I (25F) have recently started a relationship with a 24M. For context, he is a very sweet and loving boyfriend. He is a recent foreigner in my country, we speak English together.
Now I have many female and gay male friends, but I have never been able to be close friend with straight men because, in my personal experience, all of them tried to ask me out/ go further physically, even when made it clear that I only wanted a platonic relationship. The outcome of this experience made me distrust the possibility of a platonic heterosexual man/woman friendship.
Three months ago, I started going out with a new boyfriend. He happens to have many and mostly female friends, including very close best friends, that are single. I was wary and talked to him about my experience and fear. He reassured me and insisted that he didn’t think of his friends that way. I wanted to believe it and tried to accept it.
Now, before we met, he was already living with one of his single closest female friend, as roomates .They come from the same country. It was uncomfortable for me, and I told him, but once again he told me nothing was going on. Now, the more I know about them, the more I learn: they work together, eat together, go shopping for food together, go on business trips in the south and go in the same swimming pool with their coworkers, went out to brunch yesterday, and now will go to a concert together tomorrow (I cant, I have an exam soon, and anyway i was not invited since it was her that bought the two tickets).
I have now reached a stage where I feel like a substitute girlfriend and I do not feel like I can’t tolerate this any longer. On the other hand, I would hate to appear like a nagging, controlling girlfriend, I believe that people are free to do what they want. I cannot possibly ask him to stop seeing his friend. But I am afraid to be hurt in the long run. I usually rarely express my jealousy because I think it only brings more troubles than necessary. Would I be unreasonable for bringing this up exactly as I exposed it here ?
TL;DR: boyfriend is way too cloose to his roomate single girl friend for my peace of mind. But I don’t know what is acceptable or not in a mature relationship
7 comments
This is a you problem. You don’t trust your boyfriend. If you don’t trust someone you shouldn’t be with them.
I’ve had lots of experience with men who can’t be platonic friends with women but I also have plenty of male friends that have never hit on me and that I hang out with. It’s perfectly possible to be friends with the opposite gender without wanting to get in their pants.
He is a recent immigrant to your country who has a strong friendship with another immigrant. Unless there’s a situation where he’s hiding his friendship with this woman then I don’t think you have anything to worry about. But if you can’t accept it then that’s fine too, just break up with him.
You are being extremely insecure. Therapy might help.
I think this is a situation where the length of the relationship matters. You’ve only been dating him for a few months, and he was already living with his friend/roommate before you met. This is a situation you entered willingly, even if you weren’t totally sure of all the details, and it would be controlling if you tried to redefine the terms of their friendship now that you’re dating.
However, I’m not going to say you’re a bad person or that you need to get over it and stay with him. Most platonic friendships don’t result in doing absolutely everything together; there’s usually a happy medium there. You’re allowed to make a boundary that says you only want to be with someone who puts their girlfriend/ boyfriend first. Those guys are out there, it’s just not this guy. If you break up with him, make it clear that this was your mistake and not his.
I don’t like that you use your past experiences with men and apply your take on those friendships as if they’ll apply to every man you meet. That’s not fair to us. Unless your bf does something legitimate to make you distrust him, you can’t not trust him. But trust takes time to build, anyways. Your bf has one close friend he’s had way long than the two of you have known each other, so you really can’t pull rank here without sounding nagging or controlling. If you guys are a good match, then in time you two will grow closer and you won’t feel like a substitute gf, but overall that’s a you thing, not a him thing. Be patient, enjoy the relationship, and don’t get wrapped up in your jealousy. You’ll miss out on a lot of potentially good times with your new bf.
I have incredibly close girl friends. My friend group is 70% female. We go to festivals together, crash at each other’s flats, share hotel rooms/beds all platonically and respectfully. The girls will change in front of me since they know I don’t watch them. We are incredibly close and 100% platonic.
I recently took two of the girls on a trip with me. One has a serious long-term boyfriend and his only concern was that I looked out for his girlfriend. The other boyfriends in the group trust me completely. They’re thrilled when their girlfriends visit me (we live in various cities pretty far apart) because they know I’ll look out for them and keep other guys away when we’re out at clubs. One couple broke up for a few days (each believing it was truly the end of their relationship), and the boyfriend was crying on the phone to me, thanking me for comforting his girlfriend/talking her through their breakup:holding her as she cried/etc.
I’m sharing all this to demonstrate that men and women can have very close, platonic relationships where nothing shady is happening. It doesn’t look like your boyfriend has done anything to earn your distrust.
The problem isn’t with him but it’s with you. You don’t trust him and you should, you can’t use your past experiences to judge every man.