Ask The Fellas

[Guest itrayya]

iilysium , uh.... your bf knows that y'alls a decade apart??? that's really immature of him to not see that there will be differences. and let him know that if he wants to babysit, he can find another girl. i know its for the guys to answer but i just gotta let you know that you ain't gotta take the crap that he gives you. he should be more mature than that to see that you need tender and caring love, you already have a dad, you don't need two. love shouldn't have to be suffocating and controlling.

[Guest Mkoll]

@msuarez21: then its up to you to come up with a day.  ask him if he wants to hang out at your place or see a movie over the weekend.  if he says no, ask him about the next weekend.  shouldn't be too hard to come up with a date.

@iilysium: i find it really funny that just because he's a decade older than you, both of you assume he's the more mature one.  from what you said, he seems pretty darn childish.  yes you were the victim of a crime, but if it wasn't that serious, then you should still be able to maintain your freedom.  paying for you and making sure you're comfortable is sweet.  not letting you go anywhere alone is over controlling.  calling you naive, gullible, and a child is immature.  freaking out when you grab a bite to eat AFTER HE LEFT FIRST is just wrong and completely uncalled for.  so is figuring out your chances of cheating on him and saying that you're going to "spread your legs" with all the other guys.

Leave this guy.  He's just not good for you, or probably anyone.  i'm sure you have plenty of "life experience" to hold out on your own as an individual for a while.  Really, you don't deserve to sit through his high minded lectures.  be the more mature one in the relationship like you always have been and leave him.

[Guest HERMIT]

How do I tell the guy that I like that I want to hang out with him. He suggested we do, but we never came up with a day

Well, you already have an "in" in that he's already suggested that you guys hang out.  My suggestion is to use that prior invite in your approach.  Revisit his invitation to hang out and ask him whatever happened with that.  Then you can reiterate that you're still interested and then use that time to probe for more specifics and actually setting up a meet-up time.  Don't be afraid to prod, but don't be too pushy.  Just don't ask about it and then find yourself only going halfway without getting into specifics and planning something definitive.

I feel stuck in a relationship right now...

Judging from the context of your post, I think it's safe to say that you are evidently feeling stifled in this relationship.  But it doesn't seem like you're asking any kind of specific question - other than you are just venting out your situation.  Do you want to break up with him - or are you asking what you can do to make the relationship better?  Either way, itrayya pretty much brings up the obvious - and it applies to both cases.  You're going to have to develop a backbone and definitively set up boundaries for your boyfriend to follow - otherwise, he will continually set the figurative "line in the sand" every time and dictate the tone and direction of this relationship.  Far be it for me to say it, but given the manner in which you describe him and his actions/behavior, at the very least these past series of events might warrant a serious review as to the viability of this relationship.  Descriptive words such as 'calculating' and 'controlling' are obviously red flag terms to take note of.  It doesn't help either that there is a wide span in the age difference and levels of life experience.  That's something that unfortunately will never change, given the status quo.  I guess the big question now is if you truly think that your boyfriend is of the personality to continually lord over this fact every time he lectures you or you guys argue over something.  Quite frankly, I think what you are experiencing in general are the classic symptoms of a relationship that has to deal with such a challenge as an age/experience gap between the two partners.  Of course, you could be tempted to write off the current situation as being due to the underlying incident of you being victim of a crime.  But think about it: it may be just one incident that you suffered and eventually get over - but look at his reaction and the way he's treating you.  Will this be his attitude and approach when you both are faced with a similar challenge later on in the relationship?  I guess this is the million dollar question that you have to seriously ponder and answer for yourself.  How you answer will hopefully guide you into what kind of "state of the union" action you will need to take.  Do you think it is salvageable and able to be improved upon?  Or is what you are experiencing only a foreshadowing of what more you'll have to endure in the future?

In any event, and as itrayya has alluded to, the bottom line appears to be that you have to grow a spine and put the brakes on whatever "control" your boyfriend is slowly developing over you.  On a side note, I seriously hope that with him having rented you a room you are not finding yourself in severely compromised position.  Like you said, you feel like you owe him a lot and I agree, what's emerging is a pretty unbalanced situation.  What you need to do for the time being is to put a stop to the continuing unbalance and don't allow yourself to be further subjected to being "under his thumb".  Living in a rented room of his choice and by his design is bad enough.  Hopefully, you can devise proper contingency plans to extricate yourself from that situation should push have to come to shove.  To me, that current living arrangement is your biggest disadvantage and one that your boyfriend can try to strategically use to 'guilt-trip' your or hold you emotionally accountable.  Don't fall into that trap.  Be strong.

[SouRen]

A few days ago I left a post asking what to do about this guy.

So I'm really confused about this guy that I like. I don't know if he's interested in me or just being 'a nice guy.' My friends say that since he's a shy guy, he won't make the first move and it's up to me to ask him out first. But I'm afraid that they're totally wrong about this and I will make things awkward between us if he really isn't interested in me in that way.

When we're in groups we barely talk, but once everyone goes away we start talking about anything and everything. I'm always the one that send an IM first but we end up chatting online for a long time until I'm the one that usually tells him that I have to go. On FB, I notice a lot more that he's on whenever I'm on and he logs out right after I do. (This has happened way too many times for it to be a coincidence... IMO). I asked him if he could help me out on my project and we ended up hanging out for hours instead just talking about stuff. Lol. ^^ During a game once, we all had to compliment anyone in our group and he told me that I was, "very pretty." I didn't even know him that well at the time but now that I look back on it, I wonder if he liked me since then?

On one hand I think he likes me but on the other hand, he totally ignores me unless I initiate first. He's giving me mixed signals here! What should I do? I don't know how to react around shy guys...

What ended up happening after that was that I ended up asking him if he wanted to grab a cup of coffee. I was only expecting to chat with him about an hour or two at the most at the cafe, but he insisted that I grab something to eat since he remembered that I didn't eat lunch that day and suggested we walk around until we found a place. That walk turned to a sunset walk along the beach... and then dinner. At the end of the night, he called our day 'a fun date.' I honestly was expecting nothing but a casual hang out between friends and made it clear that we were just grabbing coffee... o.o

But the thing is, I realize that I'm always the one initiating things like IM, FB, texts... etc. Is it normal for the girl to initiate all the time because I really don't get this guy... Someone please tell me what's going on?

[Guest HERMIT]

But the thing is, I realize that I'm always the one initiating things like IM, FB, texts... etc. Is it normal for the girl to initiate all the time because I really don't get this guy... Someone please tell me what's going on?

Well, I suppose you can say that it's not normal in the old-fashioned, conventional sense. But hey, we're in the 21st century. Women have been fighting for equal rights and independence and such. So what is considered 'normal' anymore? All I can tell you is that at least we are in a relatively more progressive age than in years past. Just because you initiate anything is something to somehow be frowned upon or be embarrassed about. In the end, he ends up picking up the slack, so to speak, and he runs with it. You end up having more of a good time beyond what you probably were expecting. Look at it this way, at least he seems to take the initiative to prolong the interactions and to finish. Would you rather that he just simply did the initiating and then you having to keep the interactions going because he ends up seeming distant and disinterested? I'd think that would be a worse sign of how he felt about you if this was the more common scenario. I think it's like you said, the guy is probably just shy and just needs that little reassurance to get himself started. But when he goes, he seems to take over doesn't he? Maybe in time, as he gets more familiar and comfortable with you, he'll probably initiate more things on his own the way you prefer. In the meantime, enjoy the 'arrangement' for what it is. When you initiate, I'm presuming you are coming from a neutral, platonic approach - but it sounds like he's being much more demonstrative of how he feels once he's picked up the baton and run with it. So why dwell on a little thing when in the big picture you are ultimately enjoying each other's company.

[Guest xox_ForeevrAlone_xox]

heey i had this guy problem. So recently we started talking like it has been back and forth but not every day and when we talked i always had tomessage him and he only messaged me if i had some random status on my black berry messenger. like if ididnt have a status he wud never message. and when he did message he would sometimes say good night when he ended the convo or sometimes just leave me hanging and just out of the random stop talking to me. so a couple of days ago i started flirting with him and it seems like he likes that becasue he now says by to me properly never leaves me hanging and always wants the convo to keep on going. when i used to ask him to hang out he was always "busy" so now that i am flirting with me i wondering shud i ask him? but he is really close to this otehr girl that he is talking to prom with :/ and i aksed him is anything going on with the two of them and he is like he does not know what is going on. so i was wondering why the sudden change of him flirting with me and all? like this doesnt mean he likes me right? and shoudl i even botehr to continue to talk to him?

[Guest HERMIT]

@xox_ForeevrAlone_xox:

Well, he's suddenly flirting with you because you suddenly started flirting with him. Most guys would find that flattering and I'd imagine they'd usually flirt back. I mean, if you tease a cat with a piece of string, it's going to get its curiosity up and start chasing after it and playing with it. Are you still going to wonder why the cat is suddenly all stimulated?

Anyhow, it sounds like this guy doesn't have anything set in stone with this other girl so I imagine he's keeping his options open. He's been talking with this girl for some time about prom .... and now he's got you suddenly flirting with him too. So I'm sure he's probably just waiting to see what happens between the two of you. He could be wondering which of you shows more interest in him or he could just be playing the both of you. But one thing you can do, is that I suppose you can drop the flirting act on your part and see what happens then. If he was actually interested to begin with and you're worth the trouble, then he'd take the initiative to try and resume the flirtations. Then you'd have a better idea as to if he likes you. But if you stop and he does nothing, then there never was anything to it all along.

[Guest xox_ForeevrAlone_xox]

thank u soo much hermit u really helped out alot! i will def take ur advice and drop the flirting act and see if he does it back. ireally hope he is :#

[Guest kisschu]

This guy and I are friends but he confessed to me. I gave him a straightforward answer saying I didn't feel the same way. He told me not to worry about it, so I assumed that he also wouldn't worry about it either (I assumed this because I didn't want his confession to bother me and thought he just had a small crush on me). I wasn't too sure how he came to like me because I had no intentions of dating him. We had a class together so I thought, why not talk to him. My friend who is also friends with him let me know that he was completely mesmerized by me and that he really really liked me. I was shocked to hear this, and began to feel kind of bad after I rejected him (but I still didn't feel the same towards him).

As of right now, I feel like it would be awkward to talk to him, or even see him. Would it be a bad thing if I avoided him? Pretty much every guy I either reject or break up with are extremely head over heals for me, so I feel like I cannot have a peaceful, normal conversation with him without looking at him and feeling like the evil person.

[Guest HERMIT]

This guy and I are friends but he confessed to me. I gave him a straightforward answer saying I didn't

In this particular case you said that he told you "not to worry about it". As any normal person, you can only go by his word - so hold him to it. Because he's made that stipulation to you, then simply treat him like you'd treat any other platonic friend. If what your mutual friend had said was true, it would be more awkward for the guy than it would be for you. After all, you were clear and straightforward, right? So don't make matters worse by skirting regular contact with the guy and noticeably avoiding him. Pulling that kind of low-brow behavior only makes the guy feel worse for confessing and/or makes you look like a snob because you give the appearance that you're better than to commiserate with guys you've rejected. Just do the mature thing and treat him with dignity like any other normal human being. Don't further magnify the rejection by now ignoring him. So long as you just treat him like anyone else, only he can really "mess it up". If he starts acting up or weirdly towards you, then that's when you have cause for considering the avoidance of this person. But don't start avoiding him anyway, especially after he had told you "not to worry about it". You've already rejected him. If you start 'worrying' about him after he'd told you not to, you'd be adding insult to injury to the situation. His feelings would be further hurt than it needs to be and you come off not looking good either.

[Guest kisschu]

HERMIT, thanks for the advice. It helps and your explanation makes one hundred percent sense. I guess I didn't really think about my situation in that perspective. Thanks again!

[prechuz_azn]

If a guy is used to liking girls that are...ummm volatile what are the chances he'll go for a good-two-shoes like me? This guy is a thug by the way and he hustles marijuana for a living...

*sigh* I like bad boys...

[Shuga]

Hiiiii guys! I was just wondering, several things, if you don't mind answering them!

1) if a guy calls you 'bro' or 'buddy' and all that, does it mean he has no romantic interest in you most of the time?

2) do some of you guys legit not like replying back to messages? what if you liked the girl, would you always reply? some friends say someone likes me, but i don't think so... sometimes he doesn't reply to my messages.

3) two of my best friends do/did tkd and they used me as a sparring buddy a couple of times. as a result, i'm pretty casual about physical touch of the fighting variety and sometimes i punch or whack someone with force without thinking (lol, my girl friends hate it). when it's to a guy, most of the time it doesn't feel like a hard punch to them, right? so i'm guessing to them it's like a play-fighting gesture. is that sort of physical touch seen as flirting to guys?

[Guest HERMIT]

If a guy is used to liking girls that are...ummm volatile what are the chances he'll go for a good-two-shoes like me? This guy is a thug by the way and he hustles marijuana for a living...

*sigh* I like bad boys...

I personally don't see too high of a success rate even if he were to go for you, to be honest.

Hiiiii guys! I was just wondering, several things, if you don't mind answering them!

1) if a guy calls you 'bro' or 'buddy' and all that, does it mean he has no romantic interest in you most of the time?

2) do some of you guys legit not like replying back to messages? what if you liked the girl, would you always reply? some friends say someone likes me, but i don't think so... sometimes he doesn't reply to my messages.

3) two of my best friends do/did tkd and they used me as a sparring buddy a couple of times. as a result, i'm pretty casual about physical touch of the fighting variety and sometimes i punch or whack someone with force without thinking (lol, my girl friends hate it). when it's to a guy, most of the time it doesn't feel like a hard punch to them, right? so i'm guessing to them it's like a play-fighting gesture. is that sort of physical touch seen as flirting to guys?

1. It just indicates that he's pretty friendly and comfortable with you at the very least. But it doesn't mean that it couldn't develop into romantic interest later on down the road. Calling you 'bro' or 'buddy' in and of itself is a bad way to try to gauge a guy's interest in you. You have to look at other things too, like positive body language and how he treats you in general, to name a couple.

2. Plainly not replying back to messages is just generally rude, period. At least acknowledge them to some minimal extent at least. With that said, it seems pretty logical to me how much he values/prioritizes you as far as his everyday life goes.

3. Any kind of physical contact by a girl is sure to get a guy's attention. Whether it's considered flirting depends upon the context of the touching. But to keep it general, if you touch a guy in any way, you bet he's going to damn well think about it. So if you don't want to risk having it interpreted to be flirty, then refrain from making any kind of physical contact with him.

[Guest akp124]

Alrighty. So we exchanged numbers. I still haven't said when I want to go over to his house and hang out. But i will. And he seems to start the conversations we have most of the time. I'm starting to like him, but I don't know if he just wants sex or if he wants to really get to know me.

[Guest HERMIT]

Alrighty. So we exchanged numbers. I still haven't said when I want to go over to his house and hang out. But i will. And he seems to start the conversations we have most of the time. I'm starting to like him' date=' but I don't know if he just wants sex or if he wants to really get to know me. [/quote']

Well, you're kind of in control of that anyway. The only way to find out is to go out with him and see how the date goes. That's what dating is, to get your feelers out, get to know the person better, and figure out where they're coming from. If indeed he is only after sex, I'm pretty sure you'll know and you can just terminate the date and not consider him for any more dates afterwards.

[Guest akp124]

Well, you're kind of in control of that anyway. The only way to find out is to go out with him and see how the date goes. That's what dating is, to get your feelers out, get to know the person better, and figure out where they're coming from. If indeed he is only after sex, I'm pretty sure you'll know and you can just terminate the date and not consider him for any more dates afterwards.

I know, but I don't think it would considered a date if we're just going to drink a bit...lol Ugh, it's like, I know what I have to do, and I want to, but at the same time, I don't.

[Guest skybubble]

hi guys, not sure if this has been asked before, but what does it mean when a guy calls you weird? Many guys would say it to me after we crack a few jokes/laugh at random things I say/do, and it would make me feel really self conscious after.. so what is the connotation of 'weird' in that context?:S

[Guest HERMIT]

hi guys' date=' not sure if this has been asked before, but what does it mean when a guy calls you weird? Many guys would say it to me after we crack a few jokes/laugh at random things I say/do, and it would make me feel really self conscious after.. so what is the connotation of 'weird' in that context?:S[/quote']

Since it's stated in the context of you guys being in a joking manner amongst yourselves, then I'd gather that it just means that you have a rather peculiar and unconventional brand of humor that's not expected out of a girl. How their reaction continues after saying that should give you a clue as to whether you should be self-conscious or not. If the mood suddenly feels awkward and uncomfortable, then those guys probably do think you are pretty weird. But if the mood is still jocular and light-hearted and the guys are still laughing, then I wouldn't worry too much about it. If they are still laughing about what was just joked about, then calling you 'weird' is probably more akin to saying something along the same lines as 'you are funny and trip us out with your sense of humor'.

[Guest iDrinkMilkT]

Heys,

So I've been in this long distance kinda complicated relationship with a guy I met over last summer. We had our bumps and rough patches because I wasn't into the idea of long distance but we decided to try it out. We just got out of a fight sorta cause we haven't been talking for a week and a half. But after the fight I noticed he was talking to his ex more (facebooking). I know she still has feelings for him and he told be he'll "probably not" gonna get back with her but I can't help but feel jealous but he tells me she's just a friend... We aren't official so I can't say anything about it. But I don't know how to handle this situation due to the long distance... Any insight is fine. (:

Thanks!