Not sure if he will be happy in an open relationship

[tthhr]

Hey y'all, looking for advice here. Met this interesting, loving guy in August and we've been seeing each other since. He lives two hours away by car, so we visit each other every weekend or every other weekend. Early September we began to discuss expectations and I made it clear I would love to be his main partner in an open relationship. Specifically, open to individually hooking up with as well as developing secondary romantic/sexual friendships with other men. He agreed, though not enthusiastically. So far, he's dated two or three guys in his city, I've hooked up with one while on holidays in another country. Talked about it, no big deal.

I check in with him every time we see each other to know how he feels about our arrangement, or whenever he feels upset or insecure about me talking (or potentially talking) to other guys in his presence. One time he got upset because I went on grindr (dating app) and talked to someone while we were silently cooking, listening to music. We went over it, he apologized and understood that, really, I was just excited about having found some latino guy (which I am) in Germany. I wasn't even looking to meet up with anyone — most of the time I'm just curious about the people in my surroundings. Yesterday he called me to ask that I explicitly let him know if I intend to leave a bar/club with someone else whenever we go out. This seems to be the scenario that worries him the most. Will call him tonight to explain that when I refer to an open relationship, I don't mean to suggest that I'm a dating-machine (I'm an introverted grey ace), like, I'm not going to abandon him at a bar or, as long as our relationship remains loving and healthy, anywhere. I've asked him to tell me if he's unhappy being in an open relationship, in which case we would have to break up.

I have two main worries. First, I fear that he may not be able to support me when it comes to my potential secondary romantic/sexual friendships/hook-ups. Second, I'm also worried that he will not tell me that he is unhappy with our arrangement out of fear that I would terminate our relationship. And I don't know if my language is in any way threatening. It's just that I would much prefer to let go and let him find someone who also shares an interest in monogamy than hurt him. My plans for now involve discussing possible scenarios where we're meeting other people (together or separately) as well as look up relevant articles online and have him read them, since it's not really a topic he's immersed himself in before.

I would really appreciate any advice or references on the topic.

[Heather]

It sounds like you two need to talk more before we could do anything but make guesses here. Why don't you have these talks with him, then check back in with us?