The Broken Refrigerator

The broken refrigerator analogy is something that really spoke to me when I first read about it.

The analogy goes like this:

Imagine you have a refrigerator. One day, it stops working - you come home to find your ice-cream melted, your milk warm and smelly, and your vegetables wilted.

You have three options at the moment: you can figure out how to fix the refrigerator; you can throw it away and buy a new one; or, you can decide to keep it as it is but never buy any foods that need to be frozen or refrigerated.

The last option is patently ridiculous; and yet it is the one most people in the poly community seem to choose. That is, when someone feels jealousy at their partner doing a particular thing, they make a rule against the thing rather than trying to find the cause of the jealousy.

The article I linked to above goes into LOTS of detail explaining it, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't already read it and is interested in polyamory or open relationships.

I had an experience the other day that made me think back to the refrigerator analogy:

Miss Prism was joking to a female friend of hers, asking her if she wanted to have a threesome with herself and my beloved Mr Oldman. Watching this happen in front of me made me seethe with jealousy - I wanted to be part of such a threesome, thankyouverymuch! I wanted to provide Mr Oldman with an outlet for that stock straight male fantasy!

It got to the point where I was going to pull them both aside and tell them I wouldn't be comfortable with Mr Oldman having a threesome unless I got to be a part of it, even though I knew this proposition was a joke and the chances of the threesome happening were almost nil.

Then I thought about the refrigerator. Clearly, this hypothetical refrigerator of ours was broken and I was about to propose he stop buying frozen foods. Really, I should try and fix it instead.

I thought about Mr Oldman. I imagined the joy on his face if this hypothetical threesome were to occur, and immediately felt a little bit of compersion at the idea. I imagined how wonderful that day would be and who would I be to take that away from him!

Then I thought about why I was feeling jealousy - it's because I wanted to do something nice for my partner. I wanted to make him happy. And him having a threesome with two other women wouldn't infringe on that; in fact, my making a rule against it would have been the exact opposite of what I really wanted!

So, Miss Prism - if you can get that threesome for Mr Oldman.... go for it :)

Jealousy and Compersion

As far as polyamory goes, I have been really 'fortunate' you could say, in that in all my relationships I was effectively the sole girlfriend and so was never confronted with jealousy head on. Mr Oldman has a girlfriend, but she lives in a foreign country so it didn't really affect me on a day-to-day basis. I tried my best to get Mr Wrong a girlfriend, to be a good wingman, but it hasn't panned out... at least not yet!

Then, Mr Oldman went on a couple of dates with one of my good friends. For some reason I want to give this friend the nickname "Miss Prism" after the character from The Importance of Being Earnest. I know she'll object to this, but I like it.

When they were on their date, I was spending the evening feeling super excited, wanting to know how well it was going, trying to imagine what was happening. The next morning I eagerly texted them both for details, and then I found out that Mr Oldman and Miss Prism both had a most delightful evening.

I felt jealous. I hadn't felt it before - at least for a long time. It was like a small thing squeezing my heart. It felt weird. I knew that this sort of thing is common and expected, even in poly relationships, so I tried to set it aside.

A few days later, I was visiting Mr Oldman in Perth and I asked him to tell me how the date went in detail. He gave me details from the dinner he cooked for Miss Prism, and even included some of the more saucy ones. As he told me the story of their date, that little squeezing feeling of jealousy evaporated so very quickly. Instead of it being an abstract feeling that he slept with somebody else, instead I had this beautiful feeling that he had this wonderful date with a great person. I had compersion in a big way. Let me be the first to say that compersion is AMAZING, almost on the level of new relationship energy. And the more details I was given, the stronger this feeling was.

I know details aren't for everyone. Mr Wrong hates me going into sexy details, but I think that's because I talk about my sex life so much that he knows he's going to hear me telling 3 or one of my other friends about it in short order anyway. But hearing Mr Oldman's sexy details made me feel so happy that I was glad he was willing to share :).