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Dear Breakup Girl,

I met my boyfriend three and a half years ago on vacation. It was a perfect scene...night on the beach, waves crashing on the shore, fireworks left over from the fourth of July going off overhead...you get the idea. Well, I saw him first from a distance walking straight towards me and before I even clearly saw his face I had this moment of clarity. I thought, "This is the guy I am going to marry." I don't know anymore whether I believe in love at first sight, maybe I never did, but that is what I thought, corny as it sounds. Things were wonderful. We attended the same college after high school and were happy to be together after living 6 hours apart for two years and only being able to see each other for a weekend once or twice a month. It was tough, but we made things work. I felt like I did a lot of growing as a person from the responsibility of a long-distance relationship. I had to develop a lot of understanding, trust and respect for other people's feelings (namely his).

The problem arose right before my sophomore year of college. I met Crush Boy. I saw him at a party at a friend's house and thought he was great. (Cute, nice, sweet, shy, wonderful manners...my boyfriend is cute, nice, and sweet but is sometimes unknowingly inconsiderate and dresses in raggedy jeans and Kiss t-shirts and an old leather jacket that's...oh, we'll cover this in a sec!) My friend and I ended up singing along with a cd and it turned out Crush Boy also is very interested in music (I was President of my high school's Advanced Chamber Choir) and we ended up singing show tunes and things together for the rest of the night. I was leaving for college the next week but saw him again before I left at the same friend's house. A group of us watched movies and Crush Boy and I ended up snuggling on the couch. I left for college the very next morning. Boyfriend was there and as always he insisted on spending every waking moment with me. All the time I secretly pined for Crush Boy!

I saw a guy walking around campus wearing the shirt Crush Boy wore the night I met him and almost cried. It wasn't so much that I missed him (though I did horribly) but that I knew it could never be. My relationship with the boyfriend had seemed picture-perfect until that time. His way of dressing irritated me a little but I was willing to overlook it and knew that was how he was when I met him. (I am not even going to attempt to change a guy!)We met in a fairy-tale way. He did little fairy-tale things for me. I felt loved and appreciated. The fairy-tale eventually wound down as it always does because nothing can stay new and exciting forever, but I continued to feel the love and everything I had before. Until this last summer. I don't know what it was or what caused it but the boyfriend didn't seem to work as hard at maintaining our relationship. I have my suspicions that it was a certain girl he met at work though he denies it. He had a habit in his pre-Me days of developing obsessive crushes on girls. (Not the psycho kind, the cute sitcomy Ross-Rachel kind. I normally don't crush very easy at all.) He quit e-mailing as much or writing though I continued to do this and buy little presents and send cutesy cards, etc. Every year on the anniversary of the day we met we go to the beach where we met and this summer there was no three-year anniversary present for me though I got one for him. (Did I also mention there was no Valentine's Day gift or even a birthday card that year either?) So obviously after all this, when I met Crush Boy I fell for him.

Yet there is more...the boyfriend is caring despite all the above. He is, as mentioned earlier sometimes unthoughtful and inconsiderate...but this is also the guy who waits on me voluntarily hand and knee when I am sick, drove me to the E.R. when I was deathly ill and basically takes orders from me all day. (I get bossy at certain periods in the month without realizing it.) And he never complains. He will occassionally bring me flowers or fix me dinner and have it waiting when I get back from class, too.

But I also buy all the groceries and we always end up spending my money though his family has twice as much as mine does. And oh, BG, to be honest, this is also the guy that said he was going to kill himself when he thought I was going to break up with him once. It was a false alarm but it made me think about actually doing the deed. This was a year and a half ago and no such behavior was ever repeated. Not even when we broke up a month ago after arguing and stayed that way for a week. (He cried but he was the nicest, most understanding guy then.) His parents are both psychiatrists and I wanted so bad to tell them about what happened a year and a half ago but he made me promise not to. (I think they suspected something was up though, but the boyfriend does not talk in-depth with his parents. I think he has some issues because he is adopted. To make things worse on him his birth mother has been harrassing him lately for a meeting for the first time in his life.)

I think he felt depressed that time though because he's basically planned the rest of his life around me though I never asked him to. I once thought I wanted to marry him and I can still see it happening but lately I haven't felt attracted to him on the whole. There are little bursts when I do and I stare happily at him for days. Then there are other times where I don't even feel like having him touch me. And this bothers me because I wonder what is wrong with me though I tell myself that there seems to be more wrong with him sometimes. Still it really bothers me because despite that one disturbing day ( I absolutely could not believe he would do something like that because it is SO unlike him) he truly is one of my many best friends. I can still and always have been able to talk to him about anything. I can't imagine my life without him in it. But the thought of being with Crush Boy has me preoccupied.

When the boyfriend and I broke up most recently and he was so understanding he asked me if I wanted to see other people. I said I wanted some time to think about it. But then we were watching movies in his dorm room one night (he lives two floors below me) and we ended up hugging good-bye afterwards. I told him then that I just wanted to see him. I had thought about him seeing other people and it made my stomach ache. He said he wouldn't have dated anyone else even if I had but I think eventually he would have and I couldn't bear the thought. I think I might have mistook this for "I am still madly in love with you" when really I am starting to think of him more as a guy pal. Because now, I am home for Christmas break and Crush Boy being best friends with my best friends is unavoidable. And even if he were avoidable I would still want to see him because I consider him a really good friend as he has been there for me over this last semester just as well as anyone else. It has been made very known to me by Crush Boy and our mutual friends that he likes me VERY much and thinks about me all the time. He is totally respectful of my relationship with the boyfriend though, as a few weeks after the snuggling event he met the boyfriend and thought he was odd but a nice guy. They've sat down and played video games together! Crush Boy told my friend whose house we met at that he thinks the boyfriend is a cool friend and that he and I make a cute couple in a way but that he may not be the best guy for me. Well, my friends have been saying that for two years so it wasn't news to them or me because they had told me the same thing themselves. My parents have said the same thing. (They are also infatuated with Crush Boy!) Crush Boy has met my grandmother even and she loves him. (My grandmother and I talk about everything!)

To complicate matters even more, Crush Boy has chronic diabetes and at the age of 22, is up to four or five insulin shots a day. He frequently has reactions and has to carry his insulin case with him at all times and have his medical alert bracelet on at all times. His life expectancy is low and he has decided not to have children. None of this bothers me, though, because I feel myself developing feelings for him that I have never had for anyone. He even told me once he didn't know if his life expectancy would be that long. But I don't care. He seems so wonderful. It's like he's a butterfly who may not be around that long but he's such a beautiful person. His family is just as important to him as mine is to me while the boyfriend is staying home to party with friends instead of going to Florida to visit his grandparents for Christmas. Crush Boy and I have all the same interests (Star Trek, Star Wars, music tastes). I just really really like the Crush Boy! I want to be able to have a relationship with him and not hide it from the boyfriend. I also refuse to cheat on the boyfriend. I owe him more than that. I am a breath away from telling the boyfriend that I want to see other people. But yet I dread the stomach achy feeling if he does the same. It will drive me insane. Yet I can't chain him down if my heart's not in it anymore. Yet, I hate to give up on the fairy-tale romance my boyfriend and I once had. Still I can't let a guy as cool and amazing as Crush Boy pass by. I can't ask him to wait forever. AAAAGGGGGHHHH! Please help me put things in perspective, BG!! I REALLY REALLY REALLY NEED YOUR HELP!

--Erin B.

Dear Erin,

Sounds to me like you're home for Christmas breakup. I mean, it sounds like you're trying to get, like, permission from Breakup Girl to move on. I understand why you'd need some sort of validation, and I understand why you'd want to break up in the first place. With all due respect to your boyfriend's other prevailing issues, you want a partner, not, like, a distracted waiter. "For old time's sake" is not a convincing motivation to extend a relationship into the new year. And of course the thought of breaking up -- his being hurt, his seeing other people, yadda yadda -- isn't exactly a sugarplummy vision. Important -- and oft-repeated -- Breakup Girl Maxim: the icky feelings that surround a breakup are part of the territory, not evidence against its wisdom.

But just a few words of caution. First: about your boyfriend's talk of, God forbid, killing himself. Whether this is high-stakes emotional coercion or an actual threat, take it -- if it happens again -- as a serious issue either way (but again, not as a reason to stay). Be careful and thoughtful. You know him and care about him. And/but you as the dumper can't be the one to heal him from his dumpage. If things seem truly dicey, you may have to bust him to his parents. Use your judgment.

Second, notice that I have made my case (that is, seconded your motion) without a single mention of Crush Boy. That's because this, Erin, is not about choosing between KISS and Chamber Choir. It may seem that way in practice, under the circumstances, but it's not. One boy at a time. I know you're home for break, and CB is so totally adorably around, but -- especially if/since you think things could get serious -- see what you can do to avoid messy confusing overlap. Do your best to bar him from any sort of triangle. You probably could use some space yourself.

Finally, another warning about Crush Boy: do not romanticize his illness. None of this "butterfly" stuff, yo. It's excellent that all his insulin baggage doesn't interfere with your attraction, but I'm a little nervous that it's also actually fueling part of your crush. A teeny dose of reality: you guys live in dorms, not, like, out on the moors. Ask anyone who's had a partner with an illness. I'll bet the Nightingale factor fades-- or at least winds up complicating things. I am so not telling you to stay away; I am just suggesting that you use this insight as data: why, Erin, would you consider decreased life expectancy ... cute? Why might you be dying to take care of someone? I don't know -- just take a minute to think about it this ...and all the rest. Okay? Good luck. Let us know what happens.

Love,
Breakup Girl

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