Fiancée’s date sounds like more than a friend

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 07/07/2017 (3376 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: My fiancée has a “just a friend” I’ve never met. This friend is very good-looking, intelligent and well-to-to. They go out now and then to expensive restaurants. These dates are intimate, late and very dressy.

When I tell her how I feel about it, she tells me it doesn’t mean anything, they are just friends and that we aren’t married yet. Then she asks if I want to break up. Because of work connections and friends who know all of us, I know what’s going on when they go out. It is all quite humiliating and I don’t know what to do. Any suggestions?

— Heartsick, Winnipeg

Dear Heartsick: She’s playing you, disrespecting you and cleverly throwing it in your face, like you have a trust issue. The woman’s giving you a trust issue. What would make you mad enough to leave this situation? Getting mad would at least show you have boundaries, which she is currently tap dancing on. 

Do you live together? If not, you can just say adios. If you do, figure out what you want to do and find a sublet for the apartment, or one of you can take over the lease. She makes cracks about your wedding day being the beginning of being faithful forever, but that’s a ploy. Respect in a relationship starts soon if the match is right, but that requires the person to have good character, not just a charming personality.

This woman has no boundaries, so do you really think this would end if you got married? She would just keep telling you you were stifling her and you should trust her. Since you know what’s going on and feel humiliated, she’s actually waiting for you to wake up and say goodbye. You can definitely do better than this. Summer is the best time to find a new relationship. Lose her, get online, go to every social thing you can and tell friends to to feel free to match you up. Good luck!

Hello Miss Lonelyhearts: Your response to Don’t Want a Disaster was on point. (The advice to the parent on making an eight-hour family car trip fun with rotating seat changes, activities and stops.)

I recall my mother often got in the back seat when we did our annual family road trips (she traded seats with a sibling, who then sat in front). It mixed things up for everyone; my sibling was the co-pilot and felt important on those long summer trips all over the United States travelling for days on end.

When my mom sat in the back, she would engage us with games, talk with us and let us nap on her shoulders — it was the best! When my parents switched drivers, my dad did the same. It made long days in the car so much more fun. They had snacks, drinks and games, and gave us their attention to occupy and satisfy us. We also stopped lots to stretch our legs.

Family road trips can be so amazing if you do them right. Been there — parents did it so well!

— Great Times, Manitoba

Dear Great Times: I agree! And to make it better, my mom Cynthia was the queen of lunches on family trips.

When we would start to squabble, we would see her long arm coming over the front seat, doling out different kinds of sandwiches (egg and salmon salad, peanut butter and jam) and then cookies, cake and Orange Crush.

A half hour later we would have to stop the car, I’d throw up and we’d carry on — the four of us kids, mom, dad, babysitter, dog panting and cat yowling.

Thank God we were only going to Killarney Lake, an hour-and-a-half drive from Manitou, where we lived. My beleaguered dad would drive right to the beach, open all the doors, and we would run into the cool lake, already in our bathing suits. I can smell that coconut tanning oil from here.

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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