My (F20) boyfriend (M20) has a best friend who is the same age as us and we all go to the same school and are in the same class. Before me and my boyfriend started dating he and his best friend would joke around about being gay, which I understand is pretty normal in guy friendships. However, they also took it a step further and would touch and rub each others leg, feed each other food, and put their faces really close until they were almost kissing and would pull away at the last minute.
At the very start of my relationship with my boyfriend, I told him I was uncomfortable with this saying how joking about it is fine but I don’t wish for him to be physically doing things that resemble a relationship with another guy. He agreed and told his friend that he doesn’t want to do it because he’s in a relationship now. The next day when my boyfriend wasn’t around, his friend approached me and told me I was too controlling and that my boyfriend is going to break up with me sooner or later because there was no way we would last and it was my problem. It escalated to a point where his friend was calling me a bi*** and chasing after me to call me that when I tried to walk away. I brought it up with my boyfriend who also asked his friend for his side of the story. His friend told him that I was disrespecting him when I barely said anything. My boyfriend proceeded to say that he doesn’t know who to believe.
Over the following week, his friend went around insulting me and bad mouthing me to everyone in our class whenever I talked to my friend or asked a question, he would make fun of me in front of a group of people and insult me over things like my voice and my appearance. This group of people sometimes included my boyfriend who didn’t stand up for me. For a while in public my boyfriend would be mean to me and pretend he hates me even though everyone knew we were dating. When I confronted him about it and told him I wanted to break up he told me he was sorry and that he would cut off his friend which he ended up doing for a couple of months.
Fastforward a couple of months, his friend approaches us and pretends everything is fine. He tells my boyfriend in private that he still doesn’t like me. I don’t know the details of what they say, but he was being civil to me in front of my boyfriend. I thought maybe he changed so I just moved on even though I was still pretty upset about what happened especially since his friend never apologized to me. But as more time passed, my boyfriend started prioritizing his friend over our relationship like bailing on a date to hang out with his friend, feeding each other again and pretending to be “intimate” while in front of me. I told my boyfriend I don’t want a repeat of what happened and said that if this continues then I don’t think I want to be in a relationship with him. My boyfriend then decided to cut off his friend again by ghosting him through not answering calls/texts even though they still communicate through groupchats with other people in their friend group.
Right before our summer break, my boyfriend and I got into an argument which we later resolved, but before we resolved it, he decided to take a plane with his “friend” which he supposedly cut off months ago to visit the guy’s family and stay with them for the break. When I talked with my boyfriend later on the phone, he said he doesn’t want to not be friends with the guy and he’s still very close with his best friend but he also wants to maintain a relationship with me. His friend is no longer being outright disrespectful to me or our relationship but clearly there is still unresolved conflict. I still want to be in a relationship with my boyfriend but I’m not sure how to proceed
TL;DR: My boyfriend’s best friend disrespected me and our relationship. They stopped talking but suddenly became close again. Still want to be together, what should I do?
Comments
Your boyfriend gets to have whatever pieces of trash he wants to have as friends.
You get to decide whether a person who wants to be friends with that sort of trash is someone you can respect and have a healthy, fulfilling relationship with.
You have to accept it as a given that he is going to stay friends with this guy.
What you don’t have to take as a given is that you are going to stay in a relationship with him.
Honestly your boyfriend’s character is nothing to write home about. Throughout your post, the main theme is him not standing up for you even just once. On the contrary, at some point he even joined in on the bullying, and when it became clear you won’t sit in a corner and tolerate this silently, he started ghosting and unghosting the friend instead of simply sitting him (and anyone following along) down and telling them he will absolutely not tolerate any disrespect towards his partner moving forward. This is what an upstanding guy would have done before playing hide and seek with their supposed best friend. But this dude cares about avoiding conflict above all. He doesn’t care about your comfort or his friend’s feelings, for that matter. You should have stayed broken up.
You disrespected their friendship, how di you expect him to act. He is still a teen in brain development. I would suggest you ask yours why are you having such homophobic worries?