Friend’s mom is off limits

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This article was published 09/01/2016 (3890 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I know this may sound weird, but the problem I have is I’m falling in love with my best friend’s mother. She got pregnant at 16 and married two years later. My buddy’s dad is a good dad, but he and the mom are now divorced and this wonderful young-ish woman and my friend live in a house near to mine. I just met him a year ago when I switched schools and we are close friends.

When I met her I was shocked at how beautiful and young she looks! I’m 18, like her son, and she’s only 34. She looks like she’s in her mid-20s. I have such a crush on her. I have a hard time going over to his house — she is so friendly my body reacts. She always invites me to stay for meals with them. I think she’s flirting with me. I feel weird for keeping this secret from my friend.

It would be mean to stop being a friend over this and I could never tell him. What should I do?

— Feeling Like a Creep, Winnipeg

Dear Feeling Like a Creep: Your best bet is the geographical cure — stay out of their house. This could not work as a relationship in a million years and could really hurt your friend if he twigs to what’s happening. Most guys your age don’t hang out at home a lot, so do regular things outside the house and refuse the dangerous dinners. Safe things are movies, sports, concerts, comedy and karaoke — anything is smarter than sitting around flirting with the guy’s mom when your hormones are hopping.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I got a red envelope in the mail from an old girlfriend. I was so surprised, I opened it. The letter was from a woman I used to date in university, who abruptly broke up with me, quit school and moved back home with her parents who live out east.

She’s now claiming I’m the father of the child she conceived just before she broke up with me and sent me his picture. She says she wasn’t old enough to get married, wasn’t in love with me enough and didn’t want to be a financial burden on me. My jaw was on the ground and the emotions that ran through me were so strong I ended up crying. I have a son, or so she says, and I want to meet him.

She says her family has convinced her she should contact me about the child, so he can have a relationship with me (and she can get child support.) She has lived with her family and the boy for too long and she wants to move out. Financial support from me would help in that move. She has a low-paying secretarial job. Hell, I must have a ton of back child-support payments and I’m not a rich guy. I will be making good money when I graduate and start working as a doctor. I’m near that time now and she must know about my situation through mutual friends. What should I do? The boy in the picture looks somewhat like me.

— What Now? Winnipeg

Dear What Now?: Your impulse is to fly down and see the boy right now. Stop! This may seem hard-headed, but you should see a domestic lawyer first, have a paternity test done and work out your legal and financial responsibilities before she presents you with papers of her own to sign.

Remember, this isn’t the type of woman who shows all her cards at once. She dumped you without telling you why, moved away and — if this is your child — kept him from you, his father, until you were about to have money and could be useful. Why didn’t she ask before? Kindness to a starving student? Maybe. More likely, she didn’t want anybody (like her parents) trying to push you two together and the folks were willing to foot the bills.

If the child is yours, and it does seem likely, you need to know what lies ahead when you go meet your biological son. This woman has stayed at home, so you must wonder if she has a boyfriend or not, and if the grandparents are doing most of the child-raising. In a worst-case scenario you might not get to see your son very much at all until he’s grown and can do what he wants.

So try not to get too excited and engage too many fantasies about helping to bring up this little fellow until you know what’s-what. If he is your son, you may want to apply to hospitals to work in the city where he and the mother live. Even though you and she are not a couple, you can still co-parent pretty well if you live in the same city.

Please send your questions and comments to lovecoach@hotmail.com or Miss Lonelyhearts c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6

Miss Lonelyhearts
Advice Columnist

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