Woman in Throuple Came Out as Bisexual and Polyamorous to Parents. She Never Could Have 'Anticipated' Their Response (Exclusive)

 

Alana Underwood, Kevin Jankay and Megan Smith — who share their lives in a throuple under the handle “Camp Throuple” for over 300,000 followers on TikTok — open up to PEOPLE about their unconventional relationship

The trio shares the origins of their relationship and the experience of coming out to their parents and friends

“But we believe that everybody's on their journey and love can overcome everything,” says Jankay

When Alana Underwood, Kevin Jankay and Megan Smith decided to affirm their committed relationship as a throuple, they knew that there would be barriers. But telling their parents was a whole different ballgame.

In 2020, Underwood and Jankay had been dating for a little over three years when Underwood decided to confess a nagging thought that had always bounced around the back of her head: Though she had only previously pursued men, she wondered if she was romantically interested in women, too. She wanted to explore what bisexuality might look like, and she wanted to explore it alongside Jankay.

When she confided in Jankay, Underwood tells PEOPLE, he was open to the idea. They decided to make a profile on a dating app together in pursuit of what Underwood says she believed would be an “experimental, one-off, sexual experience” with another woman.

But after connecting with Smith — and starting to spend more and more time together over the next few months — the trio eventually admitted to each other that their feelings had progressed beyond their sexual genesis: They wanted to be in a throuple.

In an interview with PEOPLE, Underwood, Jankay and Smith — who share their lives in a throuple under the handle “Camp Throuple” for over 300,000 followers on TikTok — opened up about life in their unconventional relationship and the experience of coming out to their friends and family.

The three all moved in together into a 600-square-foot apartment, complete with one bathroom and a single bedroom with a queen bed pushed together with an air mattress. (Yes, they all share a bed every night, though they rotate which throuple member sleeps in the middle.)

As they were adjusting to life together, the trio tells PEOPLE, they soon realized that striving for perfect equality among their individual relationships was an unrealistic goal; rather, they learned to appreciate the different ways they each related.

“The way you love each individual person is different,” says Smith. “That doesn’t mean it’s more or less — it’s just a different type of relationship. Like, mine and Alana’s relationship is very different from mine and Kevin’s. But that doesn’t mean it’s more or less. It’s just a different experience and a different type of love.”

Jankay adds that they also found ways that living in a trio strengthened their relationship — even beyond the more traditional, monogamous relationship that he had previously shared with Underwood.

“You get double the support and double the affection,” he says. “You can bounce something off one person and get feedback from another. If you’re in a quarrel or an argument with one person, the other person can show a perspective that you might not see because you’re in the heat of the moment.”

By the summer of 2021, after the trio had gotten comfortable in their new relationship structure, they decided that it was time to share the news with their parents.

Smith’s parents — who Underwood lovingly calls “total hippies” — were already on board from the beginning. But the process was much more nerve-racking for Underwood, who was also coming out as bisexual at the same time as polyamorous.

“I sat down with my parents, and I was like, ‘Hey, so I’m bisexual, and I also have a girlfriend — who is also Kevin’s girlfriend,’ ” she remembers, laughing at the situation now. “No kidding, their jaws hit the floor.”

Though they were initially shocked by her relationship, Underwood says her parents quickly came around to the idea.

“They were just like, ‘OK, so have you guys gone camping together?' They just tried to figure out the best way to continue this conversation, and so it was a much better result than I could have anticipated,” she said.

For Jankay, it hasn’t been quite as easy. When he told his dad, he “didn't know how to take it,” Jankay says. And though his mom “seemed receptive” at first, she later called him and told him she “wasn’t OK” with his relationship.

Jankay didn’t speak to his mom for two years, though the pair have recently started to rebuild their connection. “We've taken baby steps, and she's started to have conversations with me, but it's never about my life or asking how the girls are or anything like that,” he says.

“But we believe that everybody's on their journey and love can overcome everything,” Jankay continues. “There’s no animosity or anger. She's had her own journey, so I respect it, and when she wants to — and hopefully she does — I'm here.”

As for their friends, says Underwood, everyone has “responded really great.”

“The friends that Kevin and I had — when they met Megan, they immediately were like, ‘You are our friend now too. They just welcomed her in. That was really cool for our like chosen family to accept her and bring her in.”