boundaries Archives - Paging Dr. NerdLove

Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Handle a Toxic Friend?

December 17, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Doc:

About three years ago, I had a close knit friend group that I had a falling out with. I was close with all of those girls but one in particular, and she was the main cause of why I don’t speak to that group to this day.

Now I won’t bore you with the details of why I don’t speak or acknowledge her but essentially her choices, words and actions could be summated into bullying, purposeful ostracizing of me from the group and horrid gossip. I can’t pinpoint how this all started, but I cut my losses after a year of the harassment and stopped talking to them (even the ones who acknowledged her abuse). It took me about a year with therapy to get over the loss of that friend group and the anger I felt for her turning them against me, but I picked myself up and started making new friends.

My friends now are beautiful and supportive; however, recently I have noticed that this “old friend” has begun hanging around my group. This is fine because for the last 3 years, if we are at the same party, she and I are free to enjoy but I’m not going to converse with her. So here’s the issue. I noticed that one of our mutual friends said something along the lines of “don’t worry about Friends of Foe, she won’t do anything that would bother you” to her at one of these parties. I know this sounds like I’m jumping to conclusions (entirely possible), but this is the similar attack method she used last time. She made me out to be a bully and rallied our friends around her cause of taking me down…

Am I wrong to feel like she is up to her old tricks? Am I wrong for setting high boundaries and not letting her in my life even though its been 3 year and she and I have mutual friends? Should I just ignore her and continue on my way?

All in all, I’m worried that she is bomb about to explode in my friend group. And if this concern is warranted, I’m unsure on what to do. I’m firmly against speaking to my friends about her because I don’t want to preach to my friends that she destroyed my reputation, while simultaneously doing that to hers. Her presence doesn’t give me anxiety the way it used to but I still have one line, I’m fine with having mutual friends but I can’t tolerate that kind of behavior again. Unsure what to do…

Best,
Friends of Foe

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Help, I’m Afraid To Date

October 12, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Doc,

I’m going to start with a quick rundown of my dating history for context. I never bothered dating in high school, thinking that those sorts of relationships wouldn’t last and weren’t worth it. Once I got to college though, I…didn’t get much further. I saw relationships everywhere that looked miserable and seemed to end over very petty things. It was all very dramatic. I saw demanding women and inattentive selfish guys getting together constantly and I envied them. I kept thinking that if I had the chance, I would definitely be a better boyfriend and also would probably be wiser at choosing a girlfriend than some of these guys. Instead, regrettably, I became a Nice Guy; a strategy that as you can imagine, didn’t work at all.

When I eventually started dating during my first year of grad school, I decided that the best way to avoid getting trapped in the kind of miserable relationships I’d seen was to design a sort of committed friends with benefits model that in practice ended up with me getting sex and armchair psychotherapy and with her getting….to be quite honest, bad sex and not much else. I got my heart smashed 4 months into this bad experiment and yeah, I royally fucked this up because I didn’t even know what a relationship was much less how to hack them to avoid the problems I saw.

Still I was optimistic that I could do better. I’m 28 now and over the past years I’ve dated a bit in short bursts which never ended up developing into anything you could call a relationship. It just became really clear early on that these arrangements wouldn’t work out which I honestly didn’t take too hard.

The thing that has put new terror into me around the prospect of a serious long term relationship is something that happened to my best friend. He’s a transguy which obviously comes with its own snags, but he is one of the strongest, most resilient, most emotionally intelligent people I know. He spent 3 years in what ended up being a very verbally abusive relationship with his girlfriend and spent the following 3 years depressed and trying to mend himself from the aftermath. He’s doing great now, but if I were unlucky enough to end up in that kind of situation, I think I would be a lot worse at handling it. I don’t think I would have the insight to see it for what it is or the boundaries to stand up for myself/leave the way he did. He did everything right and still had to piece himself together after. This terrifies me.

Relationships on the whole seem dangerous for me to get into at my skill level even though I’m kinda old. I really would like to be in a healthy committed relationship but I don’t have enough faith in myself or humanity to risk getting hurt or hurting someone else because I don’t know what I’m doing.

How do I gain the skills I need when the world is this scary?

Signed
Courage the Cowardly Man

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Get Others To Respect My Boundaries?

September 10, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hey Doc,

I’ll admit, this isn’t a question related to romantic relationships, but rather to familial relationships, although I do believe that the advice I’ll receive could be generalized to friendships and other relationships:

I’ve finished university, I’ve started a job hunt, I’m moving into a place that I’ve found, and I’m ready to get out into the world and be An Adult (TM). Unfortunately, one of my parents does not appear to be ready for that. Parents, they worry, right? And they wonder what their kids are up to, right? Well, I think there is an extent to which a parent can worry before it becomes excessive AND MY MOTHER HAS CROSSED THAT THRESHOLD SEVERAL TIMES OVER.

I’ve lived away from home for the entire decade I spent in university, yet I get “Catch a taxi or a bus home, don’t walk; let me know when you get home.” texts even though I know the city well enough to know when and where I can walk alone safely. Heck, I’m expected to text “Good night” every single night.

I receive texts multiple times per day, every day. Each answered text often leads to a flood of buzzing as I end up in a text version of “Twenty Questions”. And heaven forbid if I choose to ignore a text. “Hello?” “HELLO?” “HELLOOOOOOO”. Then come the phone calls. And more texts until I answer. Heck, today I decided to stop responding to a line of questioning to take a dump and grab a shower. Twenty minutes – five phone calls (three to my cell, two to the landline) and multiple texts.

Nothing is off limits. How was my day? What am I doing? Where am I? Am I at home? How was such-and-such-thing I mentioned doing? Have I done this or that thing that I’m supposed to do? And, in the case of the latter, CONSTANT AND REPETITIVE REMINDERS TO DO THESE THINGS. Deep down, I’m convinced that she genuinely does not believe me to be capable of doing ANYTHING without these reminders and without hand-holding through the entire process.

And the automatic justification “It’s a mother thing.” that brushes off any and all inappropriate behaviour. And there’s no reasoning with her. In one ear and out the other. “Mothers, they worry” just wipes away the dependency and anxiety issues that literally everyone I know comments about when I tell them anything that she does.

Anyways, now that I’m moving to a new place and entering a new phase in my life, I believe it’s essential that I create and enforce A LOT OF BOUNDARIES. So I’m looking for some advice as to how to do so effectively. I don’t want to cut her out of my life entirely, but I would like for her to not be a constant, nagging presence. “Do you miss me?” “No, I can’t miss you. You won’t leave me alone!”

Regards,

– My Beloved Smother

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Avoid Abusive Partners?

August 31, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Doctor,
Do you have any tips or advice for screening out toxic/abusive partners from the dating pool? I’m talking about those who are well-rehearsed in appearing sincere, understanding and respectful, so it takes a couple weeks (months, years …) to see the red flags waving. For those of us who’ve been through the psychological wringer in the past, spending even just a few weeks with another such person can be re-traumatizing. By the time you’re starting to see the real them, you’ve also started to share yourself and become emotionally invested/vulnerable. What can you suggest to limit exposure to people who will take advantage of you and dick around with your head & heart?

– Wanna Be Pre-Cog

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: What Do I Do About Someone Else’s Crush On Me?

May 21, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hi, Dr. NerdLove;
Thanks for the wonderful column.

I… have a problem with disappearing and I think I need the Chair Leg of Truth. I keep having to deal with other people’s very, very inconvenient crushes on me.

Example #1: I gave up my the forums of my beloved hobby when Married Sad Boner Dude “fell in love” with me. He refused to stop talking about how in love with me he was, or work on his relationship with his wife, so I faded. Not before he threatened to kill himself and implied that I, his True Love could save him by encouraging him to make an intercontinental move to court me.

Example #2: I moved away from my hometown when College Experiment with Heterosexuality Sad Boner Dude was “uncomfortable” with the fact that I insisted upon living near him (which is to say: living with my mother, two hours away). I’m not attending reunions and I donate anonymously to my college, because OMG what if the poor dear gets triggered by seeing my name the way he was when he saw me from the train that one day? (To be fair, we did have a serious case of the zombie relationship, and I don’t blame him for being relieved to see my toxic-to-him ass retreating.) I gave up all my college friends that had any association with him, too. That hurts to this day.

Example #3: I started working remotely when Sad Boner Co-Worker got a crush on me and started acting in a frightening and quasi-stalkery manner. Good luck advancing in my career without being allowed to come into the office more than once a month!

Example #4: I faded from a local con and skipped the workshop I’d paid for last year when Sad Boner Dance Dude decided that I was The One and refused to let me talk to my friends and tried to follow me to my hotel at 3 a.m. I am going back to that con this year. Maybe. I dunno.

Example #5: I just f-locked the archives and all entries for the foreseeable future on my blog, which was middling popular, because another Married Sad Boner dude kept defiantly trampling my boundaries, getting angry when I refused to chat with him while I was busy at work or at dinner with my daughter, trying to sexually dominate me and requesting to see my ass on video chat.

Doctor Nerdlove, I don’t know what to do.

I am RIGHT UPFRONT about being lesbian, about not being even remotely interested in romantic relationships and kind of disgusted by sex with anyone but myself. By PUA standards, I’m a Midwest two when I make the effort, and I never, ever make the effort. I guess I’m kind and friendly and a little funny, and I try to appreciate how awesome every individual is in their own right, but I mention that I’m not available or interested in romance in any way, shape or form. I’ve even tried not bringing it up. That makes it worse. Not saying “not interested” at the beginning and end of every sentence to a Sad Boner Dude feels like he’s going to pounce and say, “Aha! You didn’t say ‘Simon Says,’ NOW YOU HAVE TO MARRY ME. Or at least let me call you my fiancée until I lose interest and wander off.”

The worst thing is, these are good men. They’d be horrified if they read this letter. They’d write me eight-page SAD PANTSFEELS LETTERS about how it wasn’t like that! If you publish this letter, readers of yours will be curling up like they’ve been nutkicked because they’ve done something that remotely resembles this and they feel personally attacked.

But for me, it is like that. Suicide threats. Being followed at night. Getting cornered at the office by a nightmarish 6’3″ ex-cop who keeps telling everyone about how women make shit about abuse up, who then turns up in your parking lot at one in the morning blaring Barry White because he “finds you attractive.” Getting badgered because I’m hanging out with my family instead of worshiping the boner, even though a boner, for me, is a Lovecraftian Elder God with whom I want no truck. Eight-page SAD PANTSFEELS letters.

How do I prevent guys getting crushes on me and mistaking them for an excuse to ignore clearly stated boundaries? Look, I’m sure women do this too, but it’s not a problem I’ve run into with women. And for that matter, what do I do with these Sad Boner Men? When guys do get crushes on me, is there a more constructive response than “three strikes, and I run screaming, because it’s super-mean to exist and not want to be someone’s prize, even though I’ve skipped to the end of that particular book and, spoiler, horrific ruins for everyone and no-one has any fun getting there and the car chases suck”? It feels like I’m cruel to keep visibly existing, but it’s almost always in my own space. Also, I feel like this is one of the reasons you don’t see women in male-dominated fields: there’s this thing where guys fixate on women and the women leave. I really hate the thought of contributing to that. I want to grow a spine, but dang. It’s mean to them and sometimes feels dangerous to me to hang around. I want my blog back. I want my forums back. My mom wants me to visit her.

Is there something I’m missing here? I already carry a taser. Or am I being unreasonable? You’d tell me if I was being unreasonable, right?

Thanks,

The (Vanishing) Villain in the Rom Com

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