Seconding the first nonnie's advice. It's interesting to me, reading the other perspectives, because I ended up with the same feeling I often have while reading Dan Savage's column. He seems to think that polyamory and open relationships are the answer to many relationship problems but to be quite honest, lots and lots of people are just not wired for polyamory. If my partner was having genuine feelings for someone other than me, I'd want to know about it so I could find someone for whom I would be first and only. I'd also be really upset and hurt as your partner that you allowed yourself to fall in love with your friend. I don't believe in "uncontrollable feelings"; if you felt yourself falling for the guy, you could have chosen stay away from him. It's also really unfair to your female friend that you've let yourself develop feelings for her boyfriend, although it's good that you're not interested in trying to break up that relationship.
So the way I see it, there are two possibilities: a) you're not wired for monogamy, in which case it's important your boyfriend knows that, so he can make the decision whether to stay or go or b) there's something wrong with your current relationship, and instead of dealing with it, you're externalizing your feelings onto this other guy. I think you need to decide which of the two it is, and if you're not able to get over the other guy, you owe it to your boyfriend to break it off with him and allow him to move on.
I know myself and I know when I'm starting to feel things that could become problematic. In a case like this (and something like this actually did happen to me once, so I'm speaking from personal experience), if I knew I was becoming attracted to my friend and I wanted to continue my relationship with my current bf, I'd make the decision not to be around that friend anymore. Before it got to the point where I was in love with him, which is unfair to my boyfriend and even more unfair to the other guy's girlfriend, supposedly my close friend. Also, be busy, get a new hobby, join a new club or something, give yourself something else to think about rather than obsessing over the new guy.
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Re: Naive and inexperienced nonnie is hopeless :/
(Anonymous) 2011-08-16 01:52 am (UTC)(link)So the way I see it, there are two possibilities: a) you're not wired for monogamy, in which case it's important your boyfriend knows that, so he can make the decision whether to stay or go or b) there's something wrong with your current relationship, and instead of dealing with it, you're externalizing your feelings onto this other guy. I think you need to decide which of the two it is, and if you're not able to get over the other guy, you owe it to your boyfriend to break it off with him and allow him to move on.
Re: Naive and inexperienced nonnie is hopeless :/
(Anonymous) 2011-08-16 04:23 pm (UTC)(link)How do you control your feelings? (I mean this question sincerely, because I'd love to be able to control mine. You have no idea.)
Re: Naive and inexperienced nonnie is hopeless :/
(Anonymous) 2011-08-16 04:41 pm (UTC)(link)I know myself and I know when I'm starting to feel things that could become problematic. In a case like this (and something like this actually did happen to me once, so I'm speaking from personal experience), if I knew I was becoming attracted to my friend and I wanted to continue my relationship with my current bf, I'd make the decision not to be around that friend anymore. Before it got to the point where I was in love with him, which is unfair to my boyfriend and even more unfair to the other guy's girlfriend, supposedly my close friend. Also, be busy, get a new hobby, join a new club or something, give yourself something else to think about rather than obsessing over the new guy.