A
female
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:I feel horrible for feeling like this but I can't stand the fact my boyfriend is still such good friends with his ex girlfriend. Is it even normal to spend so much time with someone who you dated?!We have been together for 8 months, and it wasn't until recently I started to feel like they spent way too much time together when he told me that a group of their mutual friends were planning a camping trip in summer and asked me if I wanted to go despite knowing that weekend I am away for a hen party for a work colleague. I expected him to still go but when he told me he would be sharing a car ride and then a tent with his ex, I couldn't believe it!Yes, they broke up almost 2 years ago but I'm not the only person who would get angry at her boyfriend sharing a tent with his ex!They are good friends, which is fine but I can't feel like their mutual friends are just covering for something else. I asked him if he had feelings for her or if they were seeing each other behind my back and he insisted it was purely friendship and I was crazy for thinking that.They go to sports matches, nights out, parties ect with their friends and at times I am also there. A few times I have had to remind her that he is my boyfriend and she just laughs in my face and tells me to get real! He then again told me nothing was going on and that he loved me not her. But when she is rubbing his back or hugging him constantly what should I assume?I have been cheating on before, so maybe I am a little crazy but I also know the signs, but I'm scared I am being over the top and I will lose a guy I love through my own insecurities.
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reader, anonymous, writes (24 March 2014): There are suggestions that you go to the hen party?
You've already made it pretty apparent you're not going to have any fun. Your heart will not be in it, and there is nothing worse than having a downer at a party. The point is to celebrate with your colleague, not bring your woes to the party.
Your mind will be at the campsite; not on having fun with the ladies. You can fake it. That would be exhausting; eventually the activities will get annoying. You shouldn't go unless you know you will be in the right frame of mind for it.
A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (24 March 2014): Don't cancel the hen party to go camping! If he's willing to put him and his ex in that situation then he's definitely not worth cancelling your fun evening out!
Best to cut your losses before he hurts you more. He obviously does not give 2 hoots about yur feelings, or have any commin sense of his own!
Good luck xx
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A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (24 March 2014): Sorry to say but you are being manipulated. There is a pattern here . You are being made to feel guilty about feeling uncomfortable about your boyfriend spending time with your ex . Not exactly a caring boyfriend.
Time to wake up or the next stage will be her spending the night in bed with him because "she was too drunk to go home " or so upset that he let her stay the night.
I would have moved on well before the tent incident as a matter of pride .
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A
female
reader, like I see it  +, writes (24 March 2014):
 It is weird, and I would call your apprehension about it not "insecurity" but rather "common sense." You are dead right about not being the only person who would put your foot down about something like this. Sharing a car is no big deal but a small tent is a very personal space. My last ex actually told (or should I say tried to tell) me pretty much the same thing while we were dating - that he was going camping/rock climbing with an old hookup of his and a mutual male friend of theirs without me (I had to work and couldn't attend; he knew this), and because this girl claimed not to have her own tent my ex EVER so kindly volunteered to let her share his. Hmm.
I'm usually very tolerant of partners staying friends with exes and so on, because my experience has been that *most* times they're respectful and open about it, but I drew the line at that because putting two drunk people who'd had casual sex before alone together in a tiny tent just seemed to be asking for trouble.
So I said that was fine with me provided that coming home and being single was fine with him. (It wasn't.) In the interest of compromise, I loaned him a tent of mine for her to use, and she did.
Nothing happened that trip, but later I caught him going to dinner and then to bars with two different girls behind my back and then lying to me about it. (He again tried the "We're just friends" line on me, but I guarantee the girls he took out one-on-one didn't view the outings as "just friendly," and if he had nothing to hide, then he had nothing to feel he needed to lie about.)
At that point I did what I should have done earlier and stopped wasting my time on the guy. He later tried to get back together with me while he was in a relationship with someone else, which more or less proves to me that no lesson was learned - by him, anyway.
Some guys (girls too I'm sure, but I haven't dated them) just can't seem to be satisfied with the full attention of just one girl; they need the ego boost of extramarital or extra-relationship flirting, almost like a recreational high. How far the flirtation needs to go to be "satisfying" to them varies by person, but in NO case is it fair to the primary partner, who is often completely unaware of the situation until stumbling across a text or a message or seeing an incriminating tagged photo on a social media page. My ex was one of these guys. Your boyfriend sounds like he may be one as well.
What I took away from my experience, and what I hope you will consider in your own decision, is that your gut feeling about a person or a relationship is something to ignore only with great caution. No one likes to feel like they are controlling, insecure, or overly suspicious, but a GOOD partner won't keep throwing you the red flags that make you feel that way, either. Someone who genuinely cares about your feelings will set boundaries not because you twist their arm or put your foot down about things but because they love you or care for you and they WANT to do right by you.
It's true that he invited you along and told you what he was doing beforehand, but if he knew full well you couldn't go then he would have felt "safe" in making that offer because there was absolutely no way you could take him up on it. I'm guessing that by throwing out an invite, even one you couldn't possibly accept, he feels that he's undermined any "right" you have to object to it.
I see three options for you here:
1) Accept the situation without question, as he seems to expect you will do; let him go as is, and worry about what he's up to the entire time
2) Try to reach some sort of compromise with him about it that doesn't put him in her tent, knowing that you'll basically have just his word for whether he kept to the deal unless you feel like interrogating his friends about it;
3) Recognize the pattern of inappropriate behavior that *already exists* between him and this ex of his, inform him that you don't find that an acceptable trait in a romantic partner, and walk, thereby minimizing the amount of time and heartache you have wasted on someone who apparently does not appreciate you.
Best wishes, whatever you decide.
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A
female
reader, Honeypie + ♥, writes (23 March 2014):
 I wouldn't cancel a hen party for this. I would however prepare myself to be single fairly soon. Because if they DON'T hook up on the camping trip, it WILL be some other time. Why should you NOT go to a hen party for a friend? You are NOT your BF's chaperon.
You BF may NOT think much of all this time he spends with her, BUT she without a DOUBT is still after him, wanting him back. She has already told you to "get real"... Implying that she has as much "right" to him and his affections as you do.
The ONLY reason I'd cancel going to the hen party over this camping trip is because I didn't want to ruin the hen-party by being upset the whole time worrying about what might happening while they camp.
I don't think that is at all a normal friendship, specially not with her being so touchy feely.
Now the reason WHY I would go to the hen party and let him go camping is this, it will give him enough rope to hang himself with OR he will prove you wrong. Either way it's a win in my book. Win if he cheats because he can't hide that from you, I bet you. So if he cheats you know it's only been 8 months so moving on should be TOO hard. And he he proves you wrong.... Well, maybe that will help you feel better about this odd arrangement he has with his ex.
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A
female
reader, Tisha-1 +, writes (23 March 2014):
 Your boyfriend's ex will be spending a weekend in a tent with him? Ah.
I might make one last attempt to salvage the relationship by skipping the work colleague's hen party and joining the camping trip. N.B. I would be sure to have an exit strategy planned when I discovered my worst fears were in fact real.
But I think the writing is on that proverbial wall. If he's all super cozy with the back rubs and hugging and the tent sharing and you on the sidelines?
The good news is that you've only spent 8 months with him and now you will totally have a boundary set for the next guy.
I think I'd let this one go back into the pool of inconsiderate and oddly entitled weird ex-boyfriends!
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (23 March 2014): If nothing is going on, he wouldn't share intimate quarters with his ex to create the circumstances that could create a mishap.
There will no doubt be alcohol. They will be among mutual friends; who will look the other way, and not intervene for your sake. In fact; I find it quite bold that he would arrange such a set-up having a girlfriend.
For most women, one minute spent with an ex-girlfriend is too much time. Sharing a tent out in the wild with an ex might be pushing the envelope. It's too cozy, and the atmosphere and setting might lend itself to be more romantic than appropriate. I'm a camper. I know what it's like sleeping by a nice warm fire on a chilly night; after a few glasses of wine or bottles of beer.
It sounds innocent, but the opportunities such a situation could present, is more than you should ask of your current girlfriend. Especially when you're only eight-months into the relationship, and attempting to establish trust. He is laying it on pretty thick. He also sounds narcissistic enough to have it his way; or dismiss your feelings about it.
Why can't you cancel that "hen party" to be with your boyfriend?
You were invited, and now you're going to spend the whole other event being a worry-wart; and killing fun for the other women. They will definitely understand your decision to cancel. You've already confronted his girlfriend; and you got dismissed as being foolish. It would have been more appropriate to be reassuring; if he wishes their friendship to be continued and to reinforce your trust.
Cancel your " hen party" and go camping with your boyfriend.
If he seems to be too conjoined at the hip with the ex-girlfriend; then dump the clown, and find someone who prefers to have one girlfriend at a time.
Get what you want and need out of a relationship; don't settle for what you're given. Put your foot down, or just put up with it.
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