Poly familiesFollow

As some of you may know, I am polyamorous. I have two boyfriends, who both know about each other and are fine with the situation. One of them is married and has another girlfriend, both of whom he lives with. The other has had some flings but hasn't found anything else serious as of yet.

I recently told my parents about this. They don't really get it, but generally speaking they're supportive. Or so I thought. I was talking to them about being poly a few nights ago, and they asked what I would do if I had kids. Would I continue this lifestyle or would I settle down and be monogamous. I told them that I didn't see why having kids would change anything. My mom wasn't particularly happy with that answer, but my step-dad got very upset. He essentially told me that he thinks that that sort of environment is not appropriate to raise children in, and if I do have kids and continue that lifestyle, he will do everything in his power to protect my children from me. Essentially, he would have my kids taken away from me.

I think part of the issue here is that he has no idea what this would consist of. I don't know if he thinks I'd be having orgies in the house, in the room next to where my kids sleep or what. That wouldn't be the case. What my ideal is for having a family, is that I would like a household with more than two parents. So, if for example, my secondary boyfriend and I stayed together, and our primary relationships were still going strong, the four of us might get a house together. His girlfriend doesn't want to have children of her own because she has a lot of health problems and doesn't want to pass them on. But I think it would be a fantastic experience to grow up in a house with more than two parents. Some things kids feel comfortable talking about to one parents, other things to a different parent. Plus there's not going to be as much stress to find baby-sitters or day-care, and the more incomes a household has, the better off financially it will be.

I'm curious, what do you guys think? Do you think growing up in a household where you have more than two parents that love you and care for you is unhealthy? Immoral? Or do you think it has the potential to be a really great experience? I'm a big fan of the saying "It takes a village to raise a child." That's where a lot of these thoughts come from.

The problem is that multiple parents will only serve to confuse a child, or alienate them from their peers as they get older. When John or Jane tell their teacher they have 3 daddies and 4 mommies, questions are going to start, and your kid is going to be in the middle of it.

I look at it this way. If it's going to potentially harm your kid down the road, be ready to give it up if necessary. If you aren't willing to sacrifice yourself for your kid, you shouldn't have any.

As far as the "It takes a village" belief, I always read that as "I'm too pathetic to raise my own child". I'm married but my wife is pretty much the definition of a ****-poor parent, and our nearest family is about 3500 miles away. Granted she's only 3, but she's well mannered, behaved, intelligent, curious, and creative, so I'd say I've managed just fine without a village to do my job for me.

As far as your lifestyle, to each their own. If it's not hurting anyone else, **** what others think.

I kind of agree with Raolan, on some points.

Will it confuse the kid? Probably not. If it's what the child has always known, and you and your companions are good parents, then I don't see any internal issues.

However, Raolan does have a good point about it raising some questions from other people. Our society is much more accepting than it once was, but that doesn't mean everyone is going to look at your situation with approval. There are going to be questions, whether it's the child's teachers, friends, other parents, etc. In a more extreme situation, such as your stepdad, it's possible people will fight to have your kids taken away, because they view that as an unfit situation for a child to be in.

I'm of the opinion that a family can be whatever the hell it wants, whether that's a same gendered couple, a polyamorous arrangement, or plain old mom and dad, as long as the child is raised well. It always needs to be the child first (but you knew that anyways).



tl;dr: I don't see it causing any internal problems - there's no reason something like that wouldn't work beautifully. But what do I know, I'm no child psychologist. However, you just need to be prepared, because something like that will raise eyebrows.

Some kids are going to learn from their parents to denigrate or be alienated from other children who have Muslim parents, or Atheist parents, or Religious parents, or poor parents, or rich parents, or immigrant parents, or mentally ill parents, or addicted parents, or Handicapped parents. Prejudice is a fact of life. All we can do is teach our own children to be as open minded as possible, and to try and judge individuals on their own merits, rather than their backgrounds.

My folks divorced when I was 6. It didn't take me long to figure out the "game" I could play with them. Dad and his wife on the weekends, mom and her husband on weekdays. Basically 2 sets of parents. Mom says no/dad says yes, etc.
Children will find the weak-link and exploit it for their benefit.

In no way am I pushing the "man+wife only" idea here. Just trying to point out with multiple adults playing parent, there will be conflict among them when it comes to saying yes/no, punishments/awards, etc. That would be something that I'd want to clear up before any young ones are produced. Some serious emotional hurt could be brought on all parties involved if not.

And yes, kids with just 2 parents have the same problem. But with 4+ "parents", can you see the potential for that same problem to get out of hand?

Just something to think on.

I think it's a concern about parental boundaries and understanding who is who. Does each of your boyfriends get an equal share in disciplining the children? How about their spouses? "This is John and he's 'Daddy #3' but his wife Carol is no one to you" Children do better with structure and I don't think the environment you describe really provides that. Even in the "village", kids understand that it's immediate parents first, then perhaps extended family, trusted adults, etc.

From a parenting level, it's hard enough to coordinate discipline between two parties and sound consistent. I can't even imagine the nightmare of discipline by committee between a group of people with varying blood ties to the child in question or the confusion that would cause. I don't think it's "immoral" as such but I think it's a whole hell of a lot more complicated than "You have three mommies and two daddies who love you -- yay!!"

I'm not using "discipline" here to just mean groundings or that sort of thing. I'm talking about the whole punishment/reward structure, decisions about what the child can/can't do, etc.

It is difficult enough to coordinate with just one other person when it comes to raising a kid. I'd like to say I can't imagine the nightmare of a having a half dozen other people putting in their two cents, but that's the grandparents' job and there's no bigger headache than dealing with two sets of culturally different old farts telling you what's what. And that many more people, ugh.

I'm picturing something as simple as "I took two piano lessons and hate it, I want to quit".

So biological mom thinks kid should stick with it. Biological dad thinks kid should get to quit. Satellite "parents" A & B thinks "stick with it" but Satellite "parent C thinks quit. Is biological dad "outvoted"? Should there be any circumstance where the non-biological parents get to overrule the biological parents? If not, they're not really parents, are they? More like glorified aunts and uncles who mom happens to fuck. Even in a traditional step-parenting situation, which can get hairy enough when the "this is my kid" emotions run high, you at least realize that you're taking pretty well defined slots and the two of you are hopefully equal co-partners. Again, I don't think it's innately immoral, just not easy and not necessarily better than the norm.

That said, the chance of Pigtail's step-father successfully removing the hypothetical kids over this is about nil. Courts are notoriously loathe to remove kids from their biological parents, sometimes to a fault. Unless there's evidence that the children are being actively abused or neglected, I don't see them being removed on account of too many adults living in the same household.

Edited, Jan 20th 2012 8:58am by Jophiel

I think the problem is more people take marriage less seriously, the willingness to divorce so quickly is a result. But I don't really seeing that changing anytime soon, so arguing that is kind of pointless really.

As to the original question, I think Joph hit the nail on the head. Defining the roles is a must to give the child structure. Without that you could be in for some big problems. If you can define that and have everyone living together agree on it, then it could be a positive environment for the kid.

I think your step-dad's concerns likely go back to his own hang-ups. I can only speculate, but he's probably viewing it as some sort of hippy-commune or cult. He probably views it as a dangerous environment for a kid, maybe fearing that the child may be abused or some such. We used to hear a lot of stories about that back in the 70s and 80s. Of course you never heard of the ones that were cool and functioned as intentioned, but I digress. He sees your relationship as some sort of deviant behavior, so he figured further deviant behavior is inevitable.

I doubt your step-dad would have any legal authority to take your children from you unless they were in a dangerous environment. Really without that, he wouldn't have a leg to stand on. It's unfortunate he feels that way, perhaps with time he'll come around.

This has more or less been said 20 different ways already, but that's never stopped me before. Kids are raised in all variety of households by extended families, grandparents, with cousins, shared households, etc. they are all quite capable of turning out alright. It'll depend more on the character of the people you are with than anything else, IMO. Expect not-normal living conditions to cause them trouble with their peers, at least from time to time. But, as long as they have good people around them to rely on they'll probably be fine.

♫ My polyamorous friend,
You've got me in a mess of trouble again...♫

Edited, Jan 20th 2012 12:36pm by Eske

I don't have that issue since I don't get off on cartoons for six year old girls.

You do?