The Unexpected Paths of Non-Monogamy: A Conversation with Annie Undone, EP. 94

Are you ready to challenge everything you thought you knew about relationships? In this eye-opening episode, I sit down with Annie Undone, a writer, artist, and relationship anarchist who's been through it all - from monogamy to swinging, polyamory, and now relationship anarchy. Together, we unpack the raw truth about opening up relationships and why it might just lead to the end of your current partnership... but that's not necessarily a bad thing.
The Uncomfortable Truth About Opening Up

• Why most people are terrified of opening their relationships (and why they might be right)
• The challenges of taking it slow when you're excited about new possibilities
• How to embrace relationship transitions without letting fear hold you back
• Beyond the Binary: Redefining Love and Connection
• The beauty of tailoring relationships to fit the people in them, not societal expectations
• Why relationship anarchy isn't just for the polyamorous crowd
• How exploring different relationship styles can accelerate personal growth and self-discovery

A Peek into Annie's Upcoming Work

Annie teases her new ebook, "On Polyamory," coming out in February. It's a collection of 11 essays chronicling the emotional peaks and valleys of her journey through polyamory and the end of her marriage. Find her work on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/annie_undone
website - https://ko-fi.com/annieundone/shop
patreon - https://www.patreon.com/annieundone

https://elleciapaine.com/call

Chapters

• 0:01 Navigating Open Relationships With Annie Undone
• 12:11 Exploring Relationship Anarchy and Love
• 18:47 Exploring Growth and Self-Discovery
• 28:30 Exploring Polyamory and Non-Monogamy
• 45:37 Intimate Sex Tip Discussion for Patreon

Transcript

Ellecia: 0:01

Hey friends, welcome back to Nope we're Not Monogamous, the podcast where we laugh, learn and explore the wonderfully weird world of non-traditional relationships. I'm your relationship Ellecia Paine, and today we're having one of the most honest, eye-opening conversations yet. So here's the deal. Most people are terrified that opening their relationship will lead to the end of their relationship, and you know what Annie andone says they're probably right, but the ending doesn't have to be a bad thing and also isn't inevitable. Annie's a writer, artist, relationship anarchist, with sass and insight that only a non-binary babe can bring. She's been through it all Monogamy, swinging polyamory and now relationship anarchy. And today we're going to unpack what it really means to open up a relationship, the challenges of taking it slow and how to embrace those transitions without too much fear. Oh, and before we jump in, here's a quick shout out to you, my listeners and viewers If you love what you hear today, do me a solid, follow the podcast, leave a review. When you do that, I'll give you a personal shout out on one of the upcoming episodes and it's my way of saying thank you for being a big part of this growing community. And if you aren't on my email list yet, go to aliciapaincom. It's the best way to stay in the loop for tips, events, new episodes, other good stuff. I'd love to see you there.

Ellecia: 1:21

Okay, let's explore the terrifying, exciting and transformational truth about opening relationships with the incredible Annie Undone. Let's go, okay. Let's first of all welcome Welcome to Nope. We're Not Monogamous. I'm really really happy that you're here. I'm excited to have you. Do you want to? Do you want to tell the listeners just a quick little like who you are?

Annie: 1:45

Do you want to tell the listeners just?

Ellecia: 1:46

a quick little like who you are yeah.

Annie: 1:49

Okay, so I'm Anne Dunn. I started like making content on Instagram back in probably like 2021, 2022 area, when I opened up my marriage of 16 years and we were practicing polyamory. Kind of like. My stump speech is that I've practiced every single relationship style under the sun, from monogamy to non-monogamy to swinging polyamory, and now I'm a relationship anarchist and I'm looking to kind of normalize, moving very fluidly through relationship styles without stigmatizing any of them, moving very fluidly through relationship styles without stigmatizing any of them.

Ellecia: 2:27

Yeah, I love that and actually it's super relatable because we've done I have gone through that that, that iteration of all those things Did you?

Annie: 2:39

I feel like I've been following you for a long time on Instagram Did you used to not show your face?

Ellecia: 2:44

That's true, yeah. So okay, I was like, like am I putting the right memory together here?

Annie: 2:48

yeah, my ex kind of didn't want me showing my face, for you know some, some legitimate reasons, um, but when we got divorced, I was like, what am I doing this for? Like there's nothing, there's nothing left to hide, and I thought that it was going to be like this big fanfare of like. Oh my god, I'm showing my face and I thought, you know, this is going to be like this big fanfare of like. Oh my God, I'm showing my face and I thought, you know, this is going to like maybe impact my life in some way. And that turned out to not be true. So I'm no longer anonymous, and I guess it's been that way for about a year and a half, and it was a great choice. I'm very happy with it.

Ellecia: 3:18

Yeah, yeah, Amazing. You know, I feel like that kind of is what happens every step of the way, right, Like opening a relationship. You're like, oh my God if people find out. And then like, okay, well, some people know now and I haven't died. And then you know, like the next step, like oh my God, what if people find out? And then it's like, oh, okay, we did that.

Annie: 3:40

I'm still fine, absolutely. I mean, I think I have suffered different impacts than some, in that I got a divorce and my polyamory was weaponized against me, not just in my friend group, not just in the family that I was exiting, but also in the court system, and that was really difficult for me, but also in the court system, and that was really difficult for me. But I will say that even with all of that, the storm was weatherable and I don't regret any of my decisions.

Ellecia: 4:14

Yeah, yeah, beautiful, good, good. Similarly, we actually we went through a custody case with non-monogamy being the central argument and at the end they were like, well, don't do sex things in front of your kids, like you know, none of us do, and we're fine. We were like cool, we never have and we won't.

Annie: 4:36

It was a very odd and surreal experience to watch my page come up in court documents, to like see all of that happening and thinking, wow, what am I putting on the line? To like run this account and to say what I need to say. And I just decided not to waver from my sticking point that I was like I know that I'm a good parent, I know that I'm not doing anything wrong, that my life is consistent, steady and stable and all those things. I know that I'm a good parent, I know that I'm not doing anything wrong, that my life is consistent, steady and stable, and all those things you know were fine. In the end, you know, I think, if there's anyone going through that, I think what most people are so afraid of is like what's going to happen in court. But you know, most court cases do not make it in front of a judge and I think that's really important to note for most people who are being like legally threatened by a bitter ex.

Ellecia: 5:30

Yeah, yeah, truly truly. It is the fear of it, not always, but often the fear of it is bigger than what actually happens, and it's so fucking stressful.

Annie: 5:59

It's so stressful. Married couples right, and a lot of us have these starry-eyed notions of we can weather anything. The couple comes first and yada, yada, yada. But the truth is, when you open a previously monogamous relationship, whether you're married or not, the likelihood that you're going to lose that relationship is pretty high.

Annie: 6:19

So I think, people don't love to hear that and of course, whenever I say it, there's immediately the people who are like yeah, but not me. And I was firmly in the yeah but not me camp until it was me and I thought even in that that I was being realistic, like going in. But I think that there's lots of reasons why that happens to couples. Breaking codependency is really really hard. For those of us who have come up in compulsory monogamous culture which is basically all of us and redefining an entire relationship, there is generally a more reluctant partner and you know, for some of us, once we open into that right we can't go back, and that's not always a. That doesn't always mean we can't go back to monogamy in general. Sometimes it just means I can't be monogamous with you anymore and people also don't like to hear that.

Ellecia: 7:28

Yeah, yeah, that's so true. I mean you're just, anytime you're making changes, you've made the change. Like you have changed things and that might may not be the final like iteration of it, but like you have changed things, it's like you know, uh, you know it's. I have people often that are like in the like dating right, they're like single and dating. They're like. I know I don't want to be monogamous, but like, shouldn't I meet someone like, like, build a solid foundation of monogamy? And I'm always saying, like, actually begin as you intend to go on. Don't create a monogamous relationship and then knock down a few walls later on, thinking it'll be fine, like you can do that, but you're going to save yourself some steps.

Annie: 8:08

Yeah, I think that I think that opening a relationship once it's closed is is really difficult, um, and I also think that you have to think about what are your ultimate goals, too, right, like what kind of relationship do you want to have? I think there's also the sticking point for a lot of couples, right, like what kind of relationship do you wanna have? I think there's also the sticking point for a lot of couples, right, is they're like but in this other relationship we don't talk to each other like this. In this other relationship we're able to have these conversations or have this vulnerability, right? So I think we tend to get sometimes stuck in those paradigms.

Annie: 8:42

Like Jessica Fern talks a lot about this in Pollywise, the paradigm shift, right, and so a lot of it is about, like, mentality, right? So if you think you're going to go into a relationship and form a monogamous foundation, then it's going to be built on a monogamous foundation, right? So I would more suggest, or or gently nudge people towards a relationship anarchist foundation. Take the mononormativity and the heteronormativity out of the base of your practice, because if you do that, you will have more options ultimately more options ultimately, can you explain?

Ellecia: 9:26

this is one that is often weird and hard to explain for you.

Annie: 9:34

What does relationship anarchy mean? Very, very simple, right? People love to overcomplicate this. Right, Relationship anarchy simply means tailor-making relationships for exactly the people in them. There is no parameters. This is not some big, mysterious thing, right? If you look at the Relationship Anarchy Manifesto, it is such a simple document. Right, it's so short. It's like what? Five, six paragraphs. Right, it's really simple and that can mean anything. Right, you can be a relationship anarchist and be monogamous. You can be non-monogamous, you can be polyamorous. You can be some shade of gray of that. Right, it's an inclusive term.

Ellecia: 10:15

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it that. That has been the most, I don't know. The thing that I'm always trying to tell people is you want a relationship that works for the people in the relationship and not for the people that are looking outward in, and often that's what we're building is relationships that work for the people looking outward in.

Annie: 10:37

I think too, sometimes we see relationship anarchy as this weird Buddha Buddha level enlightenment version of polyamory. Right, and I just rail so vehemently against this because it's not like some destination. I think that a lot of polyamorous people, as we go through shifts in our relationship setups, sometimes our priorities shift, and so my relationship practice means something very different for me now than it did five years ago. Right, part of my practice includes the decentralization of romance and the centering of myself. It includes intergenerational living, which is something that was very important to me, like most of my adult life, but I wasn't really sure how to get there, and so the priority for me isn't on multiple romantic relationships, right, and you know, look, some polyamorous people will fight to the death on this right.

Annie: 11:46

Polyamorous people will fight to the death on this right that it means multiple sexual and romantic relationships. I will die on this hill because that is not inclusive, right, this excludes asexual and aromantic people who do not participate along binary lines, and so, really, when we begin to blow out the definition to be more inclusive, the titles don't matter anymore. It's really just about love, and that's why I am so crazy about relationship anarchy, because it is the gray areas. It's and and wonderful that you don't have to be attached to like one way of doing anything.

Ellecia: 12:30

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that. I love that so much. It's so good there's. So I feel like when we, you know, we, we kind of like we grow up, we're, we're dating, we start dating, we start doing those things and it's we're so focused on finding a person and that romance and sex all has to be a part of it, and and then, and then we kind of start moving out of that into you know, like if you're going from monogamy to non-monogamy, there's still like it's so the romance and the sex are such a central part, and that is the part that often screws us up, that often makes us make decisions we didn't want to make, do things we didn't want to do, say yes to things we're really a no to, because but the romance and the sex have to like I don't know, they they almost make us, we, we put those almost on a pedestal, above our own actual needs.

Annie: 13:26

Yeah, yeah, I mean I had some really interesting experiences coming into polyamory. I came into polyamory by way of kink, so I, um, my first polyamorous partner was an asexual kink partner, um, but he was not a romantic and he was in fact very romantic and it kind of immediately began parsing out concepts for me in a way that I didn't necessarily know was happening at first, but it helped me. It was the first time that someone said to me I really don't care what you look like. You basically have no, no sexual value to me. Like, who are you I'm interested in being romantic with, with your personality, with your soul, right Like that was like a very mind-blowing concept to me. And as a, a female person, assigned female at birth, I'm a non-binary human. I've learned, but at the time, as the world views me as female and like over-sexualizes me in a lot of ways, that was so appealing to me. And it still took me a lot of iterations in polyamory to get that out of my system. Right Like I'm a very slutty, dirty person and that's a whole facet of me. But as I was able to explore those concepts, I was like, oh my God, I'm demisexual. Like, if I sleep with someone too many times I don't even have to like them, I think I'm in love with them. What in the heck, right Like I was like I hate this, so it it got me to the place where now I can ask myself what is emotional safety for me and how? How do I want the interplay of emotional safety and sexuality to happen for me, right, and what types of relationships do I want to have and what other types of love do I want to experience? Because this is just one right. Romantic love and sexual expression, that's one thing, right, but there's so many types of love to experience, right Like.

Annie: 15:43

Imagine me on the precipice of divorce, being like moving back in with my mom at 37 years old. Right, and now, almost three years later, my mom and I doing relationship anarchy style, work to deconstruct where's the line between being a parent and being a roommate, from being a grandparent to being a parent, how are we dealing with our trauma and how is that affecting us? Right Like. I had a conversation with my mom and I was like I think that some of your attachment issues, you think I'm like always running out the door, I'm committed to this living situation with you. I need you to understand that right. That is a different type of deep, deep work. It goes beyond the bonds of family that we actually have decided we like each other.

Annie: 16:34

Yes, yes, oh, my God, I love that so much so I think and it's been and actually it's been really, really interesting, because my mom is a therapist, right, and so watching her journey, as she's been like okay, let me see what you got going on there, Watching her read the books and watching her be like I think I want to have some polyamorous experiences. I think I want to have some polyamorous clients. I think I want to work with this population. Her and I did a workshop together this year, right. Like our relationship has also gotten more dimensional as we have explored. You know, what do these things mean to us as a family?

Ellecia: 17:18

Yeah, Gosh, I love that so much, like a lot, a lot.

Annie: 17:23

I mean, and I don't think that this is this isn lot, a lot, yeah, yeah, I mean, and I don't think that this is this isn't the traditional way, right, when we think about where do the roads to polyamory lead for people? Right, and you know this is part of my relationship anarchy, because it's like you know, we generally think about individualizing away from our parents as having my own house and having my own. Well, for me, individualizing away from my mom is saying no, no, no. I want to have this conversation about like trans advocacy with you and I want to like, I want to have a really clear and specific opinion on this and I want to debate this clinically with you and I want to talk about how you support people and how I support people and I want to dig into these like other concepts about you know, how am I parenting my child and what is your role in that as a grandparent who's living in the house and where do I not want you to interfere? Right, like I want to dig into that.

Ellecia: 18:20

Yeah, yeah, you know, and it's funny because you say this isn't the traditional way, but, like only for the last, like hundred and fifty years. Is that not the traditional way, right, right? Actually, this is, this is what we've been doing for most of humanity and we've gotten away from it, and so it's really beautiful to to, to find the tools to be able to come back around to what actually is very like nurturing and supportive and like supports the whole family.

Annie: 18:47

And it's hard. You know it's also difficult, right, like I was like oh, all the work I'm doing in therapy now it's just like all like centered around, like family and breaking these cycles, and this is really uncomfortable. I I miss sometimes just doing the like. Can I just be jealous of something?

Ellecia: 19:08

Can't we just talk about like easy boundaries yeah.

Annie: 19:19

It's hard. It's hard work, but it's it's worthy work, because we get the types of intergenerational exchanges that are often lost to isolation.

Ellecia: 19:24

Frankly, Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yeah, yeah, I love it. Changes that are often lost to isolation. Frankly, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yeah, yeah, I love it, it's so good, it's so good. What? I'm curious, what do you think? Hmm, I keep thinking about, like people that are opening up, going, you know, kind of going through the stages, like we want to be sexually open, we want to be polyamorous, we want kitchen table Polly, we want and then expanding and learning more about themselves. And I'm curious, what if you could give someone a way to like skip some of the, some of the things that could be skipped, or like fast track some of the lessons? What would you? What would you tell people? Like, how, how do they, how can they keep moving faster, but not too fast?

Annie: 20:20

I mean I would say slow down, I would say don't go fast, right, I mean I think that I think that the fast track is the disaster track and look, don't get me wrong. Right, like, I think, if you want to go fast, if you'd rather do your chaos on the front end, um, it's valuable but it can be really destructive.

Ellecia: 20:41

Right.

Annie: 20:42

Um, and I think that, like, the excitement that comes with opening changes the pace at which we open, and I think that people are very eager in those moments. There is such a frenzy that happens around that. And, like I remember my friend who basically, like she introduced me to like non-monogamy. She was like we're swingers and like we're having the best time of our lives Two years after we had opened our marriages. We were both like God, miss Frenzy, don't you just miss that? Right.

Annie: 21:15

And so I will give this kind of two sides of the coin advice, right, like if you are so freaking turned on that you can't slow down, right, I'm not going to tell you don't do that, I'm going to tell you, do what you got to do, right.

Annie: 21:34

But I think that you know some of that joyful chaos that we engage in in the beginning of our polyamorous journeys, engage in in the beginning of our polyamorous journeys, it's not sustainable. And now I'm very slow, very metered, very intentional, but that was forged in the fire of chaos, right. And so I think there's no magic bullet for couples opening up, right, like you got to go through what you got to go through and you have to be mindful of the people around you. But like, sometimes you just, sometimes you just can't, like sometimes you just want to lose control a little bit. Like sometimes you want to do your chaos and sometimes you're like, fuck it, who cares? Right. Like sometimes people are like, whatever, I don't I, the consequences be damned. Right, and if that's you right, you can damn the consequences. But there will be some, right, like I definitely I had that for myself, right, and so just know the kind of fire you're playing with, really, yeah.

Ellecia: 22:36

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But which is what's so helpful about things like this? Right Is like you, cause you don't know what you don't know, right.

Annie: 22:43

So hearing people's experiences and going like, oh, that's, that's what the fire looks like yeah, I mean look, I remember saying to my ex-husband in a very, very infancy of the journey I was like, if at the end of this we don't end up together like I am okay with that, right, there was an intuitive part of me that just kind of knew, right, and I don't think and I remember saying this several times and I don't think he ever heard it he was just like yeah, we'll go to therapy, it's fine, right, and we had very different truths in this, right, and I'm not really like that was a chaotic period of my life, but classically like, I'm not really like that was a chaotic period of my life, but classically like I'm not a chaotic person.

Annie: 23:30

So that was something very different for me. And I think in some way he wasn't able to look at that and go, it's really different for her. Why would she? How would she do that, you know, whereas that kind of chaos was kind of his normal and so he wasn't registering anything different, right, like he was always kind of more chaotic, more fly by the seat of his pants, I don't really care. And so that felt like past the salt for him and for me. I was like, yeah, something really different is happening for me here, like I could very well be on a very destructive path and I mean I made a lot of decisions that severed relationships and blew things up, and those were relationships that needed to go anyway. So it wasn't the losses felt great at the time, but in hindsight it's no great loss.

Ellecia: 24:23

Yeah, yeah, truly, truly.

Annie: 24:25

I mean like I did it all Like I dated my best friends of 22 years. Like you want to talk about bad decisions.

Ellecia: 24:31

Oh, oh, take it from me. You don't know what you don't know. I've made them all.

Annie: 24:42

Like I really did it.

Ellecia: 24:44

Oh, but we could do this.

Annie: 24:50

Yeah, like really, I was really just like yeah, whatever, like maybe it's meant to be, maybe it's destiny, like now it's just bad decisions.

Ellecia: 25:02

Oh, my goodness, I wonder, do you? Do you look back and go like, even if we hadn't opened up at some point, that would have ended? Oh yeah.

Annie: 25:11

Oh yeah, I just think. Well, this is part of my theory. Is that, like? Polyamory is really an accelerant right? It's going to show you exactly what your plot holes are? Right, like I can name them all now. Right, like that marriage was always doomed to end because, at the end of the day, he wanted control of me, of everything I did, of you know, my body, my job, my relationships, my place in life, my money. Right, this just sped it up and it was easier to see when other people were around. Right?

Annie: 25:43

And I've got my own plot holes too. I, I will lose myself in people like there is no tomorrow, right? Um, I can be, you know, very romantically centering of people. I idealize people I love. Um, I've got a lot of good qualities too and I, I learned that, learned that. I learned that I'm very giving, perhaps to a fault. I learned a lot about my sexuality and my gender identity, my queerness. I was able to date a lot of women and kind of learn about myself in that arena. I mean, it will just show you everything and if you're actually willing to listen, you can learn a lot.

Ellecia: 26:29

Yeah, yeah, that's the best part, in my opinion.

Annie: 26:34

Yeah, the best part, yeah, I mean like I feel like in the last five years I learned the 20 years that I have spent in adulthood was all kind of crammed, that blooming of it. Like I feel like I was a little bit of a late bloomer right Like I came into polyamory around 36, 37. And in those like four or five years I learned everything about my adult self that I needed to know to get up to this point.

Ellecia: 27:05

Yeah, yeah, Do you? I'm curious um, do you find that you are more confident and self-assured?

Annie: 27:17

Well, yeah, I mean for sure, for a lot of reasons, right. I mean I feel like the day I left my marriage was the day I grew up, right, like I was like, okay, I'm an adult, now I'm going to go, but I think, like I think that I'm more sexually confident, I mean, and some of these things I'm still learning, because, kind of living under the control of my ex-husband really stunted a lot of things about my growth and confidence. I'm always learning about things that I thought I couldn't do and that's helping me build a lot of confidence as well. Still, there are some issues I feel like I will go to the mattresses with anybody about non-binary and trans issues, about feminism, right, like there's some about polyamory, about relationship anarchy, right. I feel very confident about some of those issues and there are issues that I still feel like I got a lot of growth and learning I got to do over here.

Ellecia: 28:17

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yeah, yeah, I feel that, Totally, totally Excuse me. Do you? Do you think polyamory, or even like non-monogamy, is a choice or an orientation?

Annie: 28:40

I think it is both an orientation and a practice right, distinct from one another but obviously intertwined. Right, there is being polyamorous, which is the orientation, and there is polyamory, the practice right. So the reason I make this distinction and I say that it is firmly both is that a person can identify as polyamorous but not be necessarily practicing polyamory. And some people can be oriented monogamously and, for whatever reason, be finding themselves in a practice of polyamory. So I think it is first and foremost in orientation, in the same way that monogamy and ambiamory are also orientations right, I identify as an ambiamorous person.

Annie: 29:27

I'm capable of either a polyamorous or a monogamous relationship, kind of just dependent on a variety of factors, and I'm not distressed by either setup. Really, of course, my version of monogamy would never look like your grandma's version of monogamy Right. But I think that you know what I don't think it is is a lifestyle Right, like, like, they try to couch gayness as like a lifestyle Right. No, people are choosing that big old gay lifestyle Right. I think you are, you know, either oriented that way or not. But but sometimes, even when we're not oriented away, we dabble in the practice and sometimes that's a process of discovery and sometimes we fall on a spectrum just like anything else.

Ellecia: 30:21

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm with you. I'm with you on that one.

Annie: 30:43

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just love to see us do as a, as a non-monogamous community in general is like embrace the nuance, y'all. Like there is so much nuance when you start unpacking these concepts and that's kind of the beauty of it, I mean, it's just like the gender binary, right, like there's, so there's. It's such a beautiful and diverse spectrum and yeah, so we're never going to be able to land on this very definitive kind of answer. But but why should we, you know?

Ellecia: 31:17

Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, imagine if we had all grown up knowing that we had all of these options. How much easier it would be to explore the next level, right, yeah, some of these concepts that feel really hard because they were foreign in our upbringing. They were completely foreign, and so we're trying to wrap our head around these concepts as adults. And then we get it and we're like, oh, now, okay, I see.

Annie: 31:54

Now, what's next? Imagine if we had all grown up knowing that, like, we had all these options available to us. Well, when I look at my child, who is, you know, gen Alpha, right, those kids are much more fluid. They're having these kinds of conversations much earlier, um, you know, and and it gives me like so much hope, it it really like, it really makes me smile when I see like the, the level of like just knowledge and education that these kids have on um, the emotional level, but also on like the options level, right, my child said something to me like I said, oh yeah, it's like lots of those things, and they were like, so would you say, like you're polyamorous for it? Like that's not really the word, but I love that for you, that's not really like.

Ellecia: 32:49

That's not really the word, but I love that for you.

Annie: 32:51

Let's bring out a thesaurus now. Yeah, I was like, I was like, yeah, like that's it, but I mean like it's in their vernacular, it's in their ethos, and so it's like it's a cool. It's a cool thing to watch uh-huh, uh-huh, yeah, I love it.

Ellecia: 33:02

I have three teenagers who are like you know. They're just like yeah, this is just that's just what you do. It's just life.

Annie: 33:08

Yeah, it's like normal for them, like it's like past the salt. Like we got, you know, like we got. We got a world of choices out there.

Ellecia: 33:16

Yeah, one of my kids was like it's so weird, I'm the only straight person in our house.

Annie: 33:21

Sorry sorry, yeah, I mean, my mom sometimes talks about like yeah, you know like she. We were in the car the other day and she said I'm just so binary, I'm just a woman, and we were like I know it's so weird, we're like, we're so sorry for you, like how are you this straight? Exactly like weird thoughts and prayers.

Ellecia: 33:59

Oh, you're a writer too. Yes, yes, I am. Yeah, yeah, tell me about that.

Annie: 34:06

So I have a couple of zines I've written. Well, I've been a working writer my entire adult life, right. I've worked in like public relations and I've been a blogger, and so I'm a career writer, right. But I am also a poet and so I have an entire zine which is called 24 Hours, which is about the first year of my non-monogamous practice, and it started as a chat book called Cedar, which was about the kinky asexual relationship I had with my first partner, Sam, who was my submissive, with my first partner, Sam, who was my submissive, and so it kind of unfolds from there into some other relationships that I had. I think it's about 80 pages. So I wrote that. And then I have sort of this.

Annie: 34:59

It didn't really sell well because it was like maybe a little too triggering. It's what would you call it, Creative nonfiction of a sort called the Ride, which is about an experience that I had where, basically, you know, if you've ever thought back in your history and thought, was that great? You know you're like, did that happen? The way I thought it did Was that was my consent violated, and in my early twenties maybe I was 19. I was working as a hostess at a restaurant and a woman came up to me and said I rode back from college with your high school boyfriend and he was very sorry about what he did to you that night in the bathroom. I was like well, I gotta go, but it really stuck with me. And so that zine is an imagined conversation between her and my ex-boyfriend on this ride and what I think happened between them and kind of why she like basically quandary that I was having and it basically chronicles the downfall of my marriage.

Ellecia: 36:45

Pretty excited about that. That sounds great, and it was at the height of my polyamory as well. Yeah, yeah, I know that's um, I am not a writer, uh, but but the most writing I've done is when I'm like in turmoil and crisis and emotional upheaval, uh, around relationships. Um, that's, that's what I've done, the most writing.

Annie: 37:13

Yeah, I mean there's a lot there and I think you know I've been putting the essays out one at a time on my Patreon and I was like I don't want to limit this to just the people who are on my Patreon, like anyone should be able to pick this up for 10 bucks and like read it Right, because I think that that emotion is relatable, like we're all experiencing the same set of emotions in polyamory, right, even if the situations are somewhat different. We're learning to sit with anxiety. We're learning about what is autonomy. You know we've all who are married and have kids had that skeptical family member say you're going to get divorced. And you know what? A lot of us have gotten divorced after we swore we wouldn't.

Annie: 37:57

And you know I wanted at the time, at the time that I was writing all of these, these works that I've written, I wasn't really setting out to tell the exact story that I was telling.

Annie: 38:10

I was just writing what I felt, whether that was in poetry or in story or in essay form. But in this particular work, when it's strung together, I think it really does tell the story of coming into my self-confidence and my truth, not just in the marriage but in my relationship to polyamory and other people and where I stood on that um, which is pretty, you know, which was a pretty painful journey, honestly. Um, and as I think it is for a lot of us, right, it's, it's, it's not easy emotional work, um, and of course, you know that lots of people will say to you along the way well then, why are you doing it? Yep, but whether you ultimately end up in a very polyamorous practice or relationship, anarchy or some kind of other setup, these skills will pay you dividends. Like, there is so much about myself that I just don't. I think it would have taken me so long to learn these lessons, to understand who I was. I think the growth was exponential and just so worth it in the end.

Ellecia: 39:27

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. I think that this is going to end. You know, people say that all the time and I just I always think like, well, if it does, then kind of good, because I don't want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn't want to be in a relationship with me, or in a relationship that isn't serving everyone in it. Yeah, so if that's the case, then okay.

Annie: 39:54

Well, I think society sends us the message that the worst thing you can be is like a failure at relationships, right, like whatever, the relationship with myself is the most important one. And what society has effectively done through their pushing of this compulsory, toxic monogamy is separate me from me. And you know, I remember when I had like a pretty big attachment rupture with my current partner, like after my divorce it was I mean, it was worse than my divorce. It still goes down in history. We're still together, right, like it goes down in my history as the one thing, like if I was like acting, that's what I would think of to make myself immediately cry, right.

Annie: 40:39

But it also made me think what am I doing with myself here that I'm this afraid of a person leaving me, because being this afraid it's going to get me is left, because I'm going to be so terrified all the time. And I wish that we would have more of a societal focus on self-security and recognizing health and like centering oneself. Right, we're all so freaking traumatized that we're clinging onto other people instead of creating deep security. And in this way, I think the polyamorous community is kind of onto something. Right Like we're trying to do the work to create self-security. We're not always succeeding right Like it takes a lot of iterations of that, but we're essentially removing the fear of being left right and that's very triggering for those monogamous people. How dare you not be afraid to end a relationship?

Ellecia: 41:41

What does that mean?

Annie: 41:41

for me. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing, right, I always say this and you know it's like it's not about you monogamous, sallyally, right, like there's this very, you know, divorce is not necessarily contagious. I'll say not necessarily because, like, people are triggered by people leaving marriages, being themselves saying I've had enough of this, right, like, um, because a great many people do make different choices, they will be being treated poorly, abusively, not standing in their worth, and they worry. What does that say about me if I choose to stay right? And so they will move away from people who are actively making different choices than them. It is a type of self protection for those people?

Ellecia: 42:34

Yeah, yeah, totally, totally yeah. It's very much like wait. If we're not all doing this thing, then why am I doing it? Yeah, yeah, but I'm doing it. So.

Annie: 42:45

Yeah, and, and you know, I think that non-monogamous people present a challenge to that just by way of their existence, right, in the same way that non-binary and trans people challenge masculinity. Right, very triggering for the patriarchy to face their inequities, right, the fact that, oh, but I'm following the rules, as a quote, unquote man and I'm not enough, I'm not allowed to be myself. How dare you partake of this type of joy? Right, it's triggering for them Very, very clearly. Yeah, I mean so that. And that's the thing, right, and that's why we have to keep being loud, that's why we have to keep existing in in joyful ways and say like, if you're triggered, be triggered.

Ellecia: 43:42

That's a you thing, let them.

Annie: 43:44

Yeah, let them.

Ellecia: 43:45

Oh, my God.

Annie: 43:46

I just bought it. I just bought the book. Yeah, let them, it's fine. Yeah, I just bought it. I haven't read it, bought it I haven't read it yet I haven't read it yet either yeah, I'm like, it's in my, it's in my audible uh-huh.

Ellecia: 43:58

I just I just started a 365 day embroidery journal so I can listen to more audiobooks and do something with my hands.

Annie: 44:06

Yes, I love that I drive a lot, so I am always at right now I'm reading Pleasure Activism by Adrienne Marie Brown. Oh my God.

Ellecia: 44:15

So good, so good. I love that one.

Annie: 44:18

Yeah, I just feel like a really enhanced imperative right now to really seek joy, right, like because for me, after I was done, you know kind of like mourning the state of the world in November, I was like, all right, like what are we going to do? Like we're not going to. You know, like we have to be happy. We deserve we still deserve joy. So like, where am I going to fall on this?

Ellecia: 44:45

Yeah, yeah, it's the best way to fight it. Yeah, so that's, that's kind of the trying over here.

Annie: 44:53

Yeah, so that's kind of the trying over here. Where can people find you? So you can find me on Instagram at Annie underscore Undone, and you can also find me on Patreon at Annie Undone. I have over 150 long form pieces of writing on there and several collections writing on there and several collections I. You know. I write about everything from relationship anarchy to domestic violence, um, breakups and divorce. Uh, non-monogamy, kink sex. Um, it's all there for you. Um, and I also have a discord that comes along with that, and I also offer peer supports one-to-one peer supports, which is, honestly, some of my favorite work that I do through the page. Um, it's just connecting with people on a one-to-one level.

Ellecia: 45:35

Yeah, yeah, I love that. That's amazing. I have one more question for you, and this one does not go on the regular um uh episode, but is for my Patreon supporters. It's called uh, just the tip Uh, and it's um. What is uh your favorite or best sex tip? Amazing. Thank you so much for coming on and talking to me.

Annie: 46:10

It was my pleasure. Thank you for having me coming on and talking to me.

Ellecia: 46:14

It was my pleasure. Thank you for having me. Okay, that was Annie, undone with her. Just the Tip for my Patreon lovers and friends with benefits If you didn't get to hear that tip, go to patreoncom slash, not monogamous and get signed up so you can get the juicy bits If you want to follow Annie on her social media or her Patreon links in the show notes. Bye.