Monogamy Doesn’t Work…Not For Me
By: Najwa Helyer
Tags: Editors Pick, Relationship, Monogamy, Love, Marriage

Firstly, I don’t really believe in monogamy or the institution of marriage. It was never something that made sense to me and it never worked in my family. There’s really only one marriage that I’ve seen in my life that’s worked, and even then I still say that there’s still time for it to fuck up and they get divorced. When people talk to me about it, they think I’m crazy or that I haven’t found the one. But that’s precisely the point, I don’t believe that there is just one.

Secondly, the term unconditional love is thrown around a lot, but I don’t think it exists. There are conditions to everything; especially love. Seeing my grandmother call the police on her son proved that to me. If the biological love between mother and son can be pushed to its own limitations, then so can other types of love. For example, I would never be with an abusive man, that’s a condition. It’s also strange to me how it’s believed to have unconditional love but relationships come with so many rules.

I’ve only ever been in two long-term relationships in my life. They were both extremely different people and they taught me so many things about myself but also relationships in general. Both relationships taught me that monogamy is not for everyone. As I say this, that doesn’t mean that I want to be with loads of people at the same time (not that there’s anything wrong with that either), but the idea of committing to one person was just something that I couldn’t understand.

Monogamy may work; just without the limitations

My first relationship came about when I was really young; 20 years old and in university, I had the world in my hands. Alex wasn’t in school, he was working full-time which meant we lived apart from each other and being in a long-distance relationship was amazing for me – I had my own time and space to breathe and be who I am and Alex accepted that from me. Even when summer rolled around and I wanted to spend a free day alone instead of taking the train down to see him, he was alright with that.

That was a big thing for me, I’d seen many friends giving up a lot to be in a partnership, but Alex never made me give anything up. I was wholly me and he was a part of it. Emotionally, however, Alex and I couldn’t communicate well. We were sensitive about multiple things and nothing could be said without hurting each other, not that we raised our voices at each other, there was too much love and respect there. But we just couldn’t understand each other.

Until I met Charlie. He quickly became a good friend of mine and helped me through my emotional struggles with Alex. When Alex caught wind of my relationship with Charlie he said I was “emotionally cheating” on him. I never knew that was a thing….did you? I was confused as to how a completely platonic relationship caused such a rift between us.

I never believed that one person could be everything for you, and Alex knew that he couldn’t be everything for me. He eventually confessed that it hurt his ego and he felt betrayed, but I didn’t know how else to navigate the relationship and Charlie helped both of us. But that’s an important rule of monogamy, you have to be mindful of all your friendships too.

By the end, Alex and I parted ways because we just couldn't see eye to eye about my friendship with Charlie. In hindsight, I know why he thought it was problematic but Charlie was a big part of my life then and he still is now. People always question my relationships with the opposite sex, just as they always question male-female relationships if both are heterosexual.

If love is unconditional stop giving me so many rules

That’s always the one thing that many people always seem to ask for when they seek out a partner, unconditional love, but even as they are seeking out for this kind of love, they set rules for those relationships. Doesn’t that count as conditions? At a young age, I already knew that I would never be with an abusive man or an addict. I’ve witnessed first hand the damage that does to a person and a family and I knew that wasn’t a partnership that I want. Until I realise there was more to it than that.

In my second relationship, Aseem was overprotective and controlled me. Especially with what I wore. If he wasn’t with me when I was going out, I wasn’t allowed to wear anything too revealing. He would ask me to send him pictures of what I looked like before I went out (I never did) and would always tell me that he’s trying to keep me safe. But as our relationship went on it got worse. He drank way too much and was constantly fuelled by alcohol that by the end, it got abusive. Oh, the irony.

It was a strange position to be in, to stand in front of a man that would tell me he loves me and accepts me for who I am but would constantly control me. I never doubted that there was love, there was, but it was a love of power. He loved the idea and the feeling of power he had over me. When I ripped myself away from that relationship, I was open to a horrendous type of love that I never want to experience again. I could receive his unconditional love, but it was dependent on how much I was able to abide by his conditions…does that make sense?

A lot of relationships seem to turn into some sort of game and it’s tiring – stop telling me what I need to do in order for you to love me. When I asked Alex if I’ve ever done that, yes he replied quietly. My condition was my freedom and I asked for it without even knowing — when I felt free, I loved freely but when I felt trapped, I withdrew. That’s when I realised that there is no such thing as unconditional love because even I, someone who just wants to be loved, could not give love unconditionally.