“I’m seeing a guy from work at the minute, but he won’t tell anyone about me. He ignores me at work and never invites me out when he’s around friends and I haven’t even been to his house yet, what is the problem?”
Matthew’s answer
Relationships at work are difficult to negotiate.
Men want to be taken seriously at work and it may be that the guy your seeing is keeping you secret as he doesn’t want his personal life to be the subject of speculation at his place of work.
He may also be doing this out of respect for you as he doesn’t want you to receive similar attention. When you first start dating its natural for a guy to be cautious about letting you into his life meeting his friends and seeing where he lives until he is sure where the relationship is going.
However this should not be the case for longer then a few weeks and if this continues I advise you to suggest to him the idea of spending time at his house or having a drink with his friends and judge the situation accordingly depending on his reaction.
If he refuses don’t immediately be defensive or accusatory just say in that case you would rather do something without him that evening. If he is worth your time he’ll find a way to let his guard down and include you more in his life.
Until he acknowledges you as his girlfriend you are still available and have not obligation to do the things he wants and it might take him realising this to make more of a commitment.
Agree that the last line is the best – until he acknowledges as his girlfriend, you are still available. Also consider that there might be reasons that that a person is self-conscious of being attracted to someone that doesn’t fit their image of who they would be with. I am in relationship where it took my man awhile to accept that he was attracted to an older woman. Similarly I was once attracted to a man who was fat and shorter than me. On the other hand, all this is encouraging because it means that superficial things aren’t necessarily a barrier in the long run if other things are working.
What Lily said!!! ^^^^^
While this is a little old…. I had a “relationship” that was similar with someone from work. He always came to my house, but never took me to his, I never met his friends or family… one day about 5 minutes after he left my house I had a knock on my door. A woman who was seriously pregnant (she looked like she was going to give birth any second now) with a baby on one hip and holding a toddler’s hand was standing at the door. She asked me why I had to be stealing her husband. My jaw about hit the floor. This man had never once said he was married, didn’t wear a ring at all, and had never acted married (besides keeping me a secret from everyone anyways). Well at work that night I flat out asked him if he was married. He said no, and I told him about my visitor, and he admitted he was married “but my wife doesn’t understand me like you do”. I broke everything off, of course, and the next week he was dating another girl from work. I told her he was married, and she told me I was a liar. Eventually word got around that he was married though, the company had a picnic and he brought his wife and kids. He didn’t look too happy to be there, so in all honesty I’m assuming that she’s the reason they were all there. So in all honesty it could be too that he’s married or in a serious committed relationship and just doesn’t want to admit to it.
If the person acts ashamed, why even bother with them? Break it off and find someone who respects and publicly acknowledges. There is no excuse for anyone treating someone else like there are dirty little secret. That isn’t love. They’re just using yo