Everybody is Doing It:Three's Company

"...All three of us, intoxicated with desire, played havoc with everything visible and palpable which Nature had bestowed on us, freely devouring whatever we saw and finding that we had all become of the same sex in the trios we performed ." - Giacomo Casanova, History of My Life

Who wants one guy when you can have two?

Interesting article from Instinct magazine

by VINCE CATRONE

So let's say you're out and about, minding your own business, looking your Saturday night best, when a handsome man gives you his million-dollar hello smile from across the crowded room. You smile back, and realize the smiling man is with another smiling man. Could it be? Is there a couple in your immediate future? Isn't this just like the video you rented a few nights before?

The idea of three gay men getting together to share a night of earthly delights is hardly groundbreaking; chances are most of you thumbing past this article in search of some hottie in a pulled-down scuba suit have a story or two to tell about your own private menage. But what about when a hookup becomes more serious? Is it possible for a threeway to go beyond bedroom gymnastics and into the realm of a serious emotional relationship?

You might think three people hanging out together is inherently unstable; it's easy to gang up on one another, one person feels left out, sex becomes problematic and conflicting needs ultimately undermine the relationship. No one said it's a cake walk, but for a few brave souls out there, life as a trio is not only rewarding and fun, it can last beyond your crazy vacation to Ibiza.

SIMPLE MATH

"I came in as the third," says Jared, "and I honestly thought it was going to be a hookup for sex. But then we started talking and we realized we had lots of similar interests." Jared had met one of the partners at a bar, and the next day he met the two as a pair. From there, the three became inseparable. "It was nice," he explains. "As far as my friends were concerned, I was dating two guys."

According to Barry Cardiner, an L.A.-based marriage and family therapist, there are elements that are fairly common among three-way relationships. It often begins with a stable couple relationship that decides to invite another person in. "Usually the third person they bring in is younger," Cardiner explains.

For Jared, a nice guy from Missouri, doing the three-way thing was not something he was looking for. A previous boyfriend had suggested inviting someone else in, and he initially rejected it. "I was dead set against it, had jealousy issues," he says. "But a little later here I was. I did a complete 180. When I came in as the third person, there weren't any of those issues I had been concerned about."

Even better, there were plenty of benefits. "It's a nice feeling of closeness," Jared explains. "The three of us all sat on the couch together. It was like a big pile of guys. There was a feeling of longing and togetherness. But I was lucky; the two guys I was dating were very good at communicating. It never fell into a place where it was two against one." Although, their sleeping arrangements were sometimes challenging. "It did get a bit crowded," Jared laughs. "Two average-sized people barely fit. It was really nice in the winter, but it got on the hot side in the summer."

Communication turned out to be crucial, since Jared found himself more attracted to the first half of the couple he met, at least initially. "It was a while before I did anything sexual with the other guy," he explains. But the three of them worked through it, to the point where sex between them all was very rewarding, and far better than one-on-one man-play. "It was like a night-and-day difference," Jared proclaims of sex between three people as opposed to two. "I was making love with two people and they were making love back to me. It was incredible. I don't think [that level of intensity] is possible with just one person."

ROOM FOR ONE MORE?

For Max, a hunky 20-something undergrad in Wisconsin, his three-way experience had the same ups and downs he would have had with anyone he was dating. "It was a fairly >> normal relationship," he says. "But instead of dating a person, it was like dating an entity."

Max met his couple through an ex, but didn't think anything of it since the couple was already in a relationship with someone else. After that relationship ended, Max realized the pair had something to offer him. "It wasn't like, Let's call him up and have sex,'" Max explains. "We would go snowboarding together. They both had their own businesses. It was ironically normal, except there was three."

Cardiner points out that if any committed relationship is going to work (whether it is with two or three people), parameters must be set. "There have got to be rules and boundaries," he explains. For three-ways, those rules have to be even more understood, and perhaps more complex, than a traditional relationship. "None of us were allowed to have sex without each other," Max admits. Which even meant the original couple couldn't do it without Max.

Settling conflicts between all of them were resolved fairly easily. "They would come up with a conclusion, and see if it flew with me," Max says. "They would work out what they thought was fair between them. One or the other would come to me with something. But sometimes I'd bring up a topic," he adds, "and all three of us would talk about it."

Despite their good relationship, Max felt there was a difference because the two of them had been dating for years. "In the back of my mind, I knew I was never going to be completely equal," he admits. "I couldn't rely on those shared experiences that would make us stronger."

AND THEN THERE WERE THREE

But for some, the couple-plus-one model is not the only way threesomes come together. When Ben was in his sophomore year at Stanford he started exploring his sexuality. "We lived on the same dorm floor as undergrads," he says of his two boyfriends, "but we moved out into an apartment when they found out I was sleeping with both of them. They had been together the year before. So we all became lovers, best friends and sort of a family."

Ben and his boyfriends had some things in common that made building a relationship easier: they were students at the same university, and were all goal-oriented young men focused on their educations and their future careers. Plus, they were all healthy young men discovering their sexuality together. "We actually broke my queen bed frame, and I knew post-orgasm that I needed both of them," Ben admits of their first night of love all together. "The sex in our relationship was the binding ingredient at times, but it was not a relationship based solely on sex."

Unlike Max's situation, Ben and his cohorts often had sex in pairs since they all traveled regularly. "We would have phone sex," Ben explains. "That was amusing." Despite the freedom within their relationship, Ben says he was always faithful to his threesome, and as far as he knows, so were his boyfriends.

For the next two years, the threesome was inseparable, sharing a house with a pool off campus. "We traveled together, shared clothes and everything," Ben explained. "We rotated sleep positions, but that is a whole new story. We never lacked fulfillment. Our families only knew we were all roomies."

Although Ben says his three-way relationship was one of the most important in his life, he doesn't see himself jumping into another situation where he is dating two guys. "These guys taught me about the meaning of life," he says. "The uniqueness of our individual selves grounded us together. I'm not sure if that could be duplicated."

Jared, whose relationship also ended because he too needed to move for professional reasons, says he would love to be in another three-way situation. "I've talked to couples online and they're often just looking for the sex," he explains. "They're not looking for the long-term. If I hadn't left Missouri we would have stayed together probably. There was a time when I was seriously thinking of getting in touch with them again."

In the long run, the challenges that face three-ways are similar to the challenges that affect couples, but the added variabilities of another person makes it that much harder to maintain the relationship. Still, to the few who have found a good three-way relationship, the benefits are terrific, and the dynamics end up being much like any other dating situation. None of the people interviewed for this article felt there was anything odd or strange about their relationships - everyone was healthy and happy. Ben noted that some of their friends found it difficult to understand at first, but eventually most of them came around and were supportive. "I know individuals can find love with more than one person consecutively," he says, "so why not in a group of three?"

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