Monday mail makes marvelous

Lots of people had stuff to say about Friday’s letter, on the girl who appears to be smitten with her gay roommate.

One articulate reader took time out of their busy schedule to share:

good luck with that.

How minimalist. In a way that kind of says it all. It’s an extremely sticky situation, and there is likely no perfect solution. I had to offer two potential options in my reply, emphasizing my love for the honesty angle. My gay friend Johnny wrote in to express his preference for the behaviour modification angle:

This line struck me as being very odd: "She likes sleeping in his bed, as opposed to her own."

Dude lets her sleep in his bed? With him?

Perhaps Hernando is in this mess because he likes the attention and enables it? God knows, he wouldn't be the first homo to do something dumb like that.

But setting aside that, I don't think I'd confront her about this as it will only serve to make her upset and paranoid and probably a lousy roommate at the same time.

I like the advice of cutting the strings. Part of the reason she's attracted to him is undoubtedly due to all the attention he gives her.

And, for heaven's sake, tell her to sleep in her own god damn bed.

You’re right, Johnny. I think I should have advised Hernando’s friend to advise him to be more reserved with Janice regardless of whether he decided to tell her how her attention had been making him feel. True, I did say he should have been able to be affectionate with his new, suddenly close female friend, but I should have said that's O.K. provided she was well-adjusted enough to not take it as something it wasn’t, and that does not seem to be Janice, so it follows that his friendliness does seem to have gotten him into trouble here. Live and learn, better late than never… etc.

So I modify my advice. Cut the apron strings a bit, maybe little by little, and see what happens. If nothing improves, I still strongly recommend talking to her, because you know he risks making her upset and paranoid and a lousy roommate if he changes his behaviour with her and she notices and is hurt and confused by that, too. If Hernando ‘confronts’ Janice (though I think that’s a really strong word for what should happen here), there’s a chance it’ll not go well, but there’s a chance she’ll realize how intense she’s being and ease up. It’s kind of an optimistic choice, I think; their friendship (not to mention home life), should it continue, would be more genuine and healthy and relaxed than if he just started avoiding her.

Neither solution is fail proof, and there’s going to be some discomfort no matter what. Sucks!

Somebody agrees an advice alteration was needed:

I think cutting the stings little by little is definitely a smarter choice, especially since she's his roommate and that complicated things quite a bit.
I really do think that Janice is just taking the loose rope Hernando gives her and now he realizes he gave her a bit too much and he's no longer comfortable with that.
I also think he should backtrack one step at the time: start doing things without her, take time away from home to breathe, stop telling her everything, etc.
Truth is, it's sort of like the overbearing friend you were talking about earlier. The fact that he hasn't pushed her away earlier is because a part of him needs or enjoys that closeness as well, so I think both of them are troubled in this and not just the slightly delusional Janice. It seems to me like both of them need the affection and stability. Just now, Hernando feels the need to peel himself away and fly on his own for a bit, and that's exactly what he should do, allthewhile communicating with Janice so she won't double her efforts to try to get closer while he's trying to pull away. Hernando needs to learn how to respect himself and how to communicate so that others respect him as well.

That could all be helpful to consider.

Somebody wrote in to criticize my assessment of Janice:

How can you say you know all this stuff about someone you don’t know? Maybe she’s just awkward. You can’t say for sure she’s in love with the guy.

Hey, sure, it’s definitely possible she just has no idea how to be a friend, if that’s what you mean by ‘awkward.’ I could totally see that. But you know, these blog entries get pretty long anyway without me trying to catch every single possibility for a situation. And, the meat of my advice -- for Hernando to talk to her and/or cool down his involvement a bit -- would work in the situation that you pose, too.

You know, if nobody felt the freedom to make calls in situations concerning people they don’t know, the advice column, as a model, could not be sustained. I DO NOT WANT TO LIVE IN THAT WORLD.

Tune in Tuesday for my thoughts on the dynamic between ex-girlfriends and now-girlfriends, as one girl struggles to not send her ex and his chick mind bullets every time she sees them.