Lesbians have difficulty recognizing differences between partners due to gender-specific sex-role socialization. Our socialization facilitates primary identification with others and discourages differentiation. As lesbian couples are comprised of two women, both partners bring to the relationship conflicts about differentiation within an intimate relationship. The desire to merge, or to be as close and as alike as possible, is one end of this continuum. This becomes problematic when differences between partners surface either consciously or unconsciously.
At the other end of the continuum is the woman, or lesbian couple, who fends off conflictual dependency needs through a false independence, or rigid self-sufficiency. Nonmonogamy can serve as a vehicle to de-merge the merged individual or couple. It can be used as an attempt to structure dependency needs in a woman who may be terrified of the loss of self implied in primary intimacy with another woman. Nonmonogamy can function as a stable solution to conflicts regarding merging, or as a transitional step in the development of autonomous boundaries.
Lesbian nonmonogamy differs from heterosexual nonmonogamy because partners are open about their affairs. This difference may arise from the feminist political value that monogamy is based on patriarchal ownership of women, and from female socialization patterns which make it atypical for women to value sex without love. The combination of open communication about noncasual sexual relationships is the particular challenge of the nonmongamous lesbian couple.
Lesbian relationships where there is unconscious merging can have its own problems. Loss of self, no differiation of power, and co-dependency are common patterns seen in relationships where there are no boundaries between the couple. Monogamy then becomes a smoothering, clinging identity to a particular kind of relationship that may or may not be a good one for each individual in the couple.
Lesbian intimacy and couple dynamics are an underanalyzed phenomenon that is complicated and can complicate and even break couples up if not addressed in a relationship. This is a highly value-laden issue in the lesbian feminist community. Our couple partnerships need support to look at and understand the dynamics of coming together and separating within an intimate relationship.
Socialization within a heterosexual society does not have to address these issues in the same way as lesbian couples do. With a man and a woman in an intimate relationship, psychological difference is more easily recognizable and can feel more safe than the sameness of two women in a relationship. Examining this dynamic and bringing consciousness to the problems created by it are important to our having healthy lesbian relationships.
