Stages of accepting PM

[PeteR]

Scriptural examples of struggles in polygamous families show a breadth of problems....

Abraham: problem appears to be rivalry between Sarrah and Hagar. Main issue seems to be Hagar trying to usurp Sarah's position.

Jacob: He seems to be the primary problem in the family by playing favorites, something the Leah and Rachel appear to iron out, but remnants of the struggle Jacob's favoritism created plague kol Israel to this day....

David: Rivalries in his house are likely a reflection on him being focused as king and not enough as father.

These have limited application in this discussion, but they do show that the man can definitely be the fault. Headship.

 

[Cap]

Scriptural examples of struggles in polygamous families show a breadth of problems....

Abraham: problem appears to be rivalry between Sarrah and Hagar. Main issue seems to be Hagar trying to usurp Sarah's position.

Jacob: He seems to be the primary problem in the family by playing favorites, something the Leah and Rachel appear to iron out, but remnants of the struggle Jacob's favoritism created plague kol Israel to this day....

David: Rivalries in his house are likely a reflection on him being focused as king and not enough as father.

These have limited application in this discussion, but they do show that the man can definitely be the fault. Headship.

You forgot the big one,

Jeremiah 3:8
I gave faithless Israel her certificate of divorce and sent her away because of all her adulteries. Yet I saw that her unfaithful sister Judah had no fear; she also went out and committed adultery.

Not really sure how the headship thing works for this one.

 

[cnystrom]

I am glad that I am not the only wife "falling apart".

Your feelings are very common. One thing that pretty much all polygamists agree on is that polygamy is hard. Harder than monogamous marriage. In fact, it is so hard, even most polygamists recommend avoiding polygamy if that is a possibility.

The good news is that most successful polygamists also believe that the hard work is worth the reward. That the larger family, with more supporting adults when it works is a beautiful and even holy thing and in fact is a gift of God.

I also think they most people who have been through the journey, even those who have been unsuccessful at polygamy (such as myself) believe that the journey is still worthwhile. That what they learn (about what God really wants concerning marriage, about what men and women really want and need) and the character that they are forced to develop are worth the struggle.

Do not feel alone. You are at the right place.

 

[andrew]

^^^Gold.

 

[cnystrom]

Well said!
Many times we here expressions like, its Gods will for me, or its the path God has chosen for me to walk, etc. Its almost like some feel we have no choice in the events taking place. The way I see it is that the choice is ours to make. Just because Jehovah has clearly shown that PM is both moral and acceptable, does not mean that we are personally chosen by God to walk that path. That choice is ours to make.
With regard to the statement from Kasandra above, spot on! If we as a husband choose to pursue another wife, then the first wife should not feel left behind or less loved and if she does, then we are the ones at fault not her. It is true that she will still have things to contend with such as jealousy, but I believe that if she is safe in our love and affection, as shown by the little things, like holding her hand a little longer and so on, then the possibility of a poly marriage is much more palatable. At least to my mind if we are unable to keep our first wife safe then we should possibly rethink our desire to take a second. That part of the load is ours to carry, not hers!

This is all true, but I found in my failed courtship last year that it is a little more complicated than this.

It is an obvious truth that a man must ensure that his first wife feels loved, appreciated, needed, not forgotten, cherished, etc. However, what I found is that I was juggling needs. There were my wife's needs, there were my intended's needs, there were my own needs, and finally I had to juggle with the question of what God really wanted for me and for us. And at times these needs seemed to conflict with one another. I was often forced into trying to decide which was the greater need at that moment in time.

Wife needs some reassurance, but intended is waiting for me. If I pause a little and give my wife some reassurance, will my intended be upset that I am a little late? The right thing to do is be on time, but wife really needs this. Intended will be ok if I am a little late, because she will be excited and happy to see me....I hope. Anyway, it can get real complcated real fast.

Another conflict: how do you handle the cell phone? Wife wants to know what is going on. Intended expects a certain amount of privacy. Not trying to hide anything, but what is the right balance?

How well you handle these types of situations may be a good test to see how ready you are to be a polygamist.

I think the more mature everyone is and the more that you all can work together, the more you can trust each other instead of being adversarial, the better off everyone is, and the better your chances are of success and living happily ever after are.

 

[andrew]

A side note: This is where community comes in (not online 'discussion' board community, real blood sweat & tears community). It may appear that the meltdowns are primarily among the women (because they are), but that's at least partly because that's their only recourse. A guy can just keep doing what he's doing and play the headship card; a woman either sticks around or leaves. A community around the family can provide much needed 'reality checks' if either the man or the woman is being, let's say, difficult.

 

[andrew]

Ha! Chris beat me to the juggling metaphor (great minds...), but I was going to suggest that a guy who has been successfully juggling one rubber ball (one relatively contented woman) has to take some accountability for deciding whether he's ready to juggle two or three running chainsaws (angry, hurt, insecure, confused, suspicious women)....

 

[cnystrom]

It seems to me that there a stages in accepting PM. For men, you either accept it and go with it and deal with whatever that process brings. But, for women, it appears there are two basic steps, but even these are done in stages.

For a woman it seems that accepting it as a possibility is the first step, and its gradual tolerability in ones mind. The second stage is accepting PM in real life, both for first wives and any other position. Once a woman says she will accept it in theory, there is still the possibility that reality will force her to change her mind.

I could be wrong but it doesn't appear that PM relationships go wrong because the husband made a mistake in deciding to have PM relationship, but that the wife, or wives have issues that keep them from functioning correctly in the relationship.

Do others see this or am I missing something?

I think for everyone there is a two stage process:

1. Intellectual undestanding of the doctrine. There are a lot more people that support polygamy intellectually than there are those who are trying to live it.

2. Believing that it can be a blessing for you and your family. Far more rare.

I think both sexes can go through these stages, but it is perhaps more pronounced in women.

Although it is more common that the husbands get to #2 before the wives do, I think the reverse is more true than most people imagine. I have seen plenty of examples where wives have talked husbands into polygamy for various reasons.

The sexual drive is a strong human motivator so it is not surprising the male advocacy. Further first wives lose a lot culturally by going to an alternative lifestyle and the advantages for women, while present are less obvious especially to those newly acquainted with the idea of polygamy. With what our culture teaches about monogamy, patriarchy and even marriage it should not be a surprise that women have difficulty with polygamy. Culture is a strong current. Much compassion is needed.

 

[cnystrom]

A side note: This is where community comes in (not online 'discussion' board community, real blood sweat & tears community). It may appear that the meltdowns are primarily among the women (because they are), but that's at least partly because that's their only recourse. A guy can just keep doing what he's doing and play the headship card; a woman either sticks around or leaves. A community around the family can provide much needed 'reality checks' if either the man or the woman is being, let's say, difficult.

Probably a good time to mention that if you think the community provided by the forum is great, you really should try to make it to a face to face retreat. They can by life changing.

(P.S. I am not a staff member. Just a happy customer.)

 

[cnystrom]

Now, to try and clarify, in all the comments that I have seen here on this forum about the struggles that face families, I have yet to read about the husband mistreated, or disregarded, or generally didn't care about the well being of a wife or wives. It seems to me that once a husband decides to follow this course, there is a genuine effort to try and make it work. I would imgine most of that comes from trying to follow God and please Him more than anything else. (I realize there are some husbands who don't follow this idea, but I'm not talking about them, and haven't read about them here)

There are probably at least a couple reasons for this.

1. You probably get a better class of husband in this forum than in other polygamy forums. Join a few polygamy forums on Facebook and you will see plenty of husbands who have no business being polygamists. Those are the guys who post things like "My wife found a lady on the internet last week who agreed to join our family and we moved her in this past weekend, but now it does not seem to be working out. Apparently she hates kids and working and only likes to do drugs all day. What do we do?"

2. Even those who were on this forum who crashed and burned are now no longer here. Polygamy zorched them and now they follow another path. The long time members here are the survivors.

 

[Cap]

Thank you cnystrom and Andrew these are the things I was looking for. Not trying to blame anyone but the circumstances of life and how to better handle them in the future.

 

[FollowingHim]

Thanks for clarifying where you were coming from @Cap. I see why you formed the impression that it comes back to women, but think this is a misunderstanding. Completely agree with @cnystrom's latest post regarding this and know real-world examples of both points...

I would add

3. Everyone naturally sees the faults in others rather than themselves. Men outnumber women here in terms of active members. So there is a tendency for detailed discussion to be with a man asking for help with the problems he perceives - which are the issues his women are having with the concept. That isn't necessarily the full picture.

If you looked only through the posts by women seeking advice with marital issues, whose husbands are not on the forum, these tend to give the impression that the problems are caused by the husband being over-hasty or foolish in other ways. That too is not the full picture. But the common recommendation is "get your husband on the forum", because nothing will get better until he amends his leadership style and/or decisions, the women aren't in a position to fix it. So there is a completely different perspective here if you look for it. But these discussions are shorter and the participants often don't stay long, so it is easy to overlook these examples and get the impression that women are generally the cause of issues.

 

[PeteR]

You forgot the big one,

Jeremiah 3:8
I gave faithless Israel her certificate of divorce and sent her away because of all her adulteries. Yet I saw that her unfaithful sister Judah had no fear; she also went out and committed adultery.

Not really sure how the headship thing works for this one.

True. Thanks. Yeah, totally the woman's (house of Israel) fault in that one....

 

[Joleneakamama]

The long time members here are the survivors.

I'm a sort of long term member. We came close to adding a sisterwife about 6 years ago, and the way that situation ended was hard on everyone. I don't know that we belong in the survivor class, but perhaps, since we still see polygyny as a positive possibility.

I mostly wanted to say there has been a ton of good discussion on this thread, and add that I have seen the kind of crazy @cnystrom mentioned above. Some of the situations I have heard about, and had ladies share with me even first hand over the years are just inconceivable to me.....and of course the media will always report on the most dysfunctional and bizarre examples AND suggest if possible that it is the normal expectation for people that are our kind of crazy (seeing big biblically styled families as a good thing).

 

[rockfox]

Honestly the average person's monogamy experience looks rather dysfunctional and bizarre to me.

I don't have multiple wives, that's just a commentary on marriage in America today.

 

[rejoicinghandmaid]

Let me say it's been very enlightening to read this thread. As somone new to the Biblical teaching of PM, accepting it because I can see from Scripture the truth of the matter, and yet being very human and wondering HOW does a man seeking God's will and a woman also seeking God's will move forward in pursuit of this choice once they are convinced and committed and feel God leading them into this paradigm shift--this thread has been the most transparent of any that I've read on this forum. I spent right at 3 months searching, reading, trying to wrap my brain around everything on this site. That was after vv76 had carefully explained the Scriptures, and I'd embraced the truth.

So thanks, Cap, FollowingHim, Andrew, Steve, RockFox, Aussies, Kasandra, RustyWest4 for sharing. I'm aware that some are in PM and some are not. My biggest take-aways are the following:

Aussies:
"At least to my mind if we are unable to keep our first wife safe then we should possibly rethink our desire to take a second. That part of the load is ours to carry, not hers!"

Cap:
I made this statement more focused on trying to understand what women have to go though in this process, but that seemed to leave out what the process of accepting PM actually intails for a man.

First, you are completely in love with your wife, you are content and everything is at peace. Then comes this idea that God has a better path for you. You try to reason it out and even talk to you wife about it hoping she can help you understand at the same time she is suppose to accept it as a good thing for her. The emotional turmoil is only just beginning in BOTH of you. It all seems like a good idea to the man and they hope the wife will get onboard. But as she works through her stages, the man starts to realize the depth of what is being asked of him. The choices of following God or following your wife. The risk of losing it all. To come to the place of being asked to sacrifice your son, is a place few can go to easily, man or woman. Then as reality starts to form and the possibility of this actually working out comes the thoughts to a man about spending night's away from the one he loves. The idea of sharing a life instead of just living the one life with the one he loves while he starts to develop the same level of love and commitment to another. These things start to weigh heavy on him. I don't envy the struggles of a wife, but make no mistake, a husband is struggling with God and sometimes the pain is beyond compare in him. And that doesn't even begin to talk about the pain of losing a second in the process. No wonder few venture to this part of the mountain.

So again, thanks a bunch! Being a woman, I've never been able to consider the struggles a man might encounter. It's done my heart good to read these comments!

 

[cnystrom]

I'm a sort of long term member. We came close to adding a sisterwife about 6 years ago, and the way that situation ended was hard on everyone. I don't know that we belong in the survivor class, but perhaps, since we still see polygyny as a positive possibility.

Close enough! And you are still here!

When they pass out the "I Susvived Polygamy" t-shirts I vote that you get one.

 

[Joleneakamama]

When they pass out the "I Susvived Polygamy" t-shirts I vote that you get one.

Thanks! I'll take one.

It was the hardest thing I have been through, and it was her breaking things off, and the reasons why she did it that made it hard. Her getting to know the family was fine, her visiting was neat....it was all a learning experience, and a walk of faith all the way.
I must just be a little crazy, because it didn't put me off the idea at all.

 

[cnystrom]

It was the hardest thing I have been through, and it was her breaking things off, and the reasons why she did it that made it hard. Her getting to know the family was fine, her visiting was neat....it was all a learning experience, and a walk of faith all the way.
I must just be a little crazy, because it didn't put me off the idea at all.

We had much the same experience just last year. Still sort of grieving it. I was just reading old messages tonight.

 

[Joleneakamama]

We had much the same experience just last year. Still sort of grieving it. I was just reading old messages tonight.

I understand. It's been almost six years here....and it took time. I lost a really neat friend, and it really felt like a death in the family.