xxxx Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 I would really like some advice. My boyfriend and I have a very good relationship. Things are great. Except for one thing. He has a female best friend. They have been friends for 10 years and are very close. It has always been platonic and they have a brother/sister relationship. I struggle with this as I am not comfortable with him being so close to another female and catching up with her regularly. Sometimes it is with me and sometimes they catch up for drinks or dinner on their own- like he would with a male friend. She is very friendly and I like her despite my awkward feelings. The things that do get to me is how close they are and the fact they share everything, she is very affectionate towards him and gives him hugs and knows him so well and they are very important to eachother. I need to know how to relax with this and trust him - because he is great to me and deserves my trust. I just flinch every time I am around them and they have jokes and special names for eachother and all the things best friends do. BTW he is aware of my feelings and has been trying to make it easier for me. That's why I really want to just accept this and move on!
BG1985 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 There was a huge thread about this the other day, but it was started from a man's point of view. Many called him controlling and insecure. However, I think it's weird for people of the opposite sex to be best friends without any sexual tension or feelings in general. It sucks that you have to share him with another woman.
ecco51 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 I can relate to you, my long term gf also has a similar guy friend that has been a family friend between her and her brothers since they were little. When I first met her, I was a little turned off by this, like the post above me said, I didn't like the feeling of having to "share" her with another guy. I quickly got over this though, he was there before me so I'm not going to tell her to get rid of a life long friend bc I was insecure with myself. You have to be confident in yourself and in the relationship. Some people find this unfortunate but you kinda gotta trust until they do something to take away that trust. I wish there's a magic switch I could flip to instantly make u comfortable with the situation but there really isn't lol. What I did was take a step back, evaluated the fact she ends up in my bed every night, she's never done anything to have me not trust her, this girl really does love me and if she by any chance decided she wants to screw around on me, thered be nothing I could do to prevent it and she wouldn't be worth my time anyway lol. I hope that helped somewhat
counterman Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 I agree with what ecco said. He does love you and he did meet her before he met you. It is annoying sometimes, especially if they use pet names that have for each other in front of you or she hugs him in front of you but you have his love and you trust him. Just take a step back from it all and let it be. If hey cross a boundary then that's a different story.
txsilkysmoothe Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 There was a huge thread about this the other day, but it was started from a man's point of view. Many called him controlling and insecure. However, I think it's weird for people of the opposite sex to be best friends without any sexual tension or feelings in general. It sucks that you have to share him with another woman. Amen! I know I couldn't stand by and watch them. I think he is sharing with her a portion of the intimacy that should be reserved for you. That was fine when he was single, but now .............. In my opinion these types of relationships are tantamount to having a pseudo girlfriend or boyfriend. Well he now has a REAL girlfriend so ......... I feel for you - how do you compete with 10 years?
carhill Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 OP, all I'm seeing here is positives. The friendship is transparent. The friend supports your relationship. You see first-hand that he can have a loving friendship. You seem to like the friend other than during what you consider to be awkward moments, like when they show affection for each other. Do you think, in ten years, if they wanted to have a sexual/romantic relationship, they would have? You didn't mention whether or not she's straight and/or in a relationship of her own. Any comments on that?
venus-blue Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 I would respect this relationship because it shows that your man has integrity. He has shown that he does not only view women as sexual objects(a rare and diminishing quality in men). I wish there were more men like him, who have self-control, a secure sense of who he is and what he wants, and can respect women and not objectify every one. He is the type you can trust alone with another woman because he is not a total perv. You should thank him and suck his dick. Good for him!
BG1985 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Sorry, women always have been and always will be viewed as sexual objects. How else would humans procreate? I just still feel iffy about girls and guys truly being best friends without some element of sexuality or something else involved. And how do you know that there has never been any romantic interest between the two? Is it because they told you nothing has ever happened between the two? If something had happened between the two of them, do you think they would tell you the truth about it?
SadandConfusedWA Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Uh, I would not tolerate this dynamic. I don't beleive that straight men and women can truly be close friends without something else involved. I have had close male friends and the line was crossed every single time. I remember one close friend (we were close for 5 years or so), went out for dinners and drinks and his new gfs would always be unclomfortable with me. And for good reason....we used to make out every now and then - and he used to tell me all the problems in their relationship.
OnlyJake Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Amen! I know I couldn't stand by and watch them. I think he is sharing with her a portion of the intimacy that should be reserved for you. That was fine when he was single, but now .............. In my opinion these types of relationships are tantamount to having a pseudo girlfriend or boyfriend. Well he now has a REAL girlfriend so ......... I feel for you - how do you compete with 10 years? I completely agree with this post. OP, I was in the exact same situation you described with a previous boyfriend. He had a best girl friend from college, and when he and I dated they had been friends from like...12 or 13 years I think. As TX said, how do you compete with that? Even though she claimed my bf was "like a brother to her" I was still uncomfortable with their relationship to an extent (mostly on her end). This was partly because of banter I had seen on Facebook (banter, comments on pics, etc.), the pictures I saw of the two of them together, the fact that she was always calling him (drunk and sober - the fact that she frequently drunk dialed him realllly bothered me), and so on. I thought I would feel better after meeting her, and even though she was very friendly, seemed to like me, was very warm toward me, I didn't. Reasons for that: at the time I met her she had apparently just been dumped by her bf - AND MY BF DIDN'T EVEN KNOW SHE HAD HAD A BF!! Now if he's like her brother and she's always calling him how does that even happen? Another thing that really bothered me was she sent me a friend request on FB, and under "interests" her only entry was my bf's name. Little things like that just gave me a creepy feeling. Anyways, getting to my point, the OTHER thing I realized after I met this girl is how MY BF respected me and our relationship so much that she was also forced to show respect - their only physical contact was a hug hello or goodbye, just like any other friend, they only used common nicknames for each other, I got the most attention from him when we were all together, etc. I also realized at that point how my bf had clearly placed his relationship with me above his relationship with her, and he didn't engage in behaviors that I had previously had a problem with, or thought would be a problem. It was very subtle, but I did pick up on it. I think you should have a chat with your bf about these things.
angie2443 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Amen! I know I couldn't stand by and watch them. I think he is sharing with her a portion of the intimacy that should be reserved for you. That was fine when he was single, but now .............. In my opinion these types of relationships are tantamount to having a pseudo girlfriend or boyfriend. Well he now has a REAL girlfriend so ......... I feel for you - how do you compete with 10 years? I think this is important to consider. Depending on how far you want to take this relationship, at one point you're probably going to want to be the most important woman in your boyfriend's life. Right now, you are sharing him in a sense. This may be fine for now. However, if you two decide to get married, have children, build a life together, he's going to have to place you way above his friend. Competition and conflict may very well arise. If you stay with your boyfriend long term, the two of you will hit a rocky point and who will he confide in? Maybe you, maybe his friend. Trust me on the rocky part. It happens in almost every long term relationship. If your boyfriend doesn't have good bounderies regarding his female friendship, your in for some heart ache in the future. I'm not telling you that you should be concerned now. I don't know where you want to take your relationship. I don't know what you want in the present. I'm just giving some things to think about. Good luck.
ecco51 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Haha this debate could go on forever. I guess its all personal preference. I was raised to believe jelousy is a worthless emotion and I believe it. I've never met a girl that thought it was a good quality, every time I ever ask a girl for top 10 traits they want in a guy, confidence is up there. Like carhill said, the friendship is pretty transparent, you can't ask for anything more in my opinion. When you guys refer to her as competition I find that kind of insecure, the girl is in love with you, not the friend. My gf has had a childhood family friend with some guy for twenty years, she sees him a few times a month. Usually I'm there but there's time where I chose to do something else so she goes alone...I couldn't care less. Like I said she ends up in MY bed every night. I have a good amount of female friends too, none that I'm too close with, but idk about how your gf feel, but everytime I'm in the company of someone of the opposite sex I really start to appreciate my gf and it makes me realize how special she is in comparison to other girls and it m,akes me not to even want to think about touching another girl and my gf has said the exact same thing without me ever telling her I felt that way. She's in love with you for a reason, stand tall with the confidence that you have her. One day when you both have careers, families, ect..that guy friend is slowly going to turn into a few times a year phone call and a christmas card lol I've seen it happen many time.
meerkat stew Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 OP, all I'm seeing here is positives. The friendship is transparent. The friend supports your relationship. You see first-hand that he can have a loving friendship. You seem to like the friend other than during what you consider to be awkward moments, like when they show affection for each other. Do you think, in ten years, if they wanted to have a sexual/romantic relationship, they would have? You didn't mention whether or not she's straight and/or in a relationship of her own. Any comments on that? Great food for thought, OP.
angie2443 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 . The friendship is transparent. The friend supports your relationship. Only the boyfriend and his female friend know if the relationship is transparent or not.
meerkat stew Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 Only the boyfriend and his female friend know if the relationship is transparent or not. Well by that logic, no one except the parties involved ever truly knows the nature of a relationship. It's as close to transparency as it gets when real efforts are made to have the opposite sex friend become a friend of the relationship as opposed to being kept under wraps.
angie2443 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 xxxx, I'm not implying that anything is going on. I know where things can go under the right conditions. I also know that a new relationship often differant boundaries then a more established relaitonship. To be sure, an opposite sex friendship and for that matter a same sex friendship does not have to have sex or romance in it to be destructive to a primary relationship. How far you are in your relationship with your boyfriend is part of what will determine if this friendship is healthy for your relationship or destructive. Do you have any boundaries in your relationship besides the obvious physical ones? Can he tell his friend anything about you and the relationship he has with you? At this point in your relationship, does it matter?
Buttnutter100 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 It sounds like they probably were physically intimate at some point in the past but then moved beyond that stage before he ever met you. I still think they have a strong emotional connection which will hamper the growth of his relationship with you.
Crazy Magnet Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 All, the female BFF....story of my life. I approach each situation with eyes wide open and realize that each situation will be different. After the recent thread on male/female friendships, I dug a little more into my own situation....turns out the BF and the female BFF had dated for two years about 12 year ago. Yeah, squashed that in about 0.3 nano seconds. I'm understanding, however, I am not a doormat. Anyway, talk to your boyfriend about the way you feel. He should respond to your concerns, or he's not worth dating!
BG1985 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 I've seen guys who were so confident about the state of their relationship that they let their girlfriends hang out with other guys, since they "knew" nothing would happen. Let's just say things didn't go quite as planned. There is such a thing as too much trust.
ecco51 Posted January 29, 2010 Posted January 29, 2010 In my opinion there's no such thing as too much trust. Relationships always start and end unless u decide you're going to marry the person, or remains gf and bf til the day you die. The way they end in my opinion doesn't matter. Bc some decided to betray your trust shows first hand that the relationship wasn't going to work in the first place. You can't blame yourself for not "leashing" her up and putting your foot down telling her what she can and can't do, if the girl has class she'll try to turn the friendship into a mutual thing between you and her. If she doesn't and tries to conceal everything, then you don't have a trust problem...you just picked a sketchy ass girl. Idk about you but I wouldn't want to involve myself with that kind of girl.
venus-blue Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 (edited) I have many male friends where there is no sexual dynamic between us;we never have kissed or even come close, never. Not all men want all women. We are not all compatible, some of us can be friends, for real. Some male friends I have known 15+ years and when I go to see them it's like I am going to hang with my brother. My bf doesn't have a problem with it, as he is also their friend and has no reason not to trust us. He has female friends that I fully trust as well. Maybe it helps that I grew up having a brother and being very close to him. I think it is possible to have friends of the opposite sex, if that's what you truly are. I agree that I would be uncomfortable if the woman was taking time away from my partner and I being together(ie. he cancels plans with you to be with her, is constantly going out with her, talks to her constantly, but ignores you), but I have gotten frustrated with my guy spending too much time with a male friend. In truth it was just that I wanted more time with my man, which was selfish; I cannot be his only social contact. Love is not a sport and your partner is not your prize to compete for. Not many rational people want to be controlled in such a way and will see your feelings as insecurity, which is a very unattractive quality. Keep your head up, set reasonable boundaries, and love yourself. Edited January 31, 2010 by venus-blue
BG1985 Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 I wouldn't have a problem with a girlfriend or wife having male friends or even hanging out with them. However, if she and her male friend were going to have lunch or dinner together, I expect to at least be invited or introduced to this guy if I don't already know him. I think it would be wrong for my SO to make social plans with another guy and intentionally exclude me. I also think it's inappropriate for a guy to ask out someone else's girlfriend for a one-on-one dinner. What pressing matter do they have to discuss that I couldn't be around for?
You'reasian Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 I've seen guys who were so confident about the state of their relationship that they let their girlfriends hang out with other guys, since they "knew" nothing would happen. Let's just say things didn't go quite as planned. There is such a thing as too much trust. I agree with this. Ladies, if you want your boyfriend to stop hanging around their ladyfriends, lead by example and stop hanging around with your guy friends... I know, I know - its different because you're a woman, its your perrogative, yadda yadda yadda - but this will continue to be an issue so long as you are doing it yourself.
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