Friendship Is Greater Than (or Equal To) Romance

I recently read the Vogue article asking, “Is having a boyfriend embarrassing now?” and it hit a nerve, but not in the way I expected.

For a long time, I thought the embarrassing part of my life was not having a boyfriend. I felt behind, like I was missing proof that I was lovable or chosen.

But now that I do have a boyfriend, I’ve realized something surprising: I’m not embarrassed to have a boyfriend. I’m embarrassed to talk about him.

He’s my whole world in many ways. He makes me feel safe, grounded, and deeply loved. And yet, whenever I catch myself wanting to say something sweet about him or share how happy I am, I feel this strange hesitation. Like I’m about to cross some invisible cultural line. Like I’m about to become… a “boyfriend girl.”

You know the type. The girl who makes her relationship her entire personality. The girl who disappears into coupledom. The girl who centers romance above everything else. And I don’t want to be that.

Not because I don’t value my romantic relationship. I deeply do. But because I am so much more than who I’m dating.

Somewhere along the way, celebrating love out loud started to feel uncool. Independence became aspirational. Singlehood became (rightfully) empowering. And being visibly invested in your partner started to feel embarrassing, especially online. We learned to minimize our happiness, to downplay attachment, to protect ourselves from looking “too much.”

Psychologically, this makes sense. We live in a culture that rewards emotional self-sufficiency and subtly shames dependency. We’re taught that needing people makes us weak. That centering relationships means losing ourselves.

But here’s what I keep coming back to: I didn’t become who I am because of one person. I became who I am because of many.

My friends, the ones who sat with me through heartbreak, celebrated my tiny wins, listened to my spirals, reminded me who I was when I forgot, they shaped me just as much as any romantic partner ever could. My platonic relationships taught me how to communicate, how to hold space, how to love without conditions or expectations.

They made me, me.

And with Valentine’s Day coming up, I can’t help but notice how narrowly we define love. We pour so much attention into romantic relationships: the gifts, the dinners, the captions, while friendships quietly carry us through our lives in the background.

We celebrate couples publicly, but rarely honor the friends who know our childhood stories, our patterns, our fears, our growth.

So here’s my take: Friendship is greater than or equal to romance.

Not instead of. Not in competition with. Just equally deserving of recognition.

Romantic love matters, of course. But so does platonic love. So does chosen family. So do the people who show up consistently, who love you deeply, who stay even when there’s nothing shiny or performative about it.

I’m learning that it’s okay to love my boyfriend loudly and love my friends fiercely. It’s okay to value romance without letting it define me. It’s okay to be happy in a relationship and still honor the community that made me who I am.

And maybe the real work isn’t deciding which type of love matters more.

Maybe it’s remembering that we don’t have to shrink any of them.