Building A Life Larger Than Romance

I remember not-so-gracefully coming out as polyamorous to my parents nearly eight years ago. At the time, I didn’t really know what I was doing. I only knew that I needed something different from the conventional relationships I had known.

My previous relationship, at 21 years old, had felt restrictive. Like many relationships, it was built on invisible agreements I had inherited without questioning them: unspoken expectations, ownership, and fear. His values were almost the antithesis of polyamory: unquestioning loyalty, exclusivity as proof of love, and a belief that commitment meant choosing one person above all else.

At the time, I didn’t yet have the language for why it felt so suffocating to me. I was young, unsure of myself, and I trusted his confidence over my internal compass. Beneath it all was an undercurrent of mistrust and dishonesty.

In the years that followed, I began experimenting with non-monogamy. I was curious and hungry, and willing to dismantle everything I thought I knew about love.

My second attempt at “coming out” to my parents was three years ago. I was dating a man who had a wife and a child, and once again, I found myself trying to explain my life in a way that made sense to people who had inherited a very different relational blueprint. They were confronted, not because they thought it was bad, but because polyamory challenges our ideas of family, the future, and commitment itself.

It asks questions many of us are taught never to ask. Can we commit without exclusivity? Are there other ways to relate to people? Can intimacy exist outside of romance and family? Can we truly be free?

During those years of experimenting, I began to notice how much of our relationship culture is organised around sex, and I started to wonder why.

Why does sex make a relationship more legitimate than friendship? Why do we assume romantic love should sit at the top of the hierarchy? Why do we build our lives around sexual partnership, often at the expense of community?

At first, polyamory looked like freedom to me, because it expanded romantic possibility. Over time, it actually helped me see that sex and dating is not what I want to center my life around.

My priorities started changing, and, without realising it was happening, I shifted my goalpost to organise around value instead of sex. I allowed myself to be drawn to people I would never date. After my relationship with the married man, I partnered with people who shared and expanded my vision of how to live. We met through a therapeutic and collaborative spaces, rather than romantic ones.

To me, intimacy is much bigger than sex. Some of the most meaningful, supportive, and life-changing relationships I have ever had have been platonic.

Today, I have a team of people in my life who care deeply about me, not because they are sleeping with me, and not because they are trying to build a conventional future with me, but because they are genuinely invested in my wellbeing, my growth, and the life I am building.

We continuously choose a path that brings us closer to one another, because of shared values rather than attachment. If I had been hyper-focused on finding “the one”, I never would have built this system of support, or started the career that I am deeply passionate about.

Recently, I’ve had two men tell me, respectfully, that they feel insecure because I am not prioritising them. And frankly, there is truth in that. I am not.

I told one of them that I think we will be connected for a long time, but that means that we are going to need to accept many different iterations of our relationship, because a stagnant, all-consuming relationship is not something I am interested in. I am building something larger than any one relationship.

I haven’t made any other attempt to “come out”, partially because I no longer feel that I should have to explain my desire to be as free as possible, in a world that often fears freedom.

But today, my dad asked me to write an article on polyamory. Not to sell it, but to help people understand it better.

My version of polyamory is this: I want to change the world.

My work, my purpose, and the communities I am building are central to my life. If people want to be a part of that, they can be. If they don’t, they naturally will not sit at the top of my priorities.

This is incredibly confronting in a world where most relationships are built on convention. The expectation is very real, especially if you are a woman who loves deeply.

I’ve been told that one of my superpowers is making people feel like they are the only person in the world. I understand why that can be confusing, because I can offer immense presence, devotion, and care, without promising that I will centre my life around a person.

It’s important to differentiate that I can love someone fully in a moment without structuring my whole life around them, and I can care deeply without forgetting my purpose.

In fact, that presence, commitment, care, and unconditional love is the very foundation of my purpose, and frankly, I’m happy if anyone on the planet wants to be present with me for a minute, a day, or 100 years. If that’s through romance and touch, amazing. If not, it doesn’t make it any less valuable.