Relationship Woes and Advice XX: One X Short of an Awesome Title

[Trellan]

I feel like I'm a bloody monster.

That's not being fair to yourself. There is no way you could have possibly known what was going on, and it's perfectly reasonable to send a "what the heck?" message. Feeling sheepish is normal, but don't be so hard on yourself. Just let her know there's no need to apologize and that you'll be there when she gets back.

[Coidzor]

I feel like I'm a bloody monster.

Heh. Takes a lot more blood to get ya bloody & a lot more monstrousness to make a monster out of that.

No, the only monster here today is me, as usual.

Besides, if she had the time to check her freaking facebook wall, she could've at least let her friends know that something was up with her in her status if nothing else.

[Chas the mage]

Hello, chaps. Before I say anything, I'm a 15 year old straight male. If you think this is silly, please, tell me.

Okay, Here is my story: I'm chilling with my girlfriend one day, and we went on face book after a while, and this guy that she met on "omegle" starts talking to her. He's from Tunisia, and he's 18. it started out as a normal conversation until the man started talking about her body in some pictures, and said he wanted to have... relations with her. In an even more straightforward manner than I just said, but I won't restate it because of the sheer vulgarity. Anyways, so he says "Just kidding, but I will if you want me to." and he goes on like this, randomly flirting in the most straight forward manner I've ever seen. So, I tell her I don't like this and then shes insistent that he was kidding, ever after multiple comments of the same variety. Then a few days later he talks to her again, and I confront her about it and she says that "girls like to be flattered and know they can get other guys, but I love only you and I'm not cheating on you or anything." and he continues like this, even after I spoke with the man himself. I told her I want her to stop talking to him, as this is a dreadfully familiar situation, and she said no.

Am I just being jealous (I accept that I can be sometimes) or is this just wrong?

[Sarco_Phage]

The dude is coming on to your girlfriend. Most boys would be quite jealous, yes. It is natural for you to feel out of sorts.

[DeadManSleeping]

@Maralais: You could maybe send flowers or do some other thoughtful gesture, as is nice when another is in a bad spot, but you haven't actually done anything wrong. You couldn't have known.

@Chas: She's not cheating on you, but you still have a right to find the situation uncomfortable. If she wants to stroke her own ego more than she wants to put you at ease (and she's straight-up said so, which I will grant is more than most people like that are polite enough to do), then you are in what we call a "bad relationship". It is better to be in no relationship at all than a bad relationship. Maybe ask her one more time, letting her know you are really not okay with this. If she still wants to do it, then, well, she can do it without having you as her boyfriend.

And don't get too broken up over it. You're 15. The chances that any relationship made at your age will be anything but experience under the belt (at least, in our current culture and society) are closer to 0 than the chances that I will spontaneously develop the power of flight. Keep dating, try your best every time, and someday, you'll have earned the bliss of a relationship of mutual love and trust.

[Pheehelm]

Your primary problem right now isn't the flirting, or even how you feel about it. Different couples have different boundaries for that kind of thing. Your main problem is you've told her this is upsetting you, and she's turned defensive and is blowing off your discomfort. Absent a transcript of the discussion, I'm left to wonder if this started with how you told her, or if she defaulted to defensiveness. Either way, no, you're not being silly.

I told her I want her to stop talking to him...

What specifically did you say?

...as this is a dreadfully familiar situation...

Care to elaborate?

[Chas the mage]

@Sarco phage: Thanks

@deadmansleeping: Thanks. as much as I don't like this situation, I'm not being all depressed or anything like that. As much as I'd like the relationship I've had for almost a year now work, its not the end of the world.

@Pheehelm: I told her, rather directly, "babe, I don't like this guy, I want you to stop talking to him." And the familiarity... My ex would playfully flirt with my "friend" who would hit on her seriously, referred to her as "sexy" to her and myself, and even tried to ask her out during the relationship, claiming that he was more attractive than I was.

[Moonshadow]

So... the girl that I want to ask out hasn't been on MSN for 4 days >_> I shouldn't worry... right? :/

[Sarco_Phage]

So... the girl that I want to ask out hasn't been on MSN for 4 days >_> I shouldn't worry... right? :/

No. And don't go thinking that she hasn't been on MSN specifically to avoid you; that would be baseless paranoia.

[Serpentine]

@@Pheehelm: I told her, rather directly, "babe, I don't like this guy, I want you to stop talking to him."

That could be a source of problem. You didn't discuss the matter with her, you flat-out told her what to do. That's not a good thing to do in a relationship - but then, so's having a sexually suggestive conversation with someone else right in front of your boyfriend.
I think, if you want to salvage the situation, you need to start again. Don't say "don't do this", explain to her that it makes you uncomfortable and why, and talk it out. Maybe come to a compromise of some sort, if only just working out limits you're relatively okay with.

[Jalor]

And you don't have to be insulting. Other people have pointed out that I was wrong without accusing me of malice in the process.

Hostility =/= malice. You reacted to Coidzor's post as though it were a personal attack, and you also treat different dating approaches as a deliberate slight. Your problem is that you're looking at the actions of others in the worst possible way. It's not "glass half empty" with you, it's "glass infested with deadly amoebas and pathogens" and that's not a healthy way of thinking at all. Do you often feel like most of the people around you are rude and insulting to you, personally?

Am I just being jealous (I accept that I can be sometimes) or is this just wrong?

Your feelings are 100% understandable, but perhaps a bit of perspective will help. This guy lives in Tunisia, and I'm pretty sure they haven't yet figured out how to send someone's actual physical genitalia through the Internet. To your girlfriend, talking to this guy seems like an awesome deal because she gets the self-esteem points from an older foreign guy flirting with her, but without having to deal with physical advances. In her mind, she has a really good deal - if she's only 15, this might be the first time an older guy was interested in her enough to maintain communication - and she doesn't want to lose that. Like Serpentine said, if you explained your feelings about the whole thing, it might help.

[Thufir]

Hello, chaps. Before I say anything, I'm a 15 year old straight male. If you think this is silly, please, tell me.

Yeah, that's silly. Teenage heterosexuality is like the most ridiculous thing ever.
(I realise that's not what you meant, but that is genuinely how I read it initially. As to serious advice, other people have already said what I would want to say)

[Lissou]

Hostility =/= malice. You reacted to Coidzor's post as though it were a personal attack, and you also treat different dating approaches as a deliberate slight. Your problem is that you're looking at the actions of others in the worst possible way. It's not "glass half empty" with you, it's "glass infested with deadly amoebas and pathogens" and that's not a healthy way of thinking at all. Do you often feel like most of the people around you are rude and insulting to you, personally?

No, I don't. I never thought people were being mean about it or anything like that. I said that I don't work this way, and that I couldn't help but feel unimportant if I knew someone wasn't dating me because I'm me but because I'm around and it has to be someone.

Some people replied saying "well it can be because it's you even though they're not in love with you". And while I don't understand that either - seems like a waste of time to me to date someone in the hopes you might maybe fall in love, rather than wait until it happens and date that person. Unless there are some benefits to dating someone you're not in love with, and that's what I don't personally get I guess - at least I can see how it's different from "let me try and weed people out by dating them and seeing which to eliminate from the list of potential partners" or "this is the list of things I need in someone, I'll try and find someone who fits them and we can go from there". Because I see these are too... clinical, in a way, and that's not how feelings work in my experience.

Yeah, if I'm dating someone and they say "I was just trying out people and wow you're so amazing so I stuck with you and I love you now" I would be less appreciative than if the person said "you were everything to me so as hard as it was I decided to risk it and ask you out". I guess it's because one is "I was just chilling and I stumbled upon a diamond accidentally, and that's awesome" while the other is "I saw this mine and I mined it until I finally got the diamonds I knew were there all along".
Asking someone out doesn't have the same value (to me) if you don't care about the answer because you don't care about the person. It's not the same.

I don't think that makes other people's love less big or anything like that. I was talking about how I felt about it personally, and how I didn't understand. I'm glad people explained. I'd have no reason to say I didn't understand if not to hear what people had to say about it, so I could wrap my mind about it. And I guess I can understand it a little bit better, because liking someone, hanging out with them more and more and so on, that's the kind of things I do with friends. So while I can't project that to a romantic relationship, I guess I understand the broad lines of how it works.

I just would feel like I was using someone if I said yes to going out without being in love with them. Like I was faking it until I make it, or something, hoping that later on I fall in love and it retroactively makes the dating okay.
It's different with sex. With sex it's about desire (and similarly I wouldn't agree to have sex if I have no desire and just hope for it to show up later after having sex enough times).
I don't know, for me dating is like going out with a friend, but with romantic feelings. If there are no romantic feelings, it's more honest (to me) to do stuff as friends, rather than (from my point of view) as "potential future partners".

I hope this post was clear enough about being only about my own perceptions and experiences and not a projection on anyone else (only how I personally experience their actions, and whether it's true or false it remains the way I feel about it, and it's not something I decided to feel just to be mean or something) and that this way it won't hurt anyone's feelings.

And... I'm still not sure why it did. If you don't match my description, then it wasn't targeted at you. If you do, it's not an insult since it's the truth, and that might be the way you work.

I might come off very strongly or forceful or something, but it's not my goal to hurt people or impose my opinion. I just tend to feel very strongly about things. I share them because I want to talk about them. I want to learn stuff. Coidzor, I felt like you were telling me "you're either a moron or an *******" and that felt uncalled for and nonconstructive, and that's why I responded that way. I apologise if I misinterpreted your message.

Bottom line is, I'm not trying to explain things in the worst possible way. I'm trying to explain things with what I know, and when I'm missing important things because I don't understand or experience them, I can't just make them up. That's why I appreciate when people pitch in with their own experience from which I can learn.

[rogueboy]

Asking someone out doesn't have the same value (to me) if you don't care about the answer because you don't care about the person. It's not the same.

First, to clarify: I'm going to assume that by "care about the person" you mean above and beyond the way you care about friends - I can't imagine (and I don't think anyone here's advocating) dating someone who you wouldn't be at least enjoy hanging out with as much as your friends.

This struck me as overly black-and-white, unless I'm misunderstanding you pretty badly. The way I read it, there are 2 basic options: you're in love with someone, therefore you care about them so you ask them out. If you don't love them, then clearly you don't care about them, so why ask them out?

But the way I see it, there's an in-between, and maybe it's in the definition of love that we have. Isn't it possible that you care about someone more than (at least a majority of) your friends without being in love with them, romantically? Maybe this is coming from the fact that I haven't ever been in a relationship, so I haven't dealt with it first-hand, but I see there being a "caring about someone" scale, which goes from "we're friends and we hang out on occasion" (above an acquaintance) to "I will go out of my way to help you succeed and be happy when I can" (close friends) to "I can confide just about anything to you and know that I won't get anything but support in return" (best friends) to "I'm in love with you and want to be with you always" (partner).

Hopefully those points along the scale make sense, I didn't put a terrible amount of thought into how I phrased them.

[Serpentine]

The concept missing from this discussion is "like-like". More than friendship, not quite - but with the potential to become - love. You get to know - and/or ask out - someone you might like-like. If you do like-like them, you start a relationship with them. If it develops into love, you stay with them. If it does not, it ends.

[Maralais]

Well, aren't casual relationships for like-like situations? You don't fall madly in love, yet you find out that you like(as in, like a lot) spending time with someone, and so you decide to get closer, but without the bonding and all.(That is, if things don't get the 500 Days of Summer way, but hey, one part was madly in love in the beginning there)

[Coidzor]

You mean lust with a personal attachment like philia but without having coalesced into being full blown wossname, Eros's partner?

Nah, that never happens. People don't just become attracted to their friends or anything. That's just crazy talk.

I mean, just consider the history of this thread. No one's ever come in here before asking about how to explore the feelings they have for a friend & see what develops from them.

[Esprit15]

That could be a source of problem. You didn't discuss the matter with her, you flat-out told her what to do. That's not a good thing to do in a relationship - but then, so's having a sexually suggestive conversation with someone else right in front of your boyfriend.

Seconding this. Don't tell her what to do. Express that her flirting with this guy, especially right in front of you, is very uncomfortable for you. Right now you are likely coming off as controlling in her opinion, which will create a knee-jerk reaction of being defensive about it. I and my current gf have talked about this in the past and just decided to set up and agree upon boundaries on what we considered "cheating" and "being friendly." It has worked pretty well for us so far.

[Chas the mage]

@Thufir: Nice

@Serpentine: I expressed my unhappiness before then, and we discussed it a bit but not much. But that is a good idea...

@ Jalor: This is true... it definitely bothers me that he talks about that stuff right in front of me and my girlfriend is kinda Laissez-faire about it...

[Lissou]

First, to clarify: I'm going to assume that by "care about the person" you mean above and beyond the way you care about friends - I can't imagine (and I don't think anyone here's advocating) dating someone who you wouldn't be at least enjoy hanging out with as much as your friends.

People date strangers all the time, apparently. People give their number to someone they've just met and hope to grab a drink. People go on blind dates. They're not doing that with their friends.
And as I said I see a relationship as friendship+feelings, so if the feelings aren't there, why date rather than just hang out as friends just like before? I'm sure there is a reason, but it's not something that I'm interested in so I don't understand what the reason is.

This struck me as overly black-and-white, unless I'm misunderstanding you pretty badly. The way I read it, there are 2 basic options: you're in love with someone, therefore you care about them so you ask them out. If you don't love them, then clearly you don't care about them, so why ask them out?

But the way I see it, there's an in-between, and maybe it's in the definition of love that we have. Isn't it possible that you care about someone more than (at least a majority of) your friends without being in love with them, romantically? Maybe this is coming from the fact that I haven't ever been in a relationship, so I haven't dealt with it first-hand, but I see there being a "caring about someone" scale, which goes from "we're friends and we hang out on occasion" (above an acquaintance) to "I will go out of my way to help you succeed and be happy when I can" (close friends) to "I can confide just about anything to you and know that I won't get anything but support in return" (best friends) to "I'm in love with you and want to be with you always" (partner).

Hopefully those points along the scale make sense, I didn't put a terrible amount of thought into how I phrased them.

The concept missing from this discussion is "like-like". More than friendship, not quite - but with the potential to become - love. You get to know - and/or ask out - someone you might like-like. If you do like-like them, you start a relationship with them. If it develops into love, you stay with them. If it does not, it ends.

It seems to me that maybe we either have a different definition of loving or a different definition of dating.
It's possible that for me the middle ground, the "like-like" stuff, counts as being in love. On the other hand, among the list given by rogueboy, I don't personally understand the point of a relationship for anything under the being in love category. It seems to me I already get all the benefits I might want from the friendship itself. If I also want sex I can have a FWB. But I wouldn't want an actual relationship without being in love.

Thanks so much for everyone who elaborated on these points :)

[arguskos]

You know what sucks? When you find someone who's attractive, engaging, entertaining, intelligent, and all those other fun indications of "you're awesome!"... and they're dating someone else already. At least I made a new friend, which is good, but, I mean, really? Oi.

[Objection]

The concept missing from this discussion is "like-like". More than friendship, not quite - but with the potential to become - love. You get to know - and/or ask out - someone you might like-like. If you do like-like them, you start a relationship with them. If it develops into love, you stay with them. If it does not, it ends.

This is ... very confusing. Let me see if I've interpreted it correctly.

There's this stage somewhere between friendship and love (that bit alone is news to me), in which you get to know a person (but didn't you do that during the process of becoming their friend?), and it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost.

I get the feeling I'm way off here, so do point out and explain the error in my thinking if I am.

[term1nally s1ck]

But I wouldn't want an actual relationship without being in love.

Thanks so much for everyone who elaborated on these points :)

Dating, especially casual dating, isn't the same as a relationship. For those first few dates, neither of you will be thinking about 'are we gonna get married and have kids' etc. It's more a 'Oh wow, my first impression of this girl was pretty good, I hope the rest of her personality is just as awesome, and she's not hiding anything from me...'

You're on a relationship test drive. It's a 'I'm initially attracted to you, and you're initially attracted to me, lets see if we're compatible in other ways'.

Personally, I define a date as 'any activity shared between two people alone, where both parties are aware that mutual attraction is present.'
You can't exactly skip that stage. The awkward moments with the person you're kinda into but aren't sure of yet, where it's just you two hanging out, and you both kind of wonder if anything is gonna happen? That's part of dating. It's the relationship's foreplay, if you will, and as with foreplay itself, it can sometimes be just as much fun as the real thing.

This is ... very confusing. Let me see if I've interpreted it correctly.

There's this stage somewhere between friendship and love (that bit alone is news to me), in which you get to know a person (but didn't you do that during the process of becoming their friend?), and it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost.

I get the feeling I'm way off here, so do point out and explain the error in my thinking if I am.

Yeah, it's called attraction. That first moment when you're looking at someone you met recently, who you're starting to realise is actually pretty and interesting, and you wonder for the very first time if anything might happen. That's attraction. You're not in love yet, you barely know the person. But there's definitely more than just friendship there.

[Jalor]

And as I said I see a relationship as friendship+feelings, so if the feelings aren't there, why date rather than just hang out as friends just like before? I'm sure there is a reason, but it's not something that I'm interested in so I don't understand what the reason is.

The missing link here is attraction. No, not something for tourists to spend money on, that feeling of "this person seems especially interesting/sexy and I feel like I could maybe fall in love with them". Dating is when both parties are consciously exploring that attraction instead of just hanging out as friends. I know some people are quick to fall in and out of love - I have a friend like that - and maybe you're one of them. Maybe what you call 'love' is closer to what I'd call 'attraction'.

It seems to me I already get all the benefits I might want from the friendship itself. If I also want sex I can have a FWB. But I wouldn't want an actual relationship without being in love.

There's more of a difference between the experiences of dating and friendship than sex and not-sex. I can't remember the last time I spooned with a regular friend, for instance.

Also, I don't know if it's easier for you because you're a woman, but despite my best efforts I've never been able to get a FWB. I talk to just about everyone I see on any given day, I regularly keep in touch with more people than anyone else I know, and I pursue everyone I'm attracted to, but my only options are 'one-night stand', 'girlfriend', and 'friend'. Is this just me?

[Coidzor]

Also, I don't know if it's easier for you because you're a woman, but despite my best efforts I've never been able to get a FWB. I talk to just about everyone I see on any given day, I regularly keep in touch with more people than anyone else I know, and I pursue everyone I'm attracted to, but my only options are 'one-night stand', 'girlfriend', and 'friend'. Is this just me?

Life is like that sometimes, but being a woman definitely is an advantage in establishing that kind of arrangement, yes.

[rogueboy]

People date strangers all the time, apparently. People give their number to someone they've just met and hope to grab a drink. People go on blind dates.

Ah, good point, I had forgotten about this. Perhaps my comments works better in terms of pursuing a relationship, with term1nally s1ck's distinction between casual dating and a relationship in mind?

There's this stage somewhere between friendship and love (that bit alone is news to me), in which you get to know a person (but didn't you do that during the process of becoming their friend?), and it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost.

Perhaps I'm interpreting Serp's comment differently, but I read it as the 'like-like' stage ending, not the friendship as a whole. I think it comes from what the "it" at the end of her statement applies to: the friendship or the relationship.

I can't remember the last time I spooned with a regular friend, for instance.

By reading this to imply that you have spooned with a regular friend at some point in the past, it becomes far more entertaining.

[Coidzor]

and it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost.

No, that's generally dependent upon a whole lot more than attraction fading.

Why is this confusing to you?

[Felixaar]

Yeah, that's silly. Teenage heterosexuality is like the most ridiculous thing ever.
(I realise that's not what you meant, but that is genuinely how I read it initially. As to serious advice, other people have already said what I would want to say)

This is exactly what I was going to say. Being fifteen, also, is very silly. Why be fifteen when you could be twenty-five? Hfft

[Jalor]

By reading this to imply that you have spooned with a regular friend at some point in the past, it becomes far more entertaining.

Wait, never mind what I said before, I do remember the last time I spooned with a regular friend. We were both at another friend's place with the rest of our engineering club, designing a space settlement for a competition. This was the weekend before we had to submit our final product, so naturally 90% of the work had to be done and we worked through the night. I took a nap on a bed that was empty when I got in, and awoke a couple hours later to find one of our graphics guys had crashed in the same bed and began spooning me in his sleep. I think that counts as spooning a friend even though neither of us were conscious when it happened. Also, that was the only time I've ever been the inside spoon.

[Serpentine]

Well, aren't casual relationships for like-like situations? You don't fall madly in love, yet you find out that you like(as in, like a lot) spending time with someone, and so you decide to get closer, but without the bonding and all.(That is, if things don't get the 500 Days of Summer way, but hey, one part was madly in love in the beginning there)

Sort of, but it's also often unavoidable.
I would expect most relationships that stay "like-like" for an extended part, or all of, the relationship to be pretty early in people's lives. Teenagers and young people are still working out what they want from life and from a potential partner and are just getting into this sort of stuff. They're not expected to fall in love until they "grow up". And as a personal example, in the future I'll be basically "love or bust" - no longer interested in "like-like" relationships.

People date strangers all the time, apparently. People give their number to someone they've just met and hope to grab a drink. People go on blind dates. They're not doing that with their friends.

That's the "getting to know them" part of the whole thing. You don't - generally speaking - fall madly in love with someone the very moment you lay eyes on them. But you may be attracted to them and get a feeling that, if you got to know them, you might fall in love with them. Thus: dating.

It seems to me that maybe we either have a different definition of loving or a different definition of dating.
It's possible that for me the middle ground, the "like-like" stuff, counts as being in love.

That's possible.

This is ... very confusing. Let me see if I've interpreted it correctly.

There's this stage somewhere between friendship and love (that bit alone is news to me), in which you get to know a person (but didn't you do that during the process of becoming their friend?), and it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost.

I get the feeling I'm way off here, so do point out and explain the error in my thinking if I am.

You're conflating two relationship-starting types.
Type 1: you notice and ask out a stranger on a date. Thus: the getting to know the person bit.
Type 2: You get to know someone, become friends, and then it blossoms into a relationship. The getting to know the person bit is covered by the becoming friends bit.

And it's not "it either becomes love or goes right back to zero, thereby causing the friendship to be lost". It's "if you fall in love, you go into a devoted long-term relationship (maybe). If you don't, the relationship ends and you may or may not remain friends."

Life is like that sometimes, but being a woman definitely is an advantage in establishing that kind of arrangement, yes.

I would like to point out, though, that regardless of whether this is true of the "establishment" part, the vast majority of FWB arrangements I've experienced or heard about ends up with the female just wanting a casual fling and the male hoping for more.
Just an odd flip on the stereotypes...