Our years together certainly do not add up to the decades of some of the responders, however this past winter we passed our 13th year together. Its great to laud the diversity which relationships can take.
I met my partner while he was selling computers in a huge store, between degrees, and I bought one from him. As he said I got the home service plan. And over the next months we dated and eventually moved in together. There is quite an age difference of 11 years but it does not seem to have made much of a difference. He was 23 and I was 34 when we met. He had never had any sexual experience....I had had a long term relationship with a wonderful man which had ended a few years before at my partner's desire. (we are all good friends now)
Being Canadian we could marry, but have no plans to. I strongly feel that I do deserve the right to marry (or do anything else) on an equal basis with straight people, and am proud of Canada being a progressive country on so many fronts. My partner and I both however felt that we would not have married if we had been straight, and that under the common law of Canada we are treated in every respect as a married couple anyway, from filing taxes together to the freedom to adopt.
As I mentioned my partner was inexperienced when we met, and after several years when teh opportunity for a threesome developed with another guy we discussed it and decided to pursue it. We have had some very pleasant ongoing and safe meetings with a few other guys over the years, and all have been pleasant and rewardking.
My partner has been away for much of 7 years of the time together doing graduate work in three different cities. They ahve been great places to live and for me to visit, and the distance has allowed us to maintain aspects of our independance...and yet to really look forward to our time together and make good use of it.
We do occasionally meet other guys, but our policy from the beginning was that we disucssed it, and always told each other everything. For us...the honest and respect has really worked well. Neither of us have ever felt jealous. I strongly feel that this is because we had a very good base to our relationship of many years before we ever met another guy on our own...and that since we are totally honest with each other we have never had to wonder what our partner MIGHT be doing!!!
We think of our relationship as "inclusive", rather than "open".
At the same time I stress that this is the relatinoship which has gradually developed over time. I advocate it for nobody else...but it has certainly worked well for us.
We have also startled a few of our friends, in that we regularl have talked about what we woudl do if we ever stopped living together in the way of property division and so forth. In our opinion, because we have not simply taken for granted that all would continue as it always has, it means we appreciate each other all the more. We believe we are even more likely to stay together....because we accept that there is always the possiblity that we might part.
The abililty to talk and communicate about EVERY aspect of a relatinoship for us is what makes it work. Companionship as mentioned before, shared property, similar goals and values are all more important than sex. Sex is wonderful and important. But there are obviously many facets to a relationship.