HELP ME, HARLAN! Insensitive boyfriend cares more about flirting than girlfriend’s hurting

Harlan Cohen

Dear Harlan,

My boyfriend is a flirt – that’s how we met. He makes conversation with attractive women, whether I’m around him or not. He’d never cheat on me, but I find it annoying and rude when we are on a date. He tells me that men are flirting with me all the time, and I don’t stop them. Am I wrong for wanting him to stop?

Hurt by a Flirt

Dear Hurt,

It’s humiliating to be on a date with a man and realize that your boyfriend is gazing into another woman’s eyes over your shoulder. Why does he think this is OK? I would never intentionally hurt my wife – I love her. That’s probably why we’re still married. I listen to her when she’s upset; I care if she’s uncomfortable. To not care is childish, selfish and disrespectful. It’s childish to expect you to put up with this. It’s selfish for him to think only of his own feelings. And it’s disrespectful for him to think so little of the relationship that he keeps doing this. While you can’t control how other men react toward you, he certainly can control how he acts around you – but he doesn’t want to. If he insists on continuing to flirt with other women in your presence, stop being present. If he

doesn’t want to change, consider changing to a different man. This will give you a chance to upgrade to someone better, and it will give him the rest of his life to flirt with other women as a single man.

***

Dear Harlan,

My child struggles socially because he does not partake in drinking or smoking pot as a senior in high school. How do we help to support his decision, and reassure him that he will find friends with similar strong convictions? We worry about college experimentation with drugs and alcohol that will occur once he’s no longer under our roof. Any suggestions?

Parents of Grad

Dear Parents,

I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around the correlation between making friends and drinking or smoking pot in high school. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, among 10th-graders, lifetime use of alcohol fell by 40 percent, from 72.0 percent in 1997 to 43.4 percent in 2016. Among 12th-graders, there was a significant 25 percent drop in lifetime alcohol use, from 81.7 percent in 1997 to 61.2 percent in 2016. When it comes to marijuana use, 31.1 percent of 12th-graders, report regularly using marijuana. This means most people in high school are not pressuring him to drink or smoke pot. This makes me think his challenges have less to do with drugs and alcohol and more to do with something else in his life. If he has a history of struggling to make friends, enlist the help of a therapist. He might have anxiety, challenges reading social cues or something else that’s limiting his friendship-making skills. As for my advice for students who struggle with making friends, a job, a leadership position or a

spiritual connection are the best places to start. A job or leadership position gives him something he has to do and forces him to be around people. A spiritual connection means always having a place to go and a deeper connection with welcoming people. To sum this up, I’d focus less on your fear of him doing drugs and alcohol in college, and spend more time supporting him as he explores why it’s been so hard to make friends in the past.

***

Harlan is author of “Getting Naked: Five Steps to Finding the Love of Your Life (While Fully Clothed and Totally Sober)” (St. Martin’s Press). Write Harlan at Harlan@helpmeharlan.com or visit online: www.helpmeharlan.com. All letters submitted become property of the author. Send paper to Help Me, Harlan!, 3501 N. Southport Ave., Suite 226, Chicago, IL 60657.

© Harlan Cohen 2017

Distributed by King Features Syndicate Inc.

–HELP ME, HARLAN!  Insensitive boyfriend cares more about flirting than girlfriend’s hurting–