Help, My Situationship Wants To Leave Her Wife For Me!

Q: I’m 27, poly, and have been seeing a married woman (34) for five months. She and her wife (36) decided to open their relationship shortly before we met, and from the start, I was clear that I wasn’t looking for anything serious. She said she was on the same page.

We see each other about once a week, and our connection is really fantastic — incredible chemistry, fun dates, interesting conversations, amazing sex! I haven’t been excited about someone like this in a while, and I’m very happy with our situation as it is.

Last week, she told me she wants to leave her wife and be with me. What?! She says their marriage has been rocky for a while, and being with me has made her realize she deserves to be happier. I don’t want to lead her on, and I feel guilty for any role I played in blowing up her marriage and hurting her wife. But I also would hate to lose something that feels special. Is there any way to salvage this?

A: When you say “salvage this,” do you mean the relationship you were previously enjoying? No. No, I do not think you can salvage that exact thing.

And while you might be able to retain some parts of this connection, I would not recommend it for a myriad of reasons. You have very different feelings for each other, and communication isn’t getting through on either side. I mean, she — seemingly without any prior indication of her plans — left her wife. After telling you that she was on the same page. That page being: not looking for anything serious!

Maybe she didn’t leave her wife exclusively for the sake of getting more serious with you, but she certainly seems to see that as part of her next steps. That is a whole lot of action for her to take without several honest discussions.

Plus, leaving her wife and jumping into a relationship (or ratcheting an existing one up to a new level) is a horrible idea. She’s gotta sit with herself for a bit. She has to ask herself hard questions, not just flee to the next fun thing.

And I’m sure you two do have fun together! But it’s easy to enjoy sexy hang-out bang-outs once a week. It’s a lot harder to have nonstop laughs when you have to file taxes together.

She is looking for something that doesn’t exist, and you are hoping to maintain something that can’t exist anymore. This is partly because her marriage is no longer there to act as a counterbalance.

I have a few friends who are in open relationships, and often, part of the draw is that the married person has other people to rely on and do life with. Taking turns cleaning the litter box and planning your White Elephant exchange with the in-laws don’t just provide structure — they also create comfort (if you zoom way, way out). It does not sound like you’d like to be the person picking up her prescriptions or listening to the 4,048th story about her boss being incompetent. You were, in fact, clear up front about wanting to keep this casual!

Without the counterbalance of her having another partner, I suspect this relationship will lose its zhuzh. Going from a once-a-week dinner date to a thrice-weekly sit-around-and-watch-Traitors-in-sweatpants situation changes things.

You might be saying, “OK, Sophia, what if she agrees to just keep it casual?” It’s a no from me, dawg. Letting a relationship simmer on the back burner with someone who wants pan-seared romance is torture for both of you.

For you, it would mean repeatedly shutting intimacy down, or feeling like “the bad guy” for not wanting the same things she does. For her, it would mean trying to keep a leash on what she’s been feeling (something she’s probably already been doing) and feeling like the “the bad guy” for constantly pushing for more.

Neither of you is bad! You just want different things.

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