Oprah explains why she never married Stedman Graham

Oprah Winfrey at the premiere of "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" (Reuters)

After 31 years together, Oprah Winfrey and boyfriend Stedman Graham have no intentions of getting married. However, the 63-year-old star wants people to know that they are both perfectly content with that fact.

Speaking in the upcoming September issue of Vogue, the former talk show host was asked what being in a long term relationship, but not ever getting married, taught her about women in our society.

“Live life on your own terms,” she responded.

Winfrey went on to explain that the topic of marriage never really came up between her and Graham. The only time it did was when she asked him what would have happened if they’d ever actually got married.

“We wouldn’t be together,” he responded.

“We would not have stayed together, because marriage requires a different way of being in this world. His interpretation of what it means to be a husband and what it would mean for me to be a wife would have been pretty traditional, and I would not have been able to fit into that,” Winfrey said.

As Entertainment Tonight notes, the star’s status as the founder of a media empire has made it difficult to keep her relationship moving on her own terms over the years. In 2016, she was forced to take to Twitter and shut down rumors that she and Graham were planning a wedding.

For now, it seems that Winfrey and Graham are content to live as boyfriend and girlfriend to one another rather than husband and wife.