Backtracking boyfriend doesn’t rate your respect or your cooking

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 31/01/2021 (2077 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: When my live-in boyfriend was drunk, he told a young woman friend of my sister I was “lousy” in bed. Apparently he was talking to this girl on his cell, for some unknown reason. He said I was a great cook — better than his mother — and funny to be around, but in the bedroom he rated me a four out of 10.

The girl called my sister, who called me right away. He and I had a huge fight — lots of tears on my part.

I quit cooking for him that day! I’d been making great meals for us both, and packing him giant lunches on top of working 10 hours a day myself.

I told him about the phone call and was packing my bags when he begged me to stay and said he would do the cooking. Then he kind of backtracked and said the sex was “good enough.” He knows I’m wiped out and need to sleep when I finally get to bed.

Before, it was too much to give him anything more than maintenance sex. I’d hurry things up purposely and fall asleep. Now that I’m not cooking, I’m awake and putting him through his paces in the bedroom. Last night he apologized again and took back the four rating. What a prince. He said he wants me to come back into the kitchen and join him for meals and cooking.

I suddenly realized I don’t really want things to be hunky-dory with him in the kitchen or anywhere.

Now I have shown him great sex because I’m not too tired. The thing is, I don’t feel the same feelings of love I used to. What is wrong here?

— Seriously Thinking of Leaving, Fort Richmond

Dear Thinking of Leaving: He drunkenly threw you under the bus to another woman. Sadly for him, it was a woman connected to you. He insulted you behind your back and trotted out private information with a number rating of your sexual performance. The result? You don’t trust him now, and for good reason.

You tried to work it out by giving him a “punishment” of doing all the cooking. And then you made a supreme effort to improve your performance in bed. How did that feel? Good that you showed him what he had been missing, but also humiliating that you felt you had to prove yourself a decent lover.

It’s not surprising you’re looking at the door. Most women wouldn’t have stayed and tried to work it out with him. You don’t mention marriage or children. Why not look for somebody who deserves you? And never date a man like this again — lazy, critical and a drinker who runs his mouth to other women.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: My wife is making me work out with her. She’s obsessed now, and would even like to compete as a bodybuilder. I don’t want her to be a muscle-bound freak!

Yesterday we had it out. I told her I was happy with running and doing cardio with her, but we were not on the same page with this serious weightlifting crap.

She said she needed me to work out with her to keep up her ambition, and that “strangers” aren’t working out together at gyms (no kidding!) and she also can’t get another safe workout partner who’s a friend.

I said, “It’s your dream, not mine!” She quit her job and has stayed home five years to have our babies and get them started — a dream we both shared. But she lost her foothold in her teaching career doing that. Now she’s grabbed onto this muscle-building nonsense as it if it’s a substitute career.

Money is not the problem. I make more than enough to support the family, but please God, let her go after a real career which pays. Help us please!

— Not a Willing Bodybuilding Partner, Sage Creek

Dear Not Willing: She loved having a career and now she wants one again, as well as mothering the kids. That’s understandable. But bodybuilding is not a good career for making a living.

How about you support her in both bodybuilding as a sport and finding a new career she’d love? Since you have the money, you could offer to help her in getting any education she needs to get on a new career path. Good luck, you two!

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

   Read full biography