[April Masini, your AskApril]

Boy, are you ever right! Nice guys do finish last. So quit being one, if you want to win over the girl. 😉 I’m not saying you should turn yourself into Charlie Manson, but don’t be so available. Make yourself seem more like a catch to her, and trust me, she’ll find herself being a lot more interested! Women don’t really want the easy to get guys. They want the guys who are confident, funny and successful. They want men who aren’t necessarily interested in them!

I know you think you’re doing the right thing by being just friends with her, but that’s not the way to capture her true interest. She wants you to come on like a boyfriend, not just a friend. Ask her out on a date, and be the man who isn’t interested in being the back up guy she tells who she’s sleeping with to. 😕 Don’t settle for being less than any woman’s main man.

You’d do well to read my book written for men who want to get the girl. It’s called Date Out of Your League, and it will help you move from nice guy, the guy who the girl wants! You can download it here. [url]https://www.askapril.com/relationship-dating-advice/date-out-of-your-league.html[/url] I hope that helps — let me know how things go! 🙂

[April Masini, your AskApril]

You can want lots of things, but it doesn’t mean you’re going to get them. 😥 In fact, it’s very hard — wait, make that impossible — to make a man do or be something he doesn’t want to do or be. So, while you are ready to be friends with your ex-boyfriend, and really want to be friends with your ex-boyfriend, he doesn’t want exactly the same thing at the same time. Since you’ve already been blunt about what you want from him, and you’re still not getting it, I think you have to accept that he is where he is in his life, and right now that doesn’t include you being the kind of friend you’d like to be to him.

The good news is that you’re out and dating, and that you like being in a relationship. It’s very hard to have male friends without one person or the other in the relationship wanting more than the other one. It’s a lot easier to make your real friends women, and your love interests men. While that may sound black and white, it’s one way to make your life easier, and eliminate any mixed messages or disappointment you may feel.

I do hope you’ll get my book, Think & Date Like A Man, now that you’re single and dating, because it will help you a lot during this time. You can download the book here. [url]https://www.askapril.com/relationship-dating-advice/think-and-date-like-a-man.html[/url].

I hope that helps! 🙂

[April Masini, your AskApril]

I’m not sure how old you are, but the dynamics you’re describing are very high school. High school teenagers obsess over whether or not someone likes them, and how much, because that’s all they [i]can[/i] do! Most of them don’t have cars or enough money to really date, so hallway drama over feelings and making out in locker rooms or under the bleachers is the best they can do given their limits.

Adults have a great way of showing each other how they feel. It’s called dating!! 😉 If this guy likes you, then he’ll show it by asking you out on a date. The beauty of a date is that it’s so deliberate. When a man asks you to have dinner with him, or to go to a movie or some other event, you can know that he definitely wants to get to know you more, and he likes you enough to want to get to know you.

The mixed signals you describe in your post aren’t important because if he likes you, he’ll ask you out. That’s how you’ll know there are no mixed signals.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

The problem here is that you are the one who moved in with your boyfriend [i]and[/i] his brother. You’ve already agreed and condoned this roommate situation rather than a romantic couple living together. So the scene was set for a frat house lifestyle when you agreed to move in with both your boyfriend and his twin.

Since you’ve already made things very clear to your boyfriend about what you want in terms of your living situation, and he’s not willing to do it, you have to be the one to make the decisions that will govern your life. You can’t press him into something he doesn’t want to do, and clearly, he’s not ready to get married.

If you move out, which I would advise, you should move out with a fresh start in mind. You deserve a guy who’s going to want the same lifestyle you do. You’ve spent way too long committed to this frat house lifestyle. It’s time for you to get what you want in your life. Understand that your current boyfriend doesn’t want the sane thing you do, and that to get what you want, you have to move on. If you don’t, you’re going to get more and more angry at yourself, and take it out on your boyfriend. He’s being clear. Now the ball’s in your court. Make your move. 😉

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Your boyfriend is in the process of moving out without being very clear about it. The pressure he’s feeling from his boss and from you about getting married, is only pressure because it’s pressing him towards something he doesn’t want to do. If he wanted to marry you, and his boss told him it would be a good idea to marry you, he’d certainly take the advice as encouragement, not pressure.

Pay attention to your boyfriend’s actions, not his words. That way you’ll see he’s backing out of the relationship, and he doesn’t have the grace to do it one fell swoop.

You’ve already asked him over and over if he’s breaking up with you and while his words are confusing, his actions are clearly implying that he is.

You need to be the one to take care of yourself at this point because he’s not doing it. He’s taking care of him. I think you can do better than the situation you’re in, so I would advise hastening that break up, and getting back out there to find Mr. Right.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

You’re not wrong to be concerned that your boyfriend’s ex-fling and sometime best friend is competition. He may not view her as a love interest, but she’s still an ex-fling, and it sounds like she’s still interested in him.

Because you’re both young, he may not understand that this best friend of his is going to be a problem for whomever he has in his life — whether it’s you or someone else. He may not have enough experience to understand this just yet.

That said, if and when he cares enough about you, he’ll spend less time with her — or else only see her in your presence. If you can bring this subject up with him in a way that doesn’t make him feel threatened or defensive, he may volunteer on his own to do the right thing. The tricky part for you is to understand that unless you and your boyfriend are developing a strong commitment, he isn’t going to be ready to put your needs first. So timing is important.

When a man is ready to make a commitment to a woman he’s going to act like he’s committed. He’ll start acting like part of a couple that’s committed to each other, and that means putting your needs in this kind of situation first.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Your co-worker likes you! Now, it’s your job to give him some encouragement. Don’t talk about your feelings with him. Take action! [i]Flirting[/i] is a great device to let a guy know that you’re interested in him as more than just friends. In my book, Think & Date Like A Man, [url]https://www.askapril.com/relationship-dating-advice/think-and-date-like-a-man.html[/url], you can find all the tips and advice you need to get him interested in you. In broad strokes, what I can tell you here is that men love to chase and win over women. If you give him something to chase, he’s going to be very, very happy about being with you. So step up your game! And buy my book to dial up your relationship to the next level. You won’t regret it! 😉

Don’t think about the other girl, and stop wondering why he said whatever he said to her. Just focus on you. He’s clearly given you the signs that he’s interested in you as a girlfriend.

And don’t think of your investment in this relationship as wasting your time. Dating is a process that you use to figure out what you want in a man, how to get that man who is your Mr. Right. I don’t see anything in the situation you’ve described as a waste of time.

So go for it! 🙂

[April Masini, your AskApril]

You’re spending a lot of time talking about feelings. I would encourage you to consider actions instead. There’s an old saying that actions speak louder than words, and I really subscribe to that tenet.

Whether or not your girlfriend has lost her feelings of love (and yes, those feelings come and go in any normal relationship), her commitment to you seems to be gone. People who are committed to each other in a relationship or a marriage, allow their feelings to ebb and flow but stay committed to their partner in their relationship. Your girlfriend is finished with the relationship. She’s out.

You don’t want to accept that, so you’re clinging to anything that sounds like a shred of reconciliation, but I’m not hearing anything as substantial. Breaking up is hard to do for most people, and your girlfriend is no exception. By teasing you with her feelings, she’s giving you shreds of false hope.

My suggestion is to move on. It’s the only way you’ll know if she really wants to be back with you or not. If you continue to talk to her, entertain a reconciliation and mull all this over with her friends, you’re keeping a dead relationship festering. If you cut off from her, and start dating on your own, only then will both of you know what it’s like to be without one another. At that point she may realize she doesn’t want to be broken up, or she may move on, and you may realize that there are women out there who satisfy you in every way, and with whom you want to pursue a relationship.

I hope that helps.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

I don’t think you can avoid pain in the relationship you’re in because you want there to be some commitment, and there is no commitment. It’s the rare woman who can do what you’re doing and not get hurt. Usually women want some kind of commitment when they’re sleeping with a man. Some women are able to fool themselves into not thinking their guy isn’t dating other women in the weeks and months when he isn’t with them. But usually, when they do find out there are other women he’s dating, they’re hurt. It’s a lot easier for most men to date different women in different countries or states or towns, act like boyfriend and girlfriend with each one of them, and not suffer any emotional pain. Women don’t usually have this same ability.

If you don’t want the hurt at all, then understand that you’re not compatible for a traditional relationship with your ex-boyfriend because of the distance, and because, as you mentioned, you aren’t ready to marry at your age, and you want to finish school first before you contemplate marriage. Don’t fool yourself that because the two of you are like boyfriend and girlfriend for 4 weeks out of the year. Or even 8 weeks out of the year, that he isn’t dating other women in the same way he is you. If you understand that in your bones, you’ll let him go and only date men with whom you are compatible, and who are available to you geographically!

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Your boyfriend isn’t Mr. Right. And you’re so anxious to cling to him, you’re giving up important parts of who you are, and you’re walking on egg shells around this guy just so he won’t leave. This dynamic isn’t going to get better.

He doesn’t want to commit to you, and the fact that you say you’re living together, but are not “officially confirmed as a couple” is really unfortunate. If you decide to live with a man after dating for three years, there shouldn’t be commitment problems. You’ve just taken yourself off the market by moving in with him, and he should be cherishing this decision you made for him. That he’s threatening to move out and break up after this incident with your co-worker, is just one of a serious of incidents he’s going to use to control you. As long as you’re scared of his breaking up with you, he’s got control in the relationship. This isn’t healthy, and it’s not going to bring you happiness. It’s also going to chip away at your self esteem.

All you really owe your boyfriend after the co-worker incident is an apology for not knowing his feelings and a promise that you won’t do it again. But that’s not going to keep him from emotionally abusing you and telling you he can no longer trust you. He’s going to continue to look for a way to control you.

I don’t think that this is the guy for you, and I know you’ve spent 3 years of your life trying to cultivate a relationship with him, but if this is what you have after 3 years, you can do a LOT better.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Love isn’t enough to make a relationship last. Compatibility has to be there, and if your girlfriend of ten years ignores your need to spend more time together, you have to decide if that need is a deal breaker or not. If you need a certain amount of time with your partner, and that’s non-negotiable, then you’ve hit a wall in your relationship and you’re no longer compatible. However, if her not spending as much time with you as you’d like is something you can not like but overlook, then the problem is really yours to work on and find things to do without her.

My suspicion, however, is that you’re looking for a way out of the ten year relationship, and want to create a reason for leaving her by using this not spending enough time together as the catalyst. Usually after a year or two, people decide to marry, and because you haven’t, I think there’s something about this relationship that’s keeping you from moving forward. In fact, I think you may have already decided you want out, and are looking for a way to break up.

See if this resonates for you, and let me know what you decide.
🙂

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Check out my book written for couples who want to put some spice back in their bedroom. It’s called Romantic Date Ideas, and you can download it for $14.95, here [url]https://www.askapril.com/relationship-dating-advice/romantic-date-ideas.html[/url]. The book will offer you scenarios you can create to set the mood to get her feeling sexual and romantic. It sounds like she may be bored, and may need some creative and romantic stimulation. You can help with that! 🙂

Part of dating is getting to know someone else, as well as yourself, so see if you can find new ways to get her motor running, that you haven’t already tried before. Positions are great, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg — so to speak. Women get turned on by all kinds of things like candle lit dinners, romantic music, a massage followed by a sushi dinner and then, well….you know. 😎

The book will give you all the tips, advice and tools you need for dozens of different dates. Figure out what works for you and your girlfriend.

Let me know if this helps, and how things go.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Do you want to do charity or do you want to get married? 🙄

It sounds like you take pride in having “rescued” your girlfriend from her family and now want permission to “save her.” 😐 It doesn’t really sound like she needs to be saved.

You are not, and should not be responsible for your girlfriend’s part in her dysfunctional relationship with her mother. You can talk to her about it, but there’s no way you should be getting on a plane right now to get involved with her relationship with her mom. It’s really none of your business. Sorry — but for some reason you feel like you know what’s right and wrong in your girlfriend’s life, when in reality, everyone has their own process of dealing with family, and you’re denying your girlfriend her own way of working things out by intruding — or, as you put it, “saving her”.

Nine years is a long time to be dating someone without marrying, and now that you clearly have pause about marrying her, I think it’s time for you to move on. You may lose her if you do, but the price you’d pay for being in a marriage you don’t want to be in is a lot steeper than breaking up with a girlfriend of 9 years who you’re not sure you want to marry, after all that time.

[April Masini, your AskApril]

Sleep on your mom’s couch! 🙂

It’s not a good way to model relationships for your daughter to be with someone who’s not interested in you enough to live with you and your daughter, but cheat on you, too. The tension will eventually bubble to the surface and children pick up negativity.

Being at your mom’s house, even though cramped, will be a loving family situation, and sometimes everyone needs help. You’re lucky to have your mom available! 🙂

[April Masini, your AskApril]

I know you’re upset that you broke up with your boyfriend, and now that you want him back, he’s dating other people and isn’t interested in a monogamous relationship with you.

Giving him ultimatums won’t work. What you have to do, as you would when you like any guy, is give him the opportunity to win you back! You can’t chase him — you have to let him chase you. You should download my book, Think & Date Like A Man, written for women who want to find Mr. Right — get him and keep him! You can buy it for $15.95 right here. [url]https://www.askapril.com/relationship-dating-advice/think-and-date-like-a-man.html[/url]

You can’t start off from where you left off because he’s moved on. You’re not in the same places that you were when you first started dating. So accept where you are now, and be your best self who’s trying to get the guy (read the book!) but don’t throw any guilt at him. What he did was fair. And his wanting to date you, as well as others, since your break up, is fair too.

If you’re not willing to just date now, then you may decide that moving on is all you’re interested in doing. But if you do want to date him, Think & Date Like A Man will really, really help you! 🙂

I hope that helps!

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