Finding Human Relationships as a Zoo
A Zoosexual is someone attracted to animals. A Homosexual (short of course for Homosapien-Sexual) is someone attracted to homosapiens. I feel incredibly lucky in that I happen to fall into both categories. Both humans and animals are incredibly appealing to me, and I’ve managed to achieve my dream relationship where I have a human boyfriend and a canine partner and we all live together as one happy family. That said, as simple as things are now, they certainly weren’t always this way. Much like most zoo topics, there’s a lack of data when it comes to what percentage of zoos are zoo exclusive, but based on my own experiences I’d say it’s somewhere around 40%. That leads me to believe that there’s probably a lot of people out there trying to figure out how to navigate having both a human and an animal relationship, and so I thought I’d share my experience in the hopes that it makes someone else’s life easier. Of course, there are a million ways to go about these things: what works for one person’s situation might not be as good for someone else’s. But in this article, we’ll go through some ideas that are generally a good place to start for a healthy poly zooey relationship.
Let’s start with the basics. What comes first, the chicken or the egg? Or, in this case, the animal or the human. Both sides present different challenges. If you have an animal partner already and you’re looking to bring a new human into your life, the tricky part is figuring out when and how to tell the new human about the existing dynamic between you and your furry paramour. If you tell them too early, you risk them feeling uncomfortable and potentially even put your safety at risk. If you tell them too late, it feels like a betrayal that you kept a secret for that long. Especially if you feel romantically about your animal partner. On the other hand, if you have a human partner and want to bring in an animal, you have more room to talk about animals as fantasy and establish a baseline with your human, but it could also lead to a situation where your human partner doesn’t want an animal in the house, or they feel uncomfortable about it after you’ve already been with them for a few years, and it puts you in a very awkward position. A lot of the times, it’s not really up to you as to what relationship you commit to first. Very rarely is life so convenient. So here’s a few tips and tricks for both sides.
If you have a human partner and you’re looking to introduce an animal into the relationship, step one is communication. Ideally early into your relationship ask your partner what they think about having an animal around. Make sure that they’re on the same page as you in that regard. Having an animal in the house (or in the barn) is a big commitment, and some people just don’t want to put up with that in any capacity. If they’re firm on not wanting an animal in general, you may have to decide between them and your dream relationship, and it’s better to do that as early as possible.
From there, take things slow. We already wrote an article on coming out that has some awesome tips for that process, but to summarize:
-Put out feelers on their opinions on things like animal rights
-Share adult content ranging from furry to feral to zoo to see how they feel about it
-Make some jokes about zoo stuff just to see their reaction
-When you do come out, take it seriously and be patient and willing to answer all of their questions
The best time to have this conversation is when things start to get serious in the relationship. The first time you think to yourself “I think I want to spend the rest of my life with this person” is probably a good metric to look for, but other milestones such as moving in together or meeting each other’s parents also work. Every relationship is different and it’s up to your best judgement to figure out the best time, but remember that you want to start doing that list of stuff up there well before you get to this point so that you’re ready to actually have the conversation by the time the milestone that feels appropriate rolls around. Once you’ve had the conversation with your partner, you’ll have a better idea of how to take things from there. There’s a chance that they’re a zoo too, and they’re super excited about animals. But, if they’re more lukewarm on the idea, definitely give it some time before bringing up the idea of actually bringing home an animal.
When you do bring that up, stress the fact that it’s not just about sex, because due to the social perception of zoos that’s unfortunately where their mind might go. Take their wants and needs in an animal into consideration as well. If you have a dream breed but they don’t like them for whatever reason, try to find a compromise. Remember that while it may just be you that’s engaging with the animal on a zooey level, that animal is still going to be a part of the relationship and if you shoulder your human partner out of the way to have everything you want, that starts the relationship between them with disdain and jealousy (something we’ll touch on later.) Once you do bring the animal home, make sure to give your human partner lots of time to build a connection with the animal, as well as to see the connection that you’re building too. Show that this is a situation mutually beneficial for everyone. Make sure to do check ins, and ask your human how they’re feeling, and what they’re thinking.
And that’s double important for when it comes to sex. Once you and your new animal partner are ready to take that relationship to the next level, make sure you’re open and up front about it with your human partner. Don’t treat it like something deserving of shame, or else it’ll seem more like it is shameful. In fact, even if your human partner isn’t a zoo themselves, invite them to participate or at least watch. This gives your human partner the ability to sate their curiosity and see for themselves that everyone is having a good time. It’s easy to assume the worst when something is happening behind closed doors.
And that’s that! Now let’s take a look at it from the other side.
If you have an animal partner and you’re looking to introduce a human into the relationship, there’s a few changes that are really important. If you skipped to this section because it’s what’s applicable to you, I’d highly recommend that you do a skim of the last section because there’s some similarities that I’m not going to go over again. Anyway, first of all, when you start dating the human, make sure that your animal partner has plenty of time to meet and get used to the new human hanging around all the time. You have to remember that if you move in with a new person, your animal partner is going to have to deal with them all the time too. Make sure to give time for them to get a vibe from them. If you’re a few dates in and your animal partner absolutely hates the human, maybe they might not be the one. Likewise, this gives the human time to assess the relationship you have with the animal. If they see that you and your animal partner really care about each other, it makes the next bit a whole lot easier.
Much like the other way around, at some point you’re going to have to have a conversation with the human about the relationship you have with your animal. If you skipped the last section, scroll up to the bullet points and read that and then come back. Coming out when you already have an animal partner is both easier and riskier. On the one hand, the human partner can clearly already see that your animal partner is happy. It’s hard for the human to assume you’re hurting your animal partner if they’re also just giving you affection all the time. However, if they do have a bad reaction, there’s already potential legal liability if you’re living somewhere where bestiality is illegal. Even if criminal charges aren’t placed, there’s still a chance you could get your partner taken away. It’s extra important to make sure you have a good judge of the human’s character before coming out in this situation, as you’re putting your partner’s safety at risk when you do it. Be careful, even if it means holding off on advancing the human relationship until you’re ready to have that conversation with them.
Once you do tell your human partner that you’re active with your animal, give them time to warm up to the idea. Don’t start suddenly pushing your sexual activity in their face. It’s an amazing feeling being open about your sexuality with your human, but they may need time to process. Allow them to ask as many questions as they want. On the other side, I said that it’s important to have that open door policy when it comes to sex. That was vital because you already have a level of trust with that human. On this side, take things slower in that regard. The goal is still to get to that point, but do it in steps. For example, instead of saying “wow me and my animal partner had crazy sex yesterday,” saying something like “wow, my animal partner was really horny yesterday,” or even “wow, my animal parnter was very persistent yesterday” all give more room for them to distance themselves from the physical act. Especially if they’re not comfortable with the idea yet. Once you feel like they are a little bit more relaxed, that’s when you can mention that they’re totally welcome to participate or watch if they’re interested or curious. A lot of this just comes down to intuition and the kind of relationship that you have, so you’re going to have to do a lot of feeling things out. Take your time. Once you come out, you don’t have to feel any pressure to move things along faster. Given some time, ideally they’ll get comfortable with the idea, and you’ll be in a happy and healthy relationship!
There’s one topic that I haven’t addressed yet, and it’s because I think it’s equally applicable to both sides. This is something that can be a really serious problem that starts small and gets a lot bigger over time. And that problem is jealousy. When you’re in this set up, you’re essentially entering a three way relationship. Even if your animal partner is more like a best friend with benefits, there’s still a lot to think about in this regard. Especially because your animal partner might not see it that way. Because animals are just as likely to get jealous or protective about their partners as humans are. Let’s start by looking at the animal side of things.
Human society and animal societies look generally nothing alike. Bringing an animal in line with human society is already a huge jump for them. And so, when it comes to relationships, there may be some instinct based hang ups that you need to address. For instance, in the animal world usually males (and sometimes females) are very protective of their partners, especially after breeding. We could get into the evolutionary psychology of it all about that behavior being to ensure that their seed is the one that gets propagated, but that’s not really relevant for this conversation. The point is that if you’ve been with an animal for a long time and suddenly start banging a human, there’s a chance that your animal partner might see that human as a threat. They might be jealous and bitter whenever the human is around, and act aggressively. They might get uncomfortable whenever you and your human have sex, or scratch at the door when you and your human are alone in the bedroom. It’s very important to address these issues early on. Make sure that your two partners have plenty of time to bond early in the relationship. If you go on walks, allow your human to give your animal treats, or feed them. Show that they’re not a threat, and that they’re going to be another person they love to have around. If jealous actions do occur, make sure to give your animal partner plenty of time and affection to show them that even though you’re spending time with a new person, they’re still just as important to you. Try to involve your animal partner in as many activities as possible and make sure that they know that you love them just as much as ever.
Similarly, trying to assuage human jealously involves a lot of letting them know you love them, but with a lot more boring words. As humans, one of our favorite activities is putting labels on things. We seem to absolutely love trying to define abstract concepts, and then shoving in things that don’t quite fit into those boxes. As such, when you’re in a relationship with a human and an animal, it’s probably a good idea to have a conversation about what box you’re putting this into. Are you three people in a polyamorous relationship? Are you two humans in a relationship with a dog that you sometimes have sex with? Or are you something totally different? You should be upfront about how you view your relationship with your animal, especially if they came before the human, but this is a conversation that your partner needs to take the lead on. Let them express how they feel, and make sure to ask lots of questions to figure out what they’re comfortable with. For me personally, the resolution we arrived at is that I’m in a romantic relationship with both my canine and human partners, but we aren’t “poly.” Each relationship is too different from the other. Especially considering my partners don’t have any romantic connection with each other. That probably doesn’t make sense to a lot of people, but it doesn’t need to make sense to anyone else. The important part about the labels is that you and your human are happy with it.
From there, just make sure that you’re giving plenty of affection and that you’re open to talking about things whenever they have a frustration. It’s easy to let little things become big things. For instance, I used to always cuddle my canine partner when watching shows because that was a habit that we had before introducing the human partner. But, after a few months, my human expressed that he was frustrated because he wanted to cuddle as well, but felt like he was relegated to the other side of the couch, physically and metaphorically. He didn’t feel comfortable bringing it up when he first got annoyed by it because he felt like he was intruding on the relationship that I already had with my canine partner, and so instead just got bitter. I could have avoided that by just checking in with him more and asking how he was feeling about things. Humans are way more willing to vent when you specifically give them space to, and it’s extremely important to listen to your partner’s concerns.
It can be a lot of work having two partners. You have double the needs that you have to keep in mind, and you need to have the energy and will to be able to give double the affection. Before getting into this situation, you need to know in yourself that you can handle that effort, because as much as it’s a dream relationship for a lot of people, that doesn’t mean that it’s easy. And getting into a situation where you’re stuck between two partners when you just don’t have enough love to go around feels awful for everyone involved. That said, I don’t mean to scare you off of the idea. I absolutely love both my partners, and I love the relationship that we have together. Seeing my human and my canine super happy together while they’re playing makes me absolutely overjoyed. I hope anyone else out there looking to enter this kind of relationship gets the chance to. And hopefully, this quick guide can help you do it.
Thanks for reading!
Article written by Tarro (February 2023)
Find them at https://twitter.com/hereforthezoo
Questions, Comments or Concerns? Check out the discussion thread over at ZooCommunity or join our Discord server!
