The Exact Agreements My Partner and I Live By After Six Years of Non-Monogamy

Photo by Breno Cardoso

One of the questions I get asked most, in DMs, at parties, and in the comments here, is some version of: but how do you actually do it? Not the philosophy, but the practical stuff. What are you allowed to do? What do you tell each other? Who decides?

I’ve always answered vaguely, partly because it’s personal and partly because I don’t want anyone treating our setup as the correct one. It isn’t. It’s just ours, and it’s taken six years of trial, error, and some very long conversations to get here. But I also know how helpful it would have been, back when we started, to see what another couple actually agreed to. So here it is, the real version, along with the rules we started with and later threw out, and a template at the end so you can build your own.

Where We Started

When we first opened up, our agreements read more like a list of safeguards than a description of how we wanted to live. We had a veto, so either of us could end the other’s connection if it made us uncomfortable. We had a rule against dating friends or people that we encountered often (like neighbors, coworkers, and the like). We weren’t supposed to develop feelings, only physical connections. And we told each other everything, in detail, because I think we both believed that if we knew everything, nothing could surprise us.

Almost every one of those rules was written by fear. They were trying to make sure neither of us ever felt threatened, which sounds reasonable until you realize that feeling threatened sometimes is part of the deal. I’ll come back to why we dropped each one. First, here’s what we actually live by now.

1. We tell each other before, not after.

If either of us is going on a first date, the other knows beforehand. It’s not a request for permission, but it isn’t just a formality either. Sometimes one of us isn’t up for it that week, maybe because we haven’t had enough time together lately, or because we’re having a hard time and need the other person around. When that happens, we say so, and the date usually moves to another night. It doesn’t happen often, and neither of us uses it to block the other. But knowing the door is open to say “not tonight, I need you” makes it much easier to say “have fun” the rest of the time.

The other point is that neither of us should ever find out something about the other’s life from a third party, or from a phone screen, or after the fact. This is the foundation everything else rests on, and it’s the one agreement we’ve never changed.

2. Sexual health is non-negotiable.

We both get tested regularly and share our results. We use protection with new partners, and we have the health conversation with anyone new before anything happens, not after. If either of us finds out about anything, even something minor, we tell the other immediately, and we tell anyone else who needs to know. I learned this one the hard way, as some of you know, and it’s the agreement I’d push hardest for anyone else to adopt.

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