Whole Lotta Love

Polyamory is suddenly everywhere-and it's changing the face of love, marriage and even child-rearing. Five intimate stories of non-monogamy.

- Rosemary Counter

For proof of polyamory's move into the Canadian mainstream, look no further than our easternmost province. In 2018, a judge in Newfoundland and Labrador ruled that a polyamorous trio of two men and a woman were all legal parents to their child-ruling against the province, which had refused to list more than two parents. "Society is continuously changing," the judge wrote, "and family structures are changing along with it." In 2021, a British Columbia Supreme Court judge issued a comparable decision on behalf of a similar "triad" relationship.

Polyamory, a relationship structure in which three or more adults form a long-term, committed relationship, suddenly seems to be everywhere. A 2019 survey of Canadian adults by researchers at the University of British Columbia and the University of Toronto found that one in 10 respondents were or wanted to be in an open relationship. Another survey by researchers in Canada and the U.S. showed that one in five respondents, especially younger ones, have practised "consensual non-monogamy" an umbrella term including polyamory and non-monogamous lifestyles like swinging and open marriage. And in the past few years, polyamory has become the subject of books, films, TV shows and even a reality show, Couple to Throuple.