Non-monogamous blogger lays out the facts

Samantha Fraser, blogger at Not Your Mother's Playground, was interviewed for an article on non-monogamy in The Grid, an online city magazine run by the Toronto Star. The piece is decent, but the author spends a lot of time stressing how complicated, confusing, and exhausting non-monogamy seems.

Fraser wasn't too bothered by the coverage, but she did take the opportunity to clear up some things that the article left murky. In the process, she wrote a blog post more useful than the original article.

To be honest, the only issue that I have with it is that it seems to focus on the fact that -- a few months into non-monogamy I struggled extra with the little details -- like the visual cue of my husband’s date's wine glass being left behind in my kitchen. When we were relatively fresh other people fuckers, silly shit like that was hard to handle. So I share those stories with other people because those are the things that threw me for a loop back in the day. A few commenters on the article have latched onto the wine glass story, suggesting that if I’m not comfortable with that then I must not really be happy with non-monogamy at all.

And this is a mild challenge I always see that, for the most part, I ignore. There are a lot of assumptions out there about open relationships. First of all, people will often react strongly when they hear someone is in one. "Isn't that hard? What about jealousy? What if you fall in love?". On the flip side however, if I suggest mySELF that non-monogamy is hard and that sometimes those questions can have really tough answers, then I obviously must not be happy with it.

. . . I find this attitude so ridiculous which is why I will constantly strive to be honest when discussing open relationships . . . However in the interest of clarity, I will list a few points here that maybe I haven't said in some time.

Read Fraser's list of things she has personally learned from practicing non-monogamy.

Audiobook version of Opening Up

Yes, it's true! As of last fall, Opening Up is available as an audiobook. This is my first book ever to be converted into an audiobook, and it's unabridged -- a full 11 hours of non-monogamous goodness. The audiobook is narrated by Jo Anna Perrin and published by Tantor Audio.

You can buy the audiobook online on many sites, such as Amazon, Audible, and Tantor (where it is currently 50% off!). Mp3 audio samples are available on all of those sites, so you can preview the narration before purchase.