My anonymous blog is not so anonymous anymore

Two days ago, I did a little shameless self promotion on r/polyamory.  Why not?  I had a post that I thought was fun/funny and would appeal to a large number of Internet users/poly people so I went for it and posted up a link.  After a few upvotes, I was given a sudden burst of traffic to the site.  The most exciting thing about this is that people clicked around and read other posts, not most people, but some people liked my writing enough to click around and see more of it.  Other people took the time to comment on several posts.  This is pretty cool, but also terrifying.  The anonymity of my online journal is broken at least to an extent.

It started when NMB finally found the right set of words to Google.  He shared it with his wife.  Then my Reddit self-promotion lead to this happening:

Yep.  I ran into one of my boyfriend's other____ (dates? lovers? Gawd, lovers sounds so cheesy.  I don't know the right word... but you get the picture.) on Reddit.  This lead to a PM where we confirmed each other's identity and that I am, indeed on her polycule diagram on Fetlife as I suspected.  This lead to me texting NMB to tell him who I met and where, which lead to both him and his wife popping onto the thread to say hello.

I'm so amused by this, but again, a little afraid.  A comment left today lets me know that at least one other person mentioned in my writing has read my blog.  Big City's poly community is small enough that I was personally recognized by a stranger from a post on r/polyamory.  It's impossible for my writing to not be affected by this somehow.  I have already held back on writing about certain subjects/people when I knew that they were reading.  I'll be a bit more sensitive to this fact, for sure, but it's important to me that I continue to write in a way that is honest and true about my experiences.  Therefore, you won't see me sugar coating and pretending the icky feelings aren't there.  If there is one thing about poly that has met my expectations is that it's a lot of work.  I don't want to misrepresent this.  Like my friend that divorced us said, "Feelings will get hurt." I never denied the truth to that, but I knew the risk/benefit made it worth it.  I also knew that Hubby and I were up to the challenge and that we could get through it.  That's what is important for me to document here.  If anyone is going to read this, I want them to know that this is not easy, but that these problems are solvable.  Every relationship has it's problems and challenges.  Sometimes a couple makes a choice to do something hard for the chance of a better life, like moving or taking a job in a different city or having children.  They accept the challenge so that the rewards will be felt by both of them in the future.  Deciding to become poly is the same sort of mentality.  We went at it together, knowing that the work would pay off in the end with a new, more free relationship model.

WHOA, sorry TANGENT!

The point is, what is the point?  Oh yes, the point is that despite my total anonymity being broken about and scattered to all the corners of the universe, I want to do my best to continue to write as though no one is reading.  I don't want to hide the icky stuff for the sake of people I know are reading it or might be reading it.  This means I have to suck it up and accept that I'm baring my chest a little bit, even for the things/behaviors/thoughts/emotions that I'm not proud of.  Now, throw me some beads. ('Cause I'm baring my chest, get it?  Get it?  You know, I've never done that...  but I just thought about it and I don't feel like I'm missing much.)

Actually, the main point here is that if you find yourself the subject of one of these, don't get mad, learn from your mistakes and know that I'm remaining true to myself.  You put yourself out there and so did I.  Ha. (But seriously, learn from your mistakes, ok?)