Jess asks :
Hi Lucy,
Me and my boyfriend have been together for 8 months now. Over the past 3 months he's become a lot more distant and I've found out that he has been lying to me quite a lot. Throughout our relationship he's been texting another girl and has now admitted that he does fancy her and, if she didn’t have a boyfriend, he would have asked her out instead of me. He's gone to gigs and meals with his friends, which is fine, but he lies about it and just stops texting for hours while he's out without telling me the reason, so I worry where he is or think he's mad at me. He's held parties with all of his friends and everyone he knows and not invited me or even told me about it. He hasn't let me meet any of his friends, even though he has met and hung out with every single one of mine. It's just starting to build up and get to me, and now I feel like he doesn't really want me around and doesn't love me if he's happy to lie to me and keep me away from all of his friends. I had a lot of problems at the start with self-esteem and issues with my family. He's been so patient with me and helped me through it all, and I can't thank him enough for that, so I'm reluctant to give up on him, but I'm not sure where to go from here. I'm not sure if it's worth trying to get through it, and if it is, I'm not sure where to start with him. We've talked extensively about it and he's apologised, but nothing's changed. What do I do?
Our Reply
Hi Jess,
One of the most important things in your relationship is trust and it seems lacking here on your part. If you have talked about this to him a lot and nothing has changed then it might never. You need to ask yourself can you find a way to handle this element of the relationship or do you see it getting to you even more the longer it carries on?
It is right tor recognise the good things that he has done for you in your time together and it sounds like he was a great help with your self-esteem issues. There does come a point however when it helps to look at the bad and the good and if one outweighs the other. He lies to you, he doesn’t invite you out with his friends, he admitted that he would have gone out with another girl if she had been single, he doesn’t communicate with you. All of these are rather big issues that probably need to be dealt with before moving on and building up the truest again.
Perhaps he is worried that if you are out of your comfort zone with his friends that you will find it difficult and that you self-esteem issues might resurface. If that is the case then he needs to communicate with you can tell you his reasons for keeping you from that part of his life.
If he isn’t willing to meet you half way then perhaps it’s time that you find someone who will.
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