Perimenopause, Co-habitation & Solo Poly Realness

Welp kids, perimenopause is here. Perfect time to talk a little bit about one of my favorite aspects of being solo poly.

Me, not co-habitating with a partner, at Casita Colibri

Today feels like a good day to share a little bit about one aspect of what my solo poly journey looks like:

I am my own primary partner and that means that my first and most important relationship is with myself. One of the ways that this shows up for me in my solo poly life is that I am not interested in cohabitating with a partner at this time.

Here’s is today’s scene: I am a 47 year old woman who is currently having my second period of this month. And while I’ve been experiencing a variety of symptoms for the past several years, I do believe that this is my super official ‘welcome to perimenopause’ love note from the universe/my body.

Feels like I’m bleeding out.

Feels like observing myself but not in the enlightened, self reflective way. It’s more like, bitch what is your problem exactly cuz you are frfr trippin.

Feels like my friends telling me that I seem fine and they don’t see what's the big deal (puhleese believe that I am not fine on the inside and trust me, you don’t even want to hear about it, just take my word for it).

So as not to turn this into the perimenopause diaries (though that will be an important and recurring segment that will definitely show up here often), I will spare you any more of the details but I think you get the picture.

And let me just say how grateful I am to be in my own sweet little casita being all forlorn and in the pit of despair BY MY DAMN SELF (and my 4 jungle cats of course)?!

Over the past several years of my solo poly life, as I have healed in many different ways, one way is that I have learned how to self regulate in ways that living with spouses for 18 years of my adult life didn’t allow. Sharing a bed, a bathroom, a kitchen and all the food in the refrigerator, is a whole thing. And it’s a whole thing that I loved and appreciated for the most part during both of my marriages. But sharing mood swings is a different story, and my experience in living with two spouses is that we had to bump up against each other’s triggers and traumas and anxieties and just do our best to figure it out and hope for the best. Sometimes we did. Sometimes we didn’t.

When it came time for me to ask myself what I wanted in a relationship and how I wanted to show up with a partner, I was able to make the conscious choice in wanting to live separately and this has opened up a whole new world for me that I have really grown to love and appreciate.

So on days like today, when I am experiencing new hormonal changes and all the roller coaster emotions/fatigue/brain fog/joint pain/mood swings/etc that come with that, I get to be by myself to enjoy (or very much not enjoy) this new particular experience I am having at this stage in my life. Today, I get to choose to not put my funk onto a partner.

Today, I choose to be alone and feel my feelings without trying to explain it to anyone, even when that someone really loves me and wants to help me through this. The truth is that I actually don’t want to be helped in this moment, and in other moments where I have actually liked getting to observe these feelings and all these hormonal changes inside of myself in a way that doesn’t affect another person.

I don’t always want or need to be cheered up. Sometimes, I just want to be.

Sometimes, I just want to show up for myself.

Sometimes, I just want to stay in bed and hide under the covers with no one there to worry about my choice to do so (because I’m fine, really).

Sometimes, I want the space and the freedom to listen to my inner child and give her just what she needs without anyone else’s outside influence, as sweet and good intentioned as it may be.

It’s just one of those days as Monica once said. And I’ve been a human long enough to know that this too shall pass.

“Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that free self was another.” - Toni Morrison

I’ve really appreciated getting to know some of the not so pleasant and not so fun parts of myself, without judgement, and even without someone else’s affirmation or encouragement.

I have a loving partner.

And I have many loving friends.

And I know that all of them are there for me when I need them. They show up for me when I call.

But living by myself has taught me that it is also a gift to just hold and be with myself. Living by myself has taught me to communicate with myself in some really beautiful ways that just wasn’t possible when I lived with my spouses.

I am a woman who has been blessed to have had many lovers in my life. And I am very fortunate that I don’t regret a single one. I understand what a privilege that is.

One thing that I can tell you that all lovers have in common is that at some point, all lovers leave. This fact doesn’t make them wrong or bad. That’s the way love goes.

And yes, I am still to some degree working through my abandonment issues. But I am proud to say that now finally, at almost 50 years of age, I have learned to love them and let them go. This lesson has been a gift to both of us. Learning to hold gently and release gently.

I, however, am forever.

I will not abandon me.

And I am not a back up plan. I’m not just here for myself in preparation for when the next lover leaves. Nor am I anticipating or waiting for the right lover to come along to live with. I invest in and put myself first and invest in my relationship with myself before I engage with anyone else…so that I can engage with someone(s) else! From a healthier, more healed place. This actually serves everyone involved because I get to show up as my best self for myself, and I also get to pour into my partner(s) and my friends and family in generous ways because I prioritized filling my own cup first.

And it is this fact that has eased my passage through healing from the heartbreaking devastation of abandonment.

It is also this fact that has allowed me the pleasure of falling in love with myself, and being the kind of partner to myself that I both want to have and to be.

This fact has allowed me to embrace my own presence with my own self in ways that have elevated my own radical self love relationship, which is the very reason I now identify as my own primary partner.

When my partner gets here in a few days, I know he will hold me tenderly and kiss me softly, as he always does. And I will crawl into his strong, supportive arms and feel safe and warm. And he will listen to me as I complain (again) about my perimenopause journey. And his attentiveness, care, and sweetness are some of my favorite things about him. And I am so grateful.

But for today, I will self soothe.

Today, I will read myself a story.

Today, I will go for a walk.

Today, I will meditate a bit more and a bit longer.

Today, I chose myself and that feels good to me.

Tomorrow I may choose something or someone else.

But these past almost 5 years have taught me that just like I showed up in the past for my spouses, for my kids, for my family, for my job, for everybody else, I can show up for myself too.

I am a mother and I have been a wife, which means that I have been a caretaker.

I have also been an enabler.

And I have been co-dependent.

And in my unhealed state, I have had an avoidant attachment style.

This, choosing very intentionally to live alone, is none of that.

This is the space after.

This is the peace and the trust in myself that I have cultivated and become very fond of.

And along the way, I’ve found so much grace for myself which has been such powerful medicine.

“This was the new way of life and of love and of justice for myself. I had been through a hellish year and I was coming out on the other side holding my own hand and declaring myself home with this week-long proposal, aceptance, marriage, celebration, and declaration of love to my own damn self. It felt wicked. It felt decadent. It felt indulgent. It felt joyful.”

{Excerpt from Chapter 70: My Solo Poly Honeymoon, from my book, Are We Free Yet? The Black, Queer Guide To Divorcing America.}

There are a lot of things I loved about living with my ex-husband and my ex-wife. And I really enjoy spending days and days and days, and nights and nights and nights, wrapped around and tangled up in my partner, going back and forth between our homes on opposite ends of this pura vida country, spending precious time together in our sweet little love bubble.

But especially on days like today, I am glad that he has his own space and I have mine.

These are some of my favorite descriptions of solo poly by Sex & Love Educator, Jayda (@jayda_kissed on IG)