DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m (33F) writing in regard to my relationship with my husband (36M). We’ve been married for almost six years after dating for three. We’ve always had a solid relationship built on friendship and trust. We have shared interests that make our time together robust. We frequently travel, go for hikes, enjoy theater and film along with healthy intellectual debate, and have a solid, expansive social network. We make a point of scheduling time away from each other to maintain our senses of individuality. We’ve had friends call us #relationshipgoals and, truly, I feel so fortunate to have found a wonderful, kind, caring, intelligent, sociable, likable partner.

But lately, things have been difficult. In terms of family, his mom was recently diagnosed with cancer. Meanwhile, my mom has discovered the far-right and is becoming increasingly difficult to spend time with. Neither live nearby, but my mom has co-dependency issues and refuses to give us much space, resulting in us spending way too much time with her and not enough with his family. We’ve tried to draw boundaries and limit our time with her but, so far, these efforts haven’t been effective.

Right before the pandemic, we purchased a large house in a nice neighborhood for a steal because it needs a lot of work. A LOT of work. This moved along swiftly during the pandemic, but since then, my husband has moved between jobs every few months. He isn’t lazy and is an excellent worker, but he hit his late 30s and realized that he still doesn’t know what he wants to be when he grows up. He’s started his own business recently and it’s going well, but the house is causing a financial strain and increasing our burden of work, all while the money we originally budgeted to pay for the renovation has dried up. I try not to be resentful of my role as the financial support of the household, but it’s difficult to watch him have the freedom to make changes while I have to stay in my corporate office job to pay for it. I’d love to spend time exploring other career paths or creative outlets, but if I quit my job, we literally wouldn’t be able to afford, well, anything. Even taking a pay cut at this point is unrealistic.

This is all compounded by the weather. We live in an area notorious for snowfall, but climate change is really making the reputation nefarious. I have severe seasonal affective disorder. I do it all – CBT, lightbox therapy, meditation, supplements, but regardless, every year, post-holiday, I fall into a deep depression that lasts until the weather turns sunny again. The changing light cycles disrupt my circadian rhythm, so I’m hardly able to sleep, despite being exhausted all the time. I am not a fun person to be around this time of year, no matter how hard I try to be better.

We talk about our overall lack of happiness all the time, but it’s always in circles. There is no clear path forward or back into the time when we were happy. Neither of us is adept at visualizing the future. I’m leaning toward having kids but all of the issues above are giving him pause. My clockwork depression is making me a miserable partner and I understand why he can’t imagine adding a squalling infant to the household right now. He continues to bring up the idea of moving to a warmer area, which I’m open to, but leaving our support network and community is terrifying, especially if we plan on starting a family once we get there.

All the stress is weighing on our marriage, sexually, emotionally, and mentally. We’ve always had an easy relationship, but moving into the next phase of life is really testing our marriage in ways I hadn’t anticipated. I just don’t know how to find a way back into the sun.

Any feedback is appreciated.�Snowbound Wife

DEAR SNOWBOUND WIFE: Ever have one of those days that where nothing would go right if you held a gun to its head, and some part of you says “could be worse, could be raining”, only to for the skies darken and the pillars of Heaven shake as soon as the last syllable escapes your lips?

It sounds like that’s been the last several years for you and your husband, SW. If it were just one thing here – parental issues, financial stresses, chronic SAD – then it would be ok. Frustrating, but ok. But when each one just gets stacked on top of the other, you suddenly have a deep and intimate understanding of the metaphor involving camels, straw and weight limits.

The most frustrating thing about, well, any of this is how there’s simply not a break from it. You turn around from one life stressor just to be smacked in the face by another, like pies being hurled by a passive-aggressive clown.

Small wonder that you and your husband are at wits end and worried about… well, everything. These are the sort of constant not-so-petty complaints that just stack up until you worry that your marriage is going to break under the strain of it all.

The good news is: this is all temporary, even if it doesn’t feel like it right now. A mantra to keep running in the back of your minds is “This too, shall pass.” One of the things to keep yourselves afloat through all of this is to remind yourselves that this isn’t permanent, that you two won’t feel like this forever, and if you can hang on, you’ll make it through.

So what do you do to help ensure that your marriage actually makes it through to the other side intact?

Well, there’re a couple of things – some practical, some more emotional.

First and foremost is going to be about the story you and your husband tell yourselves about your marriage and this time of crisis. I realize this sounds like some “just put positive energy out there” embrace-The-Secret woo, but there’s actually a point to it. The way we think about our relationships and the story we tell about them affects how we feel. When we look at the turbulent times in our relationship and think “we’re barely keeping it together, if we get through this, it’ll be a miracle…”, we are subconsciously emphasizing the idea that the relationship itself is being irreparably damaged by the stress. This ends up being a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy; you’re priming your brain to latch on to things as signs of irreparable harm, wounds that never fully heal when the crisis has passed.

Instead, you and your husband want to remind yourselves that you’re in this together as a team, and you’ll get through it because you’re a team. You’re functionally telling yourself to look not for signs of damage, but for ways that the two of you to come together and figure things out together, instead of addressing each issue as individuals… especially when it feels like that aspect of the crisis is more about one person than the other. And when you emphasize the “we’re a team and that’s how we’re going to get through this”, you are priming yourself to look to this as something that will ultimately strengthen your bond, rather than damaging it.

Now this doesn’t mean that positive thinking will get you through this on its own. Nah, that part’s going to take work – a lot of it – compromise, and collaboration. But the “this is temporary, it’s going to be rough but we’re gonna do it” mindset is part of how you motivate yourselves to white knuckle your way through and hold on while you do the hard work.

Which brings us to the next part: figuring out what the precise stresses are and how you can mitigate them wherever possible. Some of it is fairly obvious, like dealing with your mother’s dalliances with the fascist right and her demands on your time and energy.

I wish you’d said a bit more about how she’s refusing to respect your boundaries, so I don’t waste your time by throwing out ideas you’ve already tried. However, one thing I will say is that enforcing boundaries isn’t about asking nicely and hoping the other person will comply. It’s about making it clear that your boundaries are not optional and being willing to do things that may be unpleasant or uncomfortable in the name of enforcing them.

One of the reasons why some people will ignore stated boundaries is because not only are their no consequences for doing so, but because the person violating them will threaten consequences of their own for having those boundaries in the first place. This is especially common with parents or people who see themselves as having some form of authority over us – real or not. They rely on the inherent discomfort of saying “no” and the possibility of their opprobrium to push past our “no”. But unless your mother has some legitimate hold over you – you’re financially dependent on her in some form, for example – the only hold she has is what you’re willing to give her. So enforcing those boundaries means refusing to give into the threat of her disapproval and making it clear that her presence in your life is contingent on her good behavior and avoiding your disapproval.

Drawing lines – things like we’re only available on these occasions, we’re not going to jump just because you said frog, if you’re going to act like this or say these things in our presence, one of us will be leaving – is the start. The next step is to do it, with neither warning, nor negotiation, nor explanation. If you draw the line of “If you repeat that Tucker Carlson bulls--t around us, we’re out“, then you have to be willing to grab your things and say “we’re out” as soon as she says it. If she’s demanding you show up to do things after you said you can’t or won’t, then you have to be willing to stick to that. This includes saying “we said no” and “we told you exactly what our availability was”, over and over again in the face of her persistence or goading. And I mean it when I say “no explanation”. As soon as you’re explaining or rationalizing, you’re no longer enforcing a boundary; you’ve entered the first stages of a negotiation.

No, as the saying goes, is a complete sentence. You don’t need to justify the existence of your boundaries. Justifying them frames them as something that can only exist as long as your mother agrees that they exist. Instead, it’s time for your mother to be on the receiving end of something children have heard since time immemorial: “Because I said so”. And you and your husband should be as one on this, each backing up the other.

Remember: your presence in her life is entirely contingent on her good behavior. If she doesn’t want to abide by a “our house, our lives, our rules” policy, that’s her choice… but it means that she won’t be a part of your lives until she does.

Another thing that seems to be stressing you both out is the unknown. Right now, there’s a lot of ambiguity about your future – your husband’s career path, the possibility of moving to some place that’s less likely to trigger your SAD, etc. As a general rule, people don’t like ambiguity and the uncertain; it stresses us out because we ultimately feel powerless. Addressing this ambiguity and getting some clarity is going to be a big part of how to lessen the toll it takes on you. This doesn’t mean that you’re going to find certainty or guaranteed answers, but tackling those ambiguous areas together will help you both gain a sense of control.

Your husband’s career and the financial strain it’s causing is a good place to start. Part of the problem is that this seems to be a big gray area, a map of the future that is mostly blank except for “here be dragons”. That empty space is a stressor in and of itself, because you have no idea how long you’ll have to hold on for until things lessen up. Just the idea of “you’ll just have to stick this out and hope your endurance holds out” is enough to drain the willpower from many, if not most people.

This is why I one thing that I think will help would be for the two of you to sit down and map things out as best as you can. Taking a long, hard look at his business and trying to calculate a timeline of when and how it’ll come to enough profitability that he’ll be able to shoulder his share of the financial burden will help. The idea that there’s a distinct end point, where things will get better makes it much easier to hang on. You have something to look to, a metric to measure progress by and milestones that tell you how much closer you are to the end. If you know that things will get better in a year, two years, whatever, then you know how to better manage your energy, instead of feeling like you have to throw everything you have at it and hope for the best. And seeing that day of release coming closer and closer can renew your strength and give you that last little bit that you need to hang in there.

It will also give the two of you more of a sense of control in your own lives, especially at a time when everything feels like its spiraling out of control.

Another thing that I think would be helpful would be for you two to collect information for potential future plans. You mention, for example, that you’d love a career change yourself, but the damage it could do to your financial situation is prohibitive. This is entirely understandable… but I wonder (since you don’t mention it) if this worry is keeping you from even looking. Doing some research, seeing what may be available to you, now or in the near future, costs very little. At worst, all that happens is that you confirm that this is a goal that may need to be put on hold for a little while – making it to the point of that more equitable share with your husband. At best, you may find that there’re opportunities out there that you didn’t know about, ones that won’t devastate you.

The same goes for the possibility of moving. Yeah, leaving your support network is incredibly intimidating, and it’s entirely understandable why that would be a disincentive. But doing some research – looking into cost of living differences, potential job opportunities, even the possibility of finding a new support network in the area – can help you feel like you at least know what your options are. Knowing what the actual pros and cons are, versus the potential ones, helps eliminate that uncomfortable ambiguity. As weird as it sounds, knowing for sure that moving to X city or Y state would not work at all is a relief. It means that at least now you can deal with the disappointment, instead of being hung up in this quantum state of “possible/not possible” and feeling the worst of both. You and your husband can even prioritize your searches by the possibility of a pre-existing support network – friends of friends, more distant family members, etc. – or the likelihood of being able to build a new one.

The benefit to some of this is that you take advantage of the part of your brain that treats the imagined future as having already happened. The act of doing the research often feels like you’re doing the work already. In most cases, this ends up being a form of procrastination. In your case, however, you’re deliberately invoking that aspect of human psychology; you’re giving yourself a feeling of progress specifically to make it possible for you to hang in through the roughest parts. You get a sense of relief that a decision has been made, that the results are already here… a feeling that can help restore your sense of hope and shore up your emotional endurance.

And, of course, this means that you may well find that there are options that you weren’t aware of that could make life that much better for the two of you.

The final thing I would suggest is that you and your husband both ensure that you treat each other like you’re in this together. This is a two-prong approach, and both aspects will be important.

The first is that you two regularly sit down and make sure that you’re both shouldering a roughly equal amount of the burden for one another. This doesn’t mean that all tasks and responsibilities need to be split perfectly evenly, but it does mean that what you take on and what he takes on balances out more or less.

For example, right now, you’re the primary provider to the household income. That’s a pretty significant burden. Finding ways for your husband to take up burdens in other areas so that you aren’t overloaded will be important. That may mean that be takes on the lion’s share of the household maintenance – especially for any renovation or work that can be done without a contractor, for example – or he handles things that you’re too stressed or busy to manage on top of your full-time job. The specifics aren’t as important as the feeling that you’re both pitching in roughly equally, and neither feels like they’re being cheated.

The other prong is for both of you to find ways to support and reaffirm your connection with each other. There’re lots of ways this can be done. Doing things for one another to help the other de-stress is a great start. Your husband can take a day to pamper you and give you a chance to rest, for example. You may find little things for him, just because you know he’d like them. And of course, the two of you should take time when you can to treat yourselves as a couple, not just two individuals. Part of making a relationship last through the hard times is to remember that you’re not just two people, you’re a gestalt entity that is your relationship together – a sort of fleshy, emotional Voltron. Doing things for the relationship, even if it’s just a romantic date night every few weeks, helps reinforce that s--t may be hard, but you have each other and that’s important.

Some of this may be made easier if you have some outside help. Couple’s counseling isn’t just about fixing things that may be broken; sometimes it’s about helping facilitate things and finding solutions before they become problems. If you have the time and financial wherewithal, I’d recommend it.

To be sure: this is easy to say from the comfort of my computer, less easy to do from the messy reality that is your lives. But even if you approach this in small steps, rather than big sweeping gestures, those little moments of connection, reassurance, rest and balance go a very long way towards easing the stress on your relationship.

Just remember though: you’re both a team, and you’ll get through this together. S--t’s rough, but it can’t rain all the time. This too, shall pass.

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’ve been reading this blog for nearly a decade now and I never thought I’d be submitting a question. But here goes!

I have a work friend. I’ve known him for a few years, but I recently changed jobs at my organization and now work with him directly. We’ve always been chatty, and we have a similar sense of humor so we get along well. Recently he’s been getting more… clingy and demanding of my time. Asking to have impromptu meetings once or twice a day. Asking if we can take our breaks together. Texting me more outside of work.

This past week was a stressful week. I had a ton going on. Plus he was being needy. On Friday, he dropped the ball on something and then called me to complain about how it’s everyone’s fault but his. It was exhausting and stressful and I decided to give myself a much needed break over the weekend. I woke up sick the next day (because of poor sleep and anxiety). He texted me about something he saw on sale midday. I ignored. He texted me a few hours later to ask if I was pissed at him. I told him I was sick and left it at that.

The next day he again asked if I was pissed at him, and I wasn’t originally, but that changed. I told him I was still sick and needed space. On Monday he texted me saying “Okay. Sick…i see what that really means.” To which I responded with a much more politely worded “what he actual f--k.” I explained “spoons” and told him I needed space (again).

I’m an anxious person. I’m on an SSRI, but even with that some situations will push me over the edge and just sort of shut me down. I’m usually pretty good at resolving those situations myself but this one makes me feel especially trapped. My partner has been incredibly supportive through this, but I dunno. I want some outside advice I guess.

My coworker is roughly 15 years older than me, and is a single, straight, white dude. He seems to consider himself a bit of a mentor for me (I do not consider him a mentor) and also seems like he has a bit of a crush on me. I’m conventionally attractive and have a bubbly personality at work (my at home self doesn’t put the extrovert face on). It wouldn’t be the first time a coworker has crushed on me, but it’s the most uncomfortable in a long time.

I know I need to set boundaries, but I also expect that he’s going to react poorly to that. He’s not someone I can avoid working with (at least for now, I have job apps out for unrelated reasons). I’m not sure how to broach this without making this all worse. And just thinking about it has been at the edge of a panic attack.

Advice would be appreciated.

Thank you,

Not Looking For A Work Husband

DEAR NOT LOOKNIG FOR A WORK HUSBAND: This sounds like an uncomfortable situation, NLFAWH, so I’m glad your partner’s been supportive. Having friends in your corner – both for moral support and someone to say “yeah, that sounds over the line” – can be important. Doubly so when this is the sort of situation where you have to work with them directly.

Now, I’m going to be honest: I’m not going to be the best person to come to for advice on dealing with this in the office.

I do, however, have insight on dealing with someone who’s unilaterally decided that they’re not just your mentor, but that they’re an important figure in your life… regardless of your thoughts on the matter. I’ve had similar issues with folks like this in the past and it’s never a comfortable situation.

I can also tell you from experience that trying to ignore it, play it off or otherwise acting like it’s no big deal isn’t going to help.

I think you’re correct: you’re going to need to lay down some boundaries. This is very much a case where silence is going to be taken as consent. The fact that he’s decided he’s taking you ‘under his wing’, as it were, without asking or offering first is kind of a tell of where his head’s at. It’s a power play of sorts – a paternalistic (literally, in some cases) approach of declaring that he knows more than you and is going to generously allow you to benefit from his wisdom and experience. Not pushing back or giving any sort of resistance is going to be seen as tacit approval.

I think the other thing to keep in mind – and again, I’ve had similar experiences, though under different context – is that this sounds like someone who doesn’t have much else going on in their life. It’s certainly possible that he has a crush on you or is dealing with an attraction to you, but that may not necessarily be the whole story. I’ve found that people who act like this tend to be isolated and/or lonely. The “mentorship” is often less “I see potential in you and want you to achieve it” and more an attempt to fill that void in his life with someone else – often someone younger and at least somewhat compliant.

A few of the tells are in how he feels entitled to your time and attention – the texting at all hours, even when it’s not about work; the getting upset when you don’t respond immediately to his texts; even the passive-aggressive “oh I see how it is” response when you tell him (honestly) that you were ill. This can read like a Nice Guy with a crush, but it also has a ring of “I do all this for you and this is the gratitude I get” to me – a certain mix of “disappointed parent” and authority figure, even when those roles are self-appointed.

(Of course, there’s no reason this couldn’t be both; there’s plenty of room for all kinds of inappropriate behavior here.)

So what do you do about this at work? Well, as I said, I’m not the best for dealing with the office issues here – for that, I recommend checking out Alison Green of the excellent workplace advice column “Ask A Manager”. Since Green’s the expert on inter-office matters and I’m not, I reached out for her insight on what to do here, and she was kind enough to respond:

“The easiest way [to establish boundaries] is probably to just pull way back on non-work contact — just by not responding to it, or taking days to respond to it and then being like “so busy lately, don’t have a lot of time” or even “I’m trying to set better boundaries between work and non-work life so I’m not really answering texts from anyone at work” (he will be offended by that because he considers himself more than a coworker, but that’s fine) and then hope/assume he’ll begrudgingly get the message after a few weeks.

There is always a risk that the guy in that situation will become more obnoxious but it could just be an extinction burst, after which he’ll make his peace with it … or he could escalate. Depending on your sense of how that’s likely to go with him, it could make sense to talk to HR now and just say, “Right now I feel like I can handle this on my own but I want you to be aware of it in case he becomes more problematic in response to me setting boundaries.” In other words, it’s not necessarily an official HR complaint NOW, but it could definitely go in that direction and there’s no reason you can’t give them a heads-up that it’s something you’re dealing with so you’re assured they’ll have your back (and also because it’s always possible that it’ll turn out this guy has already been warned about similar behavior with other women). “

On the personal level, it’s going to be important to draw very clear lines and make it known that you’re at work and your work relationship is going to be contained within the bounds of what you will and won’t put up with. Right now, this dude is pushing at the edges of the work/life separation and making assumptions about the nature of your relationship that are decidedly not cool with you.

That would mean telling your coworker that you’d prefer to keep the conversation to the tasks at hand, that you’re not available for “meetings” at all hours of the day and that you prefer to leave work at work. You should also make it clear that while you appreciate that you’ve got a friendly relationship at work, that’s also where it ends; you’re not interested in connecting outside of work, and you’d prefer to keep things professional.

It’s also going to require making it clear that anything he does “for” you when you haven’t asked doesn’t obligate you to him, just because he did it in the first place. If you’re trading favors, then that’s one thing. But if he believes that you owe him in some way when he’s done something that you didn’t ask for? That’s something that should be shut down ASAP; you don’t get to impose obligations on others by doing something “nice” for them.

Now, there’re two things here that should be taken into consideration. The first is that, as you said: you’re an anxious person, and some stressful situations can cause you to shut down. The second is how he’ll respond to being told “no” by someone he clearly considers to be subordinate to him – in life, if not in the org chart. Again, speaking from experience: people like this often get upset when someone rejects their oh-so-generous strings-attached “mentorship”. It cuts into their self-identity, and people react badly when that’s threatened. So I don’t think it’s unreasonable to worry that he’d blow up at you over it.

This is why I think that confronting him should be done at a safe distance – ideally via email. Write out what you need him to know – you’re not interested in being his mentor, you’re not interested in coordinating breaks, you don’t want to talk outside of work hours and you don’t have the time or the energy for unnecessary “meetings” and you would prefer that you both keep things professional and about the job. While this can be nerve-wracking, especially after you hit “send”, it’s still going to be far less stressful than trying to have this conversation face to face. Especially if he’s the sort of person who would try to exploit your anxiety by bowling you over with objections, deflections and derailments that may be only tangential to what you’re talking about.

Doing it by email – and possibly by your work email at that – also ensures that there’s a paper trail of your telling this dude to step off.

What happens next is where things get tricky. I don’t know if he’s likely to do more than blow up your phone with messages and texts or throw a tantrum at work, or if he is the sort of person who’d escalate things. You’re the one who deals with him on a daily basis; you, hopefully know him enough to make that call.

This is why I recommend looping others in – your partner, your supervisor, other co-workers you trust. Having more eyes on this and having people who know what’s going on is going to be part of your defense here. Other people knowing minimizes the likelihood that he’ll retaliate, either through getting upset at you or through work. Talking to your supervisor, HR and anyone else that would be appropriate also would mean you have options for how to handle your work obligations or if there’s a way the two of you could be assigned to different teams or projects.

I would also recommend that after you send that email, you filter anything from him into its own inbox. This includes texts – most smartphones have options for managing notifications and messages from individuals – DMs, and the rest.

Here’s the other thing to keep in mind: no matter what he may say, you don’t need to discuss this with him, give him room to explain himself or otherwise let him plead his case. Anything that needed to be said was in that email; that’s the end of the sentence, not the start of a negotiation. As the saying goes: “No” is a complete sentence. So are “leave me alone”, “I said all that there is to be said” and “f--k off”. If he has questions, he’s welcome to reread the email, period, end of discussion, buh-bye now, have a nice day.

I’d also recommend not spending time with him one-on-one until and unless he’s settled down and has demonstrated that he’s going to be cool. The likelihood of his trying to pivot a “work” meeting to an airing of grievances isn’t necessarily high, going by what you’ve written, but it’s not zero either. If he does try this, and he ignores that you’re at work to work, get up and leave; clearly the work part of the meeting is over. If he persists on trying to get you to talk about this with him – especially under the guise of work related issues – then it’s time for a much longer and more pointed talk with HR, possibly including the magic words “hostile work environment”.

Now, in my experience with a situation like this, when my erstwhile ‘mentor’ got to the point where I had to address things, the point was made very clear when I hung up on him in the middle of a tirade. No “sorry, got another call coming in”, no pretense that this was a polite “oh look, I have to go”, it was a “we’re done here, never call me again” and then cutting the connection. The worst I’ve dealt with were occasional voice mails from unknown numbers that alternated between aggrieved and angry and self-pitying, none of which I listened to longer than it took to recognize whose voice it was. But I’m also a cis, straight white male who’s pretty damn broad, so I wasn’t that worried about possible repercussions. I can’t say whether you are similarly insulated, so talk over the potential risks and worries with people whose judgement you can trust. Don’t worry about things seeming too overblown; get a temperature check from your crew, but in the end, go with your gut. You know the situation better than anyone in the end.

Hopefully this all works out well for you, with minimal drama and fuss. And please, write back to let us know how it’s going.

Good luck.

And a huge “thank you” to Alison and Ask A Manager for her wonderful advice and insight!

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

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: It seems like most of your questions are from younger people but maybe you can help me. I am a 67 year old widow of four and half years. I’ve been trying to date for about two. Haven’t been too successful, a few brief friends but nothing really happened with them, which I was ok with. Sometimes you just know when it isn’t going anywhere.

For the last three months, I was seeing a very nice man, charming, nice looking, treated me well. We saw each other once or twice a week. And not ordinary dates, these were like all day and half the night, going to car shows (he has a couple of beautiful classic cars), dining out, seeing the area sights, he’s only lived in the area about 3 years. Great fun. We had lots in common.

Then out of the blue he says we want different things. I did ask what he thought they were, but he didn’t respond. He had a terrible divorce, years ago, but still carries the scars. Sometime after that, he had a 10 year relationship with a woman but they did not live together. He never said why it ended. Though he did remain friends with her father who asked him “why it took him so long” to figure her out.

Anyway, that was a long time ago because it has been 17 years since he had sex. He said with everything going on in his life, it became unimportant. Traveled a lot for his job and was in different cities for months at time.

As I said he just dumps me. I did not see it coming at all. I thought everything was going good, I was totally blindsided. The only out of the ordinary thing that happened was on Christmas. He said something, don’t remember what, so I asked if he thought I was [SLUR REDACTED]. He laughed and said yes. I didn’t think much about it until I got home then started wondering if he really thought that. I may be weird but not stupid or [SLUR].

I texted him and asked if he thought that. His reply was “you sure stew about things” and that I had asked and he was joking. I told him I wasn’t stewing about it and wasn’t it better to ask than to be pis*ed off without him knowing why. It was a couple days after that when he broke up with me.

Another problem may be that I’m a breast cancer survivor. Because of the diagnosis I did not get implants but he knew this before we even met. Since we didn’t get “that” friendly I don’t know if it was in the back of his mind or not. He had said it wasn’t a problem.

Did I do something wrong asking about what he said? If he thought we had different needs shouldn’t we have discussed it before he made the decision for both of us?��I’m not trying to latch on to him because I think I’m running out of choices. I’ll be alright alone if I don’t find someone. Just don’t understand the whole thing. Any advice, insight?

Thank you.

Silver Fox

DEAR SILVER FOX: So right off the bat: I did some editing to your letter because you were casually throwing around a particular word that’s frequently used for autistic people and people with learning disabilities. I’m calling this one out specifically in no small part because many people don’t realize that using the r-word to talk about individuals is hurtful to people with learning disabilities and handicaps, and it’s considered a slur by the community. There’re better ways of expressing yourself than that.

Now let’s get to your question: what happened is that your potential beau decided he didn’t want to be in this relationship. The reason he gave – that you want different things – is ultimately an excuse. It may have been true and he had different goals for a relationship than you, or it may have been a gentle way of letting you down. But either way, whether he was telling the truth or not, what ultimately mattered is that he no longer wanted to be dating you, and ended it.

Here’s the thing about relationships, SF: every aspect of being in one requires both parties to agree, except for in one area – ending it. Ending a relationship isn’t like launching the nukes; both parties don’t need to turn the keys to make it happen. If someone decides that they no longer want to be in a relationship, then they can make the unilateral decision to end it.

Does that seem unfair? Does it feel cruel to just decide one day that this relationship is over regardless of what the other person (or people) think? It’s entirely understandable that it can feel this way; after all, it affects everybody involved. But by that same token, not being able to end it unilaterally is also cruel; there’s nothing good about staying in a relationship that you’ve already decided that you don’t want to be part of. It’s even worse when the other person decides that they’re not done with it and therefore you aren’t done with it.

Are there graceful ways to exit, when you have decided you’re done? Of course. But grace isn’t required, only the decision. The rest is ultimately a question of what kind of relationship the dumper might want with the dumpee, and vice versa. A graceful exit may make a friendship possible, but it’s not required.

Is it possible that asking him about his comment (and your response) is what triggered things? Well… honestly, it’s impossible to tell. Maybe that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Maybe everything was going swimmingly until that very moment and he decided it was time to bounce. Or it could have nothing to do with things at all. It could be because you had a mastectomy, it could be because he lost someone to breast cancer and your relationship dredged up old pain, or that could all just be a red herring. The only person who could really tell you is your ex and, quite honestly, even he may not know. Sometimes we don’t know the real reason we felt a certain way or decided to do things until we’ve had time and distance to gain some perspective on it. So any answer you would get from him would need to have a big asterisk over it, because that’s just his understanding of it now. In six months or a year, it may have changed.

But what does this mean on your end? Well… ultimately, very little changes for you. Ultimately, the only thing you can take from this – really, the only thing you should – take from this is that you two weren’t right for each other. You give yourself closure, accept that there will always be unanswered questions, because life isn’t a BBC miniseries where all the loose ends get wrapped up, and you move on.

You and this person just weren’t a right match at some level. That happens; dating is a numbers game, after all. But there will be others in time, should you want – there’s no age limit to love, sex or relationships. The best you can do is learn what you can, give yourself what comfort you can and try again when you’re ready.

Good luck.

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