DEAR EMILY,

 

I am 29 years old, separated since last year and processing my annulment. As I moved on, I met a neighbor who is also separated, has a child and undergoing her own annulment. We started talking and became friends last year.

 

From then on, we haven’t stopped talking to each other. There are times when we’d go out alone; and sometimes we’d bring her baby with us.

 

We discussed our situation and I confessed to her the feelings I am having for her. I told her about my willingness to be the father for her baby. She explained that she has other suitors and that her stand to everyone is a “NO” including me. But, she added that I’m the only one she goes out with, talks to frequently and welcomes into her house.

 

We still go out to unwind, bringing her baby girl sometimes. I frequently accompany her on her errands, bring her to work and sometimes fetch her from the office.

 

Then she requested that we lie low as she is very cautious about what other people might think and say. I have this feeling of giving up, thinking that my wooing is not enough. I am afraid that I am overdoing things.

 

Is this girl not that interested in me? Do I have to rethink this promise I made to her to never give up on her and her baby? It hurts when she avoids communicating with me sometimes. —S.

 

Think about it. You two are in this pivotal transition period where both your feet are still standing on shifting sands. What makes you think she’ll jump at something she had just gotten away from?

 

You say you talk frequently. Haven’t you expressed enough of your experiences—possibly sharing every bit of the misery and the trauma you just went through? Don’t you think she is being judicious in making sure that the exact same things will not happen again? Clearly, she wants her life—this time—to happen on her own terms, with her baby, to say the least.

 

You cannot just jump immediately from your last relationship to another because you feel close to the person you’re near.  Give time to do its magic. Allow both your bad experiences to dissipate into thin air, and washed clean from recent memory. You have your annulments to think of, which will not only be stressful but expensive as well!

 

She’s interested in you enough to allow you to be near her, her baby and her house. But not enough to lose sight of her goal. She’s still full of apprehension about starting another relationship that she’d rather give you the occasional cold shoulder to drive home her point.

 

If she goes all out and proclaims to the world your presence in her life, this may jeopardize her pending annulment, and her attempt at having a new lease on life.

 

Give her a break. You’d be giving yourself one, too. As the song “Turn! Turn! Turn!” goes, “There is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven.”

 

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