Evolving Agreements

When my partner, we’ll call him Bear, and I started dating seriously, we wrote a “relationship agreement” document. It was a great exercise to determine what sort of relationship we wanted to build together, especially because we knew our relationship wouldn’t be normative. Largely this was because when Bear and I met, Bear had a nesting partner, and due to differences in cleanliness (I identify as a gremlin), we decided not to plan on nesting together. Thus, rather than nesting partners, we designated each other “adventure partners” as the intent of our relationship was simply to grow and go on adventures together.

Our relationship agreement has changed significantly over time, which is why it’s so important for consent to be reversible. For example, the original draft had a section, in all caps, that said NO BABIES!!! About 6 months after writing the document, we did an acid trip together in which I realized …babies? And a few weeks after that, my partner was watching me play with his dog outside his window, and he also realized… oh shoot… maybe babies…? As a funny side tangent, when I told my mother that acid made me change my mind about kids, my mom changed her mind about how “dangerous” acid was.

Some of our relaionship agreement could work for people in either monogamous or nonmonogamous relationships. For example, we both use affectionate touch as a way to communicate love, so we agreed upon the relationship norm of sitting next to each other at social events, and holding hands or having a hand on each other’s knees to affirm affection in public settings. Also, we both value trying new things and having a wealth of experiences. Bear in particular values this with food, so we also agreed that when we go to restaraunts, we would both take at least a bite of whatever the other one ordered so we could each try a new thing, and if we both liked the other’s dish better, we could swap.

As our relationship progressed, we also made agreements for the way we treat each other in times of conflict. Bear doesn’t like the use of the word “disappointed” and rather prefers to be specifically told what I would have liked to see from him. Thus, when I feel disappointed in Bear, I agreed to say “this is an opportunity where you could have done better by doing xyz” instead of saying “I’m disappointed in you.”

We also agreed upon norms for meeting metas. We wanted to be cognizant of couple’s privilege when meeting a meta, so we agreed that all 3 parties should arrive at and leave the venue separately.

Bear and I try to revisit our relationship agreement every few months, and we’ve started doing strikethroughs when we update instead of deleting items because it’s funny to look back on our old agreements and see how much we’ve grown and changed as individuals and as a couple. We highly recommend this exercise for people in any relationship structure. A good starting point is the “relationship schmorgasboard” which details many aspects of a relationship that can be discussed.