1.

“The days of the traditional nuclear family being the only model are giving way to other options….Disagreements are dealt with by ranting, raving and pouting until the ladies realize I was right all along. Just kidding. They are dealt with like any other relationship, except there are more people involved. I tend to be the kind of person who holds a lot of frustrations inside until it all boils over, and then we sit down, maybe yell a bit, and finally discuss and negotiate like adults until the issue has been resolved.”

—Reggie, partner of Eeza and Cassidy

2.

“The way I explained to it to my parents, and to friends that just can’t seem to get it—I just challenge our way of thinking as a society. Romantic love is the only thing that people have a hard time getting their head around having more of, which they understand in every other way. When you have a second child, no one is like, ‘But you love the first one so much!’ If you have a great connection with two friends then you wouldn’t be, like, ‘Oh my god I have two best friends, what do I do?’ It’s not this big existential dilemma if you open up and you’re just like, this is more. And more, especially of love, is a good thing.”

—Matthew, partner of Daniel and Travis

3.

“In our eyes, we are married….I’m the breadwinner, as I work a 40-hour week and make the majority of the family’s income. Doll does the cooking, and Kitten does the cleaning. It works perfectly for us.”

—Brynn, partner of Doll and Kitten

4.

“What I love about polyamory is that everything is up for modification. There are no ‘shoulds.’ You don’t have to draw a line between who is a lover and who is a friend. It’s about what is the path of my heart in this moment.”

—Sarah, partner of Jonica and Michael

5.

“My family is very ordinary to me. We eat dinner together. We gather in the living room and watch movies. Last weekend, we went on a camping trip and sat around the campfire making s’mores, the grown-ups enjoying a few beers while my 9-year-old daughter challenged us with endless rounds of ‘would you rather?’ It all feels so wonderfully mundane that sometimes I have to remind myself that most people view us as strange at best, depraved at worst.”

—Angi, partner with an unnamed husband and boyfriend

6.

“Our relationship is based on love, honesty, communication. It feels equal to me. Um, my relationship with Dani, and my relationship with Melinda, and Melinda and Dani, we’re an equally compassionate polyamorous relationship.”

—Jonathan, partner of Dani and Melinda

7.

“It might seem strange to a lot of people, but to us it makes perfect sense. We all love each other and it was our dream to fall pregnant at the same time. Unlike conventional couples who are sleep deprived when a newborn comes along, there are three of us to take it in turns on the night shift. We breastfeed each other’s babies, split the finances three ways and the housework too. Even sex is great, as if one person is not feeling up for it, then there are two other people to choose from.”

—Melinda, partner of Dani and Jonathan

8.

“At times it has been hard to adapt to, as for me just being with Melinda was enough. So to see her fall in love with Jonathan was at times tough. But I began to realize that I could love him too, in my own way. And the more we talked to each other, the easier over time it has got. There are moments when I just want Melinda to myself, but now there are also moments when I feel just as strongly about Jonathan, too. We have just learned to cope better as time goes on.”

—Dani, partner of Melinda and Jonathan

9.

“We all felt very excited when we realized that we were in love and that we all wanted the same thing (a long-term committed relationship as three). And then there was a LOT of open and honest communication, of course. There has to be with any successful couple, and so with three people, even more so. It was very important to us that every single person was on the exact same page, or there was no way we were doing anything. No one felt pushed or coerced into anything. We really tried to look at this from a number of different angles, including the potential problems we could have, and kept feeling okay about taking another step forward. Every step forward just felt so right on so many different levels, and doors kept opening up right and left.”

—Anonymous woman, partner of anonymous woman and man

10.

“I am in a relationship with two guys, each having his own insecurities and needs and goals. Each of us is a complete universe unto ourselves. Three-way sex is hot. Three-way fights suck. Sometimes they annoy me. Sometimes they charm me. Sometimes I want to run away and hide, be alone. We are lucky because we have a three-bedroom house and a back house that we can escape to if we need it. It’s nice knowing there’s a place I can go to that is all mine. It’s important. It’s hard not to get lost with all these people around. It is important to me that we are each given the opportunity to maintain our selves, to have our own lives and our own experiences inside all of this. That isn’t always easy. It is something we work at very hard.”

—Jeff, husband of Alex and boyfriend of Jon

11.

“I thought, how is this going to turn out? You can’t read an article in Reader’s Digest, ‘Twelve Ways to make a Triad Work.’ I decided to go for it. I turned to them and said, ‘I love you,’ and ‘I love you,’ and let’s make it work.”

—Wilson, partner of Doug and Robert