My Boyfriend Keeps Putting My Safety at Risk—and Other Advice From the Week
Slate publishes a lot of advice each week, so we’re pulling together a selection of our favorites. Here are a few of the most compelling questions from the week and links to hours of advice reading. This week: a boyfriend’s scary behavior, in-law problems, and bridezillas.
It was an extra-busy week for advice at Slate: This week we presented Help! Wanted, a special series featuring some of the most common questions and themes that come up in our work. In the advising biz, there are certain eternal dilemmas that bedevil letter writers and columnists alike. We took on these age-old problems, and brought in some special guests to help answer your questions. Catch up on all the special columns here.
Determined to See the Best: I (47 F) have been in a relationship with my boyfriend (50 M) for three years. I can make a long list of his good qualities and my teenage children really enjoy spending time with him on occasion. I’m going to get straight to the “but.” Although we have been together for three years, I see him sparingly, as I am a single mom to three great kids. I mainly spend a night or two with him every other weekend while the kids are with their dad. Thus, I don’t really have the opportunity to know what he is like on a day-to-day basis. I probably see him on his best behavior. But I’ve had reason to question some things about him.
I think, but don’t know, that he drinks daily and probably too much. I expressed this concern to him and he basically said he would take it into consideration but I don’t see any change in his drinking. We have politically different views, which is fine with me, except his views are driven by anger and misinformation rather than logic and fact, such that I have had to tell him that we cannot discuss politics; we simply agree to disagree. Once, we were visiting some friends of his a few hours away and he got drunk and told me that he thought I was flirting with another man and didn’t want me coming home with him. I ended up walking by myself at night through a city I didn’t know and taking an Uber two hours home. Last weekend, we drove a few hours to stay at the beach and once each on the way there and the way back, he had an instance of road rage so severe that he was driving alongside the other car screaming and gesturing. I felt so upset and unsafe. And I can’t stop thinking that he has jeopardized my safety on multiple occasions now. What do I do?
Stubborn DIL: My husband and I have been together for seven years. We met when we moved to a foreign country for work and have lived here since. Our families live back in our birth country. My husband wants to move back home and be closer to family. I am all for moving back home. But he wants his mother to live with us, and I am not excited about this idea. I am alright with having his mother over for the weekends or going out together on family dinners, but he wants us to live in a house together, permanently.
I like his mother. She is a kind person, albeit a little self-absorbed. A couple of years ago, she stayed with us for three months. Her constant self-praise, cooking/cleaning tips, and long-winded stories about things I didn’t care about got on my nerves, and I couldn’t wait for her trip to end. I am not excited about the idea of her living with us permanently. I have seen many instances of living with the in-laws leading to resentment, blow-out arguments, etc. I have a civil relationship with my MIL and don’t want to ruin it by living together. My husband, however, is determined that she should live with us when we move. He agrees that this sort of living arrangement hasn’t worked out for other people in our families, but feels that his mother is unlike other bossy MILs and with compromise on both sides, we can make this work. He feels his mother is growing old (she is in her 60s and in good health), and he needs to be closer to take care of her. Please help!
Open to Honesty: Last night, I went on a date with someone who I had met somewhat spontaneously a week or so ago. We were having a really great time—natural conversation, very similar interests, just a good vibe. I don’t normally click with people this easily, and I was so glad our connection didn’t start on an app, so I followed the mood a little more than I might have otherwise and went back to his place. We slept together, and it lived up to the rest of the night. But in the afterglow, he casually let it drop that he’s dating someone seriously, but they’re open. I felt extremely betrayed, like he got me in bed under false pretenses. I didn’t go that far with him, but we both knew instantly that the air in the room had changed. I left, and he texted later and said he hadn’t meant to mislead me. But he did, didn’t he? It’s true that there was no dating profile involved where he could have mentioned this, and our meetup last night was organic and casual, but I can’t help but feel like he tricked me to get laid.
Bridal Disaster: My husband and I have a small circle of friends we have known for over 40 years. We have gone through every milestone together from births to deaths to seeing the first grandchild born; we attended the weddings of all their children. Now, our son is engaged to “Mia.” My husband and I are paying for a very large portion of their wedding. We haven’t asked for much and are comfortable being left out of many of the decisions. Mia has a very specific vision for her wedding and the rest of us are just here for the ride. All we asked was that we could invite our 20 friends out of more than 150 guests. These past two years have been particularly hard on us; my husband lost his parents and brother while my two sisters, niece, and great-uncle all died unexpectedly. We don’t have much in the way of blood kin anymore, but we do have “family.” The problem that is our son and his bride can’t keep to their budget, and costs are ballooning. Mia doesn’t want to cut down on her vision, so they are cutting down the guest list. And all our friends are on the chopping block.
Mia explained that she didn’t really know our friends and that it was better to have the people who really love and know the couple to be present at the wedding. I told Mia that was hurtful. These people watched my son grow up and have been in our lives longer than Mia has been alive. Is our request overbearing?
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