Scheduling as a hinge and parent
Didn't realize I had a business link attached, deleted it, and reposting!
TLDR: For context.. husband and I have been together 14 years, married almost 9. We have 3 kids (18, 7, and 3). I have a boyfriend of 3 years. Hubby and I started as sexually enm and over the years, that looked many different ways. In 2023, I had a new FWB that I eventually started catching feelings for. This was new, so I talked to my hubby about it, and he was ok with it continuing and becoming a relationship. We had been ENM, new boyfriend had only ever been monogamous, poly was new to everyone.
Over the years, the boyfriend struggled with feeling like he didn't get enough of my time, so I tried to restructure our schedule. He picked me up after work on Saturdays around 5:30, he took me back home 8-9 on Sunday night (I usually miss kids bedtime). Mondays my husband works, but my boyfriend and I are both off, so I usually spend all day over there until he takes me home between 8-9 (I do sometimes schedule appointments on Mondays and always have a trade out massage 4-5:30). Tuesdays and Wednesdays I go home after work with my husband and kids. Thursdays my boyfriend picks me up from work around 7:30, takes me home, and stays the night. Fridays I go home with husband and kids. My boyfriend also has a job that allows me to go hang out with him while he works, so if I have slow days or large gaps between clients, I'll go up there.
Tuesday, my husband and I had therapy and I brought up a struggle we had over Mother's Day weekend, because it was shared with my boyfriend's birthday. I don't try to practice hierarchy (but I'm learning some things default to that), so after bringing all of this up, our therapist asked my husband how he felt and it blew up. After a very uncomfortable, emotionally hard session, we were walking away with changes needing to be made: we needed to restructure the schedule to allow me to be home more with the family (not about more time for my husband specifically) and my husband and I both need to be more intentional about one on one time together.
This week has been very emotionally rough for me trying to navigate this and my hubby and I didn't have time to really talk until Wednesday night. We had a good talk, came up with solutions, we both were happy with the outcome, and I felt lighter than I had since therapy.
My boyfriend had already gone to bed, but I went ahead and text him the outcome of our convo. That going forward, he will now get me at 5 PM on Sundays, leave to bring me home Mondays at 8 PM (we never had set times before, but I felt it was important). Tuesday-Friday stays the same, with him still bringing me home and staying on Thursdays, and me still going to his work when my schedule allows. This changes it from 3 nights home for bedtime, to 5 nights, and from being gone mostly all weekend, to home most of the weekend. This is all because my hubby was starting to feel taken advantage of timewise and felt he had become manager of the house. I see why he has been feeling this way and agreed that I did need to be present with our family more. My husband also said he is fine with my boyfriend coming over more or joining us for family things, but my boyfriend usually doesn't, because it still makes him uncomfortable to see my husband and I interact as husband and wife (this is a whole separate issue for another time).
I woke up to multiple messages from my boyfriend not liking this new schedule (he has a history of not liking change and it causing him some type of hurt). I needed support from him, but all I got was a literal breakdown of time spent where and with who, him having his feelings hurt that he has to "sacrifice our time to benefit my other relationship" (when again, this is about being present more for my family, mainly kids), and isn't sure if this is sustainable long term for him.
I'm upset, because I've already been saying I feel like a rope in a game of tug of war, even though both say they don't feel like they're competing for my time, yet here I am, yet again feeling like a rope. It's feeling impossible to give enough time to my family and him and it seems impossible to get him to understand that this is for my family, my kids, not necessarily my "other relationship". And maybe for someone who has only ever been monogamous, this isn't sustainable, and I know he is allowed to feel how he feels.
So while I am venting, hoping for validation, but know there will probably be comments I don't like, I'm also looking to get input from others who are married with kids and are a hinge between dyads. How do you split your time? How do you keep it from feeling hierachal? How do you keep your other partner from feeling like they come second to your spouse? And when you are a people pleaser, how do you appease everyone while not losing yourself?