My friend, who I will refer to as Christine, and I have been friends for 2 years. We are both students studying the same major at university. Life in our city is incredibly expensive (Vancouver), and she has no parental support.
Even with her student loans and part time jobs she simply doesn’t have enough money to pay for her tuition, rent, and food. Christine and I were never really that close as she always kind of kept to herself (school, work, home), but a few months ago I noticed that she was not looking that healthy. She never gave a lot of details about her personal situation, but I could imagine that she was not eating that well. After one of our labs I took her for dinner at a sushi place on campus. She kept on saying she couldn’t afford it, but I insisted, and bought her dinner. She started crying during the meal saying she was having a hard time paying for food and was starting to go hungry. She also mentioned that she was getting kicked out of her basement suite as her landlord is selling the property.
I simply listened to her worries and offered to help her if she had any problems. She knows that I come from a wealthy family and I could easily help her out on food, and potentially give her a place to crash for a few days. She mentioned she was embarrassed and wouldn’t take my charity, but she knew it was coming from a place of concern.
After dinner I dropped her home and we parted ways. I then went to the grocery and bought her some food. I went back to her place, rang the doorbell, and left the food at her door. She wouldn’t take it until I told her that I would simply leave it there if she didn’t. This started a cycle of me doing this every week. When we met I never brought it up and never mentioned it at any time. If her problems were only related to food, then the situation might not be so bad, but she is now about to be kicked out.
This leads me to the crux of the problem. I am personally attracted to my friend, but that’s it. I genuinely don’t want to be in a relationship with her as I know that she isn’t right for me. She has developed some strong feelings for me. She has offered to enter a friends with benefits relationship with me to “compensate” me for the assistance. I turned her down, and told her that I would continue to give her food without the sex, and that she could sleep on my couch while she figured out her living situation.
At this point I should mention that I am an exchange student from Asia, and she is from a more rural local community. Our outlooks on life, plans for the future, and overall values are just so different. I am currently not dating anyone, but have something going on with another girl who is more my style. My friend insists that she is fine with just the sex and doesn’t care about what I do otherwise. She said I should just think of her as my maid. I am now in a weird situation. She has been staying over at my place for the last week. We have not had sex, but she sleeps in my bed (I only have 1 bed) and is honestly pushed me to the limits of my patience lol. The only thing holding me back is the fact that I know she is very inexperienced and not on birth control. I can’t shake this feeling that she will get pregnant, and that she is fine with it happening.
I havent told my friends about this problem, but I honestly know that it comes down to me either kicking her out or setting some hard boundaries with her (birth control, no pregnancy, etc). I am just being realistic, as I don’t think I can avoid sleeping with her if she lives with me. lol wtf am I doing here., should I just kick her out? Or just make the best of an odd situation? I feel like I’d be taking severe advantage of her, but if I kick her out she’d be destitute.
tl;dr my poor friend is moving in with me and wants to offer sex in exchange for my support.
27 comments
If she your friend let her stay with you till she get on her feet. You don’t have to sleep with her to help a friend out. Just set some boundaries and be a great friend
Don’t sleep with her. That’s really not right.
First of all, she’s in a hard situation and you’re offering help, don’t take advantage of her. Even though she’s the one who’s offered it, it still comes off as taking advantage.
Second of all, if you start a FWB it might mess up the thing going you have with the other girl who you are interested in.
If she lives with you, set hard boundaries.
You’re doing a really good thing by helping her, and in the future she might help you in your time of need (or pay it forward to someone else). If you have sex with her, you’ll be taking advantage of her and her situation. That’s as far from kindness as you can get. Don’t do it. Start to think of her as a sister. Tell her that you see her as such. Kill whatever attraction exists between the two of you. If she wants you to think of her as your maid, then that’s fine. You wouldn’t have sex with the maid either, and her tidying up around the place is more than enough. Ask her to sleep on the couch instead to create a clearer boundary.
Remember that if you become FWB you can kiss your future with the girl you’re pursuing goodbye. The odds that you’ll find a girlfriend who is ok with you living with a former FWB is as close to zero as it’s going to get. Sleeping with her is only going to mean that you’re going to have to kick her out at a later date, making you an even bigger AH.
This isn’t a “have sex with her or kick her out” situation. There are other options.
If you want to help her, help her. If you want sleep with her in exchange for help, you’re helping yourself by taking advantage of someone down on their luck.
There’s no way adding sex to this relationship helps anyone. Either one or both of you are being exploited in that paradigm.
Can’t she just stay with you without having to prostitute herself?
My guy there’s a multitude of reasons not to sleep with this girl and your only reason for doing so is “she lives with me”. Come on man like use your head and see how dumb this is. Do you really need people to give you a bullet pointed answer for the reasons why this is a bad idea?
If she brings up sleeping together again say something like “I have told you I am not interested in that, if you ask again then unfortunately you will have to make alternate living arrangements”. Guarantee that will shut this down quickly.
Don’t sleep with her, and consider giving her a month notice to find somewhere new, tell her she needs to move out, because it’s creating a difficult, stressful environment for you, and tell her you want your bed back and she can sleep on the couch.
Remind her consistently of her notice and when to move out.
Tell her there’s never, ever going to be a relationship with her, casual or serious.
This is not a good situation for either of you.
I dont know why sex even needs to be on the table in this? Just let her crash, help her out and when she stays too long you can kick her out again.
You already did a lot, you are a decent person man and she seems to be in a very rough place. She tries to make it up by literally offering her body, that is desperation at its limit. Poor girl.
If you dont want anything from her, then make it clear, seperate where you sleep and be a friend. Sounds like she really needs one.
But dont overdo it man, if its too much for you that is ok as well.
….what’s the issue here? Just let her crash at your place, don’t sleep with her. Just say no, be a real friend to her and let her stay at your place if it’s no problem to you, don’t make her prostitute herself for it. This should be a no brainer
You could help her without expecting anything in return. Novel idea, I’m sure.
Whatever you do, don’t sleep with her.
If you can, she make her your platonic roommate. She can contribute to the rent, utilities, etc. But you can take care of the lion’s share.
She’ll have a place to stay and you’ll have shown yourself to be an honorable friend and man. She may throw herself at you at some point. You will have to politely turn her down.
Be assertive about not sleeping with her.
For starters, make her a cozy couch bed and give her a personal corner for her stuff. Tell her that this is strictly you helping out a friend in need, just like you’d do with any male friend.
Explain to her that her sexual advances are making you uncomfortable and if she continues you will throw her out (even if you don’t mean it, just be strict)
Listen, you’re young and bound to get horny over someone you find attractive, however, taking advantage of her in a time of need is not right, and once she gets on her feet she will resent you for that.
Before you do ANYTHING romantic or sexual, make sure you’re ready to commit to a relationship with her. Yes, you heard that right, having sex with her will make your friendship complicated.
Also, sleeping with someone you feel might baby-trap you isn’t a great thing either. Remember, even sex with contraception can still end up in pregnancy. So before you do anything stupid, think of the consequences.
Send her back to the couch. She needs to be respecting your boundaries here. Get her an air mattress if she’s pretending the couch is uncomfortable.
Lock your bedroom door or kick her out if she keeps coming into your bed. If the genders were flipped, the police would be called.
Nothing says she can’t stay with you for free and not have sex, only your own will power and a locked door
Offer to move her in until she can figure her life out but then make sure that Sex is off the table and you are just trying to help as a friend
Have her sleep on the couch.
I’m not going to shame you for having natural urges but seriously put your foot down and make her sleep on the couch or sleeping bag or something. She is offering sex because she’s desperate and has nothing else to give, this is made evident by what you said about her prior. No matter how much you try to rationalize it that is taking advantage. You could also send her to a women’s shelter, she will get food and shelter there
Why can’t she help you with things around the house ? Like cleaning, cooking, other stuff?
You’ve been far more kind than most people would be here. If you want to have sex with her and maintain your integrity you can’t do it in the current power dynamic that she depends on you for food and shelter, she can’t really provide valid consent because she needs those things to live. Also, once you’ve engaged in that kind of transaction then you are in a really difficult spot that makes it harder to enforce your own boundaries too when you can no longer tolerate her living in your house and your bed.
Any person in this situation will have some limit to how much they can share their home, bed, food, etc before they start to feel resentful. You need to decide what your boundaries are to support her without resentment, and maintain your integrity. You might consider how long you are ok with her staying with you, if you need her to sleep on the couch or buy an air mattress to do this and not get frustrated by waking up with your morning wood next to a woman you are attracted to everyday. If you don’t want to kick her out, plan ahead with her to figure out how she can get on her feet (low income housing, family members, finding a job, etc.) but don’t wait until you just can’t stand the situation anymore and are in a real ethical challenge about kicking her out with no place to go.
If you are both still interested in a sexual relationship when there is no longer a power dynamic that makes her incapable of valid consent, then explore it at that time.
Maybe your friend feels like sex is all she has to offer. If you really want to help her out, you should offer her room and board in exchange for house cleaning, cooking, laundry chores, etc. rather than sex.
Move her ass to the couch and let her clean/kick in what she can for rent. Set boundaries with her. No other self respecting woman is going to get involved with you if she’s sleeping in your bed.
The boundary here shouldn’t be birth control and no pregnancy. The boundary should be a time frame for her to move out from your place and until then she should be sleeping on your couch, on an air mattress or something so you two don’t sleep in the same bed.
You will 100% screw up this friendship otherwise and she already has feelings for you.
>The only thing holding me back is the fact that I know she is very inexperienced and not on birth control
I’d like to think that, given the whole dynamic here, understanding + appreciating that she’s both desperate and you technically hold a lot of power over her (as well as likely blurred lines due to your generosity) that you realise this is a terrible idea and would make you look ___pretty terrible too___.
You should have, I’d have thought, a bit more behind this than “the only thing stopping me is….” and “she’s not my type, but I _am_ attracted to her” – like maybe morals?
It’s all well and good her being “OK” with it and you being “OK” with it but does she know you already have someone you’re having a “situationship” or whatever with? Seems unfair on both if they aren’t aware of each other etc.
I’ve got empathy for you both but continuing to sleep in the same bed sends a real mixed message given your “I don’t want to have sex with you” line.
Is she looking for somewhere else to go? Have you agreed on how long this arrangement will go on? This sounds like a ticking timebomb and while it’s a really generous and nice thing you’re doing, it also seems like it’s begging for disaster if you don’t take some reasonable and very basic steps to set boundaries, agree on this situation and also not take advantage of this situation at all and just _be a good friend_.
Um. To be honest, it’s a little concerning that you’re focused on the sex part. I get that you’re young and that’s literally a driving factor right now but she is in a rough spot in her life. For her to offer up her body in exchange for your services is essentially prostitution and unacceptable if you consider her your friend.
Actually, even if you don’t consider her your friend, you should still offer help without sleeping with her. She is desperate for help otherwise she wouldn’t have suggested this.
Your lady friend is also an ass. Wtf do you mean to consider her a maid? She’s down on her luck and needs help, not someone putting her down. Come on, man, do better.
Most universities have programs to help financially struggling students. Find out what that is for your university and put her in contact with them.
Do NOT sleep with her. Move her to couch if the temptation is too much.
Fucking hell! Why are you only seeing those two options? Why are you only considering her staying if she prostitutes herself to you?