Re: [UUPoly-L] Polyamory and pregnancy

["Brigitte Fires" <brigittefires@gmail.com>]

> J/H wrote:
> Since polyamory involves sex in one of its basics tenets, I was really
> curious as to what happens afterwards, given the sex was unprotected and
> hetero.
>
> How does pregnancy and polyamory go together for the primary couple and
> their lovers?
> Does anyone here have first or second-hand knowledge of a secondary or
> other male lover impregnating the primary wife? If so, how did that work
> out? Was the primary husband okay with not being the bio dad? Whose name is
> on the birth certificate, birth announcements, etc? Who changes the diapers
> at 3 am?
> Besides the obvious for STDs, are there any unwritten rules regarding
> birth control and conception?
> Does anyone know of or have heard of any poly families that purposely have
> children with their secondary or other family units?Thank you very much for
> the information. I find this topic very fascinating and look forward to your
> replies.


I think you'll get some arguments that sex is a basic tenet of polyamory,
but hear no argument from me--for ME, sex IS part of the relationship.


Aside from that I'd like to answer some of your questions from my
perspective.

I am not currently in a committed relationship with anyone other than my
fiance. At one point I was, and my current fiance was the second (read:
un-public but not "secondary" otherwise) partner. I was on hormonal birth
control, and fluid-bonded (i.e. not using condoms) with both. To complicate
matters of accidental pregnancy further, my primary was white, my second
partner black (and for reference, I'm white). If I had gotten pregnant by
the second partner, it wouldn't have taken long for people to notice once
the baby was born.

We did discuss the matter, as a "just in case" scenario when I had a
pregnancy scare, and it was agreed that if my second partner got me pregnant
we would simply all move in together (as we almost were already) come out to
my family and the rest of the world, but for my partners' families it was
better to just behave as if I was with my second partner now (i.e. make my
primary into the non-public partner, pretend we had bvroke up but were still
friends). He said he wanted to play an active role in caring for the child
even if it wasn't his, as I was taking care of his little girl, and he
didn't see the difference.

My primary was also sleeping with our roommate and got her pregnant. They
were not in a committed relationship, but she had stopped taking birth
control and he broke our rule about condoms (i.e. he didn't use them and he
should have been) and WOW it's amazing what happens when people have
unprotected sex! Holy cow a baby! My sarcasm here stems from their
ignorance, not bitterness I assure you.

I did decide not to stay and take care of the baby or continue the
relationship, my decision having very little to do with their intentions to
keep the baby.

My current fiance and I have not discussed the repercussions of an
accidental pregnancy from someone who isn't him (or me for that matter),
because we have a rule about using condoms with anyone but each other. If we
end up in a relationship with someone else, then we'll discuss the plan of
action for if and when a pregnancy occurs with that person before we stop
using condoms. And eventually, we do plan on me having children with others
besides him, but again it depends on timing and the people involved.

The crux of the matter is that if only the one male can get the female in
question pregnant, then it's best to continue using some kind of
contraception with other partner(s) and also talk about what happens in case
of accidents, answering these exact questions about whose name goes on the
birth certificate, announcements, and 3am diaper changings. I suspect those
answers will change with every partner involved and every different
relationship, and every family of whom the partners have to consider.