DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m gay but not really out to a whole lot of people and in my late 30’s.  I like to think I’m ok with my sexuality but something’s just not there yet with revealing it to everyone just yet (still).  I’m also overweight and while I think my face looks ok I kinda hate that I don’t really exercise and always eat the right things.  But my hatred of exercise is for another topic.

I also play a lot of a very popular MMO. I’ve also met someone through playing that game that I really, really really like.  It’s another guy, and he’s off overseas in the army in Hawaii (but will be moving back to the mainland early next year). Now I’ve also not ever really let myself get into a relationship with anyone before. Yes I’ve had sex with other guys before so I’m not a virgin, but it’s always been with just hookups via dating/casual encounter type websites from people in my local area. Never found anyone via that method that stuck.

Anyways, so I met this guy playing the game about 10 months ago, by joining their group of friends in a server for raiding. This turned into becoming friends in game, and the more we talked the more I liked him and the more I asked about him.  So I find out that he’s bisexual, and says he is polyamorous and doesn’t want to be limited to one partner.  He has a male partner he sees and sleeps with on a regular basis in Hawaii that’s in his unit (and shares other sexual encounters with the girls they bring over), and he also is dating a female gamer in our server who lives in Alabama. He’s also in game married to her and they have date nights, and she’s even gone to visit him in Hawaii (which didn’t really turn out all that well for them but yet they continue to want to date each other).

I’ve also professed feelings for him (i.e. i’ve said I love him and he says he loves me too). But he doesn’t want to make the girl he’s seeing jealous because even though he is polyamorous, she absolutely wants to keep him exclusively to herself.  She knows of his poly mindset but doesn’t want to acknowledge it.  He does not like that she does not acknowledge it.  I have to watch what I say around her sometimes so that she doesn’t catch on so much that I’m in “love” with him too.  I get envious of their date nights and I’ve asked if we could have date nights and he’s said no (because of her), but there are plenty of times in game when she’s gone to bed because she’s in central time, I’m in mountain time and he’s still up for awhile because of Hawaii time so I get him all to myself for a bit before he or I log off.

This is part of my dilemma. The other part is I’ve never had a solid male relationship before so I’m not sure what i’m feeling is true love or just like, but it sure as heck feels like it. And he’s so damn cute too boot too, but I feel like I’m ugly in my fatness compared to him. He says he’s ok with different body types.  I don’t know if I’ll ever meet him in real life but I really want to.  we’ve exchanged pictures and had a couple really awkward face time chats.  Am I emotionally immature still even at 38?

There are days when I’m bursting at the seams with feelings for him, and I try to express them to him but it doesn’t come out right and he’s not always as responsive or expressive as I am. We all show our love differently tho but we still say “love you” before going to bed/logging off from gaming.

I hope i’ve thoroughly confused you with my letter and maybe if you can pull some sense out of it I would certainly appreciate your learned thoughts on the matter. Cause I’m really not sure what my next step should be.  

Is this red flag city? Or just try to keep going and see how it turns out?

Thanks

Confused in The Dating World

DEAR CONFUSED IN THE DATING WORLD: Hey CDW, I’m here from the future and I’ve got an important message for you: this isn’t going to work and it’s only going to make you miserable.

There’s not just one red flag here, there’s enough red flags waving around to make it look like you’re running the bulls in Pamplona.

Let’s start with the first and most obvious: you don’t know this guy. Yes, I get that you’ve chatted a lot in the game and you’ve had the occasional Facetime convo, but let’s be real: you don’t know him. You know who he’s presenting himself as. You aren’t dating him, you’re dating his avatar. His persona. I realize that many, many people meet via MMOs – World of Warcraft may be responsible for more relationships than Plenty of Fish – but the fact is, until you meet him in person, there’s a whole host of things you simply don’t know about him. One of the tricky things about online dating, whether via OKCupid or Final Fantasy XIV, is that it’s impossible to gauge physical chemistry from online interactions. It’s easy enough to assume that you’re soulmates because you have great chats and steamy text sessions, but you’re not getting many of the signals and indicators that you only get from meeting someone in person. I’ve lost track of how many people I’ve known – myself included – who’ve had incredibly powerful connections with people online but found we had all the explosive chemistry of a wet fart in person. So let’s not put the cart before the horse here.

But then, there’re all the little things that spell trouble. Like the fact that you’re his (virtual) side-piece. So let’s be clear here: he’s apparently committed to this Alabama honey despite her being uncomfortable with his being poly. Meanwhile, he’s banging chicks and dudes in Hawaii (and share them with his Army bro) while “married”1 to her and seeing you on the side. If we assume everything is exactly as you present it, we’re looking at one of two potential scenarios here. Either he’s cheating on his girlfriend – she’s not cool with his being poly, after all – or he’s lying to you and hurting her regardless. In the former, he’s promised to be monogamous to her and is being a cheating piece of crap and is keeping you as his dude on the side.  In the latter, he’s dating someone who he knows can’t be in an open relationship and doesn’t care that it hurts her.

Neither of these are the hallmarks of someone worth dating. Ever.

But the fact of the matter is, this dude is so full of crap that his eyes turned brown. Regardless of which way this falls, he’s lying to someone – his girlfriend, to you, or to everyone. You’re his dirty little secret and you’re left begging for the scraps of his attention. You don’t even get dates or the ability to be affectionate with him in public – or at least as public as FFXIV gets, anyway. For all intents and purposes, you’re dating a closet case who has no intention of ever being honest with you or the people around him.

(And that’s assuming that he’s even who he says he is. I have my doubts; everything about this sets my Spidey-sense tingling.)

Straight talk, CDW: I suspect part of the reason why you’re hung up on this guy is because he’s “safe”. He’s thousands of miles away. He’s unavailable in just about every way possible short of being dead. As a result: things can’t get “real” with him. Because you’re unlikely to ever meet in person, you never have to worry about whether he might reject you because of you’re “ugly” or “too fat” or whatever. In a lot of ways, it’s easier to have a relationship that you know can’t work than to try to date someone closer to home and risk getting hurt. This guy can always be a fantasy to you.

But like I said: that heartache is coming, regardless. Even if he’s 100% telling you the truth about himself, he’s a lying, cheating piece of s

t. The only question is who he’s lying to.

Ditch this guy. You deserve someone who’s going to love you, be honest with (and about) you and be proud to call you his boyfriend. The sooner you kick this guy to the curb, the sooner you can find someone who’s far better for you, in every sense of the word.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: So my girlfriend is amazing. She’s a great girl and I’m glad that she’s in my life.

However she’s the first girl I’ve had sex with.

She’s had sex before and she’s fooled around with multiple guys before me. I have never cared about this and I know its not my right to either; because she’s a great woman and she’s with me now.

We often talk freely about things from our past, so recently she gave me a bit too much detail on the number of guys she’s been with and the things she’s done with them. This made me really uncomfortable.

I do not judge her one bit for these things and it isn’t my right to either, these are things from her past. However it made me feel insecure and dare I say, a bit ashamed of myself.

I’ve unfortunately internalized the fact that as a guy I should have had a lot of sex by now, I’m in my early twenties. I know guys who have had a lot of sex on a regular basis and I tend to lionize them reflexively. Also I feel like the more sex they’ve had the more validated these guys are, i.e they have been approved by women as fit (from an evolutionary perspective). Now if this is the way I tell the story of course it reflects very poorly on me as a man. I feel insecure and even ashamed. I feel insecure because my girl is great and I feel like men who’ve had more sex will obviously seem more fit in her eyes as well. This makes me feel inadequate.

Its unfortunate that I feel this way, because I’m actually a great guy; I look good, I can be funny, I’m smart and in control of my life and I’m physically fit.

But the way I say the story; if I am all these things and I still didn’t get laid all these years, then there must be something really wrong with me that women can just sniff out. I’ve always held the fact that I haven’t had much sex against myself and that puts even greater pressure when I try to flirt with women and take it to the next level. If I’m with a guy that has had a lot more sex than me it immediately affects my self esteem and if we both are talking to women I assume the backseat myself. Because somehow I’ve told myself that the only thing that matters is how much sex these men have had.

I’m trying to overcome it and I could use your advice.

One Trick Pony

DEAR ONE TRICK PONY: Here’s something to keep in mind, OTP: Ron Jeremy has slept with more women than he’s had hot meals. Does this make him a better, more desirable fit for your girlfriend than you do?

The story you’re telling yourself about how much sex you’ve had and how much you “should” have had is bulls

t. As I’ve said to others: it’s seven different types of bulls

t from cholera-infected bulls and all of it stems from evo-psych crap that barely works in the animal world and definitely doesn’t work as soon as you try to apply it to humans. And the first thing you need to do is realize that women aren’t magic. Vaginas aren’t Mjolnir and only give entrance to the worthy. Women don’t have a virgin-detecting sixth-sense that causes them to sense flawed men and discard them. Many times, the reason why a woman decides to have sex with someone has nothing to do with that person in the first place – just like men do. Women will decide to sleep with someone because they’re angry at their partner and want to get back at them, because they feel unattractive and want someone to make them feel pretty or because they’re horny and somebody was the nearest, least-objectionable warm body.

Similarly, guys will be virgins or had few partners for many reasons that have nothing to do with whether they’re “worthy” or not. They may have decided to wait until marriage. They may have had a long-term monogamous relationship and only been with that person for years at a time. They may simply not be that into sex or only have sex with people they have a deep and emotional connection with. None of this makes them any better or worse than dudes who’ve had dozens or hundreds of partners.

And let’s be real here: having lots of partners also doesn’t mean that this person is any good at sex. It could well be that they’re the sort of person who may be good at attracting women but is absolutely lousy in bed; they may get a lot of first time lays but never get an encore performance.

But all of that is secondary to the main issue: your girlfriend has chosen you. The fact that you were a virgin clearly didn’t bother her, seeing as, y’know she’s dating you. The only person who seems to think that your lack of experience is, well, you. You need to start trusting your girlfriend and taking “yes” for an answer because this amazing, beautiful woman has been telling you that clearly you have what she wants.

Have a talk with her. Tell her that you’re a little insecure about your sexual history (or lack thereof) and that in the future, you’d really rather not have all the dirty details. And then take her straight to bed because the number of partners you’ve had in the past is far less important than your relationship with the partner you have right now.

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 (29F) have been dating my boyfriend (32M) for almost a year and I’m jealous of the relationship he has with his ex. He texts with his ex all day and he tells me they are just really good friends. They rarely hang out in person. This woman has been in his life for 6 years and they were engaged to be married. The engagement ended because they disagreed about the subject of children.

I feel like they have a connection that I’ll never have with him. He tells me that they are just friends and he loves me. I feel like I’m the backup and they will reconnect in the future thus leaving me. Am I crazy for feeling jealous?

– Ol’ Green Eyes

DEAR OL’ GREEN EYES: No I don’t think you’re crazy OGE. I think what you’re feeling would be better described as insecurity. The thing to realize is that many times, jealousy and envy are the Check Engine lights of relationships. Sometimes when it crops up it means that there’s something wrong and you need to address a problem that’s about to cause things to fall apart. But more often, the issue is that you forgot to do the relationship equivalent of screwing the gas cap on until it clicked.

Your boyfriend had this long, romantically intense relationship with his ex that ended on what likely feels like a minor conflict. They’re still in touch, talk all the time and he still thinks of her fondly. It’s understandable that you could see this as a potential threat to your relationship with him.

If, y’know. You squint. A lot.

But the fun – and I use the term very sarcastically – thing about insecurity is that it’s supremely irrational. Insecurity is the conspiracy theorist of emotions, taking anything as evidence that your worst nightmare is likely coming true and that anything that disproves your fears is likely just made up or irrelevant. It’s confirmation bias writ large, as your jerk brain runs around with string and pushpins, making random connections between unrelated events and trying to drag a narrative out of it regardless of how little sense it makes to literally anyone else. But if you can disconnect yourself from the nightmare scenario for just a moment, step back and give yourself a chance to get some perspective, you can see that many times you’re making a mountain out of a molehill.

So let’s take a step back and examine things dispassionately. First, here is a truth: you are correct in that you won’t have a connection with your boyfriend like he had with his ex. Not because theirs was magical and sacred or because he loved (and still loves) her more than he’ll ever love you but because you are two entirely different people. Your relationship with him is unique and special and unconnected to his relationship with her, just as his relationship with her is unconnected to his relationship with you. You’re never going to have the same kind of connection because your experiences together are going to be entirely different. That doesn’t make it better or worse, just different.

Second: the fact that he has a strong friendship with his ex is a good thing. This speaks a lot to his character and what kind of person he is. It means that even though their relationship didn’t work out, the two of them were able to maintain the respect and affection for one another that’s let them be good friends afterwards. This, in turn, means that he is emotionally mature, handles conflicts in his relationships with care and consideration and, incidentally, chooses his partners carefully. Which, I might point out, means that he chose you with all due consideration and mindfulness.

Third: They had a six year long relationship that ended on relatively good terms. That’s a lot of history and a lot of time to build their relationship together. It’s a little unreasonable to expect the exact same sort of connection without that shared history together. You two’ve only been together for a year. That doesn’t mean that you can’t have a similar relationship, just that they take time. This is like comparing a career you’ve only just started to somebody who’s been on the job for the better part of a decade; you’re setting yourself up for unrealistic expectations and getting upset that over things that you haven’t had time to develop yet.

Fourth: unless you left things out of your letter, it doesn’t sound like your boyfriend’s given you any reason to doubt the sincerity of his feelings for you. Aside from possibly being a little inconsiderate about how often he texts or messages her, the biggest sin seems to be that he didn’t exile her to a damnatio memorae as soon as they broke up. Absent actual misbehavior, I think you need to let yourself fall on the side of taking “yes” for an answer here.

There’re two things you need to do here. The first is that you need to talk to your boyfriend and let him know that you could use his help in stepping back from the ledge. You’re feeling a little insecure and worried and you could use some extra love and reassurance so that you can get that vague sense of insecurity under control. Some of this may involve his being a little extra attentive to you when you’re feeling like an insecure bag of slop. Some of it may mean being a little more considerate with how much he’s messaging his ex, especially if he’s doing it in front of you.

But regardless of how he can help you, you’re going to have to help yourself by making sure that you let yourself believe him when he tells you that he cares for you and that he’s just friends with his ex. Because if you can’t bring yourself to trust him when he tells you how he feels, this relationship isn’t going to last long enough to have the kind of connection you want.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m currently having issues with my relationship.

I can’t understand or get past my girlfriend’s history. She was into masochism and being abused in ways that just makes me sick. She told me about it but also included that she is no longer into that.

Can she really just stop wanting that? Is it ok for me to ask her to take down the pictures online? Or is that not a right of mine as I wasn’t involved?

Not Feeling It

DEAR NOT FEELING IT: Alright NFI, I picked your letter because I wanted to compare and contrast it with Ol’ Green Eyes’. In both cases, the two of you are having a hard time dealing with the fact that your current partner has a history that you two aren’t necessarily comfortable with. But one significant difference is how this is manifesting. With Ol’ Green Eyes, she’s worried that her boyfriend’s just killing time until he goes back to his ex. In yours, you’re actively disgusted by a fundamental part of your ex’s past and are trying to force her to pretend that it never happened. And that ain’t cool.

This is generally where I introduce folks to my good friend The Chair Leg of Truth.

But you know what? You sound young, NFI and there’s a chance that you can realize just what you’re doing wrong and maybe not sabotage this relationship before it even has a chance to begin. First of all: your girlfriend has a past – a past that has absolutely nothing to do with you – like all people do. As with 99.9% of the relationships you will ever have in your life, your girlfriend had partners before you, had sex before she met you and did things that you may or may not approve of before she met you. And all of those experiences? They made her the woman she is today… the woman that you are into and want to date. So your interest and attraction to her are, ultimately, because of those past experiences, not despite them. Without her history, she wouldn’t be who she is and – in all likelihood – you two wouldn’t be dating.

Second of all: your girlfriend has a kink, as many people do. Her particular kink involves the boundaries of pleasure and pain. This isn’t terribly unusual; a lot of kinky people get similar enjoyment out of the release that comes from the co-mingling of the two. But, fun fact: the fact that she’s a masochist doesn’t mean she was being “abused”. It means that she was a willing participant in forms of sexual contact that – assuming everyone followed best BDSM practices – that she and her partners negotiated and planned out well in advance, with thought and care for her limits and her safety.

Now her kink is not your kink and that’s fine. There’re plenty of folks who get off to things that make me go “Really? Ok then…” But getting up in self-righteous judgement because you don’t dig the things that she enjoyed? That’s not cool, Chief.

Which brings us to your first question: can she really stop wanting that? Well, theoretically, yes. There are folks who’ll go through stages of sexual experimentation and get into kinks or lifestyles that they may not be into later on. It could be that she was trying masochism to please her partner or partners at the time. She might have been trying it out because she’s sexually adventurous and willing to try new things. Her tastes may have changed over time and now she’s not as into it as she used to be.

But you know what’s far more likely? She’s telling you that she’s no longer into it because you slut-shamed her for being into kinky sex. It’s not that she is no longer into the kind of sex she enjoyed previously but that she doesn’t want to deal with your judgmental bulls

t about what she did long before the two of you ever got together.

Similarly, can you ask her to take down the pictures of her? Well yes, technically you can ask. As in, you can flap your lips and make the words go. But do you have the right to ask and expect her to actually give your words consideration? Not so much. Not when it’s paired with your other questions.

There’re legitimate reasons to be concerned when somebody has sexually explicit photos online. We live in a profoundly sex-negative culture and people frequently use nude or sexual photos – taken consensually or otherwise – as levers to harm and harass folks. It’s not unreasonable to be worried that those pictures might, for example, might cost her a job in the future or used by somebody to try to humiliate her. But when your impetus is “this is a reminder that you had sex before me – and sex I don’t like – and I don’t want those out there”? That’s a big NOPE from me, chief.

So what do you do about all of this?

Well first of all, if you want this relationship to work, I suggest you go and do some reading about BDSM and masochism in particular. Get a copy of When Someone You Love is Kinky and familiarize yourself with the whys and wherefores of kink with books like Tristan Taormino’s The Ultimate Guide to Kink: BDSM, Role Play and the Erotic Edge so you at least can understand your girlfriend’s interests. You don’t need to need to share her kink, but maybe having some understanding about various kinks means that you won’t give her crap about her sexual interests or make her feel like a slut for having an adventurous sex life.

Work on accepting the fact that somebody’s past isn’t a reflection on you and that it’s made her into the person you want to date now. Loving somebody means understanding and accepting them as an entire person, not as somebody that you can take piecemeal and just remove the bits you don’t like.

Failing that? You can accept that the two of you aren’t right for each other and let her find someone who isn’t going to judge her for her past.

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 a 22 year old college student, and I’m in something of a conundrum. See, about a month back I finally mustered up the courage to talk to my semester-long crush in one of my classes. First we bantered a little in class, then we had long talks around campus, then we were out on a lunch date, and the next thing I knew we were having steamy rooftop makeout time. Since then, we’ve been spending tons of time together: 4 days a week, easy, and for many hours at a time. We get along like a house on fire, as you might say; we enjoy each other’s company and the sex is great.

If it sounds good, that’s because it has been, but here’s the catch: she has a boyfriend. She was cheating on him with a guy who apparently became extremely needy and got the brush before I met her, but her boyfriend has been with her for years now. Their relationship is, by her admission, in dire straits. She talks about seeing him like it’s an undesirable obligation, and says that when she has sex with him she’s either thinking about me or watching the clock. She’s been totally transparent about this with me from the start.

I was wary of this arrangement from the get-go, too, and I tried my best not to get emotionally invested in her. Unfortunately, a month of near constant contact has left me seeing this girl as someone who I want to get serious with, and the way she acts when she’s with me is giving me the same impression of her. We hold hands and kiss in public, we do stuff together (apart from sex), she’s met my parents… At this point, I just want to dispense with the secrecy and become a couple in name as well as action.

So I bit the bullet and asked her to dump him. She seemed amenable to the idea, but worried that he was depressed and relied on her to keep himself afloat and that she wasn’t really sure how to dump him, especially after such a long time. She agreed to think about it, in any case. My questions, then, are these: how strongly should I feel comfortable pushing her to dump her boyfriend, since she seems to be with him more out of inertia than actual love? And if she says yes and goes through with it, how do I build trust with someone who can so brazenly cheat, even when she’s been totally honest in all our interactions?

Thanks a bunch,

Replacement Goldfish

DEAR REPLACEMENT GOLDFISH: Before you go all in on your snugglebunny RG, I think you may want to take a few minutes and seriously think about your relationship with her. Right now, you’re in a secretive relationship with someone who has been repeatedly cheating on her boyfriend of many years – first with the dude before you and now with you. And these are the people you know of. All the while, she’s continuing to still be with her boyfriend, whom she professes she doesn’t like all that much.

Now to be sure, my views on monogamy are nuanced at best (and – in fairness – not necessarily always popular either) and I don’t think that cheating is the worst thing that could happen in a relationship. Sometimes it’s the least bad option in an awful situation. Sometimes, especially towards the end of a relationship in a downward spiral, it’s a person’s way of slamming their hand down on the self-destruct switch. I also don’t necessarily think that “once a cheater, always a cheater” is true or even necessarily fair.

But with all that being said: I think you’re heading into a bad situation. Thus far, she’s telling you that she’s afraid to hurt him by breaking up with him, but she’s been screwing other people behind his back (so we’re lead to believe) and she’s currently very publicly cheating on him with you. I’m a big believer in “deeds, not words,” and while her mouth is saying one thing, her actions are saying another entirely. Even if everything she’s saying is the god’s honest truth… that’s an awful thing to do to somebody. Especially if she’s already afraid to dump her boyfriend for fear that he might hurt himself.

So let’s just say that right now I’m not really that inclined to see her in the most favorable light right now.

But hey, I’ll be charitable and assume that she’s being sincere and honest with you about her and her boyfriend. Breaking up with someone you’ve been in a long-term relationship with can be difficult, even when you know it’s what needs to be done. But even if she’s being honest with you about all of this and isn’t just stringing you along like the latest in a line of side-pieces… her behavior suggests somebody who is either very self-centered or doesn’t stop to think about the unnecessary pain she’s causing to others. That, in and of itself, is a pretty strong sign that she is not someone you should be in a relationship with in the first place. She may be wonderful in all these other ways, but if she’s that blithely unaware of the consequences of her actions, then the odds are good that she’s going to hurt you in a similar manner, even if she doesn’t mean to.

I don’t think that entering a relationship with someone that started via infidelity means you can’t or shouldn’t trust them. Nuance exists, circumstances differ and not all infidelities are equal. But in your specific case, FG? I think it’s a bad, bad, HOLY CRAP NO bad idea no matter how you slice it. Either she’s a serial cheater, someone who isn’t good at monogamous relationships or she doesn’t think about how what she does affects other people. None of those are signs that continuing to date her is a good idea.

My advice? Save yourself the future heartache and pain that you’re currently setting yourself up for. Stop pressuring her to dump her boyfriend, dump her yourself, and find someone who isn’t coming with this much ethically questionable baggage. You can do much better than this.

Good luck.

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I have found myself stuck in a couple problems.

You see, I have a boyfriend, weve been together for about two years and he’s really, really sweet. We love each other a lot. There’s, however, one major issue: I’m asexual and he’s not. I ended up giving in to his desires because he was either too desperate or I pitied him for having an ace girlfriend like me. But I can’t really enjoy it, at all. I find myself panicking inside and praying for him to finish soon (and just so you know, I don’t really think he’s bad at it. I’ve tried masturbating before and the sensation is the about the same). We never really fought about it, and I tend to keep this issue to myself.

Given that, there is yet another problem. A bigger one, though it might sound stupid.

There’s this person I met on the internet four years ago (I’m pretty sure this person is a girl, so I’ll refer this person as a she to make things easier). She hides herself behind the image and name of a male fictional character. We’ve met online one day, started chatting and then we became friends. Although she really never told me anything about her “true identity”, I started searching for her in the web with some info she might “accidentally” have spilled (mostly her artworks). So I found some of her profiles in social networks, and I have some pretty solid evidence that those profiles belong to the person behind that character. And the more I found out about her, the more it piqued my interest. It’s really creepy what I’ve done, but I couldn’t help myself. So I kept silent about any info I’ve found about her. Anyways, there was a point where she started studying really hard for her masters, so for about a year and a half, we didn’t chat as often, but we never forgot each other, and kept sending messages every now and then.

About three months ago she was finally free from her masters and she came to me to let me know she was available again. One day about those three months ago I experienced an emotional crisis due to family issues. I was feeling really, really, really lame and cried a lot. I was desperate to talk to someone, but my boyfriend wouldn’t respond and my best friend was busy, studying for her exams. Then, like in a miracle that girl messaged me, and I responded right away, and I let out all of what I was going through. From that day on, we came back to chatting more than ever. And when I came to it, we were flirting each other.

At first, we both took that as a joke, but then I found myself getting really emotional about her, so let’s say I have slipped some hints about my feelings for her. Then she said “Don’t fall for me, we’re so far apart and I’m not fond distance relationships”, and I just played it off, saying “Nah, don’t worry”. And we kept chatting and “flirting” like always, and I couldn’t really erase my romantic feelings about her. So I kept those feelings for myself. But… as time passed we got closer and closer and closer… and flirtier… And I’ve always kept playing along. Until a couple days she said to me “I might as well fall for you, y’know. You better take responsibility if this ever happens”.

I squealed. My heart was beating like crazy.

My reply? I laughed and said “guilty as charged”.

And now she’s been talking about actual plans on meeting me in real life.

If you ever ask me, while all this stuff happened, my relationship with my boyfriend was just normal. And I didn’t really forget about him. And… she never really asked if I had a boyfriend… and I never really mentioned it.

And here’s my dilemma: I love both of them. Deeply. I don’t want to ruin my relationship with my boyfriend because of someone I’ve never met IRL before (plus never told me about their real name or face), but I also don’t want to give up on that girl. So I find myself unable to make a choice. And if ever comes a situation where I need to tell them the truth, I don’t want to hurt any of them, or damage our relationships.

It sounds really crazy, but… this was the best way I could explain this. Can you perhaps share me some advice?

One Crooked Lovebird.

DEAR ONE CROOKED LOVEBIRD: Hoo boy. This is gonna be a rough one.

First things first: stop having sex with your boyfriend, OCL. While I do believe in making arrangements when couples have mismatched libidos, there’s “providing your partner with a handjob/dirty talk/oral/what-have-you because you love them and want to make them happy” and then there’s “doing things that make you freak out and want to curl up and cry in the shower”. Forcing yourself to have sex which is clearly something you can’t stand is only going to make you miserable. That’s not fair to you and, I suspect if he knew how it was making you feel, it’d freak him out too. You and he need to have a long talk about all things sexual and asexual in your relationship because this is a bad scene. He deserves to know how you feel, you deserve to have the sex – or lack-thereof – that you want and if you want this relationship to continue, you’re going to have to find a very different compromise.

So that’s your first task. Stop having sex with him and have a long and honest talk with him and find some other way of making things work when sex with you is off the table, period the end. And if he can’t handle that… well, I know you love him, but that’s a sign that this relationship isn’t going to work.

Second things second… well, brace yourself because I’m going to be blunt and you’re not going to like this. And while I know there’s going to be an instinctual push to say that I don’t know what I’m talking about, I want to assure you: I have been dealing with people online for longer than you’ve been alive. I have seen and experienced just about every form of online relationship it is possible to have, romantic and platonic, both good and bad. So believe me, this is coming from personal, bitter and hard-won experience when I tell you this:

You’re not in love with this other person.

You are in love with the idea of them. They are not a person to you right now, they are a fantasy. You have a lot of assumptions and maybes built around things that may or may not be the person in question.  You have literally no idea who they really are. You don’t know their real name, what they look like or even their gender. You don’t know if this person even exists in the first place. You know nothing (Jon Snow…). It is extremely easy to keep and maintain a fake persona online, even for years. You don’t know that the evidence they “accidentally” shared was accidental or even theirs in the first place. There are plenty of folks who know all the tricks to create the impression of “oops, I didn’t mean to do that” in order to send people looking in the way they want.

And now the two of you are talking about meeting up? Um… no. Not just no but hell no. This is waving more red flags than a Chinese military parade.

Straight talk: even if this person is 100% who you think they are, that doesn’t mean that starting a relationship with them is a good idea. The fact that she hasn’t seen fit to share with you even little things like their name is a bad sign. Moreover, just because you click online doesn’t mean that you’re going to click in person. It’s great to say that you know somebody’s soul or their true self, but relationships have a physical component too, and that can’t be judged except in person. Even if you’re asexual, there are still issues ranging from “do you like how they smell” to “do you like how they feel when you cuddle together on the couch” that affect compatibility and attraction. You literally cannot judge these except in person and I have seen more online “relationships” than I can count founder on the rocks of things not working in person.

But again: that assumes that your online cuddlebug exists. Quite frankly, from everything you’ve told me, I’m going to say “no, no they don’t,” and if they do, they’re demonstrably not who you think.

So my second piece advice is that you need to take several steps back from your online friend until you have some very solid evidence that a) they exist and b) who they actually are. This means more than just names and pictures; those are absurdly easy to come by. I mean Skype chats where you can see them and test them by having a friend call them while you’re chatting with them as well as an extensively well documented online presence of long standing.

And even then, I’d be pretty damn skeptical. I’d certainly not say you’re in the clear to declare your everlasting love for them. They’re going to have to do a lot of work to prove that they’re legit before I’d say that meeting up platonically in a very public place with many people you know in close proximity is a reasonable idea

Don’t let yourself get caught up and hurt because of a fantasy.

I know I’ve just dumped a lot of harshness on you, OCL, and I know it sucks. Believe me, I wish I could give you happier, easier to digest advice. But right now, you’re in a bad, if not potentially dangerous place and you need to make a lot of changes to make it right. Take some time to work on the relationship you currently have before you worry about the one that you wish you had. Your online friend needs to take a distant place in your priorities until they can prove themselves to you beyond any doubts.

Trust me: I have been there, I have done that and I have a lovely line of t-shirts you can peruse from the experience.

Good luck.

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