Your Date...And Their Friends
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- Date Mistake #1 (06/01/2008)
Just because you like someone and go out with them doesn't mean you have to go out with their friends. Or does it? This week Ms R looks at what happens when all you want is the company of a particular person, but end up having to adopt their entire circle of friends.
Dear Ms R
A couple of months ago I started seeing a man who I like very much. We're both busy so our time together is precious, usually one or two times a week and the weekends. But somehow I seem to have inherited his entire circle of friends. It's like this ready-made group of couples suddenly appears every time I want to do something. There's always a group dinner or barbecue or something. If we go out to dinner he suggest asking another couple along. Inevitably there will be shared jokes and then I will be expected to talk to the girl while he talks to the guy.
While I have friends, we're not stuck together like glue: this lot don't appear to have got over their university days (we're in our thirties now) and sometimes it just seems like one big show of "Look, aren't we all having fun."
I'm not possessive (in fact I love my space) and don't mind going to the odd group thing every few weeks, but this is getting monotonous. I have very little interest in most of the people he wants to spend time with, and I've tried to suggest that we go out alone and perhaps spend a bit less time with the gang, but he doesn't get it and ends up asking, "Don't you like my friends?" It's driving me mad.
Anne
Dear Anne
You poor thing. You thought you'd found a nice companion but now you've ended up with CoupleZilla. Let me tell you that I'm with you all the way and simply abhor these kinds of packaged get-togethers. From the longer text of your letter he seems like a nice bloke but I can also see he simply doesn't get what all the fuss is about. I must say that since I came to this country fifteen years ago, I have noticed the tendency of a certain kind of middle class person to socialise in this fashion. Their calendars are simply overflowing with CoupleZilla outings.
Of course you're not possessive - in truth it's the members of CoupleZilla that tend to be. These people find security in each other's coupleness and it becomes a habit. The dangers of CoupleZilla are well documented - as each couple gets married, there is pressure on the remaining couple to join in. Children start coming along and ditto. Ms R knows of quite a few cheating men who have finally realised that they didn't marry for love. They married to keep their married friends happy.
The idea that one of their tribe could actually break out and find other friends, maybe even those who are not in a couple, is too remote for them. And therefore the idea that you don't understand how much fun it is to be together must be perplexing for your new dating companion.
There are two issues here. One is, are you having a good time going out with him in any case? Is it still fun or are you dreading it, thinking you will end up at some god forsaken rain sodden picnic with twelve people who bore you? You sound like a straightforward kind of girl, so if he doesn't understand why you'd like a bit more private conversation time, you need to point out how imbalanced it's become. The fact that you don't have anything in common with them is an added minus, however the problem is there whether you like them or not.
The second issue is the big picture. Is he going to change? Ms R thinks not. In my experience there are couple people and non-couple people. I myself am the latter, and therefore the men I see are pretty self-contained individuals who don't really mind what the world thinks.
You may be very similar to me in which case I suggest you still go out with occasionally if you wish, but make yourself scarce when the couples pop up out of the cake. If he can't see the attraction in not having another couple in tow, then he's not for you.
Ms R
A couple of months ago I started seeing a man who I like very much. We're both busy so our time together is precious, usually one or two times a week and the weekends. But somehow I seem to have inherited his entire circle of friends. It's like this ready-made group of couples suddenly appears every time I want to do something. There's always a group dinner or barbecue or something. If we go out to dinner he suggest asking another couple along. Inevitably there will be shared jokes and then I will be expected to talk to the girl while he talks to the guy.
While I have friends, we're not stuck together like glue: this lot don't appear to have got over their university days (we're in our thirties now) and sometimes it just seems like one big show of "Look, aren't we all having fun."
I'm not possessive (in fact I love my space) and don't mind going to the odd group thing every few weeks, but this is getting monotonous. I have very little interest in most of the people he wants to spend time with, and I've tried to suggest that we go out alone and perhaps spend a bit less time with the gang, but he doesn't get it and ends up asking, "Don't you like my friends?" It's driving me mad.
Anne
Dear Anne
You poor thing. You thought you'd found a nice companion but now you've ended up with CoupleZilla. Let me tell you that I'm with you all the way and simply abhor these kinds of packaged get-togethers. From the longer text of your letter he seems like a nice bloke but I can also see he simply doesn't get what all the fuss is about. I must say that since I came to this country fifteen years ago, I have noticed the tendency of a certain kind of middle class person to socialise in this fashion. Their calendars are simply overflowing with CoupleZilla outings.
Of course you're not possessive - in truth it's the members of CoupleZilla that tend to be. These people find security in each other's coupleness and it becomes a habit. The dangers of CoupleZilla are well documented - as each couple gets married, there is pressure on the remaining couple to join in. Children start coming along and ditto. Ms R knows of quite a few cheating men who have finally realised that they didn't marry for love. They married to keep their married friends happy.
The idea that one of their tribe could actually break out and find other friends, maybe even those who are not in a couple, is too remote for them. And therefore the idea that you don't understand how much fun it is to be together must be perplexing for your new dating companion.
There are two issues here. One is, are you having a good time going out with him in any case? Is it still fun or are you dreading it, thinking you will end up at some god forsaken rain sodden picnic with twelve people who bore you? You sound like a straightforward kind of girl, so if he doesn't understand why you'd like a bit more private conversation time, you need to point out how imbalanced it's become. The fact that you don't have anything in common with them is an added minus, however the problem is there whether you like them or not.
The second issue is the big picture. Is he going to change? Ms R thinks not. In my experience there are couple people and non-couple people. I myself am the latter, and therefore the men I see are pretty self-contained individuals who don't really mind what the world thinks.
You may be very similar to me in which case I suggest you still go out with occasionally if you wish, but make yourself scarce when the couples pop up out of the cake. If he can't see the attraction in not having another couple in tow, then he's not for you.
Ms R
Here Is The Writer : Ms Robinson
Ms Robinson was once a copywriter who wrote award winning ads and had eight hour lunches. Weary of the sex, glamour and lavish parties, she switched to corporate communications where she held the hands of executives and banned them from writing this execrable sentence: "In this ever changing world, the only constant is change itself." These days she writes for an increasing variety of people and has ghostwritten several books but if she told you who for, she'd have to kill you. Click here to read her blog, Woman of Experience.
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