But is 'partner' an over-used word?

[horseyhorsey17]

Just a light-hearted thing but a bit of a bugbear of mine...it (very mildly) annoys me that people now use the word 'partner' where we would have said boy/girlfriend back in the 90s. You see it on here - someone has been on five dates and now refers to their date as their 'partner.' Partner to me implies a serious, committed, long-term relationship including co-habitation - if not you're not really 'partnering' are you?

I get that girl/boyfriend might not seem that appropriate for people dating in their 30s or older - and might not cover all options for how people identify - but 'partner' still makes me go 'urgh!'

A bit of both. In general people can use the words they want about themselves so in that sense yabu.

However it does infuriate me when a woman comes here onto mumsnet with her woes about how little help she gets from her partner, and only reveals in her 3rd update that this is someone who she has slept with twice and who actually lives in a different city.

Yeah it was one of those that prompted me to start this thread!

I would have agreed with you @horseyhorsey17 (fab username btw!) until i had one! In our 50s and once we had been together for well over a year it sounded so silly introducing him as my 'boyfriend'! It sounded OK for me to be his girlfriend which makes us sound even dafter . but yes after 3 years I started to refer to him as my partner even though we weren't living together or sharing any finances.

Yeah it bugs me too and I personally don't like the title anyway BUT I don't get to police what other people call their significant others.

What I like even less though is when people try to apply the title to my marriage when I've already corrected them before. My husband is my husband, not my 'partner', and it's up to us to decide how we title each other.

Ooh I was literally just pondering this after the reading the thread "money and new partner" where the partner is a man living on another continent that the op has spent like 5 or 6 weeks in total with in person. 🤦🙄

Yes I do think the word partner is over used.

I still have a boyfriend- we don't have a civil Partnership or marriage. We've been together nearly 30 years 😂 partner sounds business like to me (I'm aware I'm probably in the minority)

I do agree though that boyfriend or girlfriend sounds a tad teenage. 🤷

Lover? 🤔🤣

Yeah it's overused. There have been a few threads recently where mums describe their schoolgirls boyfriends as a partner!

Schoolgirls have homework - not partners!

I'm in my 50s, what am I supposed to call the bloke I go out with?

I agree he's not my partner but I'm not saying boyfriend out loud.

Significant Other?

I always want to write that as Significant Otter for some reason. 🐱

Yes you are right.
I / we use the word partner for a couple of reasons:

• age : me 40's he 50's
• us having been together for a number of years and living together most of them, ostensibly as partners to outsiders. I.e. for social 'optics', to not raise awkward questions otherwise...

In reality we are barely boyfriend/girlfriend, substantively the relationship is very superficial. (Plus whatever there has been, damaged by some unkind behaviour.)

I'm going to tell my friends in their 90s to call each other "lover". 😂

I use the term partner as we've been together over 10 years, are in our 50s and the only reason we don't live together is because our children would clash.

Referring to him as my boyfriend sounds a bit teenage.

I agree that 'boyfriend' is ridiculous once you hit 30 - but what's wrong with plain 'friend'? Does the world need to know that you're on shagging terms? or do you need to send a message that says 'hands off, he's uncommitted but he's mine'?
To me, a partner is still a business partner - which has got me into some conversational tangles! Kind of difficult to say 'Is that profit-sharing or leg-over???"
I'm no linguist - but do other languages manage this better? Surely the French must have a more elegant expression!

I have a partner. I'm too old to be calling him a boyfriend.
We are in a long term (we know couples who have met, married and divorced in the time we have been together) and committed relationship. We don't live together as we were in no rush to blend families in the way that so many people do.

Eventually we will live together and/or get married when it is practical and sensible for us to do so.

I like 'lover.' I am currently single, with no intention of inflicting another man on my kids, but I might 'take lovers' like something the Bloomsbury set would have done. (The main problem with that being that in nearly two years post-separation I have yet to meet a man I'd consider taking as a lover. But I digress!)

They must do! I feel like we just don't have the right word for this type of arrangement.

'Partner' also sounds very businessy and unromantic.

I'm from Devon so calling each other 'my lover' is normal anyway.

I suppose you could always relegate them to Insignificant Other if they were being annoying.

No you have a boyfriend. You aren’t partners as you don’t have an entwined life where you share money and housing.

my mother doesn’t live with her boyfriend most of the time, so she just calls him her boyfriend as that’s what he is.

I'm also going to throw in here that I actively hate 'my Other Half'. (Not literally as I am single but you know what I mean).

@horseyhorsey17 Ooh I don't mind that one actually.

It doesn't work if you are certain retired media types in London. 😂

Boyfriend suggests fun, partner suggests business agreement.

I hate the word partner, it makes me think of the beardy illustrated bloke in a copy of The Joy of Sex I saw at a tender age and leafed through to my undying regret. It makes me feel queasy whenever anyone refers to their partner, and would use literally any other word or phrase to avoid it! In fact maybe that's why I got married, so I could just go from boyfriend to fiance to husband.