Another email from Brother #1:

From one of my favourite episodes.

Notes: Men can be relationship vultures, too, but I have not had much experience with the male of the species to blog about it.

Not all female friends are relationship vultures. Don’t be paranoid; use common sense.

Dedication: This is for Kati. You deserve more than enough, my friend.

She is the girl-woman circling above your relationship. She is looking for a weak spot, something she can swoop down on. Something that isn’t perfect about your marriage/relationship. A hole in the fabric that she can enlarge, exploit.

She wants your guy. She has her reasons, though she may not even know what compels her to do what she does. Sometimes she just likes to be the Damsel In Distress and is attracted to a Rescuer kind of man. Maybe your guy can get her a promotion at work or something, and flirtation (and sometimes sex) is what she uses to get what she wants. Some of them do it for sport. Sometimes it turns out that they just didn’t get enough hugs when they were little. Maybe she just wants whatever someone else has, and what you have is pretty good.

She is the co-worker who wants to go out for drinks “wwith everyone”, but only remembers to invite your boyfriend/husband. When it is a group setting, she usually leaves her car in the parking lot at work and needs a ride to it. Sometimes, she pretends to be drunk off of two white wine spritzers, too drunk to drive, so that she can get a ride home with your guy. She wants to get him alone, to talk to him, to get him to open up, especially about his relationship with you. She needs to know what your weaknesses are so that she can pretend to be the things that you are not.

She’s the girl at the dinner table of a mutual friend who talks about all of the relationships she has “fixed”. You will know her because in all of those relationships that she “helped”, (a) the couple is broken up now and (b) she sided with the man in each case. Watch her eyes, girls. Chances are you will find them locked onto her next victim while she talks about what a heroine she is to “poor guys” that are not getting what they need out of their current commitment. It is her way of letting them know that she can make THEIR life better, “too”.

She is the girl at the party who laughs a little too hard at your fella’s jokes. She lays the compliments on him thickly, too. She will make a point of telling you, in front of your boyfriend/husband, how great he is, how sweet, how thoughtful, how strong, whatever, and how lucky you are to have him, all the while trying to make some kind of physical contact with him (touching his hand while he lights her cigarette, losing her balance momentarily and using his arm or shoulder to hold onto while she regains it).

This part is important. Get closer to the screen, please. She is the girl that suddenly wants to be your friend… in front of your boyfriend/husband only. This is to show him what a good person she is. She says things like, “We should go out, just us girls,” or “we should go shopping,” or “let’s do lunch,” but she does not call you or return your calls. But she does call him. She talks to him about her man troubles; in these stories, she is usually the victim. She tells him about her work-related problems. She wants a man’s point of view.

This part is even more important. She will visit, call you or email you expressly to say that she hopes that you don’t think she is “trying to steal your man” – and you have not said or done anything to imply that you had entertained that thought. All kinds of red flags should be popping up at that point.

It depends, mostly on your guy’s reactions to her behaviours. It has been my experience that when a man is in a committed relationship and happy with it in general, he is oblivious to outside forces. You can tell him what you see coming down the line. He may not believe you or he may notice it now that you’ve said something. He may tone down or cut off any friendship with the vulture now that he sees her for what she is. He may not. What YOU do depends on what he does.

Note: It doesn’t depend on what she does. She is not part of your relationship. Do not make her important by confronting her or even acknowledging her existence. It usually does more harm than good. She wants to be important. Ignore her as much as possible.

If your man is spending a lot of time (especially alone) with her, if he is on the phone with her or messaging/texting with her often… if he comes home and has nothing left to say to you (because he has been talking to her all day/afternoon/evening/whatever)… if he is sharing news, his ideas, and his dreams with her before you (or worse, instead of you), flirting with her, doing things for her and leaving you to handle things at home on your own, you need to say something. That’s emotional infidelity, really. You have to stick up for yourself; this doesn’t mean you need to scream or hit him. Just talk to him. If things were good before, and he hasn’t actually slept with her, there is nothing lost that cannot be found. Talk and talk and talk. Don’t leave anything out; don’t lie about how you really feel to avoid an argument. You may come to the conclusion that it is best for both parties to dissolve the relationship, or you may discover that you love one another even more than you thought.

If your guy is sleeping with the vulture… you will probably need to cut him loose. All of the couples’ counseling in the world cannot truly repair a broken trust. You went into this relationship with the understanding that it consisted of two people. There is no room for a third party. Unless there are some “extra-special circumstances” (and I cannot think of one)…Break up. Grieve. Hang out with your girls. Do things for yourself. Seek counseling if necessary. You deserve someone’s complete and undivided attention, someone’s entire heart, and you should not settle for anything less. If you try to stay with him, you will just make yourself crazy.

If that happens, and your former guy goes off with vulture-girl, here is something that may make you feel a tiny bit better: His relationship with this creature will usually last three to six weeks. At that time, the vulture becomes bored with him and/or has gotten what she wanted from him (money, a new car, promotion, whatever) and she itches to move on to the next victim. She will either dump him outright or cheat on him a lot or just make his life miserable in general. The lavishing of compliments will cease as her mask comes off and his ego will deflate.

Chances are, he will miss you. He will probably regret how he treated you. He may try to win you back, or at least, apologise.

Accept his apology and move on.

All artwork is from Photobucket.com.

Now, this is a man’s grill!