Advice

My boyfriend’s Facebook page says he’s ‘in a relationship’ with his ex

Dear Wayne and Wanda,

I've been seeing "Bill" for several months now and we recently agreed we were officially together – meaning, monogamous, no more online dating (or searching). The problem is his Facebook page still says he's "in a relationship" with his ex. I asked him about this and he said his ex is kind of nuts and it's just easier to leave that as is, and if he were to change his status to show he was dating me, she might try to mess with our relationship.

This sounds kind of off to me, yet this guy has been completely honest with me, and is trustworthy and straightforward. I'm really not that into labels anyway and it wouldn't really bug me if he never made us "Facebook official," but it seems really weird to me that his page still says he is with someone else. To make this a bit more complex, he just moved to Anchorage from the Valley and pretty much ALL of his friends are Valley people so we don't have mutual friends and I have no way of checking whether what he says is legit.

Should I be making a big deal out of this or should I let it go?

Wanda says:

Is it weird that your boyfriend doesn't want to declare to all of social media that you are his girlfriend? Not necessarily. Many people are simply private, and don't bother declaring for all the world to see that they are seeing a specific person. In fact, if you were to look at the social media accounts of some of my friends who are in the most healthy, long-term relationships, you wouldn't even know they had a significant other.

There is plenty of research to support the theory that the people who crow the loudest about their relational happiness are actually the most insecure, desperately hoping for praise, likes, loves, validation and whatever else kind of feedback they can suck from the masses to make them feel better about themselves. Who wants to fall into that category?

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[I'm happily married — so why am I Internet stalking my ex?]

That said, this is a bit different. It's one thing if your dude resists declaring you his official lady friend. But it's quite another that despite claiming to be with you 100 percent, he's still saying online that he's with someone else. Something here doesn't make sense and something about his story doesn't line up. The fact that this past relationship and the majority of his friendships are isolated in another town on which you have limited line of sight is even more troubling. It sounds to me like he's hiding something – and by something, I mean another girlfriend.

Wayne says:

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to shoot a gnarly Boomerang loop video of it splintering when it hits the ground, did it really happen? If a real-life relationship status changes but it isn't reflected within 24 hours on Facebook, did it really happen? If a bear poops in the woods and he doesn't live tweet it, did it really … yeah, it really happened. Check your boot.

Anyway, modern times are complicated and this email makes me long for the more innocent, quaint and private days of the early 2000s, when everything you did, enjoyed, expressed and typed wasn't documented and shared with your friends, family, co-workers, exes, enemies, big business, Mark Zuckerberg, hackers and the government.

While those bygone times have gone bye bye bye like Justin Timberlake's perm, one thing stands the test of time: honesty. And maybe your boyfriend is being honest and his ex really is crazy. That doesn't mean he shouldn't freely live his life with you – in public, on social media, wherever.

Tell him his story smells fishy and you need to get to the bottom of it. If he's scared of his ex, find out why. If it's a legit concern, talk about what you're both going to do to be safe. If he's just being flaky, tell him to get over it or get over you. Either way, have him hand you his phone and teach him how to delete/block his ex and all of her informants from his social media channels. Then change his status to whatever you two agree it should be. Or try something really crazy like getting off social media for a while!

Want to respond to a recent column, point out a dating trend, or ask Wanda and Wayne for wisdom regarding your love life? Give them a shout at wanda@alaskadispatch.com.

Wayne and Wanda

Wanda is a wise person who has loved, lost and been to therapy. Wayne is a wise guy who has no use for therapy. Send them your questions and thoughts at wanda@adn.com.

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