Yes, more relationship advice, sorta...

[legendarytomuk]

Right, I'm currently a first year at College, and in my first properly meaningful relationship with a girl. We've been together for nigh on five months now, and I honestly have never loved someone quite like this.

If I had to choose one issue with our relationship, it would be that I have an issue with her being close to other guys. And frankly I want to know whether I'm simply suffering from my own insecurity or if this is a fair problem. Without wanting to say too much about her background for her own sake, I do not find it surprising that she develops such close relationships with other people, but being her boyfriend it can be uncomfortable at times. I've never really taken issue with it much before as I understand her feelings towards them are purely innocent. However, over the past few months she has became friends by the name of someone we shall call 'Jack'.

Most of her male friends have played an important part of her life, and have looked after her when times have been hard, something which I appreciate and understand greatly. But Jack seemed to appeared out of nowhere over the course of a week and quickly became quite close. These days have what is almost a strict routine of hugging each other at least once a day, but in most cases is just on sight, at which point she will literally dash in his direction, sometimes even pushing me out of the way and throw herself around him. Unless of course he spots her first, in which case he would often grab her himself, or even catch her by the hand, and pull her towards him.

I take no issue in her having friends like this at all, he has been able to help her out when I haven't been around and can almost always make her happy, but this sort of behavior still makes me feel uncomfortable, particularly as she almost never shows me the same attention, despite that we've been going out for a number of months. When I first told her this, she said that I had a problem with him and that I was being effectively being unfair, but I learned not long before Christmas that there have been rumours going round that her and Jack have been dating. This pretty much confirmed my fears that in terms of outwards appearance, they appear to be going out, not the sort of thing that I want to have to hear, it was bad enough to have to bear witness to their usual routine. She was hurt to hear this, so I didn't press the issue, but she insisted that you can't tone down a friendship.

Just before I ask you for your advice and opinions, I'd like to lay a few things down. Firstly and foremost, I do not under any circumstance believe that she is cheating on me. I trust her as much as I love her and I know she would not do such a thing, or at the very least, would break up with me first. Secondly, as much as I believe her intentions are innocent, I feel otherwise about the guys, I haven't got much more reason to believe it than what I've given here, but I know when a guy is trying it on. Finally, I know that I'm inevitably going to get answers telling me to ditch her and beat the crap about of the guy, as sympathetic with the latter I may be, neither are options.

So fellow Escapists, thoughts please! Sorry for such a long post, but I'd appreciate you taking your time to read it. What I really want to know is am I being unreasonable to feel uncomfortable about this guy? And if not, what should I do about it? Thanks in advance.

 

[Comando96]

I am "legendary"tomuk's friend in RL

She isn't cheating on him... However because of her past see has proven to be too trusting. If someone did have ill-intentions... she wouldn't pick up on them ¬.¬

 

[dmase]

edit: never mind you pretty much took my advice inadvertently.

 

[legendarytomuk]

I think probably the length of my post has kinda lost a bit of the meaning of the question. The problem is that it's difficult to be specific, I'd rather keep this as anonymous as possible. I can tell you this, she is not cheating, and it doesn't really need considering. What I wanted to know is whether I was being unreasonable to be uncomfortable about this. I should try and make it clear that they're also not close in anymore than a physical sense, if she ever has any real issues or if she is very upset, she will always come to me, and she has only ever seen him out of College once before, and in all honesty, she doesn't spend that much time with him, but she is still like this.

Your right Aylaine that a lot of it doesn't seem to add up, maybe that's because of the lack of detail I've. I should say that despite this, we are very close, and I'm not trying to say that she isn't affectionate towards me, that's not the case at all. But when we are at College, she appears to be more openly so with this guy, which is quite difficult at the moment as we're having difficulty getting time together outside of College. The attention she shows him is not actually that strange for her in terms of personality, and she doesn't see a hug to be more than just a gesture of friendship, she has in fact said to me once before that she thinks I'm "worth more" than them, quite what she meant by that I'm not sure, she could be referring to the fact that we kiss quite regularly, but both of us can get somewhat self conscious about it and try to stay mostly out of sight, making it sometimes difficult to get time. I do fully intend to talk to her more about it, especially if people agree that it isn't just me being paranoid about it. I missed out something that is possibly very important, and I apologize if you think it is, the guy is slightly autistic, which I know for a fact makes her very sympathetic towards him, but I know very little about the disorder, except that it can cause a certain amount of social difficulties (please correct me, I know that's probably a terrible description). He is only slightly so, does anyone know if at all, how much this would play into it?

 

[Hiraeth]

Hiya, I've got a friend who is uncannily similar to the girl you're seeing so I think I see where you're coming from. Based on that, this is how I see it:

She's not setting out to hurt you, and she probably has absolutely no romantic feelings for this guy whatsoever, but because you're like the rest of us you're naturally a little confused. I would suggest that you sit her down and say 'well how would you feel if I acted like that with another girl?' but I suspect she wouldn't see it as a problem at all because she operates in her own way, and doesn't see that other people don't work the same. I suspect she doesn't behave that way around you because she's comfortable around you and with your relationship, and doesn't feel the need to make a big deal out of it. It may not even occur to her that she appears to be showing this guy more attention than she's showing you.

Thing is, you're human, and in my opinion it's perfectly natural for you to be a little bit uncomfortable with her being overly friendly with other people. I saw a photo on facebook of my boyfriend hugging the friend I mentioned above, well hugging her around the waist with his head pressed into her boobs. Like you I know for sure that nothing's going on there, but I was a little annoyed that somewhere in their (somewhat drunken) heads they thought it was a great idea. I joked about it, and moved on (other than bringing it up now), but if things like that kept happening I'd be having a little talk with both of them.

I think you need to make it clear that you know nothing's going on, but you do feel uncomfortable with the fact that she's physical enough with this guy that there are rumours going around that they're together. Make it clear that you trust her implicitly, but also that you're only human, and you're a little jealous she doesn't give you the same attention. Hell make it into a bit of a compliment 'I want you all to myself' or something. You may have to accept, however, that it's just the way she is, which is how it is with my friend. It might be that if you want to be with her, you're going to have to accept her for who she is, somewhat inappropriate behaviour towards other guys included.

Hope that was somewhat helpful and not too confusing.