This is something I have experienced in the time I’ve been dating my boyfriend, Quincy. I’m from Colombia and he is presumably African-American (relax, he doesn’t know exactly where he’s from either). It’s been different from other relationships I’ve had mostly because the questions are not the usual ones.

I promise you no one in an interracial relationship wants to deal with it. Frankly, I find it unnecessary.

My relationship is like any other.

1. No, I don’t only date black guys. I love him. That’s all.

It is almost always automatically assumed that because I am currently with a black guy, that my interests have always been there or that I will always date someone black. People usually wonder if the stereotype is true and it’s not amusing. I don’t date my boyfriend because he is black, I date my boyfriend because he is sweet and loving. I love that guy, race is not a factor.

2. My parents like him just fine.

Okay, so I give this some credit since I had a slight fear there would be some issue with my parents in particular about my boyfriend being black. I come from a Hispanic family so I was scared of them meeting any guy I was genuinely interested in, but this time it was different. With all the stereotypes, I was afraid it would be an issue. I can assure you that my parents absolutely love him. My fears were unwarranted because race doesn’t matter. Parents should only care if the guy treats you with respect and gives you love.

3. It’s not any different than being with a person of another race.

I don’t prefer one or another because of their race. Black males aren’t better than guys of other races. They’re all fair game. It depends on who they are as a person. Skin color does not dictate who they are. There’s nothing wrong with dating within my race. It’s not that I don’t like their race, I just like this one specific guy.

4. I don’t like being stared at in public. So please stop doing it.

PLEASE. STOP.

This is the absolute worse. I cannot tell you how often we get stares when walking down the street. We get stares at restaurants. At stores. At the movies. At the library. Everywhere. It never stops and we don’t enjoy it. I’m super pale, I know. He’s dark-skinned, he knows. We both know we’re an interracial couple.

5. We don’t have issues surrounding our different cultures. We embrace it.

I don’t mind when we get some questions about this. We come from different cultures. This makes it interesting and cool. We get to learn about how our families do things differently. I’ve had a blast teaching him about the Colombian culture. If anything, it has made our relationship better. Sometimes we can clash because of some differences in our ideals but it’s nothing one can’t resolve. As long as you love the person, anything can be worked out. Amor vincit omnia.

6. I know our mixed babies will be cute. They’re not “different.” That’s not why we’re dating.

Oh, one of the first things that people mention when I show them a picture of my boyfriend is, “If you guys have kids, they’ll be so cute. They’ll be mixed babies.” After hearing this enough times, it has gotten very old. I know my kids will be mixed if we have babies. They’ll be cute because they’ll be kids. All kids are pretty cute. We don’t date because the kids will be cute.

7. Our kids will learn Spanish and English.

People seem pretty concerned about this. To me, it seems fairly obvious. We live in the United States, even if we wanted to, there would be no way to avoid teaching our children English. SO yes, they will learn English. Spanish was my first language so I’d like for my own children to speak it as well. Quincy will probably have to make some kind of effort in learning Spanish if he hopes to understand our children.

My relationship is an interracial one. I am VERY aware of that, it seems like I will never be allowed to forget it. I really believed this was the norm. When I started dating him, I honestly did not anticipate this kind of attention. My heart goes out to all those interracial couples out there. My heart also goes out to all those who aren’t interracial couples because every couple is a cool one. Love rules, no matter what kind of love of it is.