I love to.
We love to share about things. You know, if Liam goes on a date with somebody and has a connection, I want to know about that. I'm interested and I'm interested in what comes up for him or what he
might share. And you know, sometimes I see a different aspect of Liam or he'll say, oh, you know, and she asked me this, and we had this conversation and then it made me think about that, and there's that moment where I'm like, oh, gosh, you know, I hadn't thought about you in that way, or we haven't spoken
about that in a while. So, you know, because I guess the you know, a bit of a thing around it is that, you know, when you connect with different people, different people sort of you can share different aspects of
yourself with different people. So even though Liam and I are so familiar and I feel like I know him, you know, so deeply, and I do, there might still be you know, new things that come up for you if you're in conversation with someone else, because they're a different person and they're engaging with you in a different way.
So which comes back to and I know that you get asked this and about the jealousy aspect. And then so for someone who's not has evolved, they're feeling they still feel that that. I might say, I use the word evolved in terms of evolving a jealous standpoint. You talk, what's the word calm Compersian? Right, So I imagine I'm putting Ali and I in this situation, and Ow's now sitting with another fellow, and he and she comes home, and I go, how to go, you know, with old mate?
And already I can feel myself done. How to go with old mate? You know, you weren't with me sort of being oh, he was great. He asked me about X y Z. Now I'm already self flagellating, going fuck, I should have asked her about why she's gonna like him way better than me. I'm going to be out the door now.
I would almost take the hypothetical back a step. I would say, let's say we're on the golf course and Barry is playing. Yeah exactly, we're going to start, okay, and you guys are playing around together, and you are at the thirteenth hole okay, and Barry is. Barry is on the other other green, but he can kind of
see over to you guys on the thirteenth hole. That would be the moment to start to be like, how would you feel if Barry was just on another hole seeing what's going on in the you know, on the
thirteenth hole. You know, that would be the moment to be like, how do we feel about like the exhibitionism of that, and how would we howoud we feel about that inside ourselves before jumping to like the most intense version of the scenario, where it's like, you know, because because sometimes like that could be really exciting once you start to kind of dip your feet into those conversational fantasy territories. And I would say, you know, something that
we say to people is like, just explore that. It doesn't have to be full send. You know, you don't have to imagine being in an orgy of two hundred people. You know, It's it's like you can really just kind of explore these concepts.
Yeah, there we go. That can happen to the golf course at the club afterwards.
Yeah, yeah, both of you. Is it exciting sexually when you're like, when you're attracted to another woman and you're having a great time with her, does that excite you sexually? Or is it more just you're happy that that Liam's happy. Is there a sexual excitement to it as well?
Yeah, I mean everybody is different. For me, there is. That is sort of how Compersian looks for me, more so than the thought of Liam forming a deep loving bond where they're like, you know, having They're having big getaways and going for picnics and all these sort of non sexual activities. While I think that's really lovely and I'm not I'm not like against it, it's not really
that's a more neutral space for me. And then depend and if I'm say I'm pre menstrual or things like that, those jealousy feelings that come up for nearly everybody will get exacerbated. So it's also very interesting for me with my hormonal landscape sort of how I sort of it's like the Compersian and the jealousy knobs. You know, they're going up and down and you know all of that. So trying to be gentle on myself with that. And Liam's always been aware of that too, so being sensitive
to each other. But I think a lot of it also comes down to who the person is, you know, who who you know at the moment you know, and for a while now, Liam has a wonderful lover and she's also our friend, and she dates other people, but we also we go for coffee together, the three of us. Sometimes her and I go and right together. We have that baseline of friendship. I trust her, I have that
Metamoor connection. So Metamore your partner's partner, and that's and that's really lovely and I feel really safe in that connection. So you know, she's not moving into our family, she's not trying to pull our marriage apart or anything like that.
What would happen if that did enter in? You've got you've got a whiff of that. I mean, you're clearly an emotionally intelligent, sensitive person. You pick up a whiff of that. I feel getting what happens.
Then we're pretty intuitive people. I would say I would pick up on that very early on. And I think a lot of that also comes down to what somebody is looking for. You know, she's not looking for this particular primary person. She's really enjoying being a solo polyamorous so she first and foremost dates herself and then dates
other people. So if she was looking to like build family and find her husband, and she was looking towards Liam for that not compatible because that's not available in our way of being non monogamous.
And I think it's about compatibility with partners. You know, sometimes what we're looking for might not be compatible with other partners. And that's a question about communicating with each other what we're looking for, but also communicating with other potential partners and saying, look, if this is exactly what you're looking for, I don't think even if we may be aligned on a bunch of things, there might be it might not be the greatest of fits.
Yeah.
Yeah, you can tell if someone's looking for more or yeah, and then it's yeah, someone's going to get hurt.
Yeah in the yeah, do.
You feel a responsibility to advocate and educate people on non monogamous relationships?
Look, I don't see us as educators, but we're storytellers and were happy to share our own personal experience because we're in a privileged place to be able to do that. And when I say privileged, I mean we have the love and board of our families, we have our friends, we have that security. We're not going to be sort of excommunicated from our you know, from our parents or anything. So with that, we feel comfortable to talk about our relationship and then, you know, hope to open up a
space where other people can share about their relationship. But we're not educators, we're not therapists, we're storytellers, I would say, in that space.
So, yeah, is.
That you feel the same way.
Yeah, I think that's really spot on.
I think the sense of responsibility comes with a bit of a bigger platform and the importance of making sure that all the conversations we have remains centered around like ethics and doing things ethically and also destigmatizing alternative things.
I think if we can do whatever we can to kind of push the conversation forward a little bit, and maybe actors like you know, an example of people doing things ethically that are non monogamous, I think that's there is some responsibility that comes with that that I think we both feel, and just to make sure that we're having conversations in good faith, you know, across the spectrum.
Can I ask you this, what advice do you have for couples who are considering this opening of a relationship.
I would say, look into other people's stories, hear how they're doing it, Listen to some non monogamous podcasts. There are some really great ones out there. We have one, but there are others as well. You know, there are some fantastic books poly Secure by Jessica Fern, Sex at Dawn by doctor Christopher Ryan and Cecilda Jetha. There are some fantastic books out there. There are researchers. But you
also don't need to rush into things. I would say, go slow, keep it in the fantasy, talk about the hypotheticals, sort of have a process of you know, talk through what might come up as you're discussing it, Sit with it. Don't rush because you don't want to shock yourself. It's not an end race, you know, it's not just sort of it's a process, like any relationship is not an end goal.
And also to come to it from a place of strength. You never want to use non monogamy as like, oh, you know there's been infidelity, so let's open up the relationship, or you know the relationship isn't going great, maybe non
monogamy will solve everything. I think a bit of advice that when we were starting to open up, someone said that no monogamy is almost like a magnifying glass, you know, and if you hold it over your relationship, and if your relationship is already strong and you have strong communication, these things will blossom and bloom within a non monogamous context.
But if there are cracks, if you don't have great communication, if you take each other for granted, or you're using it as a band aid, you know, it's almost it's going to be very difficult and could you know, completely implode the relationship. So just really understanding where you're coming from within your current relationship before or kind of looking outwards.
Yeah, so interesting when you began and did someone tell you to take them? I think what you just said, Abby was absolutely beautiful. Just small steps, be gentle, patient, kind, I guess kind with yourself and your partner did was that your was that what you were, how you were being mentored when you first came in.
Yeah, that was how we approached it. We spoke about potentially opening up our relationship for almost a year before we acted on that, and then we started going to some talks about non monogamy and different discussions, so, you know, not diving into that sort of sexual experiences of it, but learning about it and meeting other people was really important.
And finding great examples of no monogamous relationships because we were so fortunate to meet people who'd been married thirty years and no monogamous for twenty years, like people who had really had so much life experience, and we just gravitated towards just like A were saying about storytelling, We're gravitated towards the stories, you know, and that's what we try to do in regards to anything like monogamous relationships
that are beautiful and fruitful. And your story is also an incredible one, and so I think just looking for those beautiful like stories of connection and trying to take as much as we can from those.
I think, for me, the.
Thing about the both of you that really strikes me is, you know, monogamy, non monogamy, whatever, it's just you know, I think if everyone just took took home, the amount of communication that you both have is really actually inspiring and incredibly beautiful. And this is why you can be whoever you want to be in this marriage, because you're so open with each other. And that's everything. I mean,
you know, relationship one on one is communication. No one says anything different than how do I get on the same playing with my husband wife? It's communication and you've got it so beautifly happening within the two of you.
So it's it's to you. Kudos to both of you.
Thanks aally, thank you.
Let's do the pulse, so we'll do a little thing at the end.
We're all excited.
Short, short answers, but we both can you both.
Answer the same question at the same time.
We want to hear your answer. William's got a big voice. Okay, for question number one? What brings you.
Joy, curiosity and.
Fun?
Yeah, like I guess specific examples talking family.
Times, family, parenting each other, creativity, curiosity.
Is there one time that you would love to revisit in your life?
I think the New York New York chapter, New York chapter.
We love New York and we I proposed to Abby in New York at the Met Opera in the in the foyer, like you know, those those moments are hold a deep place my heart.
Yeah, yeah, I would say the same thing. The New York chapter. We miss it dearly. It almost feels like Narnia. Now, yeah, that's how I think about it.
The bagels, O, yes, every day I missed those bagels.
Gods, the New York bagels.
So I heard.
You know why why they taste so good? It's the water. Oh yeah, it's the water. It's the New York water. It's the same with Guinness beer. Send to concentrate over from from from Dublin and they mix it with the New York water.
Not the same.
It tastes really great.
The No, the Guinness is best in Ireland. Don't tell me.
What is me? Yeah, I'm hearing the Irish.
Irish people screaming.
The Irish people are happy about That's why they love New York so much. Because the beer tastes just as good because it's the New York water which makes the bagels and the pizza bases taste. I love New York pizza. What do you miss when you die, Chris? What do you miss when you're not together?
Oh? Look, we're always in charge.
We have.
We do message each other a lot, like you know, there's like twenty thousand photos in our camera roll just to each other and WhatsApp, like you know, it's.
It's we're never not in contact, right, there's always something happening.
Yeah, yeah, but but I think I definitely there's been moments, you know, there's been times where you know, we haven't chatted, you know, for I'd probably say the longest is like a day or two, Like, yeah, it's really it's really not that long that we're apart from each other. But I think there's certainly an amount of time where I just find myself missing, like you know, the companionship. You know, we have so much fun together. We're always laughing. There's
always something funny happening, like no monogamy. Also, there's so many constellations of different things to talk about, and.
You know, so it's there's just funny things. There's a lot of funny things that go on.
So I think I think whenever we don't talk, you know, for an extended period of time, it's kind of for me, it's the humor and just the communication.
Okay, last question. One word to describe each other.
Oh so many words. That's a hard question.
So I would say wise, for you, even from when we first met, when you were a young man of twenty one, you've always had a bit of a you've had wisdom, an intuition, but also you're hilarious.
I just feel like you are.
I know, that's a weird thing to say about it.
You know, your man, but you are that's very kind.
I would say curious and something that I'm endlessly attracted to in Abby is just this sense of curiosity, not just for relationships, but for life, you know, for the way she moves through the world, her friendships. She's always curious about other people. She's interested in connecting. I think the curiosity feeds into that, it feeds into being a creative person. So I would say curiosity.
Can you just share a couple of funny Is there funny experiences in monogamy?
Oh?
Yeah, always, can you share?
I think one of the funniest experiences when when we were kind of initially opening up and we were meeting up with a couple up in Boston. Yes, and so we became kind of started. We met these people online. We were down in Nashville at the time, and we kind of met online and we're going to catch up in Nashville cross paths, and we weren't able to meet up in Nashville, so they lived in Boston.
We were in New York.
We were ships in the night, but we were ships in the night, so we're like, Okay, let's catch up in Boston. And so everything was online. We were talking lots we're sending photos. They were lovely, you know, and then we started to get a little bit convinced that they were catfishing us and that they.
Weren't real people.
Yes, so we drive four hours up to Boston, right and where at this restaurant where they told us to kind of meet them. And then the excuses start coming in, like running a little bit late, you know, well, something's come up, will be there soon.
And I started to get paranoid and I was looking around this restaurant. There was this man sitting in the corner and I said.
I bet it's that's him. That's the cat bit right over there.
There's something definitely going on.
And the excuses also became even more elaborate, like like we knew that he was a firefighter, and he was like, oh, you know, I had to go to a firefighter funeral, so this is why I'm late. And we're like okay, like no worries, like no rush, you know. And it got to the point where they were like an hour.
Over an hour, we're about to leave.
We were about to leave. We're like we're going to finish our drink and then we're out of here because someone is watching us. And this is like some crazy joke and we had a nice airban bit anyway, so we're like, oh, we're going to have a great time.
This is just a funny experience.
And then they rock up and it was actually they were real, and they were also just we're very good friends of this.
Day and the absolutely beautiful. This lovely cos absolutely lovely.
And the amazing part about that story is the reason they were late, and they hadn't shared this with us. They and they shared with us the next day because we exchanged kind of social media handles and they said, you know, the reason we didn't exchange social media handles with you guys before is we're actually parents, and we didn't we thought we felt too embarrassed to say that we were non monogamous and parents because we thought you
might judge us. So just so you know, our instagrams are full of you know us, you know, going to fire fighting functions and with our kids and.
So and so.
And the reason they were late was because they had babysitter problems and they couldn't.
Get that taking too long. It was taken too long, but they.
Hadn't told us the reason, so they they were just freaking out about like all the possible all the possible kind of excuses they could come up with, and so.
But that was really interesting because it also you know, showed us the level of sort of judgment that there can be, you know, for them as parents to other non monogamous people, I think because we weren't parents at the time.
Then and then they also formed as beautiful examples of people who were non monogamous who also had a beautiful family life, and that started the conversations inspiring. Yeah, we found them to be super inspiring in credit conversations with us, where we thought, maybe, you know, we can be non monogamous and great parents as well.
This is a great example of that. And and you know, it was. It was a crazy story and there's so many things came out of it, exciting.
Curious and wise. Abby and Liam, thank you so much. I feel wiser and more experienced just being around you and experiencing this today. So thanks, really appreciate your time.
Thank you for having us, Thanks for having us being great chat