I am twenty two, and my fiancé and I have been together for three years. He is everything I want in life- we have all of the same goals and ideals- and, no, we are not pregnant.
When my fiancé proposed I was so excited to tell my family- they love him and so I couldn’t wait to start planning for the wedding with my mom.
But when I told everyone, instead of being excited for me, I keep being told not to rush into a marriage. Nobody is telling me to break up with my fiancé, no one can tell me any reason why he isn’t “the one”- they just keep saying that I am throwing away so many opportunities by getting married so young.
I am really torn. I want to follow my heart and happily get married, but when so many people say the same thing you start to wonder if they have a point.
So, should I follow my heart or listen to everyone elses heads?

So, is the old adage true? Is it better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all? Or does the pain you feel during a breakup or after being rejected outweigh the happiness of being in a relationship? Is it worth it to have been on a great date if you never see that person again and are upset by it, or would it have been better for your overall emotional health if you’d never met that person?

I work in a good-sized company that I have been with for the last 4 years. We have doubled in size since I came on board. I’m also somewhat high-up in the administrative department.

My step-sister spent 6 months in vocational training for administrative assistants. She got a temporary job for another company and was let go early because of poor performance (her manager is a friend of her dad’s, so I heard all about it). Among the complaints, she was on the internet most of the day and when she wasn’t playing online, she was taking care of her “medical companion” dog (I use quotations because there is some debate on whether this animal is actually necessary, let alone really trained for the job).

My mom called me while on vacation today. She was asking me about openings for assistants (I’m not in HR). Knowing who she was asking for (I see my step-sister’s Facebook), I immediately shot it down. I said “knowing that this is for A, I can tell you she isn’t qualified for any position here”. My mom got a little pissy and started asking me what the job duties and qualifications needed were. Of course, I was at work and really couldn’t talk. I offered to send her the link to our website’s job listings, but my mom really wanted to get me to tell her directly. My step-sister isn’t with them on vacation, and I resent like hell that my mom is fishing for jobs for this girl. A doesn’t live with my mom or step-dad, but, if she isn’t working, she’s guilt-tripping my step-dad for money.

Is it wrong of me to shoot down my 19 year old step-sister like that? More importantly, is it wrong that I don’t want my step-sister even APPLYING for positions within my company, on the off-chance my company gives her a chance because of my connections, and then she fails miserably? I don’t want to be associated with that kind of issue. I refuse to be a reference for her to begin with (I’ve met her maybe 6 times and she’s never been warm or friendly towards me).

I met a guy at a friend’s wedding a little over a month ago. We ended up hooking up, and I had a good time with him talking and getting to know him. He lives about 3.5 hours away from me – he’s originally from the area I live in. He told me to let him know if I’d ever be in his city.

Well, last weekend I was in his city, and I texted him ahead of time to let him know I’d be in town, and asked if he wanted to get a drink or something. He said yeah, let’s meet up, so we did and I had a really great time. He picked me up, we went out for food and drinks, then went out later with his friends, and I spent the night at his place and we hooked up again. The conversation flowed easily and smoothly all night, there was joking and flirting along with more serious talk – it was a lot of fun. He seems to have the qualities I’m looking for in a guy – he’s intelligent, funny, social, has lots of interests, we’re at similar points in our lives, plus he’s really cute.

The next morning after he drove me back to my friend’s place, we hugged goodbye and said that we had fun. Neither of us mentioned meeting up again. I almost did, but I chickened out. I really like this guy, and I’d love to see him again. I’m not saying that I want to start a relationship, but that I’d like to spend more time with him, get to know him better, and see if it goes as well as the first time.

So my question is: how should I go about mentioning that I’d like to see him again/finding out if he wants to see me again? I feel like I have nothing to lose. I was planning on texting him later this week to say thanks again for everything (he paid for dinner, drinks, taxi, etc.) and that I had a good time. I don’t know if I should say something about how it would be nice to see him again sometime. Or if I should text him something random and funny that we were joking about over the weekend, and see how he responds to that. I wish I knew what he was thinking! Alas, the main pitfall of dating. It was just so wonderful to spend time with someone who excites me, interests me, and attracts me.

Odd situation. My friend’s been dating a guy off and on for a few years and recently they were living together and he kicked her out of his apartment. They broke up and he’s dating someone else. She’s still having sex with him on the regular because he keeps telling her he loves her, he wants to be with her, all the stuff guys say just to get laid. It’s obvious he’s not going to leave his girlfriend and he’s just using her for sex.

Should I be blunt and tell my friend what’s going on? She’s an adult who can make her own decisions and she enjoys having sex with him, but she’s never going to be able to move on until she realizes what’s going on. I’m kind of stuck morally because I know she’ll just think I’m trying to have sex with her if I tell her to leave the guy for good.

Ok, so I am going to attempt to separate my emotions from the actual facts so people can look at this as objectively as possible, although I am writing this post as more as an outlet than for advice but any comments/advice is appreciated too!

So here goes…

I met the love of my life in college, so we’re talking 4-5 years ago.

After a very torrid, tumultuous, complicated, passionate, consuming 11-month relationship, he ended it because we fought too much.

Yet he claimed to still be in love with me and want to work on things a day at a time…even though he was moving 3,000 some odd miles away. ok.

So my ex and I over those first few months kept in touch, basically still acting like a couple, despite not being in a relationship whatever.

A couple of months into the breakup he not only started a new relationship with someone new, SHE MOVED IN WITH HIM TO HIS NEW HOME IN FLORIDA.

Ok. So this is where the confusion/sadness/happiness/uncertainty starts…

He’s been with this girl for 4 years. She lives with him. She’s his girlfriend. She has that title.

While I feel like I’ve been demoted from girlfriend to “the other woman.” And naturally it’s all a part of the self discovery/screwing up process I went/have been going through, but basically he continued even when he was committed to someone else, to tell me/text me/email me/visit me etc that he loves me, misses me, is saddened by the situation etc.

And did I mention that over the FOUR year period we’ve been apart, we’ve still continued our sexual relationship?

In essence, we’re still not only lovers, but in love. He’s been cheating on her with me.

Fast forward to now: We still see each other sporadically (I’m talking like once a year) We still talk, we still have the insane emotional/physical connection that made me fall in love in the first place…

…but she’s still his girlfriend. And he’s doing NOTHING to change it.

I’ve gotten the speeches, the apologies, the broken promises that he has ended, will end it, plans to end it whatever…but nothing has come to fruition.

This probably isn’t making much sense but basically my mind and heart are at war with one another because the whole situation has severely eroded my trust in him… and yet the problem is after 4 years, despite moving on, detaching whatever, I still can’t shake him.

I know of course, what I should do is move on finally and find my own happiness….and I have. By being alone and rediscovering myself. It was logical and it helped.

But emotions don’t go away. Love like this, like what I feel, simply doesn’t just fade.

It’s still there, strong as ever, just buried underneath all this crap…and he feels it too. I know he does.

Time may have healed it and me helped me forgive, but definitely not forget. I can’t forget the love we shared because WE STILL DO.

I can’t forget the amazing sex we have because WE STILL DO.

The past is the past for me…..but one piece is continuing to be the present. His relationship or “situation” as he calls it, with this other girl…

Now wise, inspirational community of lemon-vibers, do tell or speculate:

Why would a guy stick around after FOUR years hanging onto an ex that he claims to love, wants to marry, be the mother of his children etc AND STILL BE/LIVE WITH ANOTHER GIRL!?

And no, it’s not because of our incredible sexual connection because we have gone without seeing each other for years and picking back up right where we left off…

It just doesn’t make sense to me at all…hence the title of this post.

I was once the girlfriend and damnnit, I deserve to be the girlfriend again, but what in the fuck is taking him so long to make it happen?

Discussion open!

Thanks for listening!

We all value the opinions of our friends and I suppose, at times, we give our friends more power in our lives based on the circumstance.

Sure we all are likely to lend an ear to a friend who says, “I have a friend I want you to meet. I think the two of you could really hit it off.”

On the opposite of that we may even consider things when they say something like, “Hey, about ______. I know you really like her but I have my reservations. [Insert reasoning here].”

My question is a more blunt interpretation of the second one.

Would you/should you let a friend tell you, outright, that you can’t date someone. Maybe they would even put it as you are not allowed to date a particular person.

And, take it up another notch. This friend (and in this case I am using that label loosely) presents to you an ultimatum. You can choose to date the girl/guy of interest which would result in them no longer being your friend. Or, you can agree not to date this person of interest and your friend can continue to call you friend.

What are your thoughts?

Personally, I don’t do ultimatums well. And in most (if not all cases), the person who dished out the ultimatum usually loses. Using this example, if a friend asked me to choose between them and someone else; to me that isn’t something a real friend would do and there’s more going on behind the curtain than what they are letting me seen. But in either case, you tell me I have to make a choice it 99.9% isn’t going to be you.

What if you met this guy/girl you like through said friend, would change your outlook on this?

I’ve been talking a lot recently with friends about compromise in relationships. It was set off by the topic of dating or marrying someone more or less religious than you are, what sorts of things you would be willing to put up with, what you absolutely wouldn’t, etc. I think religion is a little different than figuring out how to deal with your boyfriend’s football addiction, or your girlfriend’s feng shui obsession, but it all does come down to compromise and what’s most important to you, right?

So where do you stand on religious compromise? If you’re observant, would you be willing to date or marry someone who wasn’t? And if you’re not, would you be willing to date or marry someone who was? Do you purposefully seek out people who are more or less religious than you are? I think it depends a lot on the person in question and the level of religiosity, but I thought it might be an interesting topic for discussion (and I can add my $.02 once the discussion gets rolling…).

My boyfriend and I have been together for almost two years we’ve had some rough patches but overall a great relationship. He is a very friendly outgoing person and i am not! He has this friend whom he met from working in a bar shes a beautiful sexy girl whose carefree and wreckless. She does try to be my friend and stuff but now he just got her a job working with him and i dont like it. Am i just being jealous?

I have been dating a guy for a couple months now. We are now sexually involved as well. I have shared with him that I find women attractive sexually, though I do consider myself straight. The other day he shared a picture with me. It was a picture of four girls who looked like models and he asked me what I thought of them. I really didn’t know how to take it! I was upset and I felt insecure, so I kind of just ran out. How would you take this? How would you react? I mean, I know I told him I find girls atttractive, but I really didn’t expect us to be looking at pictures of hot women together!