Is polyamory still cheating if we both agree to it?

My wife has suggested that we open our relationship to polyamory, but I was raised to believe that cheating is flat wrong. Am I being a fuddy-duddy?

—OldFashioned


“Cheating” means going against the agreed rules or one’s personal vows or agreements. If a couple has vowed to stay sexually exclusive, then sex between either of them and anyone else is cheating. But if they have a different agreement, then what is or is not cheating is also different.

Agreements aren’t always explicit. As two people move beyond the first date toward becoming an established couple, certainly they should at some point sit down and come to some explicit agreements about how they’ll conduct their relationship, including whether or not they’ll be monamorous (sexually exclusive) or polyamorous, and with what conditions. But, alas, this does not always happen. As that couple relationship becomes more firmly established, if no explicit agreement is made, a tacit assumption often gradually arises that neither will indulge in sex with anyone else, just because for a long time that has been the cultural norm. It then becomes a shock and a severe strain on the relationship (maybe breaking it irrevocably) when contrary facts come out.

Never make assumptions: it’s relationship poison. Always talk things out in advance, and come to an explicit agreement.

Let’s say that you and your partner have made promises of exclusivity at some point in the past. Maybe it was in your wedding vows (“forsaking all others”), or you just sat down and agreed to that. Polyamory does not say that people should follow their whim of the moment, ignoring vows or agreements, and damn the consequences. Indeed, the two cornerstones of polyamory are openness and honesty. Stick by your agreements, or change them together if you feel they no longer serve you. If you go behind your partner’s back, that is not polyamory. It’s still cheating, and you were raised well to know not to do that.

So is it possible for a polyamorist to cheat? Certainly, by going against whatever agreements have been made with partners. A common poly agreement is condom use with anyone outside the partnership. So, if the agreement between primary partners A and B calls for protection with others, and if A goes skin-to-skin with a secondary C without first clearing it with B, that’s cheating. But the act of sex itself between A and C is not cheating because A and B have agreed to that, with any limitations specified.