ratbastid

MAN have you come to the right place! I'm glad to have this to comment on.

A little background. My wife (who doesn't come here much anymore, but goes by "lurkette") is bisexual. We experimented with relationships "outside" for some time, with varying levels of sanity and success. Currently--and for life, as far as we can see right now--we have an amazing and wonderful relationship with a woman whom you'll see here posting under the name StellaLuna. The three of us live together, and have since the beginning of 2007, and so far it's been the best year-and-a-third of my life.

Okay, this is perfectly said. You keep standing HERE, and I PROMISE you, everything's going to work out.

And it may not be pretty on its way to working out.

Little story. A few years ago, lurky and I were seeing a woman, a married woman whose husband was (at this point) entirely cool with it. We were seeing her together, which was our agreement and arrangement. We saw both of them socially, and mostly took her to bed, although he was sometimes there too as a peripheral player, which actually worked just fine for him.

Sounds great, right? Except it wasn't, quite. See, our object of affection has a thing for teasing and withholding. She plays games and has arcane rules and is generally touchy. We knew all this going in, but the net effect is, we don't experience getting what we want from her. Or at least, not reliably. So there's always tension, always being left wanting more. And--and here I'll speak strictly for myself--my dissatisfaction starts coming out in snarky, mean, petty, pressuring ways. I start putting more and more pressure on her, which pushes right into her teasing/withholding thing, and makes her resist even more; big vicious circle.

Finally she has the wherewithal to end it... with me. But says she still wants to be with lurkette.

And thus began one of the hardest, most painful, most transformational periods of my life. First, I had to deal with being dumped. Second, I had to deal with the woman I love most in the world's sexual expression being on the line, and the question of whether I was going to let my jealousy and hurt squash that. I'm ashamed to say that for a while, I did. I was all wrapped up in my little bundle of pain, and couldn't let them be together without me.

Finally, I had to have a sit-down with myself. I got some distance from it, and really created a commitment to my wife's sexual expression that's bigger than my hurt little feelings. I let them pursue their relationship, and committed myself to mastering my emotional reaction to it. Ultimately, here's what I saw: it made her happy. It made her happy in a way that I can't (and, I saw, I make her happy in a way this girl couldn't). And I started getting glad she had that in her life to make her happy.

There's more to the story (I was soon back "in" after chilling out, then her husband melted down and we ended it with her), but that's the part that pertains to your situation.

My advice to you: look to create a commitment (and it WILL have to be CREATED) that's bigger than your emotions. Get interested in her happiness. Have that be more important to you than your jealousy or your left-outness or however you'd characterize what you're feeling. Don't discount what you're feeling, or try to feel something other than what you feel; just have something bigger than your feelings that you're ACTUALLY interested in.

It might be interesting to analyze your emotions (ie. is it your wife you're jealous of sharing? Is it that you wish you could be with S too? etc, etc, etc), but that can also be a long, dark tunnel that doesn't lead anywhere. I'd encourage you not to get too fascinated with yourself, at this point.

Feel free to ask any questions--my life's pretty much an open book here on TFP. You're welcome to PM me, if you're more comfortable.