A Word of Advice... on friends... or more?

By Joshua O'Connell
Posted Thursday, July 7, 2005

My friend and I are getting closer and I am really starting to like him romantically and we have even talked about getting together. The only problem is that he is married with two kids. I really like him and he doesn't seem to mind about his wife and kids. Should I go ahead with anything or stop it before it starts?

--Married to the idea of a married man

There's two common threads in the questions I've chosen for today's column. One is that all of our questions involve liking someone who may not be available. The other is that there's the potential for liking more than one person.

This situation raises a red flag the size of Saturn to me right now, and for a number of reasons.

It is not uncommon for someone to like more than one person. We're humans, we have eyes and ears, and we know what we like. There's six billion people on the planet; it's not surprising that over time we'll encounter more than one person we'll develop feelings for.

You're considering entering a relationship with a married man, who has two kids, and who has no plans to tell his wife about it. You're going to become a third party into infidelity; you're going to allow a married man to cheat on his wife, who may find out and it would cause a major fallout for all three of you.

Maybe she doesn't find out, but you fall for him and then you'll be wishing on a prayer that he finally leaves his wife and kids behind. Even if he does, there's the divorce that would follow, and rarely are they a fun situation to go through.

Anyone who thinks about this type of situation for more than a minute should have their conscience screaming "UNHEALTHY RELATIONSHIP!" Don't do it.

--Confused and hurt

I should add really quickly before I begin answering that through conversations with this question asker on AIM, they had previously dated.

It all comes down to life situations. Right now, you can't really be together because of his tour of duty in Iraq. What it comes down to is not tying yourself down while you can't have him. You might come across someone you really want to date. If it's going to work out, when he comes back for good you'll end up together, but for now the best you can do is keep your options open.

If you end up meeting someone who's really good for you, his next visit might mark a change in dynamic as you realize that you're not waiting anymore, because you've found someone. So, it's not so disconcerting right now to think that because you're not seeing anyone, you're still harboring feelings that are hard to ignore.

If you meet someone, great. If he ends up being the one, great. I'd give different advice to those in a committed relationship, but you two called it off, so it's better to just remain friends and wait and see what happens.

--Simple, but complex

It's not uncommon to be attracted to more than one person, as we've already explored today. It comes down to making a decision and taking a chance on one of them. You're about to go out with this girl. See how it goes and if something comes of it, great.

As far as the girl who's your really good friend, why you haven't asked her out should be a consideration here. Do you know if she's sharing your feelings? Are you just nervous about asking her?

If you exhausted your options with the friend already, you shouldn't really worry about it. If you just never acted on it, and your interest in this new girl isn't that high, you may want to be fair and call off the date in favor of seeing if your friend's interested.

It's not right to string along a girl you're really not interested in, so think about that before making your decision.

Good luck, and thanks for asking.

 E-mail this page
 Printer-friendly page