Rose, Luke and Megan | TheOpenPhotoProject

Rose
Hometown Greeley, CO
Place of Residence Seattle, WA
Occupation Mother

Luke
Hometown Ft. Collins, CO
Place of Residence Seattle, WA
Occupation Neuroscientist.

Megan

Hometown Ft. Collins, CO

Place of Residence Portland, OR

Occupation PA student

Rose and Luke are married and share a home with their two kids aged 3 and 6. They met when Rose was at an ice cream parlor. Megan lives in Oregon with with her husband and daughter. She and her husband have known Rose and Luke for over 10 years.

Luke and Rose on at home.

Megan and Rose.

Rose: One day we were hanging out with a bunch of friends and one of his friends dropped us off at his mother’s house. Luke and I were in the back seat and he reached over an gave her a hug, and I thought I saw them kiss and I just took it in and maybe a day or two later I went to him and I said, “So I saw this thing happen . I’m interested in continuing to kiss someone I was kissing before. How do you feel about that?” And he said, “Well, that didn’t happen but I’m fine with you kissing this other person.

Rose at home.

Rose: I think had I known how to navigate and known it [polyamory] was an option earlier on, I probably would have picked it up earlier. I’ve always fallen in love with a lot of people at the same time or had crushes on a lot of people at the same time. For a long time that felt like I was doing something wrong. When Luke and I started experimenting with it, which we kind of just stumbled into it, it just felt right. It felt like the way that I wanted to live. It felt much more honest than the way I had been doing things, which was trying to be monogamous and just not really enjoying that.

Rose and Megan share a snuggle.

Megan: So I live with Martin and we parent together. So that’s a 20 year relationships. And then also in town I’ve got a boyfriend who I’ve been with for 15 years. And when life is normal and I’m not a PA student, we see each other at least once a week, usually. But that’s not been happening obviously. And there is another guy I started seeing a year and a half ago. He’s really fun. I like him a lot. He has never been in a poly relationship before and he is really uncertain if poly is something that he wants to do. So that is really challenging emotionally thinking about what we’re doing as it keeps going. And then, these two[Rose and Luke] up here in Seattle, and another boyfriend who I’ve been with for over 10 years now. Is that true? That’s true. He has been variously out of town and all over the country for quite a while now. He was in town for the first couple years. Am I forgetting anyone? [Laughing] I don’t think so! Those are kind of my core people.

Luke working at home.

Luke: I think I’m fortunate enough to be to be working in a place where if I discussed these issues with anyone, it would be totally fine. That said, I just don’t. They’re not secrets but these aren’t questions that people ask me at work and I don’t tend to bring them up.

The kids' room at Luke and Rose's home.

Rose: I identify as a mother and I think as a person who is practicing non-monogamy, I think it is really important to not hide that from my kids. I have a [Skype] date every week with a partner who’s in North Carolina, and so I usually disappear into a room and they say, “Oh, are you going on a so-and-so date?” And I say, “Yeah!”

Rose does the grocery shopping

Luke get's a snack

Luke: With children, it’s easy to explain. You talk about your lives to your kids and they accept that for what it is and they learn about the things you do that work, and the things you do that don’t work.

Megan: And with kids their normal is normal and it’s only later that you start to get the broader societal stuff and we haven’t hit that yet. I have one daughter and she’s 6. Every once in a while I make a point of asking her what she things grownups do on dates. Just to see what she says. She thinks we eat snacks and watch videos.

Rose: She’s not wrong.

Megan and Rose figure out dinner.