How to Make Friends in the Lifestyle. So I’m Told.

One question that I’ve been asked is, “How do you meet people who are polyamorous?” And that’s a good question. I’m an open-minded gal, so I actually just stumbled upon people in the lifestyle through simply talking with friends I already had, many of whom I had known since college. I was not seeking them out or anything. I was just a trustworthy friend, and they ended up telling me about their lives, and I ended up not caring (in the best possible way of “not caring” of course, in that I had and have no judgment...obviously).

But my husband and I don’t live near our old university, and neither do our friends. So, honestly, how we met people in the poly lifestyle was through an entirely different social community. See, my husband had set himself up a profile on FetLife a while back (going on four years), and he had initially not told me because he just wanted to do some research for some things that worked for our dynamic (which I don’t need to go into specifics about because that’s not the point of this blog, but you can use your imagination, and you may or may not be right, but whatever). And then he sat me down one day and said that he had some confession to make. I’m over here thinking, “When would he have time to cheat?” But then he tells me that he set up a profile, solely for the purpose of learning, “...but then I saw that there’s actually a great community out here, and they do regular meet-ups, and I thought that maybe you might want to make your own profile, and we could meet new people!”

So we went to a dinner and made some friends. Someone there made an announcement about an upcoming event she was having at her home the following month. We RSVPed for that. I showed up with sweet potato fries. I saw she had prepared a smorgasbord. I thought, “Well, I’ll just throw this in the trash.” 

We ended up befriending the chickadee, and we went to her house for parties and game nights and ended up making friends. And then we stumbled into polyamory in the way that I mentioned in the past (We made friends through game nights and made plans with said friends when my husband found them on FetLife—did I mention that part before? Ah, well. And then I freaked out about the idea of casual sex, and one of the friends brought up the idea of a relationship, and I jumped on the notion.). Oh! And that chickadee we befriended is now my girlfriend.

But none of this answers the opening question. Speaking with others, I would recommend checking out Meetup.com for local social groups. 

As for dating sites/apps, I would recommend Tinder and OKCupid, as these have both been recommended by friends and partners (particularly the former). While Tinder is primarily known for being a hook-up site, I am told that many profiles indicate “NOT HERE FOR HOOK-UPS!”

And I really do mean that this is all “what I hear,” because I have managed to meet all of my partners organically. I admit that I am in the minority with this. And it’s funny that, with how socially anxious I am, that I have been able to accomplish this.

Anyway. From there, all you really need are a few connections, and then you get into the community. Someone you meet will be a member of some Facebook group, and you can get an invite because a lot of them are “secret” and thus cannot be found during a search. Oh! But then again, some are just “closed,” which means that they are available to be found through a search. So you can meet people that way as well. However, be mindful of the fact that most of these groups are for the purpose of making friends and having a place to discuss concerns or relevant topics of interest.

So it really depends on what you’re looking for. Dating? Tinder or OKC. Friendships? Meetup and Facebook. Maybe FetLife. I suppose that’d be good for both actually.

Not sure how to smoothly end this, so: the end.