In an open relationship when you are already a parent?
I had a conversation yesterday that reminded me of what I had wrote previously about sharing a lover. I’m pragmatic about it and my opinion of it remains unchanged and that is: if everyone concerned knows about the situation and is honest to each other about it, and that everyone’s needs whether financial, emotional or physical are met, then it can work.
But things can get complicated if kids are involved. Do you tell the kids and when do you tell them? If you tell the kids would they get bullied or teased in school about it? Kids do not have the emotional capacity and maturity to be able to understand it. And neither would most of their parents. Modern society is still not capable of accepting such a liberal arrangement yet.
Note that I said “modern society”. Whilst on one of their several trips to China, my parents encountered a tribe called the Mosuo in Yunnan Province. It is a matriarchal society and their approach to sex and child-rearing is decidedly liberal in the modern sense and there is no word for “father” or “husband”.
The traditional Axia system is marriage-free. Mosuo men call their beloved women Axia (“intimate companion”) and women call their lovers Azhu. They are not bound by marriage and will live in their mothers’ homes all their lives. Every adult Mosuo girl has a special Azhu house of her own where her lover can visit during the night but must leave early the next morning. If the girl wishes to stop the love affair she simply closes the door and then the man will not return. The lovers have no economic or legal ties: Their relationship is based only on mutual love and affection, where the will of the female is highly respected. If children are born into the family, they belong exclusively to the mother’s side and inherit her surname. They are raised with their mother and uncles and are not introduced to their father until their adult ceremony.
Mosuo: A Mysterious Matriarchal Group in China.
For more reading:
Mosuo – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Is China’s Mosuo tribe the world’s last matriarchy? | Life and style | The Observer.
And here’s a good Youtube clip (embedding is disabled) – Mosuo Women – China.







