Personal Life: Romances

Jack Schlossberg

Jack Schlossberg, lawyer and grandson of former President John F. Kennedy through his mother Caroline Kennedy and who was also Alexandra's first serious romantic partner from 2016 to 2019

Sometime in late 2017, rumours began to emerge that romantically linked Alexandra to the American lawyer and grandson of the late President John F. Kennedy Jack Schlossberg, who was quickly perceived by several media outlets to be the royal's "first true love", owing to the latter's rather secretive lifestyle. Such rumours involving the two were said to have begun emerging following a number of instances in which Alexandra and Schlossberg were seen talking to one another that have mostly been used as hints of a supposed hidden romantic relationship involving the two although neither Alexandra nor Schlossberg took the effort to issue any sort of confirmation of their supposed romantic relationship. However, in a later interview with Cosmopolitan, the very first instance in which she publicly confirmed the couple's relationship, Alexandra revealed that the two first became close friends and later romantic partners during her brief time abroad in the United States where Alexandra, owing to her family's warm ties to the influential Kennedy family, initially sought the advice of Schlossberg in picking her desired university of choice, for which she was first recommended the well-known Yale University where Schlossberg himself is an alumnus. Ultimately, although Alexandra herself opted to ultimately enrol at the Seattle University in Seattle, Washington, the two continued to remain cordial friends somewhat before later beginning a romantic relationship afterward, a decision that was said to be welcomed by both of their families who saw it as a revival of the memorable but ill-fated romance between Schlossberg's uncle John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, both of whom died in a tragic plane crash on 16 July 1999 when Alexandra herself was just three and Schlossberg being only six years old. As it was her first-ever serious romantic relationship, Alexandra has since credited it for helping her to become more "emotionally mature and aware", stating, "Pretty much, Jack taught me a lot about how a relationship should go and what one expects from and is expected of in a relationship. Simply put, after what happened before, I gradually learned not to shy away and instead dare myself to try again because in Jack himself I knew and felt assured that by chance or luck someone out there truly fits me and isn't necessarily out to use me for their own selfish means".

Eventually, by August 2022, it was then believed that the couple had ended their secret romantic relationship, a fact that was later confirmed by Alexandra who revealed that the two had broken up years beforehand in 2019, around the same time that she subsequently began a relationship with footballer Beth Mead, her current romantic partner. At the same time, both Alexandra and Schlossberg subsequently asserted that they will "continue to remain friends for the foreseeable future" regardless of past developments. Meanwhile, Alexandra revealed that the couple's preoccupation with their respective careers, coupled with the massive physical distance between them with Schlossberg, on his part, mostly residing in the United States while Alexandra herself mostly lived in the United Kingdom, ultimately led to the end of their relationship as it was reportedly found "untenable" to continue by both sides who then agreed to mutually terminate the romance in favour of a more casual and non-romantic friendship, with Alexandra herself later stating, "Regardless of what happened between us in the past, Jack is and will always be a good friend of mine that I'm personally much happy to have known in the first place".

Meanwhile, regarding popular assumptions and expectations surrounding her past relationship with Schlossberg, she remarked, "From the outsiders' perspective, it was definitely like a match made in heaven and that judging by who we are, what we do, and the history of our respective families, we should inevitably be together for life in the near future. Unfortunately, fate thought differently and in the end, by chance or circumstances, we weren't necessarily meant for one another which is something that both myself and Jack have come to terms with". Later on, she added, "In hindsight, I wouldn't certainly call it a bad memory or the sort. Instead, I found my time with Jack to be rather happy and somewhat educational for myself because it was then that I truly knew what to expect from my own partner and what he or she expected from me in return". Incidentally, although for only a short while, their parents, namely Alexandra's father King Thomas and Schlossberg's mother Caroline Kennedy were said to have been in a brief and discreet romantic relationship prior to their respective marriages in which religious differences, coupled with Kennedy's desire to avoid the spotlight of being a queen consort, brought an end to their romance although the two have since remained on friendly terms as evidenced by both Kennedy and Schlossberg attending Alexandra's October 2019 coronation.

Beth Mead

Beth Mead, an English professional footballer who currently plays for Arsenal and the England women's national team. Together, Mead and Alexandra won two Women's Super League and two FA Women's League Cup titles, as well as the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup and the UEFA Women's Euro 2017

On 31 July 2022, while celebrating England's back-to-back UEFA Women's Championship triumph in a 2-1 win over Germany in the Euro 2022 finals, Alexandra sparked some media interest when shortly after the whistle blew marking the end of the match the royal proceeded to embrace and kiss England forward Beth Mead whose tender moments with the former were promptly photographed and published by a number of leading newspapers which soon led to rumours of the Queen being in a same-sex relationship with the England and Arsenal forward, a theory that initially picked up the pace while sceptics suggested that the two were merely "good friends", citing the Queen's past with both Arsenal and the England women's national team and her own notoriously private stance on her sexuality. Meanwhile, when immediately asked for clarification, most of the couple's close associates largely responded with deliberate indifference, with head coach Sarina Wiegman describing the two as "very close friends just having fun after winning a major tournament".

Eventually, on 7 August 2022, in an interview with BBC Sport, Mead finally confirmed that the two are indeed a romantic couple, adding that the two have actually begun dating sometime after the end of the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup Final where Alexandra was nearing her planned retirement from professional football. In this, Mead, who first met the royal several years prior while playing together for England at the youth level before eventually joining the latter at Arsenal, was said to have become romantically attracted to Alexandra throughout the years that they spent together as teammates to which the royal's sudden decision to retire from football reportedly concerned Mead over the future of their friendship thereby causing the former to "take it to the next step" by asking her royal teammate out on a fairly innocent "girls' night out" at a restaurant in London. To that end, over the course of a single dinner, the two eventually agreed to start a serious romantic relationship after Alexandra, as per her own admission, was both "charmed" and "stunned" by Mead's "honest outpouring of emotions". Elaborating further, Alexandra herself also revealed that the two shared their first kiss that night and were "almost inseparable" on the way back home.

Despite this, immediate concerns relating to privacy and security encouraged the couple to initially conduct their relationship in a secretive manner out of fear of excessive media coverage. Meanwhile, it was also said that whenever the two are not preoccupied with their respective duties, the two would often go out together incognito with Alexandra herself revealing that whenever possible the couple would either stroll through London with little to no security while also wearing casual clothes or have lunches and dinners at restaurants in London of their choosing. Meanwhile, the couple also spoke of the mutual surprise expressed by both of their parents with those of Mead, despite some reasonable shock at the dynamics, being largely supportive of it while those of Alexandra, namely the former King and Queen, also expressed much support for it, with Alexandra herself stating, "Admittedly, it was a little shocking of course but in the end, we both loved each other so much that for as long as I'm happy then my parents should be too". Beforehand, the former King Thomas himself had also publicly defended his younger sister's decision to marry American actress Jodie Foster, stating, "If my little sister is happy then so am I too for whatever she does. Besides, I myself personally know all too well about unconventional marriages that some people with rather archaic views would not have approved of and that includes the one between my own dear parents back then where they used to say that my mother, a simple New Yorker and the daughter of an immigrant couple, is not seemingly allowed to marry my father, the future king of a country".

Beth Mead scoring the opening goal against Austria during the UEFA Women's Euro 2022 Group A match at Old Trafford in Manchester, England. The Lionesses subsequently won the match 1-0 and later emerged as champions for a second consecutive time by defeating Germany 2-1 in the finals

Almost unanimously so, the couple's relationship was met with a mostly positive reception by many with American soccer player Megan Rapinoe, who is herself engaged to former American professional basketball player Sue Bird, publicly congratulating the couple on social media. Moreover, Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, in a sign of acceptance by the Church of England, also expressed a positive response to the couple's announcement, stating that he "wishes Her Majesty the Queen and Miss Mead all the best in their happy relationship together". Since then, the couple has been popularly referred to by the portmanteau of "Bethalex", a combination of their respective given names, while some have also described them as "the royalty of Arsenal", a term that also came to include Alexandra's younger brother Richard and partner Leah Williamson, both of whom also play for the club. Collectively, the quartet are popularly dubbed "The Four Gooners" and are well-known for their mutual closeness with each other.