Time to level playing field

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This article was published 15/08/2019 (2564 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I’m in love with a woman who suits the real me under the business suit, the wild and crazy part of me no one else gets to see. We match in ways nobody can imagine.

Sadly, I know I love her more than she loves me, because I have no one else. I’m her fun guy. But, she still has a man in her life she guards due to his poor health and fragility.

She doesn’t live with him anymore, but she lives minutes away from him and she helps him with many supports — health, money and loyal friendship. There is mild affection and some massage and cuddling, she says.

I think she will stay with him to the end, as she is a caring person, but that could be another 10 years, for all I know.

That means I only get part of her time — the best part — but she won’t hurt him by revealing me as her lover. I’m always missing her when she’s with him and sometimes I’m bone lonely. I’m always hidden. 

This summer, a woman came along who expressed interest in me. Nothing wrong with her — good looking, nice personality, bodacious ta-tas,  — but I couldn’t love her as she’s too normal. She should suit me — same kind of work,  same sports interests — but she doesn’t. My love for the other woman is inexplicable, but a fact I can’t change.

I’m an educated, reasonable man and my two best friends have tried to talk me out of my lover and introduce me to other people, but I can’t make myself be interested. My heart has a mind of its own. 

Someone suggested the reasonable solution would be to have a friend and sex buddy to fill in the lonely nights when she’s staying with him. He’s kind of like her husband, and I guess I’m just “the other man” although it doesn’t feel like that when we’re together.  Please help. — Messed Up, Transcona

Dear Messed Up:  She’s OK with dividing her time between you and her longtime love/friend who’s ill. Are you afraid she’ll cut you out of her life if you have another girlfriend on the side? She might. Right now, she’s got a pretty good deal going with you tolerating her other guy.

But things are coming to a head, at least for you. Take a chance and talk about it with her, feeling her out as to how she’d handle you having what she’s having. You’re not asking for permission.

She may look like she’s OK with it — the fairness aspect — at first. But I know women and she’s going to be red-hot jealous within a few hours because her primary man isn’t totally functional. You’ll be looking for another healthy person, and a second sex life. 

This may force her to find different way to relate to you, and get you out of her closet. 

That means her other guy will have to know about you, and understand they are “just friends” and there is no more sexy affection, and her health-care role will have to be replaced with a real home-care nurse. 

Or — and this is the chance you take — she may tell you to get lost and that she loves the sick friend more than she loves you, and it’s “thank you for the good times and good-bye.” 

At least you’ll know where you stand — in the closet and true to her, or out of it and free to find a lady who wants you 100 per cent.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I’m newly divorced and this summer is burning away with no man in my life. I swore I’d get back in the saddle this spring as soon as I had a real divorce. Confession: I’ve had a divorce for two months. What a wuss I am! 

I’ve done none of the things I put on my list to get me back into the singles and dating world. I joined a singles’ club and then didn’t go to anything.

I’m just spinning my wheels. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Help! — Stuck in a Rut, Westwood

Dear Stuck: You need to get your legally single feet wet, but not as a lone woman. Start using your singles’ club membership, and going to activities at first, where you mostly meet single women.

Find yourself a posse — a group of fun single female friends to do things with. Establish some strong friendships and then do some of the singles activities where you’ll meet more men. 

Also make plans to go travelling this fall and winter with your new buddies. Cultivate both sides of singledom together — fun with new buddies and fun with dates. 

At the same time, see a counsellor or psychologist to straighten out your messy feelings left over from the divorce that are holding you back emotionally. Good luck on your new journey!

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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