Please define “Partner” for me

[Chatonette]

When I hear someone mention their “partner”, my brain thinks living together as married basically, but without the ceremony—renting/mortgage together, possible children, etc. Sometimes I see posts on MN about “my partner did X….” Then it transpires that they don’t live together and they’ve known each other for a few months.

My understanding of “partner” is clearly off-kilter. Can someone please give me a definition?

Anything from boyf of 5 weeks, I guess.

Not to mention the ones whose "partner" lives with them but is at best a cocklodger and at worst an abuser. No contribution of any sort.

I think some people just use it in place of the word boyfriend because they think they're too old for it. However, I'm 40 and sometimes unthinkingly refer to my husband as my boyfriend. I don't think there's an official definition.

I don’t think your definition is off-kilter. I think some people want to make their relationship seem or feel more long-standing/secure than it actually is, so they say partner when what they have is a new boyfriend.

Nailed it

You know when someone describes themselves as "self employed", could be anything right?

Same with "partner", there is no criteria, a partner is just someone who has some significance in your life. Could be the father of your six kids, mortgage together, joint accounts, a will, and a dog. Or it could be just some guy you shagged, twice, and who messaged you last week for another go around.

Agree with this, and the original OP.

I do question what they're actually a partner in if they don't live together etc.

My idea is the same as yours OP.

Although a lot of women don't like the word 'boyfriend' if they're older than about 30ish.

Yes. They’re either using the term unthinkingly and wrongly, or trying to make a new relationship sound more serious and committed than it in fact is — when a poster refers to someone she’s been seeing for a few months as her ‘partner’ I always imagine said ‘partner’ quite possibly not being even at the ‘girlfriend’ stage, more ‘someone I’m dating’.

I tend to think of partner as at least 3 of:
. Living together
. Long term commitment
. Shared life goals
. Shared financial plans (even if money separate)
But I know other people use it to mean 'the person I am currently seeing'.

The “self-empire employed” analogy makes sense…so could mean anything, really.

Or it could be just some guy you shagged, twice, and who messaged you last week for another go around.
**
I nearly spat out my tea! 🤣

You don't have to live with a partner. But you can be in a LTR with one?

I'm in my 40s, so I would not call an unmarried significant other a "boyfriend", but I might call him a partner...after about six months. (I'm not in a relationship, currently)

Personal preference, really.

I consider partner to mean living together but not married.

If you are in a relationship but not living together, that's a boyfriend/girlfriend

This seems a slightly goady post and I’m guessing this is basically a stealth way of saying: “if you don’t live together you aren’t partners”. So I’ll bite.

This comes up all the time and it’s weird that people repeatedly have this prurient investment in how strangers choose to define their relationships.

FWIW a lot of people nowadays choose not to cohabit for a variety of reasons ranging from having children from a previous relationship to not wanting to share their space with another person. All of these are perfectly valid.

It’s perfectly possible to be committed to someone without feeling you have to wash their socks. Some of us actually prefer it.

Well it’s not someone who is still married and you’ve been with 4 months. 😉

Who cares how people define their relationships?

I say partner because I don’t like saying fiance or boyfriend, it doesn’t feel right for me. 15 years together and a wedding cancelled by Covid. If someone wants to say partner when they’ve been together 15 minutes, good for them.

Of course you could just see it as someone describing their sex partner. Does that help?

I use partner to mean a long term committed relationship. It's also what people who are in civil partnerships might call each other, as wife/husband is not correct.

"Committed" and "long term" clearly have different meanings for different people. For me, "committed" would include things like living together, shared finances, both on mortgage, children, in no particular order.

The older you get, the weirder it sounds saying "boyfriend".

Thank you, well said. There's no magical threshold where you transform from a gir or boyfriend into a partner. When my PARTNER and I were doing long distance, he was still my partner. Now we've lived together five years and are nominated beneficiaries of each other's pensions, he's my partner. It's just a matter of preference.

Well only unthinkingly and wrongly if you take 'partner' as definitely having OP's meaning, which after all is a relatively new definition since pre the 1960s or so the word would only have been used in a business or sporting sense, not really romantic/sexual. So who's to say that the 'new' definition of partner can't now also mean anyone you're romantically/sexually involved with in anything more than a hook-up or casual sense. There was a long thread on here a while back in which multiple people gave reasons why they preferred to refer to a person with whom they're in a long-ish term committed relationship but not yet living together, no intention of having children etc a 'partner' rather than a boyfriend or girlfriend, they were under no particular delusions or trying to mislead anyone so I don't see why we need to be pompous about only 'allowing' people to use the word if they meet certain criteria. After all you always have to do a bit of working out from context what someone means when they refer to a 'partner' anyway, I don't see that it matters hugely?

I think the word has evolved a bit. I've noticed younger people use it in place of girlfriend/ boyfriend. Maybe for some its because there isn't a gender neutral term for the person for dating other than partner.

I don’t think the OP is at all goady.

I think you can describe someone as a partner, even if you don’t live together, especially if it’s a relationship of long standing, but I also think that many people will take ‘partner’ to mean someone that you cohabit with and maybe have children with, plus joint financial arrangements.

I suppose it doesn’t really matter how the relationship is described, but there is a difference between someone you share all aspects of your life with and someone you see a couple of times a week.

We are committed and long term, future plans and goals. Shared financial plans for the future. We do have plans to marry but children will never be a possibility for us. We don't however live together currently as my own dc needs stability and consistency right now so I would neither move a man into her home or uproot her to move into his. We have time and a future together. My next door neighbour has had 3 women move in and out during that same time so according to some he has partners but mine is just a boyfriend. Some move in together after just a couple of shags because its convenient.

Well I've been with my partner for 8 years. We do lots of stuff together, house decor travelling etc but according to you we are not partners as we don't live together full time. Have houses 2 mins walk apart

To me it reminds me of being at school where the teacher would say in reference to having to team up during PE for instance "right find yourself a partner"

Or later years as a partner in business, its not a word I'd use to describe anyone in a relationship no matter their status.