As always, love and appreciate your even-keeled, kind advice Hayes! One thing that stood out to me from the letter: the boyfriend apologized without prompting. I assume he either noticed his partner was upset (great!) or was fully aware his approach to the hand holding could have affected his partner negatively and addressed it after the fact (not as great!). It also seems like he knew this about the roomate/friend's opinion before To PDA or Not to PDA arrived for this latest visit. Seems like this could be a great opportunity for a larger discussion on proactive communication within the relationship as well!
Really appreciate this post. Sounds like he prioritizes his ROOMMATES feelings over his PARTNERS feelings. Hang in there friend, you don't have to decide how you feel about it today 💗
I have to wonder why the friend/roommate has such and aversion to other people showing affection towards each other. As you said maybe she recently went thru a break up or perhaps she has had troubling experiences in the past with physical touch.
The writers description of the hand holding walking to the party and the boyfriend barely speaking to them at said party feels like there is more to the story. Does the friend/roommate have romantic feelings for the boyfriend or the writer and is therefore uncomfortable with their PDA towards each other?
And if the writer has expressed this need/want of physical connection to their boyfriend l, which it sounds like they have, it seems odd he would essentially ignore them for most of the evening.
Especially since they live so far away from each other.
Hi Hayes I'm not sure where to send a community question so I hope I can pop it here as part of your wedding edition as I am in need of help!
Me and my partner moved across country just a few months ago where we are dedicating our lives to rescuing wildlife in need which is pretty much a 7 day a week, 24h a day sort of job. We haven't had a holiday in years and our job pays fairly little which will become relevant.
My partner's brother is getting married and they happened to have picked new years eve as the date, however we can not make it as staffing will not allow, transport is very expensive and and we would have to commit to driving down for 9h the day of the wedding and back up 9h the following day as accomodation isn't in our price range particuatly at this time of year. We also have an elderly dog and we fear the weather may trap us away from the rescue centre which of course CAN NOT happen.
We have explained our circomstances but my partner's family is having a hard time understanding and is trying to convince my partner to attend alone which we are not willing to do as our lives are very busy and we are each other's support network, plus it is new years eve which we were hoping to spend together in our new home. We want to be able to make it but realistically can not but are being made to feel like we are letting the family down. What should we do? Are we bad people?
There's a lot of nuance here and you tackled it gracefully and with the utmost kindness, as per usual, dear Hayes. Tysm for sharing your insights, they mean the world!! <3
As always, love and appreciate your even-keeled, kind advice Hayes! One thing that stood out to me from the letter: the boyfriend apologized without prompting. I assume he either noticed his partner was upset (great!) or was fully aware his approach to the hand holding could have affected his partner negatively and addressed it after the fact (not as great!). It also seems like he knew this about the roomate/friend's opinion before To PDA or Not to PDA arrived for this latest visit. Seems like this could be a great opportunity for a larger discussion on proactive communication within the relationship as well!
Really appreciate this post. Sounds like he prioritizes his ROOMMATES feelings over his PARTNERS feelings. Hang in there friend, you don't have to decide how you feel about it today 💗
I have to wonder why the friend/roommate has such and aversion to other people showing affection towards each other. As you said maybe she recently went thru a break up or perhaps she has had troubling experiences in the past with physical touch.
The writers description of the hand holding walking to the party and the boyfriend barely speaking to them at said party feels like there is more to the story. Does the friend/roommate have romantic feelings for the boyfriend or the writer and is therefore uncomfortable with their PDA towards each other?
And if the writer has expressed this need/want of physical connection to their boyfriend l, which it sounds like they have, it seems odd he would essentially ignore them for most of the evening.
Especially since they live so far away from each other.
Hi Hayes I'm not sure where to send a community question so I hope I can pop it here as part of your wedding edition as I am in need of help!
Me and my partner moved across country just a few months ago where we are dedicating our lives to rescuing wildlife in need which is pretty much a 7 day a week, 24h a day sort of job. We haven't had a holiday in years and our job pays fairly little which will become relevant.
My partner's brother is getting married and they happened to have picked new years eve as the date, however we can not make it as staffing will not allow, transport is very expensive and and we would have to commit to driving down for 9h the day of the wedding and back up 9h the following day as accomodation isn't in our price range particuatly at this time of year. We also have an elderly dog and we fear the weather may trap us away from the rescue centre which of course CAN NOT happen.
We have explained our circomstances but my partner's family is having a hard time understanding and is trying to convince my partner to attend alone which we are not willing to do as our lives are very busy and we are each other's support network, plus it is new years eve which we were hoping to spend together in our new home. We want to be able to make it but realistically can not but are being made to feel like we are letting the family down. What should we do? Are we bad people?
As always, your writing resonates! Good luck with what will be undoubtedly be worth waiting for!
There's a lot of nuance here and you tackled it gracefully and with the utmost kindness, as per usual, dear Hayes. Tysm for sharing your insights, they mean the world!! <3