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Predicament of the Week
In which Breakup Girl addresses the situation that has, this week, brought her the most (a) amusement, (b) relief that it is happening to someone else, and/or (c) proof that she could not possibly be making this stuff up.

Dear Breakup Girl,

This guy I'll call Steve and I dated for a few months. He is 35, a lawyer (I am 33). We never quite "clicked" the way I would have wanted. We would argue a lot, and I always felt like when we did, he'd put words in my mouth, twist things I'd say, box me in verbally. I hated it. It was so frustrating! Anyway, after a few months of this, I broke it off with him. I did say I wanted to be friends.

And so we've been friends, but it has been very strange. First of all, we now have MUCH more fun than we ever did when we were dating. We talk, go out and shoot pool, etc. It is really nice! I think that Steve is basically lonely inside, and since I could also use more friends, it was fine.

Well, it seems that he has never quite given up on us. There is always a sexual undercurrent going on, and, yes, I will admit, we fooled around some.

I have encouraged Steve to date other women, and he has. He had always said what attracted him to me was that I was "different" from the other women he's dated. I have a decent job, and am well educated. Some of his past girlfriends have been strippers, waitresses and people who he had less in common with intellectually. But they were nice to look at, and Steve has admitted to this kind of superficiality. He said just last night that he believes many times love follows lust, so he does not see anything wrong with this approach.

So recently he told me about a girl he met at a Waffle House one night. Turns out she is a stripper, dropdead gorgeous. So they start going out. I didn't ask a lot of questions, but I was kind of disappointed. I mean, after telling me he was hoping to move on to a new kind of woman, he reverts to this! But anyway, he took her down to Florida. At which time he discovered she was also addicted to cocaine. And by the way, she makes $2000 a night stripping at some posh club. But she also admitted to doing stuff on the side for cash.

HELLO??? This girl is a hooker! Steve says he did not know of this until the trip. I feel very sorry for her. She is 20, was abused as a child, and is surrounded by a whole underworld of strippers, drugs, a dangerous ex-boyfriend who is stalking her, etc etc. I mean, straight out of Jerry Springer...I do not even know her, and I hope she will be ok!

Steve never told me explicitly how involved he got with her. I thought she was just a traveling companion, since he gets sick of traveling alone for work. He kept saying how much he wanted to help her get off the drugs.

After his trip, we went to dinner one night, and the phone rang 3 times. It was this girl, calling for help, as she was about to take another snort of cocaine. She's apparently trying to quit on her own cold turkey.

The whole scene makes me very uneasy. I have had a pretty straight middle class upbringing. No drugs or criminal activity on my end, and Steve is pretty much the same. I cannot understand why he wants to get involved with this girl. He is a senior lawyer, with a great career ahead of him. She is 15 years younger, with nothing. And when I do the math of why anyone making $2000 a night is also doing handjobs, well, it just does not add up, unless something even worse is going on. You can't tell me that people who make $2000 a night have nothing else to do than to prostitute for additional pin money.

The worst part was my stupidity. Steve and I wound up sleeping together this past week. It just sort of happened, and I am still trying to figure out if I regret it. I've decided it has not fazed me one way or another. I have not dated anyone else since Steve, and I guess I was kind of lonely when he showed up one evening for dinner. But a bolt of lightning hit me afterwards when I realized what could have happened. I asked him if he had slept with this girl, a hooker on cocaine stripping for a living. He said YES, but that he had been safe, and this all happened "before he knew what she really was into." I was horrified that I may have exposed myself to HIV, even though we were "safe!" I couldn't get over the scare, and yes, the disgust, that I had just slept with someone who had slept with a prostitute.

He claims that she doesn't "really" hook, just [adult word ahead -- BG] handjobs. Yeah, whatever. I'm sorry but to me, you either are a hooker or you aren't. I don't distinguish between the degree of the acts.

I yelled at Steve pretty bad, and he feels sick over this now. He is very sorry I feel so upset, but he does not think that anything bad will happen, especially since he was "safe." He says he really liked this girl for a while (ie, this was not a "paid" encounter). He took an HIV test a couple weeks ago, and it was fine, but I've demanded he take another one in 5 months...

He feels awful and so do I. I feel guilty for being so rough on him, especially when he admitted he was feeling down and looking for companionship when he got involved with this girl. I said there would be no way I'd sleep with him again, at least until he takes that second test. He says now he feels like I am treating him like a diseased whoremonger. I told him there's no way he's looking for an equal in a partner if he is dating girls like this, and he fired back that he thought I was being snobbish, that even though this girl is only 20 and strips, she is very smart and equal in other ways. HUH??? He says he has watched her strip and that it makes him a bit ill because he cares about her.

Am I totally overreacting to this?? I'm so turned off, even though he says he has been able to help this girl cut the drugs. Does that make me selfish and cold?? I am not, but I feel guilty for yelling at someone trying to help someone in trouble. And then making him feel like a diseased member of the human race...

Our friendship is at a crossroads right now, and I feel so sad. I blame myself for not HAVING ASKED FIRST whether he slept with her. Even if the risk is small, I should have thought about it. I feel very guilty for how I treated Steve. I don't know if I am more upset about a potential HIV risk (however small), or knowing Steve is into this stuff. I am not a prude. But I am having trouble with this because I feel like somehow it reflects on me, in some stupid way. Please help!!

-- Trying To Exhale

Dear Trying to Exhale

First of all, sweetie, yes, everyone in this Waffle House of Cards should get tested (again). But beyond that (depending on what you mean by "safe"), if those two were "safe," and you two were "safe," you really really don't have that much to worry about. Anyway, obviously, the "What was I thinking?!" thing is weighing even more heavily on your mind than a relatively unlikely health issue. You are not treating Steve like a "diseased whoremonger" (unless you've said, "Get away from me, you diseased whoremonger!" Steve needs to cut you some slack and see why these developments might upset you a bit); you are treating you like a "diseased whoremonger." You were supposed to be "different" from these (for the sake of this context) non-nice, non-intellectual girls, and there you go doing something that you consider profoundly stupid and kind of mean. (Though really, SO not as stupid as it could have been. Like NOT using projection. Or actually eating at Waffle House.) No wonder you're sad and mad.

So, whatever Steve's got going on in terms of [what society considers] Dating Down, that is his problem. Or maybe this gal really is the bee's knees. Either way, his biz. As long as you're not sleeping with him -- got that? -- not yours. Use some of those corny-but-often-effective "I" statements ("I was rough on you because I was upset because...") to clear the air with him ... and maybe let yourself off the hook in the process. See if you can't return to your fun pool-shooting days, but in the meantime, seek out and work on other friendships as well. Maybe in some place that serves vegetables.

Love,
Breakup Girl

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