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Ustwo: You're mistaken or operating from poor assumptions on several levels here. I suspect you're bringing a swinger's view of things to polyamory. I don't know what other view you'd bring, of course, given that you've got experience with the one and not the other.
It's not that there's any particular type of relationship or poly-family structure that works and others that don't. People make whatever works for them work, end of story. There are plenty of relationships where one woman has two men. There are plenty where one man has two women who aren't with each other. Happens all the time.
The only guideline here is: Does everyone know and does everyone consent? If so, it's polyamory. Now, there are people who get into it for lousy reasons--same as swinging. There are people who are curious and try it and it doesn't work for them. There are people who get into it with good intentions, it works for a while, and they quit doing the work (putting jealousies to bed takes WORK!) and it goes to hell for them. But it's a mistake to turn that into "X type of relationship is fundamentally unstable". For every example you can find, I can find counter-examples. Whether it works out or not has a lot more to do with the individuals than some "IS" or "ISN'T" about it.
I'm finding myself drawn to defend my lifestyle here, which my rational mind knows is unnecessary. I do appreciate your worrying about us, but trust me when I say, we've worked out everything we need to work out to be very comfortable with our choices, and we're clear we're both committed to doing the work in the future.
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