Daren is nonsexual and monogamous . Jenn is queer and polyamorous . Their 18 - class spousal relationship is proof that making love has no limits .
Meet Daren and Jenn M. Jackson , whose sexual love for each other radiates through the screen as we chit-chat on Google Hangout . In talking to them — and in listening to their podcast“That Black Couple ” — you get the good sense that they ’ve know each other always ( unfeigned ! ) , can fill in each other ’s time ( it occur several times in our interview ) and have a vast commitment to disgraceful lives , storytelling and advance people to unabashedly live their truths .
In 2020 , the Jacksons , both 39 , made an promulgation on “ That Black Couple ” to serve them show up in the world as their authentic selves : Jenn is a queen , androgynous lesbian who is also polyamorous . Daren is asexual and monogamous . For year prior , each of them had been thinking about their gender and sexuality — knowing that they had n’t adequately figured out how to make indisputable their inside feelings were aligned with how they present themselves to others . Each of their upbringings had socialized them to trust that their living want to look and feel a certain way .
Jenn and Daren effortlessly welcome listeners into their life on their podcast , as they talk about what it means to be contraband funny millennials in America today . They make it directly clear that whatever you guess you do it about polyamory and sexlessness , you ’re likely wrong — especially when it come to Black love .
“ Polyamory is not about just the romantic ties , it ’s about building community of interests and collective power , ” said Jenn , who is a professor and author of “ Black Women learn Us : An Intimate History of Black Feminism . ” “ There ’s other blackened folk out there who are navigating the world like us , who are render to envision out how to parent in this position that wants to annihilate us , who are trying to image out how to subsist as pansy folks , who are trying to make families . So this has always been about trying to line up that biotic community . ”
Daren said his journeying to sexlessness started with a ton of research : He read literature about what it means to be nonsexual and learned of the full spectrum of identities within that sexual orientation . He like a shot started to recognize himself in those descriptor .
“ My openhanded battle was being able-bodied to decouple my humanness by from my sexuality , ” Daren order . “ That ’s what a lot of hoi polloi on the sexlessness spectrum struggle with because so much of how people specify themselves is somewhat relate to their gender . So it ’s taking a step to say , ‘ I ’m not going to fall out those rules and those standard . And I ’m really going to define myself for who I am , ’ which is all what gayness is about . ”
The Jacksons did n’t arrive at these minute of clarity about their relationship — to themselves and each other — overnight . They met in 2002 as fledgeling at the University of Southern California , and quickly became friends who bonded over picture games . Once Jenn realise she wanted to be more than friends — and Daren stopped acting uncanny about it — they go dating and then got married right after they graduated . They ’ve been together ever since .
The Jacksons , who are parent to three child — Logan , 16 , Camryn , 12 , and Jaelen , 10 — have been conjoin for 18 year . They have launched businesses together includingColored Convos , a media platform for shameful and fag creatives where they host originative workshops , and soon aim to launch a literary magazine , too .
HuffPost babble to the Jacksons about their love life for each other , how that love has trickled down to their children , the misconceptions of polyamory and the challenges they ’ve helped each other surmount .
How would each of you depict your sexual love for each other ?
Jenn M. Jackson : I’ve been call Daren my os vegetable marrow for over the last 10 days . I feel like at this point , I require Daren to operate . My love for Daren is in my bones .
Daren Jackson : Yeah . It ’s intrinsic . I feel the exact same path .
You all are also creative partner on several ventures . How has that strengthened your marriage ?
Daren : It tone up our marriage because it really helps with our communication and also I think our compartmentalisation . So we really get along very well . We intercommunicate very well . We get each other . There ’s a lot of unspoken things , but also we ’re very clear about saying what needs to be tell and make it plain just to check that there ’s nothing lose in communication . And I think , as we move from just romantic cooperator to actual business partner , that just becomes that much more important . I think it also helped because we ’re just together more . There was a item in our life where we were just two parents going to work and biography course kind of pulls you asunder . And so our business ventures were another fomite for us to expend more time together as well .
Jenn : Yeah , and I think also the coolheaded thing about being married to someone who ’s also a creative is that you never have to justify or excuse yourself . Daren gets my trade and my graphics . If he ever writes a short report and says , “ Hey , can you proofread this ? ” I really want to learn it . I ’m activated to see what fresh thing he did with the story . I do n’t find burden by his creativity . I ’m rouse when he does something newfangled . And he ’s the same way with me . I have a Word that just come out , and he waited for age . He did n’t want to read anything ’cause he wanted to get it when it come up out into the world and experience it impudent .
Love that .
Daren Jackson : I think that ’s been really cool because sometimes people do n’t support your trade . Sometimes hoi polloi do n’t support your creativity , and it does n’t sense good when you are in a relationship with someone and they ’re not mad for your work . We have people in our home , including our children , who are cheerleaders every single twenty-four hours . So that ’s one of the cool thing about building the clientele . And we ’re write partners . We have a whole book trilogy that we ’re make for on because we can do that together and we can cheer on each other as we do it . It ’s not burdensome . It ’s actually quite exciting and fun .
I love that . Have there been any big moments within your union over the years that felt like turn breaker point or challenges , and how did you all work with each other to figure out through them ?
Daren Jackson : I’ll say , evidently , we have three kids . So the introduction of children is a lot . We have moved across the country twice . We have , plain , changed careers . We ’ve both been to grad school . It ’s really unhinged , because neither one of us has shoot 40 yet . So the joke that we ’ve always had is all the things that cause marriages to break up or …
Jenn M. Jackson : We’ve done them .
Daren Jackson : We’ve done all of them . Some of them we ’ve done …
Jenn M. Jackson : Twice . We were hold up through the corner in California . We had a new babe at the time . We were in careers that were dead ends even though they were well - paying . They ’re the sort of career that they slot fatal kinsfolk into just so they can tokenize you and never give you a promotion . And we were scurvy . We kept describing ourselves as in the waiting place , when we were living in California . And that was really hard on our wedlock . I cerebrate that was a hard clock time in our marriage , not because it hurt our family relationship — I reckon it actually brought us nearer together — but because it ’s not fun when you have all these big dreams and you ’re a creative . We did n’t write . We were n’t capable to do the things we wanted to do . And that ’s when I earn , “ OK , I ’m not supposed to be work at Disney . I ’m not supposed to be working in these job . ” And I was like , “ I fuck off to go back to grad school . ” And this nigga was like , “ for certain , go ahead . ” I still think that was wild . To this day , I ’m like , “ What ’s wrong with you ? ”
Daren Jackson : But I reckon that ’s a key factor of what has worked for us — is we are 100 % in each other ’s corners .
Jenn M. Jackson : That ’s it .
Daren Jackson : For whatever it is . She was like , “ I think I should go to grad school . ” And I said , “ Well , what ’s the best one for what you wanna do ? ”
Jenn M. Jackson : We had a new baby . Our youngest was little . I was still breastfeeding this babe . And when we attempt to sell our house , it was very racist in Orange County . hoi polloi did n’t desire to buy our family . We go to the point where we were bear on into the school year and could n’t sell our planetary house , and we got a vendor that purchase it all in cash and we pelt along out to Chicago .
I have intercourse you did .
Jenn M. Jackson : We bought our house sight unseen and moved everybody in , went to sleep , woke up , and I went to school the next day . That ’s exactly how it drop dead . We just moved on . And during that clock time , Daren was transitioning into newfangled jobs . We went through a lot in Chicago . I became very politicized in Chicago . Daren became politicize in Chicago . This is where we started really retrieve about movements and our orientation to queerness and our identities . I really mean we grew the most in Chicago , and our kinship grew the most . This is when I jump really being open about being queer and being polyamorous . This is when Daren start openly identifying as asexual . And we just kind of begin moving differently in the world .
Jenn M. Jackson : Now , I think that to me was the hardest sentence in our relationship because it was like our relationship was changing at that pointedness from a wild-eyed to a pretty much platonic relationship . And we had to resolve how we desire to navigate that and how we wanted to show up in the human race .
And that stuff was operose because hoi polloi were face at us like we were out of our minds . But that Chicago present moment , I finger like it just took a lot of communicating . I was still deal with a plenty of injury . My founder had just pass away . I was working through my other healing journeying . I was doing some self - sabotage type stuff . Poly journey was poly journey , and it was ghetto . So it was a lot .
Daren Jackson : But also you were a grad student . So your agenda was all over the place . I was play . I had a 40 - second commute . Both way , every day . We were trying to evoke Kyd , have a menage , still do our business clobber together . It was so many thing to manage all at once , but I feel like what we always number back to is we do back to each other .
block everything else , I be intimate they got me ; I get them . And so even if we do n’t see each other for a 24 - minute point , we ’re texting , we ’re calling , we ’ve planned affair out . There ’s thing I implicitly lie with that I need to take care of . There ’s thing that Jenn implicitly knows that I need or I might be going through . We were just kind of in sync in that mode . So no matter how bad it baffle . That ’s what keeps us ground .
Jenn M. Jackson : You know what ? And I believe it has fray off on the kids . I remember what ’s find is because we are so in alignment with one another and have been since we were 17 and 18 . When I met him , I experience like I knew him . We always clicked from Day 1 . So for our kids , it ’s very natural . It ’s just always been that way of life . And as a family , we ’re a very tight building block . It is a well - oiled motorcar .
I love that . What do you hope your lovemaking for each other has taught your children about their passion for themselves , but their honey for what could happen in the futurity ?
Jenn M. Jackson : So I ’ve been thinking about this a raft because we both develop up very different than how our children are growing up . Neither one of us had two parents in the household . We did n’t have a tidy sum of salubrious good example of Black queer alternative love or anything like that . And so we were the “ Family Matters ” kids , “ The Fresh Prince of Bel - Air ” kids . We watch out a lot of idiot box .
And so when we got together , we kind of were like , “ Well , we amaze to be real intentional about this . We really need to figure out how we ’re going to frame out this parenting thing so our kids can be really secure and be precisely who they are . ” And we talk about it all the prison term because they ’re so dependable .
They are not intimidated by us . They are not threatened . These Kyd are very much their own mass and they go to themselves . And I mean that ’s what this has demonstrate them . Because we do n’t model traditional gender office . When Daren and I met , he was not subject of cooking . And for me , that had nothing to do with grammatical gender . I was like , “ That ’s just somebody not devise you for life . That ’s irresponsible . ” So I was like , “ You are going to learn how to cook and you ’re fit to be a great Captain Cook . ” And now this valet de chambre has decide to make homemade chicken strip and things you do n’t have to cook ; things they already have factory for . He ’d just be like , “ I made it . ” It ’s great . It ’s really a blessing for me because I grew up having to do a lot of labor in my home .
Daren Jackson : I think the other thing too is we learn them about what matters . So a circle of times you do kind of rely on societal norms to teach multitude and guide them and figure out who they like or how they ’re supposed to be or how they ’re supposed to tog . And we very much have a ultra acceptance of you wear what you want to have on .
So that when they go out into the world , no matter what they want to do , they ’re fit out to bring off all of those situations . To me , I think we have been that mark on just upraise sound , happy , responsible , secure nestling .
I desire to be able to say when my nipper leaves the planetary house , that I know he ’s good . And we ’ve had these conversations recently where I depend at our kid and I ’m like , “ He ’s prepare . ” He can cook for himself . He know how to clean up . He have it away how to have a hefty balance with his friends . I ’ve seen face-off and where he is like , “ Hey , that was n’t cool to me . And if you do n’t reply and apologize in the correct way , then this ca n’t go forward . ” It ’s astonishing to see the thing come out to your fry that you really wanted them to get .
Jenn M. Jackson : He ’s done that with other boys and they react in kind like , “ You cognise what , you ’re ripe . We should do considerably . ”
I was take heed to one of your podcast episodes from October 2020 . And you both had promulgation . Jenn , you harbinger that you were sexuality - fluid and genderqueer . And Daren , you announced that you ’re asexual . I take on these were both identities you had probably long sit with , but announcing on the podcast might be a different matter . How did it feel to disclose that on the podcast and what has been your journey since then ?
Jenn M. Jackson : Oh , that was really fun . So we had been swan those terms around in dissimilar form for about four or five years before that . It was around 2015 , 2016 , when we both begin really thinking about our sexuality and our sex — how we wanna show up . And , like , we finally settled in 2020 . That ’s when I shaved my head , and I was proceed more masculinely , more androgynously . So we decided to make the announcement on the podcast because we thought that there were a destiny of people who were plausibly experiencing those same feeling of gender and sexual expression , but perchance did n’t have the intelligence for it .
And we require to deal all the research we ’ve done and here ’s the ways it vibrate for us . Here ’s how this shows up for us in our lives and our bodies . I think it was really set free for me to eventually be able to say out loud what I was feeling inside my trunk . Like I had been playing around with fag , but it did n’t palpate specific enough . I was , like , doing pansexual for a while . I did bisexual for a while , I did all these thing with my sexuality , but then I realize what was shift was my gender .
Daren Jackson : To me , it all come up down to socialization . I feel like a lot of people across the entire spectrum really shinny with asexuality . They always want to say it ’s something else . They always wanna say , well maybe it ’s ’cause you ’re actually mirthful . Or maybe it ’s because you have n’t found the correct person . Or maybe it ’s a aesculapian matter . It ’s always like it ’s something else other than what you say it is .
I remember specifically arise up as a Black man particularly in Orange County , without even pull in it , there was a lot of social stuff that was imprinted on me . You were going to be smart . You ’re go to be masculine . You ’re going to get married and you ’re get going to have kids and you ’re going to do all those things . And then these are the things that kind of define what it is to be a man . So my big struggle was being able-bodied to decouple my manhood away from my sexuality . And I finger like that ’s what a lot of people on the asexuality spectrum battle with because so much of how mass define themselves is somewhat linked to their sexuality . So it ’s pick out a step to kind of really say , I ’m not kick the bucket to abide by those dominion and those standard . And I ’m really going to delimit myself for who I am , which is all what quirkiness is about .
Jenn M. Jackson : And that ’s why we started the blog and the podcast from the origin . It was always to say , there ’s other Black folk out there who are navigating the world like us , who are seek to figure out how to parent in this place that wants to annihilate us , who are trying to figure out how to survive as queer folks , who are seek to build folk . So this has always been about trying to determine that residential area and trying to say , hey , look , hey , we are doing it . It is potential . It ’s OK to build up the life that you desire for yourself .
Absolutely . allow ’s talk a small bit about polyamory . You talk about how there are obviously a lot of misconception of what polyamory even is . I desire to utter about what are some of the ones that annoy you the most and how do you navigate having to even deal with those conversation or perspicacity ?
Jenn M. Jackson : Oh God , yeah . Well , so the primary one with polyamory is I cogitate there ’s this estimate that , like , somehow Daren call on me gay . the great unwashed do n’t really understand that it ’s in reality the antonym . I was already gay when I met Daren , and Daren turned me straight . So it was a temporary affair . I do n’t know how he did it and it actually pissed me off .
You said that you were so mad .
Jenn M. Jackson : Yeah , I ’m still mad about it . I stand for , I love my small fry . I ’m glad they ’re here . I just never think that it would occur organically like that . I just never expect it . But yeah , there ’s this idea that when queer kinfolk engage in non - heteronormative relationships in polyamory , it ’s because someone did something , right ? Because especially when opprobrious women do it , it ’s like , oh , well , you ’re just not get the right penis because member that grow organically is just the best phallus or something . I do n’t bed what people are talking about . So I rebut that . I conceive it ’s cockeyed .
The other common one is that it ’s just because I want to go out and have all this sexuality and it ’s just to collect people . And what ’s really problematic about that is that I do n’t recall masses realise that there are just some of us who are not made to be monogamous . I ’ve never in my aliveness ever once been monogamous . I say this story all the prison term . But I was 15 years old when I bring in that I was not capable to just date one mortal at a time because I bang too big . My love is too braggy . It ’s not up to to exist with one soul . That ’s why I have six ripe friends , and they all sense like they ’re my only best friend .
And I think that masses think it ’s about have a lack of dedication and just have all these trivial relationships with people , but it ’s actually the opposite , right ? Because when you are polyamorous and you make a dedication to be in citizenry ’s lives and there ’s more of them , it takes so much more coordination . It takes so much more conversation and agreement and you ’ve receive to keep your word , otherwise you ’re not going to be very successful in polyamory . So I think folks like to immix up polyamory with other shape of nonmonogamy .
Of course , there are cheaters who are nonethical . Of course , there are folks who are ethical , like tramp and other folks who like to play . But those of us who identify as polyamorous , for the most part , are people who in reality have deep , have it off relationships with multiple mass and who build those relationship over longsighted periods of sentence . I ’m in a relationship with people for years at a time , so it ’s not something where I ’m just hook up with folks . They have Tinder for that .
The last point that I opine is particularly insidious for Black folks is the idea that for us , that polyamory is apparently not all right and not secure , or not goodly or not good for Black children . Unfortunately , what people do n’t understand is that when you do n’t offer children options and other ways of being , when you do n’t show them the effusiveness of how people can show up in the human race , they ’ve got to go and figure it out for themselves . What I ’m excited about is that our kids know that however they make up one’s mind to love , if they wanna get matrimonial or not , whatever it is , all of those versions of how they show up are OK .
There ’s not a translation that we will disqualify them for or disown them or block up eff them for . And I really want Black family line to lean away from these lily-white supremacist , heteronormative systems and institutions of control that are really about extracting from us . Polyamory is not about just the amatory ties , it ’s about build up residential area and corporate power . And I require citizenry to really think about that .
Jenn , obviously your al-Qur’an is titled “ Black Women teach Us . ” So for each of you , what is one thing a Black woman taught you that impacts how you love contraband people ?
Daren Jackson : The first one that number to head is my female parent because she ’s the first fateful woman in my sprightliness . And it took me a long clock time to really even get how she raised me and how she bring up me . But she has a very , very quiet , consistent passion . Like you know no matter what happens , she loves you .
Whether she ’s monish you , whether she ’s not present , whether she ’s giving you a squeeze , no matter what it is , you know that what she does , she always does with beloved . And we were not a family that said “ I love you ” a portion . But love was never doubt because of how we showed up for each other . And so that was the big thing that I think that she teach me , is that dearest is a verb . It ’s great to say , I screw you , bonk you , love you . But would I rather have someone say I love you or someone who ’s gon na really go firmly for me in the paint ? I want someone who ’s gon na go severely for me in the paint . When I was looking for a partner , that ’s what I wanted , and gratefully , that is what I set up .
Jenn M. Jackson : You sure the hell did . I was think this moral has really been resonate with me a lot . It ’s in the book and it ’s from my grandmother . My grandmother was always very worried about me — my grandma Lucille , my mom ’s ma . And we expend a fortune of time together because my mom cultivate long , long time of day , and my dad was not around , so she was like my other parent . And she used to tell me all the metre how lonely I was gon na be . She always told me that I involve to really seek out the citizenry who really fuck me and love them back . And when I conform to Daren , she married us . She was a minister , so she married us . She loved Daren so much . She was so happy that I discover Daren because she knew I was n’t gon na be alone . That I would never be alone .
I ’ve been really , really reflecting on that because a lot of the women in my family live on their lives alone . My gran passed away alone . She was alone for a circle of her life . A plenty of the women in my family have gone through a divorce and they can never really find that love that lasted their life history . And I have been hold that now as a homophile person who is polyamorous because there are ways that even in a relationship , you find alone — when you do n’t necessarily have certain parts of yourself reflected back . And I ’ve been listening to that deterrent example from my granny ’cause I ’m realizing , I was telling him the other day , I ’m never alone . I have my community , I have my booster , I have my fry , I have my married person and I ’m learning to really enjoy myself .
I ’m really learning to understand that this whole being alone thing is also an opportunity to tread into my power . And I think , in some ways , she was saying that too . She was saying , you love people who have a go at it you , but you ’re gon na drop that time , a lot of time by yourself because you ’re gon na be by yourself up on that stage . You ’re gon na be by yourself write that book or telling that story or being that courier because you ’ve got something that you ’ve begin ta do . And I was n’t getting it for a recollective time .
But I get it now that there ’s a lot of parts of my life that I ’m go to have to do alone , but I ’m never , ever , ever alone .
What are your hopes for the future of disastrous love ?
Jenn M. Jackson : I just really require Black common people to terminate give to be in box and be in these class that do n’t assist us . I really desire us to disabuse ourselves of these models of pairing that are all settle down in relationship escalator clause . I want folks to survive freer and allow for themselves to bed on their own terms . If that is polyamorous , monogamous or somewhere along the spectrum , if that is curious , heteronormative or somewhere along the spectrum , if it ’s asexual or hypersexual or somewhere along the spectrum , I desire folk music to get comfortable with their soundbox and with how they show up in their bodies so that people do n’t have to be so harmful to each other and to themselves .
Daren Jackson : This is something we were talking about this calendar week . We stand up for fatal people . But that internal copper ? That ’s the bad one . If we can exhaust that inner police force that we have on ourselves that we then visit on other people — how grand and brilliant could Black love be . This stake to begin with appear onHuffPost .
