Pairs With Spares

Nicole, a social worker who asked that the family's full names be excluded for fear that child protective services would take away their son, has been with James for six years. They met when both were involved in other open relationships, and knew they wanted to raise any children in a group marriage. They are in a triad with Rebecca.

Nicole is the toddler's biological mother, though she fondly tells the story of how a classmate at his preschool assumed Rebecca was: They share platinum blond hair and nearly translucent skin, while Nicole and James both have brown hair and dark eyes. All three adults share a similar thick-through-the-middle build. When a reporter asks whether they all share a bed, Nicole bursts out laughing -- she has a hearty and well-used laugh -- and says, "Not until we lose some weight."

Though Nicole and James had jointly dated other people before, Rebecca, a paramedic with an efficient British accent, is the only one to mesh equally with both. For the triad's first date, James made Rebecca a plate of homemade Jammie Dodgers (one batch with strawberry jam, one with raspberry; he didn't know which she'd prefer). Rebecca brought them a plant. There was, says James, "a lot of courting," and a lot of evenings that ended with him and Nicole pillow-talking about how adorable Rebecca was.

Now they all live together. Most of the time, Nicole and James sleep upstairs in the master suite and Rebecca keeps her own room downstairs. But sometimes James joins Rebecca, or Rebecca joins Nicole, or the three of them lie comatose in front of the television and ponder the baby that will arrive in five months. After that, Rebecca would like a turn at carrying a child, and if the trio meets someone they all connect with, they might add another adult to the household, too.

It's less about them wanting to fulfill personal desires, they say, and more about needing more people to meet the daily requirements of 21st-century life. As in, if it takes two incomes to keep up with the modern mortgage and school fees, then who is going to provide the kids with a stable environment at home? "Five hundred years ago," says James, " 'family' meant mom, dad, grandma, aunt, great-grandma -- everyone."

They're all "out" in real life, accepted by their parents, their respective workplaces and at their son's progressive school. It's been, they say, relatively easy. But they've heard enough custody horror stories (most famously, April Divilbiss, a Memphis poly, lost her daughter after discussing her lifestyle in an MTV documentary) to make them wary of being too public.

"People in my generation are recognizing that they have more choices when they're deciding what they want their families to look like," says Diana Adams, 28, a polyamorous lawyer who specializes in alternative family law in New York. "This is an important historical moment because of the gay marriage conversation. We're becoming more accepting of gay parents, of single parents." She hopes to soon start a family with her two male partners.

About a dozen poly parents discuss both changing public perception and the daily grind of child-rearing at the "Kids and Poly Relationships" seminar.

"My oldest son is very attached to our current girlfriend," one male participant says. "It's happened before with a relationship that didn't last." He wants to know how to protect his son while still giving him the opportunity to know the girlfriend.

A woman in her mid-30s wants to know how to enter the poly dating scene again. "I've basically been baby-hibernating for the past five years," she says, but now she'd like a partner in addition to her husband.

"My 13-year-old is embarrassed of us," says one concerned dad, with an expression of profound shame.

The session leader, a clinical therapist, laughs. "All 13-year-olds are embarrassed of their parents."