r/relationshipanarchy

My first post, apologies if this is not the right forum for this.

Background
55, CIS Male, finished the starter marriage.
Solo mostly since 2008.

After divorce, I have met some amazing women, I am truly blessed for everyone of them for challenging me and improving me in some way.

I tried being in a relationship, longest one after divorce was shy of 2 year old monogamous relationship.

After the sunset on that relationship which was long distance and just would not work across oceans, I studied and took seminars.

I loved having a connection but was not looking to get married and start another monogamous married journey and came upon RA.

I feel that if I stick with my RA life with no primary partner or wife, I might have a tough journey ahead.

Most of the women I meet in the Bay Area are either poly looking for her 2nd or 3rd or someone looking for their monogamous partner.

I am living in the moment but have noticed that many of my allies are slowly pairing off.

I feel if I stay true to my RA beliefs, I might have a rather lonely road ahead.

Anyone else feels this way?

Thanks for your time and thoughts you might have on this.

For context I’m currently in a relationship & I’ve been overthinking if my partner is actually the one for me or if I’m just settling because I tend to see the good in people and he specifically told me I do that and that he worries I see only the good in people
I genuinely love him but I also thought I loved my two previous partners but after I broke up with them 1) I was sad but I heard from friends and family that he was bad for me and manipulative af 2)I felt completely fine
I feel like I can love almost anyone to a certain extent but I don’t know if I’m able to love beyond that level with anyone besides family.
That kind of worries me because how will I be able to know when I’m settling for something that’s not necessarily the best for me and/or if my partner can find someone genuinely better suited with them and they’re settling for me without them knowing they are

I posted here a week ago, saying I wanted "relationships" rather than "partners." Only after a lot of back-and-forth did I realize how my statements were being misunderstood and why so many people were just telling me I'm just a polyamorist.

I didn't mean "relationships" in the sense of "romantic/sexual partners." I meant "relationships" in the sense of "relations to others" writ large.

I'm keen to decentre partnership-type relationships as the "most meaningful" relationships in the world. People see and treat me like I'm somehow bereft of "meaningful relationships" because I don't "partner up."

By contrast, I subjectively experience my life as full with a rich ecosystem of relationships: I have a "relationship" with the elder orphan on my street, I have a "relationship" with the plants in my garden, I have a "relationship" with the kinkster who lives downtown, I have a "relationship" with myself, and so on.

What "relationships" is "relationship anarchy" about? Is it just a way for rethinking romantic/sexual partnerships, or more fundamentally about the diversity of ways we relate?

hi folks, curious if there's a relationship anarchist connection seeking ("dating") app / platform out there. on regular dating apps i run into a lot of people who don't know what relationship anarchy means and it can get a bit tiring to try to explain it all over again every time. thanks in advance :)

in this situation where i want to get something meaningful for someone but we don't do the whole traditional relationship thing. no labels, no expectations, just connection.

it's their birthday soon and i want to get them something that says you matter without it feeling like a commitment or something too heavy.

i was looking at engraved jewelry. like a simple stainless steel necklace or bracelet with a date or a word on it. something personal but not overly romantic.

but i'm overthinking it. is jewelry too much for a non-traditional dynamic? or am i just projecting traditional expectations onto something that doesn't need them

I think I need some RA advice on how to navigate this.

I have a very good friend of mine who lately has been letting himself go a lot. He spends so much time scrolling Twitter, barely sleeping at night and taking less and less care of himself.

I feel like he engages his brain less and less day after day. And I feel like he has more and more trouble understanding what I mean when I speak to him which is becoming very frustrating.

I’ve known him for 4 years and, even though we were never as close as we are now, I don’t remember him ever being this way in the past. I have the impression that the situation is getting worse because of the brain rot he consumes.

I recently looked at his feed and told him how uncomfortable I was with the amount of violent content on it and I expressed my worries that it might desensitise him. But he’s a grown adult, so he can do what he wants.

Today he sent me a joke accompanied by a picture of animal abuse and I immediately started crying. I asked him to delete the message and he said sorry but he seems not to be affected by such images in the slightest.

I am having trouble deciding what to do about our friendship.

I am usually very selective (maybe too much?) with my connections. I don’t know if I want to continue hanging out with this person who can hurt me so easily by showing me stuff he saw online.

And because online is his whole life, he doesn’t have much else to share.

On the other hand ffs, he’s my friend. Should I try and help him get off X? I’m worried about him, I shouldn’t abandon him in difficult times, right?

I wonder if I should put some sort of boundary like “if you wanna keep hanging out with me delete the app”

I also wonder if I should limit myself to revise the smorgasbord and only keep the sex because that part is so great and I don’t see much more value in our friendship at this point.

Maybe I’m being a bit too much of a downer because this picture incident only happened a few hours ago, but right now I’m in the car with him as I write and I really don’t feel drawn to talking to him as I used to.

EDIT: I told him all I feel about this and he just said sorry and seems not to have anything else to say. I didn’t dare setting a limit/boundary over this though.

Sharing some happiness. Half a year ago I started putting my exploration of RA into action and began seeing two people. We tried to focus on the connection and not impose expectations. In one of the connection we talked a lot about communication but this did not really help to actually communicate.

The other is still alive and well and we labelled it as Zeitinseln which would mean time islands, which framed our focus on connecting in whatever states we found ourselves, taking the time for it and talking about life and work as needed but in a way that felt nearly like the best (often first) times in monogamous relationships.

Recently we labelled it as Liebschaft, which would translate to loveship (as in friendship) but is a nice old expression for fling or affair. Still going strong and deepening into what feels like relational healing, a safe space from the hectic lifes this world (mostly) forces onto us.

I'd like to (finally) have people I'm close to that share similar values around RA but have no idea how I'd go about that irl. Where are ya'll finding RA folks to hang out with (but honestly i wouldn't be opposed to having an online friend. have no idea where to find those either)?

every time I become close friends with someone, it eventually feels like they want something more than friendship , which makes me interact less with ppl . It's like I'm never able to have a genuinely platonic connection without things changing.

Maybe it's just coincidence, but it's made me wonder if truly platonic relationships actually exist, especially when two people become really close , especially when u hv same interests with them?

But at this stage of my life , i really feel like - i wish i had someone, in tht way.

I've been having trouble finding a language to express how I live and love. Maybe someone here can point me in the right direction?

I move in a lot of queer circles and people are throwing "radical" ideas at me left, right, and centre: polyamory, queerplatonic partnerships, etc.

I almost feel afraid to say that I don't want any kind of partner. I've done the "partnership" thing and it robbed me of my most authentic ways of relating to others.

I love meeting people. I love getting to know someone. I love hearing about other people's lives and getting to tell others about mine. I love "being intimate" in all sorts of ways -- and then also going our separate ways afterwards.

I feel at a loss for language to tell people what that makes me. Is there a term that sums this up -- or should I drop the search for terms entirely and just focus on living authentically?

Slightly off topic, but interested in your answers.

As an RA practitioner I find it quite hard to find BDSM resources that resonate with me.

Specifically about preference checklists, I find most are either heteronormative, couple-specific, trans exclusionary, or not inclusive/representative/complete in other ways.

So I guessed this community would be a good choice to ask this question.

Do you have a BDSM checklist you particularly like? One I could fill to either hand out to new sexual partners or use it as a conversation aid to make sure I cover all relevant subjects?

Has your friend circle become smaller after getting into a relationship?
Ever since I got a boyfriend, I barely hang out with my friends anymore. Most of my close friends are guys (one of them is gay), and we've known each other for years with nothing romantic involved. My boyfriend says he feels uncomfortable and can't feel at ease when I hang out with them, so over time I stopped seeing them. I even told my friends honestly that it was because my boyfriend was jealous.
What's confusing is that some of my female friends actually agree with him. They say they'd also find it weird if their friend studied one-on-one with a guy while either of them was in a relationship, and their own boyfriends feel the same way.
Is this just a normal part of being in a relationship? Do most people's social circles naturally shrink, or is this more about jealousy and boundaries? I'm genuinely curious about different perspectives.

I met his girl we'll call "Sarah" around 3 - 4 months ago. I responded to her post, she thought it was funny and it turned out we live in the same state in Australia. Sarah is 1 year older than me, her just turning 18 and me only 2 weeks shy of 17. Sarah and I used to talk lots, she used to call me, want to hangout, we'd play games together sometimes and it was a great amount of fun.

Around 2 months into it things began to get really sexual, and me being a stupid teenage boy who's hormones are all over the place, I instantly became hooked. She'd say stuff, I'd say stuff, it was fun. She'd let me know that she has mental issues with BPD and other things, which i obviously understood.

Sometimes when we'd talk, she'd suddenly scold me for things I wasn't familiar with or things that I hadn't had much knowledge about. She became extremely rude to be from time to time, and I can take things to heart too much. She'd shame me because I'm apparently "Too white" or she'd say things like "My friends are my bare minimum." And I take these really personally because I feel behind compared to other teenagers my age. I don't have a job, a drivers liscense, anything like that.

I've been getting left on delivered for hours on end which I can understand, She has a life besides giving me attention 24/7, But I love talking to her, I can't seem to get away from her, I've become too attached. She told me the other night it takes "More effort" to call me, which slashed me like a knife. Today she told me; "I really like you and stuff but, I don't really want to date you." which sounded like more of a "I'm cutting things off" text rather than something else.

My birthday is July 15th, we agreed that we could maybe start dating on my birthday because of the age of consent laws in the state where we both live. But she said "The set date that we have where we start dating is scary, and stresses me out."

I've done nothing but be extremely kind to this girl, why does this shit happen to me? of all people, why me? I'm a nice person, why do I deserve to be treated like this? I know I'm a bum who stays inside all day, gets bad grades in school but I just want a girl to love me. I've tried with a few girls in the past, but I can never get it right. What's wrong with me? Why am I like this?

I don't know what to do, I had zero self respect and I'll do anything for anyone before I do anything for myself. I really like her, a lot. I don't want things between us to end but if it keeps going like this, I can't see myself getting better. I feel depressed enough already outside of her, I'm not one to have many friends and even the friends I have, I barely talk to outside of School/College.

I'm scared.

Is it ok to date 2 ppl that are both friends but dating the other in secret?? And they are both of ur exs and u dont want them to harm themselves? And I am 17 years old female

i just want to get this off my chest and into the open mainly. any thoughts would honestly be appreciated

for the past couple of years, i've been very "i will never get married. its just not for me. im aspec, im autistic, i dont like the steps it takes to get there, i dont like the historical meaning of getting married, i dont think i will ever find someone i want to be commited to". i am loud about it, im loud about my unusual relationships with people and how the way society views the timeline of relationships is silly and outdated, and how relationships are what you label them out to be

one of my big unusual relationships is with one of my partners. she is so so lovely. we began as friends with benefits, then we became queerplatonic partners as well. we are not dating, but people usually think we are because we act like we are, we kiss, we fuck, we act like a married couple, we do kinky stuff, we cuddle etc etc. in my mind, we arent romantically dating because we havent labelled it as such

for the past few months, ive been thinking that i wouldnt mind being romantically involved with her. i would mind the label of dating, or being girlfriends. and the scariest part is i dont think i'd mind getting married to her either. hell, ive been indulging myself by looking at what weddings could look like for the both of us

however, i feel like a traitor to myself, and to everyone i have spouted my thoughts to about the way i think relationships worked. i know that she enjoys this relationship because of the lack of label and the freeform nature of it, i dont want to make her move away because i feel like a 14 year old girl with a romantic crush around her. i dont want to imply to anyone that being in a queerplatonic relationship was not enough, because it can be for people, just apparently not for me. well qpps can get married, but that's another thing, why do i want to romantically date her in order to marry her??

i also worry that people will think that i was lying all along, about how the way i feel towards her is unique and special and different. yes, it is unique, i dont think ive felt admiration and endearment this deeply before to someone, but then we are just a romantic relationship and i feel like im letting the concept down. like im flying a white flag of defeat

im not sure if im making much sense, its late and i just want to maybe hear input 😔 she runs circles in my mind and i needed to get it out