So you go out on a date and have quite a good time, but you aren’t attracted to the person. A couple of days later they ask you to go out again. The two of you have similar interests, they’re cool, and you would genuinely like to be friends with them. You’re not sure if they’re interested in you as just a friend also, or if they’re interested in something more. What do you do?

Money and relationships can go together sometimes very well, like Peanut Butter and Jelly and other times it goes together as unsuccessfully as Peanut Butter and Mayo (my apologies to those who like that combo).

I’m curious how money matters have evolved for many of you.

How did you handle money at the beginning of your relationship? Did one person pay for dates more often than the other? If so, was this based on historical gender roles or was it based on who was more “successful” (in the manner of income)?

As the relationship got more serious, and the two of you moved in together how did you then handle money? Did you split everything 50/50; rent, utilities, groceries, household items, etc.?

How “hard headed” would one of you be when it came to buying particular items? Say your significant other loves expensive cheeses and you don’t really like cheese too much. Would you feel taken advantage of if they put a few of those “delicacy” items in the grocery cart and then simply wanted to split the bill?

How did you approach going out on dates? When do you decide if it is a situation where one person picks up the entire bill or when it will be dutch?

Now say you’ve bought a house together, are engaged, married (or any combination of the above)…so on and so forth. Do any things change here?

Have you set up a joint account? Is that the only account you have now or are you both also maintaining your own personal accounts as well? This way you have the joint assigned for all bills and the personal account for personal items where you can still take part of those indulgences with no questions asked. Do you think something like that is beneficial to a relationship or harmful?

I’m sorry for this being extremely question heavy, but I figure that leaves room for a lot of excellent varied answers and comments.

I’ve been dating my BF for about 8 months. Over the past 8 months, I’ve had the opportunity to meet a number of women he’s dated (mostly casually) through mutual interests. My BF is awesome and I’ve never felt threatened by meeting any of his exes, and I think in turn, I’ve been pretty cool and open about meeting them up to this point.
The BF has now asked me to attend a function for another (more serious) ex. I think she’s married now, and I don’t feel weird about it aside from the fact that I’m meeting yet another ex. I’m getting weary of the exes.
The “meeting of the exes” is a totally new thing for me. I’m not friends with my exes, so I’m wondering if anyone else has experienced this in the past. Is it weird that although my BF is a total gentleman and I don’t feel threatened, I’m getting to the point of ex-overload?

I seem to often find myself in the same situation over and over again and I’m wondering what the right thing to do is. Situation – girl meets boy, girl and boy exchange numbers, girl and boy go on date and date goes amazingily well. Few days go by and there’s no contact and then girl doesn’t know whether she should reach out or wait for boy to reach out. I know it sounds uncomplicated because truth is I have no problem reaching out but somehow it ends up with the boy not responding! What’s the deal here??

I’ve always enjoyed flirting with women but now that I’m getting on in years, I’m wondering if there’s a point where it just becomes creepy. I don’t want to be creepy but I don’t want to give up flirting either. What’s the cut off or is there one?

I have a friend who is married, but probably shouldn’t be. Her husband has betrayed her and it’s pretty bad. However, she still hangs out with him, and that really blows my mind. Whether or not she will get divorced seems questionable. She thinks she is stuck, and I think she doesn’t want to be alone. I am having a party, and I did not invite him, but of course I invited my friend. I have no desire to have the husband at my house, or in my life. To top it off, she has now told everyone what he has done so we all feel weird around him. The question is: Should I talk with her about it before the party? I really don’t want him there. I really don’t like him and my guests don’t either. I know it would cause some awkwardness(okay, not some, but a LOT). But, until they are divorced, they are technically married. What is the etiquette on this situation?

Hey! I’m getting of marrying age-that sweet spot a few years out of college-and many of my friends are tying the knot. I’ve been dating my boyfriend for a few years and the uptick in “When are you going to get married?/Has he proposed yet?” is atrocious. Not that I don’t want to marry him, of course, but I’m amazed at the number of random people who feel it’s their business. People in the office, grocery store, at the post office, friends of friends I’ve just met. My officemate is 22 and she keeps asking about my thoughts on cake choices and has picked out her ring years ago (yes). And I don’t want to get into discussions about money, budgets or how I feel I’m too young at 23.

If any of you have been in the same situation, how can I react politely and still get people off my back about it?

What are your thoughts on dating people who have a different education level than you? Does it bother you? Would you feel odd dating someone who didn’t go to college if you went to college? How about if you have a Ph.D, would you date someone who didn’t go to grad school? If you didn’t further your education beyond high school, would you date someone who did? etc. etc.

My ideal would be to date someone who at least had the college experience, even if they didn’t graduate, so that we would’ve had some similar experiences. Not having attended college would also be okay with me as long as they’re motivated and have a plan for their life.

My best friend is going through a crisis right now. Her live-in boyfriend is cheating on her, and being pretty obvious about it – he’s “dating” this other woman in public. I’m sure the OW knows nothing about my friend.

Anyway, I went through a cheating BF about a year ago, so it’s still pretty fresh for me. She feels since I “get it” that I am a good sounding board. Of course, my first bit of advice would be run like hell, you deserve better, I’ve refrained from taking sides or offering my opinion. I feel she needs to talk through it and make her own decisions based on what’s best for them – NOT based on what happened to me.

She’s pretty much had proof for about a month now. She hasn’t had a conversation with him yet. She’s been heading towards leaving, but just when she gets her mind mostly made up she thinks she’s making a mistake and drops it.

In the meantime she is driving ME crazy. She texts me dozens of times a day and calls me twice a day, to tell me what he’s doing or giving me “thought updates”. I love her dearly and want to be a good friend, but I don’t know how much more I can take. I know she needs to make a decision, but she isn’t and frankly, this is really bringing up bad memories and feelings for me too.

I don’t want to lose her as a friend, but I’m sick of this. I dread hearing my phone ring, and have started turning down shopping, movies with her. How do I get out of being the third wheel here?

Let me preface this by saying I can’t stand drama and avoid it as if it were the worst form of flu ever. However, I am friends with two girls who pretty much hate one another and I find myself involved too often. It’s not that I would like to be involved, but the girls seem to vent about one another to me. They know that I won’t trash the other, and I hardly ever even offer advice, and I never take sides. Yet since they are both my friends I feel like I end up caught in the middle. What would you do? It seems unlikely that they will ever be friends, but I don’t want to stress anymore about their differences!! Help!