James' World 2

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Dear Prudence,

I (47 F) have been in a relationship with my boyfriend (50 M) for three years. I can make a long list of his good qualities, and my teenage children really enjoy spending time with him on occasion. I’m going to get straight to the “but.” Although we have been together for three years, I see him sparingly, as I am a single mom to three great kids. I mainly spend a night or two with him every other weekend while the kids are with their dad. Thus, I don’t really have the opportunity to know what he is like on a day-to-day basis. I probably see him on his best behavior. But I’ve had reason to question some things about him.

I think, but don’t know, that he drinks daily and probably too much. I expressed this concern to him, and he basically said he would take it into consideration, but I don’t see any change in his drinking. We have politically different views, which is fine with me, except his views are driven by anger and misinformation rather than logic and fact, such that I have had to tell him that we cannot discuss politics; we simply agree to disagree. Once, we were visiting some friends of his a few hours away, and he got drunk and told me that he thought I was flirting with another man and didn’t want me coming home with him. I ended up walking by myself at night through a city I didn’t know and taking an Uber two hours home. Last weekend, we drove a few hours to stay at the beach and once each on the way there and the way back, he had an instance of road rage so severe that he was driving alongside the other car screaming and gesturing. I felt so upset and unsafe. And I can’t stop thinking that he has jeopardized my safety on multiple occasions now.

But the instances are few and far between, and so out of line with everything else I know about him, so I end up letting them go. So, I am three years invested in this relationship. I feel like I would tell anyone else that this guy obviously has some issues and they should move on, but I have spent my whole life finding ways to justify and excuse others’ bad behavior—it’s my superpower and my kryptonite!—so I’m not confident about what to do here. I feel stuck and not sure which part of myself to trust.

—Determined to See the Best

Dear Determined,

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