For you maybe... were you not thinking of the partners you were two-timing?

I really think it's more common than people want to admit.

@Julie808
Not two timing, overlapping ? Read the question !

@Qualia
I believe that too !

@AstralSmoke
Could be, you decide !

Wait... isn't that like going out and getting a "new" dog when the old one gets sick and isn't likely to make it? I always wait for the old one to go before I start looking to rescue a "new" one. Nevermind that I've ended up with three now!

@mtnhome
Choices, choices, choices, damn those damn choices ! Lol

@mtnhome That's a fair analogy. We have an "overlap" dog. LOL Acquired in part because I know how I am when losing a pet. It takes me forever to get another one and having spent too many of my best years dogless, not a lot of time to do that waiting thing. So knowing I'd be a basket case when the time came we'd lose our old girl, got a puppy boy, but not before she was too old to handle being around another dog, and we gave her plenty of "old lady" time away from him. They were separated during the day for his 1st year, because he was relentless & the off switch didn't hit until around 7pm.

So yeah, say someone has decided a relationship is on life support, you've done your utmost, but it's dying and you've lost your will to make it better, or the other person makes you feel hopeless about fixing it. I can totally see it being like "asking you to fire them" from "the job" of being in a relationship with you. Unless the primary relationship gets "new life" injected into it in a timely manner, the trajectory is set in motion to exit.

As we get older I can see the potential for this sort of thing to be a means to reduce for lack of a better word, the refractory period. (I'm tired & just getting home winding down so not 100%atm)

Me, too.

That's a respectful policy. Love it.

Underlapper, haha. I could make a really dirty joke about that, lol! Me too, though. I'm 58 and only have had 3 serious relationships with many many years in between, sometimes over a decade. So glad to see others with the same pattern. Nowadays, I really feel like a freak due to my inability to "hook up."

@IrishGypsy
You aren't a freak. It's about 5 years on average for me. Most of the time, longer. Feel free to make any jokes you want.

@Holysocks thanks, too new to the group to make a joke, haha. Don't even have one exactly in mind, just the innate desire to make the best one I can that has to do with oral sex, lol. Hey, what is your username about? Holy? Oh, duh, I get it. Good one.

@IrishGypsy
It's all good.

Yeah!

Well there is that! Lols.

lol

LOL me either.

I'm not afraid to be alone either. Having once spent the summit of my life for 5 years without anyone "regular". Thinking back I've been in 5 "coupled" relationships where it wouldn't have been cool to "cheat", but with the one overlap. However think I've been possibly overlapped once for sure, by a "boomeranger".

@Qualia From Australia?

@AstralSmoke No someone who returns after breaking up with you. That's so fun. sarcasm

@AstralSmoke the one, who moved away, came back annually to check my pulse, for years in absentia, then finally caught me home...and proposed I be his mistress right before he was about to be married. That didn't end well. Cheater deluxe that one. No thanks. I missed a bullet there.

@Qualia He sounded more like a grenade launcher.

I don't think that is overlapping? I inferred deception, or at the least, omission, was inherent in the definition. You are practicing polyamory, which is great. I wish I was built for that, but I'm just not. At least not that I know of so far.

Yes it's true I'd consider myself to be cheating if I, 'overlapped'.

It's a bit different to cheating in the sense that you've already made the decision to end the first relationship after establishing the second relationship, whereas cheating pretty much means you have no intention of ending the first relationship.

I know a women who was getting rid of one boyfriend while seeing another. She wound up pregnant but didn't know which one was the father, so she had an abortion. Solved that problem.

@bingst Interesting point that describes the nuance . Yes, it's still a form of cheating

I totally get this. And I'm ridiculous w/the picky thing. And I have been alone between all but one relationship. I'm currently infatuated with someone who says they're attached (not married or engaged) but boy does he act single around me. Idk. I don't like it & never been in quite this situation before. One minute I think it's done then next it's exploding all over the place.
I was perfectly content in a way before meeting him, not seeing or pining over anyone, being dead from the waist down. Now it's a GD mess.

@Qualia Oh oh. 54 year itch? Your phermones are are rampant. 66 is the new info on a woman's height of sexuality. You are getting close. Enjoy the rush....I think. =0}

@Countrywoman LOL that would explain a lot.

Really? I'm surprised you've escaped exposure to it.

The world is moving fast out there

I usually help an ex find someone else ASAP, to prevent their trying to reconcile, knowing I'd probably feel sorry for them and let them return.

My male side sees my romantic interest men as "pals," complete with having a hard-wired "bro code," where I have their backs.

You got that right!

Rich, famous, and gorgeous?

@bingst Slender, decent-looking, genuine, and kind. It doesn't take much, evidently.

I've had that too altho it's been awhile.

Yes. As if they are just waiting to jump your bones. Cringe

@Qualia Then I guess it doesn't work at all for men in the same way, not for me anyway.

@bingst well there was one disgusting pig of a person who made a pass at me while my husband was dying, and they were within feet of one another. How this guy has any friends is beyond me. And to make matters worse he wasted no time before the ashes were returned to start asking me out & all other kinds of weird shit.
So, it's not always so great, be glad. You could be missing out on a "hobosexual" or creepy idiot.

@Qualia Damn