NEED TO KNOW
- A Mumsnet user thinks her friend can do better than being in an on-and-off relationship with the same man for the past 15 years
- The woman’s friend, however, is happy with the status of her relationship because he “makes her laugh and is good in bed,” she wrote
- Commentators pushed back on the woman’s need to impose her ideals on her friend
A woman wants her friend to have better dating standards.
A user on the popular U.K.-based forum Mumsnet detailed in a post that her friend is seemingly “wasting her best years” on a man who doesn’t want to commit.
“She has been sleeping with the same man on and off for around 15 years. He has never wanted a relationship,” she wrote.
The woman noted that her friend, who is in her mid-30s and child-free, has had “short-lived relationships,” while he’s “had a few dates and one-night stands” during their time together. Four years ago, her friend met a “nice man” who wanted to be in a committed relationship and cut it off with the other man.
Alas, that romance didn’t last “after about three months,” and she “got back in touch immediately with the other man, and resumed things with him.”
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The woman’s friend and the casual man spend time every few weeks, play pool, and text daily.
“He doesn’t want a relationship, but she says she’s made it clear that if he slept with another woman, or was speaking to one with that intention, she’d be done and he’d be blocked,” she wrote, adding, “Neither of them have slept with anyone else for years. They’ve booked a weekend away and she’s really excited, as if he’s proposed.”
The woman has told her friend that she can do better, “but she laughs and says he ‘makes her laugh and is good in bed’,” she wrote.
The woman dismissed the unconventional arrangement and is concerned about her friend’s future.
“I just think it’s a bit pathetic and am worried she’ll end up 50 and alone when he meets someone he’s actually serious about,” she wrote.
Users understood that the woman was concerned for her friend, but stressed that it wasn’t her life to live.
“It’s her life. If that’s what she wants it’s nothing to do with you,” a user wrote. “If the guy makes her happy she’s already doing an awful lot better than a lot of people in so called committed relationships. Because a heck of a lot of committed relationships are anything but happy.”
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Another poster argued that not only are the woman’s relationship ideals only hers but her friend had time to change her mind.
“There’s really no time limit on finding a serious relationship if that’s what she decides she wants in the future. It’s a little different if she wants kids but it doesn’t sound like they are a priority for her,” a poster said.
The woman acknowledged in a reply that fair points were raised, but insisted her friend is “settling for crumbs.”
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