Dear Queenie,
I’ve been dating a very nice man for several months but he has a problem with the fact that a lot of my friends are men, not in a romantic way, but just friends and work colleagues and people in a group I volunteer with who are mostly men.
We have been talking about just seeing each other and no one else, but he says this would mean not having anything to do with any other men, which would mean I couldn’t go out for coffee with my work colleagues or do any volunteering with men (just with women would be okay with him, but not with men).
I would never cheat on him but I don’t want to give up all my outside activities, and he won’t consider doing volunteer work with me. He says I only do it to attract men, which is not true, but I can’t convince him of that.
Queenie, how can I get him to trust me?—Worried girlfriend
Dear Girlfriend,
This is not so much a matter of your being untrustworthy as of your boyfriend having serious insecurities. Professional counselling might help both of you – him to learn how to deal with his inability to trust you, and you to learn how to cope with it.
I agree with you that it would be good if your boyfriend would go with you to do your volunteer work. Such groups can always use all the help they can get. Could it be that he is not interested because they are mostly men and few, if any, women besides you? Maybe you should be wondering whether you can trust him?
