What word can I use for a relationship that is committed and loving, but not sexual-romantic?

My primary partner and I broke up, but very much still love each other and are going to continue being in each other's lives. We're struggling what finding terminology to tell people who we are to each other. "Ex" is technically right but honestly wrong, "best friend" is true but not strong enough. I'm just in need of more relationship-describing words so I can get people to understand two people who love each other deeply, feel like family, are sharing a life, but aren't partners.

First off, huge kudos to you two for having the emotional intelligence and maturity to recognize that relationships grow and change and don’t always conform to existing, prescribed structures. Intellectual, emotional, domestic, sexual, creative, romantic, and other types of connections are up to us to define and one doesn’t need to include or proscribe another. I recommend checking out resources around Relationship Anarchy, which does a good job of giving words and structure to ideas and feelings like this.

Ultimately, the big issue here is whether it’s more important that you A.) Find a term that you feel captures the emotional and relational reality of your relationship, or B.) Find a term that you can use externally to refer to this person. It’s sort of one or the other, unfortunately; any term that carries enough meaning to feel right to you will very likely require a lot of explanation and definition. Any term that is conversationally simple is not going to feel complete to you. It is totally okay, when talking to your great-aunt or your coworkers, to use a simplified term just for the sake of not having to derail the conversation to explain the specifics of who this person is to you. It does not diminish your relationship, it’s fine.

As for specific words:

• You can use “partner” or “life partner” - those words don’t belong to people who have a romantic/sexual connection (they have long been used to describe artistic collaborators, business partners, etc.) and you are free to re/define them.

• You can combine existing words for terms like “Family Partner” or “Life Friend.”

• You can just use each other’s names. I had one partner who ‘didn’t do labels’ so I just referred to him as “my Diogenes” and he referred to me as “my Zinnia.”

• You can make up your own term by borrowing, adjusting, or combining existing roots. Lots of people have tried to tease out ‘different types of love,’ so that might be a good place to start. Check out this theory and set of terms. I knew some folks who just used the prefix “Co” to describe how they related to each other; it was meant to encompass words like collaborator, compassion, connect, etc.

Ok SO im in a relationship with a person that ive formed a “pair bond” with and its an open relationship. The problem is, its more of an emotional partnership with the bonus of sexual stuff, and no romantic component which is perfect for me, but i am uncomfortable calling him my boyfriend, because no romance, and i wanted to ask if you had any terms you could suggest instead of boyfriend! Thanks and have a lovely holiday!

Here is a non-exhaustive list of words besides boyfriend or friend:

• Partner
• Dudefriend
• Guyfriend
  
• Lover
• Smoosh/boo/bae/other cutesy gibberish
• Amour
• Any other term that has specific meaning to you - anything from Monster to Bear to Jujubean 

Honestly, it’s not all that important. I have dated lots of people who didn’t feel like “boyfriend” and “girlfriend” accurately captured our circumstances, but we eventually gave up and just referred to ourselves that way for convenience sake.

If you make up a term besides “boyfriend” and use it with people who don’t understand the situation, you’ll end up having to explain it. And if you two feel good about the terms of your relationship, you don’t need a word to define it between the two of you.

Part of the joy of relationships is creating a world full of shared experiences. Build the relationship you want, and you might find that a cozy language that fits your needs will just sort of fall together. 

I’ve been best friends with a lesbian for about two years now (good enough for her to tell me not to move away when I didn’t think I had an option). I’m extremely attracted to her and the more time I spend with her the more I am, but I’m not attracted to her sexually. I’ve never thought about her like that, and when my now long time ex joked about asking her for a threesome it made me uncomfortable. Now we’ve both been hanging out with a straight or bi chick and she flirts with us both, and It’s obvious my bf is into her, but I’m confused by all my emotions right now. I used to just use “relationships” to denote who I was sleeping with, now I consider relationships to just be relationships and I value mine with my bf more than any sexual relationships. I feel really cliche and stereotypical since I’m a straight guy. Where should I even begin? The past year has made a lot of changes to my life and everything seems so new to me.

A lot of people who talk to me about poly identity and practices start out thinking it’s all about sexual behaviors - that fundamentally, being polyamorous means you’re “allowed” to engage in a specific set of behaviors with more than one person. But for me, and for many poly folks, it’s about a lot more. Some of us are also relationship anarchists, which is related to polyamory but not the same thing. I suspect you may find a lot of kindred souls among us relationship anarchists.

Relationship anarchy as a worldview recognizes that sex doesn’t define relationships along a pre-set hierarchy. There are people in my life that I love with a deep and abiding passion, who I think about when I hear a love song, who I would go to the ends of the earth for, who I want as long-term collaborators in this big project called life. But I’m not sexually attracted to all of them. There are other people who I definitely like having sex with, whose bodies and sexual preferences work great with mine, but I certainly am not interested in spending my life with them. And there is so much grey area - I have a different relationship with every friend and partner in my life, with different boundaries of sexuality, intimacy, and commitment. Some friends I’d love to live with but not necessarily raise kids with. Other friends I flirt and cuddle with but don’t intend to make the relationship sexual. And so on.

Most of today’s social messages about family and relationships tell us that these feelings all come lumped together, and that we can (or should) only feel them for one person at a time. But you know that’s not true. You know that you can feel this commitment, this intimacy, this affection, that you’re told as a “straight guy” to associate with a sexual-romantic “girlfriend,” for someone you’re not sexually involved with. You also know that this doesn’t prevent you from loving other people, or feeling sexual attraction elsewhere. You know all this, but maybe you don’t have a mental place to put it. In today’s society, it’s hard to find words for this reality, and nearly impossible to find love songs or stories that represent it.

You bring up the concept of cliches and stereotypes, and refer to your identity as a straight male. Try to let go of some of that. You don’t have to be everything society tells you that you are. Your relationships don’t have to fit neatly into the Cosmo-magazine, romantic-comedy, Puritanism-and-family-values structures. You can inhabit your own reality fully and without need for external validation. Whether you do or don’t have sex with a person doesn’t dictate or define anything else about that relationship. I encourage you to read up on relationship anarchy, and to keep building relationships that are healthy and fulfilling for you, no matter what they look like.