Can I trust this long-distance relationship?
What's your problem? What are your dating/relationship/marriage/single issues?
Who's lying to you?
Email [email protected] or send your letter here.
I am in a long-distance relationship with a man where we see each other every three to four weeks. We have known each other for many years. Prior to being with me, he was active on a dating website where he met several women that he dated for various amounts of time.
When we began seeing each other, about two years ago, I told him that a monogamous relationship was important to me and asked him to get off the dating website. He agreed. A couple of months ago, I walked into a room where he'd been reading and saw that he was looking at the picture of a young woman on his phone. He quickly turned his phone off and I didn't say anything. Last month, he was showing me something in his emails on his desktop computer, and I saw that he had written to someone who had clearly contacted him through the dating website. When I asked him about it, his explanation was that he has tried many times to get off the dating website but he still gets several emails each week from women, and that he usually doesn't write back but sometimes he does to say he is in a relationship. I want to believe him but this seems fishy to me. Your thoughts?
– Want to Believe
The email part is fishy to me. He gets emails? From the apps? Or is it an old-school website?
Regardless, I can't tell you whether to trust this person. I have no idea if he's lying about how he uses – or ignores – the dating sites.
What I can say is that the two of you might not be cut out for this kind of long-distance relationship. Maybe he is looking at apps – and it's because he's bored and lonely. Maybe you're realizing that three to four weeks is a very long time.
How long do you want to be with someone who's this unavailable to you? You say you knew each other for years before this, but the romantic relationship is its own chapter. Years of friendship can't prevent the bumps coming up now. You have to evaluate things as they are.
You can ask him for access to his accounts and check them yourself, but that kind of request might kill everything good here. You can ask if he needs help deleting these accounts, in general (maybe he really does). But first, consider what you want in a few weeks – or months. Is it this? It it enough? Ask him that question too.
– Meredith
Readers? Would you trust the response here? What about the distance and visits?
Speaking of Love
"Love isn't something you feel, it's something you do. If the person you're with doesn't want it, do yourself a favor and save it for someone who does." — Nate, "Six Feet Under"