Dear Missy,

have a friend who is enjoyable to be around but her significant other makes me uncomfortable. I am unsure if it is boundaries testing/creepy behavior with intent or if it is just that they are that awkward and it is landing badly. She sometimes will gently call them out but not always. I haven't because I barely know the significant other and am still trying to figure out how to handle things but am considering doing so the next time it happens. Is there a middle ground between never hanging out with them again and only hanging out with my friend alone, and allowing him to be weird and creepy? What do you advise?

LetterWriter

Thanks for writing to me. Almost every woman I know (as well as nonwomen) have dealt with this situation. We have a friend that we like a lot and they start dating someone who for one reason or another we don't want to spend much time around. I am going to make one big assumption in my response, and that is that your friend's SO is not being overtly abusive. There is a lot of good advice on the internet on how to support a friend who is dating an abuser, and, frankly, it's not a question that I can answer better than people like Captain Awkward.

LW, you are not obligated to figure out whether this person is socially awkward or testing your boundaries. It is enough that you find their behavior creepy and off putting. I have two pieces of advice for you.

First, you should absolutely take opportunities to spend time with your friend alone, especially if you and friend have a history of hanging out just the two of you. Doing so will remind you of why you like your friend and want her in your life. And, if her SO is toxic, it gives your friend a lifeline and contact outside of her relationship with them. While you're hanging out alone, do not badmouth her SO or otherwise triangulate the three of you, and if possible, don't become a dumping ground for her complaints about her SO. We all vent sometimes, but the point here is that you want your relationship with your friend to center you both and not this other person. You're doing a lot of emotional labor around her new SO, and that can get exhausting if you aren't feeding that friendship.

Second, you mention in your letter that your friend sometimes speaks up when her SO is inappropriate, but you don't say whether you do. I think we put a lot of pressure on our friends to "mind" their SOs when they bring them into our social circle, and that isn't always useful or helpful. It's okay to establish your own relationship with them, and that includes boundaries. This is especially true if your friend is in the relationship for the long haul and her SO ends up being a regular part of your life. You and your friend might have very different ideas about what is inappropriate and she may have some context that makes her more lenient regarding some of her SO's behavior (frankly, the context might be "being newly in love). What looks like "letting off steam" to her might be "wildly out of line" to you. And that's okay! You don't have to use her as an intermediary to address her SO's behavior when it makes you uncomfortable. The next time they do something that makes you uncomfortable, name it. "I don't like those kinds of comments." or "I prefer not to be touched." or "That kind of joke isn't funny (to me)." Are all perfectly reasonable things to say.

I am assuming here that the actions/words that are making you uncomfortable are aimed at you and not at your friend. Even if they are aimed at your friend, you can set a boundary around not wanting to hear some of it, but the script is a little trickier. "Ewww... don't play grab ass in front of me..." or "I don't want to hear about your intimate details." is still completely reasonable. And then, you can address this with your friend one-on-one. "Hey, I know you all are hot and heavy, but I'm not comfortable with you making out in front of me." is pretty tame.

If you name the behavior and set the boundary and they continue to push it, it's perfectly fine to stop spending time with the SO. Your letter seems to imply that you want to keep hanging out with the two of them together, so, for now, I'd try cutting out the middle(wo)man and tell the SO to cut it out on your own.

Good luck!

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