Words by Sam Donndelinger, Uncloseted Media

Andrea, a 43-year-old software engineer, was once open about being polyamorous. She told family and friends that she maintained multiple romantic relationships simultaneously, with the full knowledge and consent of everyone involved. Over the years, that’s meant dating partners separately as well as being part of throuples, in which she had two primary partners.

“I honoured the structure of monogamy while I was in it and never pursued anyone else but something always felt off. … I felt very isolated,” she says. “Something was missing. And I was always drawn to the family structures of people who were in open relationships.” 

Andrea was accepted when she came out as poly at 31 and never felt the need to hide. But that acceptance narrowed after she came out to a handful of colleagues in the break room at work. 

“After that, it definitely started making the workplace more uncomfortable,” Andrea, who lives in New Jersey, told Uncloseted Media and GAY TIMES. 

“They made a lot of jokes about all the threesomes I was having, that I wasn’t leaving enough for everyone else,” she says. “One day a joke was made that I was like one of the people from the fringe Mormon sects that practice polygamy, that I wanted sister wives.”

“The attitude of believing that my polyamorous identity made it okay to use much more sexual and politically charged language in the workplace was the main thrust of my discomfort. They [assume] that the moment I come out as poly, it's okay for them to abandon professionalism and use lewd terms in the workplace.”

Andrea says that as time passed, the jokes transformed into more bitter treatment. “I noticed the way they treated me changed. I felt iced out.”

After weeks of enduring the comments and coldness, she brought the issue to her boss. Instead of intervening, her boss told her she was “a liability.” The next day, she was fired.