DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: So I’m sure you get a bunch of emails from confused college students, but I think this one might be a little out of the ordinary. So here goes, and please forgive my confused ramblings. I’m in college, and I have a good friend who I’m going to call X.

We were at a party, a pretty low-key one (I LOATHE traditional college basement keg parties with a burning fiery passion, you have no idea), and we were all varying levels of intoxicated. I was still pretty lucid; despite being a little heavyset, I’m kind of a lightweight, and I’d kind of reached that “still lucid and in control, but the room is wobbly a bit” stage which is when I know it’s time to cut myself off if I want to get home in one piece.

So over comes X, I’m pretty sure sloshed out of her mind, and starts coming on to me pretty hard – physical proximity, hand in some… uncomfortable places, pretty much everything short of just crawling on top of me. She kept making some not-so-subtle references that even my brick wall-level of social stupidity couldn’t stop. Eventually I just flat out told her that I wasn’t going to put out. She seemed pretty cut up about that and left the party not soon after.

Thing is, while this girl is jaw-droppingly attractive, I had a few hangups. 

– It really wasn’t a good place, 

– It was an even worse time, 

– We were both varying levels of drunk, 

– I’m a virgin and that was definitely not the right time to punch my card, 

– I consider her to be a platonic friend, and, MOST IMPORTANTLY: 

– She has a boyfriend back home, who I’ve met and is pretty much a great guy, and they’ve been dating for a few years now (they met in high school, and we’re all juniors).

I don’t blame her for something she did under the influence of alcohol, because I’m pretty sure she genuinely loves this guy, but it’s still a little worrying.

My question isn’t “Should I pursue a relationship?” because holy crap, no, bad idea, creeper move, et cetera. It’s “How do I deal with the idea that someone I consider to be a friend may have something more in mind, despite having a boyfriend?” She hasn’t said anything about it, and says she doesn’t remember much from the party, but the situation is never far away when we interact these days, and I would truly regret losing my friendship with her because of a drunken indiscretion.

I don’t know. I guess I’m asking how I should deal with this situation in a way that leaves all parties unhurt.

– Confused And A Bit Nervous

DEAR CONFUSED AND A BIT NERVOUS: First of all, CaBN: you did the right thing all around. First of all: knowing your limits and when to stop drinking is a valuable skill to cultivate, especially in college. This means you can enjoy a little inebriation without being at a point of doing something you’ll regret later, on top of your hangover (and trust me: I have been there, done that and puked on the t-shirt). More importantly though is recognizing that your friend was too drunk to consent, even as she was all but climbing into your lap and wiggling. Ignoring questions of whether hooking up would’ve caused unnecessary drama, she was in a place where consent was more or less impossible. So, good for you man.

Also: you were right. While there’re plenty of ways to lose one’s virginity, a drunken fumbling hook-up ain’t one you necessarily want. Especially with the attendant drama that would come with it.

Now how do you deal with this? Well… mostly you don’t.

Here’s the thing: you’re making some assumptions that aren’t necessarily warranted by the facts. I know, in vino veritas and all that but you don’t want to round up drunken behavior to “clearly she wants more.” She was hitting on you, yes… but that doesn’t mean that she necessarily has more in mind. The thing to remember about alcohol is that it’s a disinhibitor and magnifier; it’ll amplify thoughts or feelings that’re otherwise not terribly significant and tear down the walls that’d keep you from acting on them otherwise. So if we assume she thinks you’re cute and was feeling a bit horny and lonely, a drunken haze can turn that from “well he’s cute” to “yeah, some oral WOULD be nice tonight” to “Bet CaBN’d do me *hic*!”

However, in the cold, bruised, hungover light of sobriety, one tends to look back on the things they did the night before and think “oh God, did I actually do that?” And trust me: that’s ten different kinds of embarrassment and humiliation that’s a lot harder to power through than awkward flirting mistakes. And if she does remember her actions at the party… well it’s a lot easier to feign having been blackout drunk and hope everyone buys it, and just lets things get swept under the rug. Which I suspect is what your friend is doing.

So the best, friendship-preserving-est thing you can do in this case? Play along with her and let that moment be stuffed down the memory hole. Take it as a compliment that she thought of you when her drunk self decided it was hook-up time, but let sober-her keep up the illusion that nothing happened. Years later, it can be something the two of you laugh about. But for now… it was all just a bad dream and she’ll thank you for running with that story.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: At the beginning of the year I had started seeing a girl who I had spent a long time talking to on Tinder at the end of the year previous. We had both hit it off before meeting face-to-face, and given how we went to the same University we decided to see how we enjoyed each other’s actual company. We got along really well, but I think we both were (Self-admittedly) not at a place where we could have an actual meaningful relationship with one another.

We still kept things going though for a few months, and communicated fairly well. We had shared a lot about our pasts, particularly our exes, one of which was continually bothering her with abusive post-breakup messages (Her words, not mine, I knew nothing about the guy), and even though we never called each other boyfriend and girlfriend we kept seeing each other primarily because we got along so well. There were some growing pains associated with scheduling hanging out, and also myself attending therapy due to my own stresses and things. It was by far the most intimate set of experiences I had ever had with somebody, which made it feel all the worse whenever she decided to cut things off. We met up one day and she told me she didn’t want to continue because it was apparent to both of us that ‘feelings’ were actually starting to become a real thing. Of course I had been having feelings develop, probably a bit faster than she had because that tends to be how my brain works, and on the day despite being pretty visibly torn up we parted ways amicably and I didn’t even turn around when walking away.

Only the thing is, for longer than I’d like to admit I guess I hadn’t really gotten over her. Maybe it was the intimacy thing, or maybe it was all the stresses of work and school that made me feel like I needed to have her back, but I tried to not let that want take over my actions, even though my thoughts would often drift to her at all hours of the day when I really didn’t want them to.

When we did cut things off, she was also kind of vague about what she had ‘needed to do’ in order to ‘better herself’ as we promised each other we would do. She didn’t tell me what, and she seemed pretty emotional at the idea so I didn’t pry her even though I really wanted to. I kept thinking about that for months, and I still kind of do.

So fast-forwarding through the last few months leading up to now, she’d play on my mind all the time and I’d even (Stupidly) find myself drawn to message her or check her Facebook page, because I had (Stupidly) never got around to unfriending her. So this kept going, and just as I was feeling good about my current schedule/workflow/basically lots of stuff, I’m scrolling through FB and suddenly BOOM, ‘Your Ex is in a relationship. With her Ex’.

Not gonna lie, Doc, I was really taken aback. I was jealous, pissed, sad, confused, basically everything. Thankfully I was always pretty good handling that stuff so, I messaged her saying basically, “Hey, I saw you’re with somebody else now. I hope that goes well.” and also that I was now choosing to remove her from my social medias, a step I acknowledge I probably should have done quite a while ago.

I guess my problem in this instance was, well, I can’t/never will really understand exactly what compelled her to get back with her ex when she had made it clear to me she didn’t feel like being in any relationship, hence our splitting. I know that’s a dangerous line of thinking and probably not worth it, but my brain can’t help but feel like it’s being fooled around with. This has gotten me very anxious and raised a lot of questions; the most prominent few being: ‘Is even opening up to anybody worth it?’, ‘Do I make myself an easier target by showing affection to people?’, ‘Is this even how a man is supposed to respond?’ because I’ll be the first to admit, I’ve heard a lot of contradictory answers for that last one. So yeah, I assuming that thinking too deeply in to these negative emotions can potentially only lead to a lot of bad things like hating all girls, feeling more insecure, never opening up again, and whilst know all these are really bad…

Part of me feels like it WANTS to feel that way…maybe because it’s easier perhaps…I don’t know, I can come up with lots of potential answers to things but I’m never really confident enough to go for any one wholeheartedly…

I’d very much like your thoughts on whether these sensations are normal/work-throughable, and what your advice may be to help go forward.

Thanks a bunch,

Random Irish Guy

DEAR RANDOM IRISH GUY: Here’s the thing about dating that a lot of people don’t like to talk about: there’s a lot of random chance involved. It’s not just chance in meeting someone but meeting them at the right time. Sometimes you can meet someone who’s awesome and perfect for you, but when you or they are at a point in your lives where a relationship just isn’t feasible, no matter how much you might want one. There’re times when, yes, you may like someone but realize that you’re in a place where catching feels would just be a bad idea. It may be recognizing that you’re falling for someone at a time when you don’t have the emotional bandwidth… or it may be one person realizing that their casual partner is starting to be a bit less casual.

And that leads to another cold truth: when someone says “I’m not interested in anything serious right now,” there’s usually a silent “…with you” attached to the end. This doesn’t mean that they don’t like you – especially if you two were dating and hooking up – but it does mean that they’re interested in a specific kind of relationship. And from the sounds of it, you wanted a more committed one than she did. And in that case, the kindest thing to do was to end it sooner, rather than later. It may have hurt like a mother, but breaking things off quickly and cleanly was a lot kinder than letting things continue on until you were far more invested and the break up would be even worse all around.

As for why she went back to her a

le ex? Well… the short version is: people are goddamn complicated and their decisions aren’t always going to make sense to folks on the outside. There’s almost always more to the story than we know or will ever know. Maybe he turned over a new leaf. Maybe the power of nostalgia brought her back and she’s not ready to leave the cycle of “break up, get back together, break up again”. There’s really no way of knowing and so you’re going to have to just make your own closure here.

For what it’s worth, I don’t think you were being used, RIG. I think she was up for one kind of relationship, you were up for another and she recognized that things were just going to get more painful the longer it went on. Unfortunately… that’s dating for you. It’s a full contact sport, and sometimes it’s just going to suck for a bit. So the best thing you can do: accept that it happened, mourn the end of the relationship and let it go so you can move on.

There’re other women out there, women who’re right for you and in the right place in life for the relationship you’re looking for. You just have to find them.

Good luck, man.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m 25 and been reading your website for over a year. For about that same time, I’ve been dating my girlfriend, L, 23. This has been the first great, stable relationship for me in a long time.

Now she is bisexual with a stronger preference towards women. I’m still a virgin where she has had intercourse been with women but not men. She’s gone down on an ex-boyfriend and decided she prefers receiving oral than giving it. She prefers to wait until we’re married, not for religious purposes, but more of being ready for men. We have fooled around, dry humping, my performing oral on her, mutual masturbation, etc.

I been fine with this, understanding her and all. She once made a comment that she finds the male genitalia disgusting. Recently she’s discovered so I asked if she was ready for sex but seems she still really much prefers women, saying she’d rather not do guys and suggested we do an open relationship or become polyamorous and find a bi-girl to be our third in a triad so we both get what we want. Us to be fulfilled sexually while maintaining our emotional connection and also having a three-way.

I was fine with it, truly, being patient and also supportive but I always felt like why am I here if she might not even sleep with me? I was never about it, I was all about the emotional side. Things aren’t made better by the fact we’ve been long distance for the past 4 months due to school and well traveling for a family member’s funeral. Why commit this long with a girl who’s said my junk is disgusting? Who isn’t exactly factor my needs of wanting to have full on intercourse with her after this long? We got into a huge argument over this one and aren’t talking to each other at the moment.

– Waiting to Start

DEAR WAITING TO START: Hoo boy, there’s a lot to unpack here, my dude. So let’s break it down a little:

First: She doesn’t want to go down on you. Fair do’s some women don’t like it or have an aversion due to a bad experience.

Next: She wants to wait until you’re married before you have sex as a way of being ready to sleep with a man.

This is an odd choice, but ok, some people prefer to wait. I don’t think it’s the wisest of ideas, but hey, to each their own. That’s her boundary, and we need to respect it.

Next: She finds penises disgusting.

Um…

Finally: She’s decided she doesn’t really want to sleep with a guy and is suggesting a threesome/poly relationship with another woman before you’ve even had intercourse together…

… right. Sure. Ok.

WTS, allow me to introduce you to my friend, The Chair Leg of Truth. Because I think you know damn good and well what’s going on here.

Look, female sexuality is famously fluid; the Kinsey scale is more of the Kinsey slide and people (and women in particular) often move up and down that scale over the course of their lives.

On occasion, a life-long lesbian will discover that she’s into guys too – or just one particular guy. A gay man may discover that there’s one particular woman who, for whatever reason, just does it for him. A straight woman will realize that she’s attracted to women as well.

And occasionally a bi or pansexual woman will realize that she’s not bi at all.

Your girlfriend isn’t bi. She’s gay. This doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have feelings for you, but she’s very clearly not into dudes sexually. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you’re going to be breaking up sooner rather than later. She’s asking for your permission to find the girl she’s going to dump you for under the pretext of trying to help your relationship. An open relationship is going to very quickly become a closed relationship… with somebody else. 

Polyamory isn’t the answer here either; to start with, it’s varsity level relationship management and you’ve barely started warming the bench. Moreover, a poly triad requires honesty and trust… and right now, she’s NOT being honest with you. She’s holding onto the relationship for reasons of her own – she may not be ready to admit to herself that she’s gay, she may be trying to avoid hurting you – but it’s going to come crashing down pretty soon.

You want someone who’s into you, not somebody who’s leaning on you while she comes to terms with who she really is. The best thing you can do for the both of you is to end it now. The clean break heals the fastest and it’ll be easier for the two of you to possibly salvage a friendship if you do it before bitterness and resentment creeps in. Give her a call – I’m giving you a pass to do this via the phone since you’re long distance at the moment – and call it quits. Then move on with your life. There will be other women, and university is one of the best places to find them.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m a college student. I’m female, and pretty physically acceptable according to other people and my time at the gym. However, I’ve got the natural social skills of a chatty rock, and even though I’ve gotten better at being friendly and normal since I started college, I don’t have a lot of friends, and I’ve never dated. (I’m not that broken up about the dating thing. It just seemed like something I should mention.)

Now. A few weeks ago, I started playing with the Quidditch team. Some of us hang out after practice, and I really like the group. One of the guys, however, has a habit of trying to pick up all the girls in order of whoever he finds hottest and hearing “no thank you” as “flirt harder,” and of the three or four girls who stick around after practice… well, he hasn’t been as into the ones who aren’t me. It wouldn’t work out, Doc; he’s looking for something more serious than I want with ANYONE right now, and I’m just not attracted to him no matter how much he touches me or talks up his looks and history. 

I do enjoy talking to this guy in groups, and I’d like him for a friend even though I’ve told him I won’t date him, but his advances are making it difficult for me to cultivate other relationships in the group—for example, he started talking to me about something unrelated while I was in the middle of a conversation with some other girls, and kept repeating himself until I turned to him and said I was trying to have a discussion here. While my focus is on making friends, there have been a couple guys I’ve wanted to hit on. Guess how easy it’s been to talk to them one-on-one. Go on, guess. 

My problem, Doc, is that I don’t think I’m established enough as a group member to initiate a Come to Jesus talk about how he needs to take no for an answer and stop blocking out me without making it weird between me and everyone else. We usually treat his skirt-chasing as a joke. I’m pretty sure getting him alone to discuss it would be received as a sign of interest. You write a lot about subtle ways to increase someone’s attraction to you. Have any insight on how to shut someone down without making a big production out of it or ignoring them entirely?

– Golden Snitches Get Stitches

DEAR GOLDEN SNITCHES GET STITCHES: In every group – especially amongst nerdy ones – there tends to be at least one person who has boundary issues and doesn’t understand that the first rule of other people’s conversations is that you don’t just barge into them.

(I could tell you stories. Oh how I could tell you stories.)

Sometimes they’re creepers who are only kept in the group due to Geek Social Fallacices, sometimes they’re an otherwise good guy who just needs to be smacked across the nose with the clue-by-four until they learn. But whether it’s a creeper, a guy with an annoying crush or just plain old Captain Oblivious, it’s obnoxious as hell and it annoys the living hell out of everyone around him.

Now I totally get not wanting to cause a scene amongst your new friends; after all, geeks are notoriously drama averse. I can totally understand fearing that by initiating the Come To Jesus meeting with the Would-Be Weasley might lead to your being kicked out of the group for the sin of “causing drama” even when it’s ultimately somebody else’s fault. But at the same time: you’ve got to stand up for you. You have to be your first and last line of social defense and that means being willing to tell your boundary-ignorant buddy to step the hell off.

So here’s how you handle things.

To start with: talk to your friends, especially your new female friends, about Captain Come-On’s behavior. Mention to them that it’s starting to legitimately bother you and find out whether other people feel the same way or how they handle it. You may very well find that there are others who feel the same way you do but don’t necessarily feel empowered to bring it up. It’s generally good to let others know how you’re feeling, so it doesn’t look like you’re just suddenly exploding at their teammate for no good reason.

Plus, it helps you find your Team You to have your back when you do have your mini-confrontation.

Next time he does this, excuse yourself from the original conversation and take him aside. Don’t lead him off alone, just a few steps away from the person you were talking to. Explain to him firmly that he’s being obnoxious and rude, that you’re trying to have a conversation with people and you don’t appreciate his interrupting it or trying to barge into it, the way he keeps touching you or humble-bragging about his various conquests. Let him know that his behavior is making it extremely difficult for you to be his friend and if he doesn’t cut it out right-the-hell-now, you’re not going to be interested in talking to him at all. Don’t let him rationalize, deflect or otherwise shirk responsibility; this isn’t a dialogue, it’s a download. You’re letting him know very clearly where your boundaries are and he needs to respect them.

And be willing to follow through with your threat to not talk to him. Next time he pulls his barging-in schtick, tell him “We’ve talked about this. I’ve told you to stop. Now stop.” If he continues to pester you, be willing to cut him out of the conversation via body language and positioning. Turn your back on him, edge him out of the group so that he’s on the outside trying to reach in. If need-be, take your conversation elsewhere and leave him behind.

It can be hard standing up for yourself when you’re relatively new to the group and the person you’re dealing with is an established member. But at the end of the day, you have to be your own advocate and guardian and that means being willing to enforce your boundaries even in the face of potential drama.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m  30 and I really don’t date, at all. So, recently I was going out with a friend. Just casual dating. It seemed like everything was going well and then all of a sudden she pulled the ”I like you and the way you treat me, but …”. She went radio silent for a while and acted differently once  we started chatting again. I admit, I was being a bit too pushy  and clearly she has no interest to try anything out. Recently, I discovered that she felt I was treating her like an idiot and sucking her into my world. I don’t really do much so I don’t really get that part.

She’s going through her own personal battles with her family. I’m also in one of my lowest points in life. 

I really want to apologize for my behavior, but it seems like it’s not completely my fault. What approach should I take?

It’s Not My Fault

DEAR IT’S NOT MY FAULT: You aren’t the arbiter of other people’s feelings, my dude. If someone tells you that you hurt them, you don’t get to say “no I didn’t.”

You may feel like you didn’t do anything wrong. But the fact of the matter is, something you did made her feel hurt and offended. And nobody on this planet is going to appreciate it if you try to explain why they shouldn’t be hurt. Nobody likes it when someone tries to explain their feelings to them and they REALLY don’t like it when you try to tell them they don’t have a right to feel the way they feel.

There is only one thing to do here: apologize. And not a “sorry you feel that way” non-apology. If you care about her, then tell her: “I didn’t realize I was making you feel that way. It was never my intention, and I’m really sorry. Now that I know, I won’t do it again.”

Don’t try to parse what you did and why it wasn’t that bad. Don’t try to explain. Just a simple “OK, I didn’t realize, I’m sorry,” and then try not to make the same mistakes next time.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com)

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: Long time reader of your column, first time submitter. I’ve always found the advice you give your readers to be well thought out and sometimes with the necessary amount of tough love for when it’s needed. Now with that in mind, here is my situation.

A bit over a decade ago, I had met a young lady while on Xbox Live while playing good ol’ Call of Duty. Her combination of skill as well as interesting conversation lead us to form a solid friendship despite the fact that we lived on opposite ends of the country.

At the time, I was working third shift and would get off work early in the morning. I would make my drive home, fire up the xbox and hop in game. Due to the time difference, she would have just woken up for the day and we would start our routine stomping on other players, laughing and chatting. When we would play, I knew that whatever situation I would be walking into, she had my back. Where I went, she went. When I would get myself into a bad situation, I knew a few shots would fly over my shoulder and render the threat no more followed by a “You’re welcome.”

Now at the time, I was engaged to another woman with the wedding less than a year away. She worked a normal 9-5 job and would be on her way out the door as I came home. At first she didn’t have any issues with my online friends and had even on a few occasions played and talked with all of us. But as time grew on, she became further and further jealous of my female sniper support.

At the time I denied that there was anything more between us than just friendship and video games and this remained true until a few months later when my partner told me that she had developed feelings for me, and myself, confessed the same.

Due to us both being in relationships at the time and geographical issues, we agreed that there was nothing we could do at the time to pursue a relationship. We remained friends and tension between my fiancé and I continued to grow over the issue until finally, she called off the engagement.

Fast forward a few years, and by chance, my new girlfriend at the time and I found ourselves moving very near my CoD partner. While her and I still talked and played often, we never got around to actually meeting up. This was due to time off from work as well as once again, both of us being in committed relationships. Now we have known each other for over 12 years, and recently after I had ended my current relationship, we made plans with mutual friends and finally met face to face. She and the meeting was everything I expected. We hit it off, spent loads of time around each other and even got the approval of her best friend. Now here is where the issue is.

She is still not single! The guy she was dating back when my ex-fiancé is still around. Their relationship is on the rocks and despite multiple attempts by her to end it, or her friends telling her she should do the same, they are still an item. Trust me when I say this guy is a gigantic a-hole.

My question for you is how can I go about finally getting my chance here? Tonight I am supposed to be meeting up with her to go out to dinner. I’m sure her boyfriend doesn’t know what her plans are and even our own friends have no idea that I will be in town. It makes me feel like we are sneaking around. I know that I want to have a relationship with her, but I want to do it right. How can I ask her to finally end her current relationship without sounding like a prick?

Sincerely,

Shot In The Heart

DEAR SHOT IN THE HEART: You have two issues here, SitH.

The first is that you’ve developed feelings for someone strictly over the Internet.

The second is that you have feelings for someone who’s dating someone else.

Let’s start with the former. One of the things I’m always driving home to people is that if you haven’t met in person, you’re not really dating, and crushes work much the same way. As we spend more and more of our time online, we do more and more of our socializing online as well. We network professionally online, we make friends online and we occasionally fall in love online. And to be fair: I’ve made good friends, long-term friends, with people I’d known online for years (Warren Ellis Forum, what up?!) long before I’d met them in person. Hell, I’ve been writing for Kotaku for over 4 years now and the first time I ever actually talked to my editor (as opposed to email or instant messages) was last year for a podcast. So it’s certainly possible to make long, important and lasting connections online.

But here’s the thing: love for 99% of the population, has a physical component too. As much emotional chemistry as the two of you may have, there’s no guarantee that you’re going to have physical chemistry. You may love someone for their brain, but you want them for their ass. This is why I tell people all the time that until you meet in person, for a significant amount of time, it’s a bad idea to invest romantically in someone you’ve thus far only known as text, a voice or even another face on the other end of the Skype connection. Yeah they may be cute, they may sound like Scarlett Johansson… but you don’t know how they smell. You don’t know how they taste. You don’t see the little gestures that we pick up almost subliminally that help dictate whether or not we’re going to be into somebody. And if those parts don’t line up… well, the heart may want what it wants, but your junk tends to get a say too.

This is why there are so many false positives in online dating. You two may work on paper and you may click when you chat back and forth. But until you meet in person and find out if the rest of them turns your crank, getting hung up on them is an invitation to heartbreak.

Right now, this is where you’re at.=

(And let’s be clear: this has been an ongoing issue with you. The fact that this relationship contributed to breaking up with your fiancé is a pretty good indication where you’ve been at for a while.)

So you have basically set yourself up for trouble right from the jump. Because hey, you may be super into her now that you’ve met in person… but there’s no guarantees that she has been with you. So the first thing you need to do is tap the brakes, Romeo. You know you’re into her, but you need to spend a little time finding out if the feeling is actually mutual or it’s just your gonads trying to convince you that it is. Continuing to make “BUT I LOVE YOU” the centerpiece of your friendship is going to be a great way to not only not date her but to lose the friendship in the process.

Now for your second issue. She has a boyfriend. She has had, if I’m following your narrative here, the same boyfriend for 10+ years. And you’re hoping that she’s going to ditch this guy for you because… well, love, romance and what Dan Savage calls “dickful thinking”.

Let’s start with the obvious: you don’t know everything that’s going on in this relationship. You may be her confidant. She may tell you story after story about this dude. But you don’t know everything. One thing a lot of guys in your situation do is fail to realize that you’re someone she’s venting to. You’re hearing the worst because you’re a safe, non-judgemental space, a pressure valve where she can let off steam and have someone tell her “Oh man, I’m sorry that really sucks”. Because, let’s face it, everyone needs that on occasion. Sometimes we want somebody’s help in fixing something. Other times we want to hear someone say “there there, that’s awful, here have a margarita.”

(And honestly, if you’re going to offer  a margarita, let’s also get some chips. And maybe some queso. And also now I’m hungry, dammit)

But the fact that someone is venting their frustrations – and their frustrations may be mighty and plentiful – doesn’t mean that you’re getting the full story. You’re getting part of it. You’re not necessarily hearing about the reasons why she still likes the dude. He may act like a dick – which you get to hear about – but you’re not necessarily hearing about the things he does that make her stick around even though she wants to rip her hair out.

So, once again: tap the brakes. Dude may very well be the epitome of every bad boyfriend in the history of modern courtship and a serial puppy-kicker besides… but you don’t know that.

Now let’s go with the next obvious part: it is really damned hard to end a multi-year relationship, even one that may need to end. When you’ve been dating someone for a long time, you’ve put in a lot of time. You have – to misquote the bard – built your life around them. Ending that life – a life that has been intertwined with someone else’s for over a decade is not something done lightly or easily. The Sunk Cost Fallacy alone makes people want to stick around; after all, if you leave now doesn’t that mean all those years have been a waste? But there are other reasons people stick around too: financial co-dependence, emotional co-dependence, being worried what other people might think, being afraid of being single again… the list goes on and on. All of that is going to give people pause. Hell, it may be as simple and as frustrating as emotional momentum. Objects at rest tend to stay at rest after all, and it’s easier to coast, even in a bad situation, than it is to apply the energy to change it.

And then there’s the possibility that she’s just not ready to leave yet. She’s tried to end things but she keeps going back? That’s generally a sign that she hasn’t reached the point of no return. While I’m not the biggest fan of Alcoholics Anonymous, sometimes a person really does have to hit the relationship equivalent of rock bottom before they’re ready to finally jump ship for good.

And then there’s the last thing to consider: you want her to leave him for you… but you don’t know that she wants you the way you want her now that you’ve met in person. Yeah, you both confessed your feelings for one another… but that was before you met in person. And now that you have? You get along great, but that doesn’t mean that she’s physically or sexually attracted to you. If those pants-feels don’t exist, then there’s really not much to be said.

So here’s what you need to do. First: stop assuming things. You don’t know that she hasn’t told her boyfriend about you. You don’t know the full story about any of this. You know how you feel and a fraction of her life. Stop building your fantasy narrative and stick to facts on the ground – what you know, what you don’t know and what you know you don’t know.

Second: once again, tap the brakes. You’re about to plow headlong into a Friend Zone pileup. If you don’t want to get hurt more than is strictly necessary, stop investing quite so much into potential and deal with actual.

Third: Make your case. “Hey, I know we said we were too far away to do anything last time we talked about there being an us, but now that I’m closer, I’d like to give it a shot. What do you say?” And then leave it there. If she says “yes,” then blessings on you both. But recognize she may very well say “no”. And while she may like you – hell she may like you a lot – that doesn’t necessarily doesn’t mean that she’s ready to overturn her life. All you can do is put it out there and wait to see what she says. Maybe having a place to land if she does leap out of that boat will be what gives her the strength to do so.

But if she decides she’s not ready to, or not for you? Then the only thing you can do is accept her answer with grace and respect. Doing otherwise will just damage the friendship.

Good luck.