On high road, you can’t lose

Carolyn: My wonderful boyfriend of five months is living with one of his female friends from high school. When he and I started dating, she got really territorial and flipped out. Now, she doesn’t even speak to me. I feel like I have made reasonable efforts to win her over but, honestly, I don’t particularly like her. He generally sticks up for me to her but not always. And sometimes the things that he takes her side on are issues that are really important to me. I try to be sympathetic to the roommate dynamic, but it’s getting really difficult. Except for this one issue, everything else is totally great. I love all of his other friends, am so attracted to him and think he’s hysterical. Short of giving the not-cool her-or-me ultimatum, what can I do? – A.

How much time is left on his lease?

Theirs is a years-long friendship and yours is still, at this point, a blip, so you can’t expect him to end their friendship just because she doesn’t like you.

But you can expect him to end their friendship, or at least stand up to her, on his own behalf – because she’s being childish and rude. Assuming you haven’t done some undisclosed horrible thing to her, his defending her is indefensible. If she can’t be civil to his guests, jealous or not, then these are true colors she’s showing.

Unfortunately, drawing the line means one of two things: an ultimatum, which would be counterproductive, or a breakup, which might prove to be premature.

So give it time. Specifically, give him time to see this friend for who she is. Right now he probably sees the battle as Roommate vs. Girlfriend. The longer you walk the high road while she mucks the low, the harder it’ll be for him to miss that it’s really Roommate vs. Decency – a battle in which strong people know to take sides.

Might he still miss the point? Sure. That’s possible even after you make it easy by calmly declining to hang with the roommate, a legitimate stand I suggest you take.

But as with almost any dating conflict, you can’t lose here. If he doesn’t figure out that indulging his roommate is wrong, then you still come away wiser, that your hopes about him were misplaced.

Dear Carolyn: What do you do if you think one of your best friends is about to marry a gay man? I feel there are way too many signals to not be concerned. For example, his only friends are girls (e.g., his best man is his dad and the remaining groomsmen are in the bride’s family); his favorite topics of conversation are shoes and outfits; he reads romance novels and likes chick flicks; he has stereotypical mannerisms. I have more, but I’ll keep the list short. I don’t want to anger my friend, but I don’t want to see her get hurt, either. Do I say something or keep my mouth shut? – Trying to Help

Unless the “more” you have is his boyfriend, you have nothing but stereotypes, and so you have nothing to say.

That doesn’t mean you can’t help. Any time you’re worried about a friend’s mate, you can always just get her talking, see what she has to say.