SINGAPORE: Not knowing how to deal with the fact that his girlfriend keeps giving a married male colleague a lift home after work, a man took to Reddit to ask locals for advice.
“How do I deal with this, my emotions, and this situation if it constantly makes me feel uncomfortable, but to her she’s not doing anything wrong?” he wrote on the r/SingaporeR forum on Thursday (Oct 30). “I’ve raised this to her many times, but she says there’s no ill intention and so she has no intention of stopping this arrangement.”
For context, the man shared in his post that his girlfriend drops this male colleague at his doorstep whenever she uses her family’s car, which is about once a week, or every day if her parents are travelling overseas.
Sometimes, he added, his girlfriend also gives a few other colleagues a ride to the MRT, but more often than not, it is just the two of them. “They’ve known each other for almost two years, about the same time we’ve been dating, and she’s been doing this since early on in our relationship. I’ve stopped bringing it up, but honestly, it still makes me really uncomfortable.”
In addition to the car rides, the man said there were other incidents involving this colleague that made him uneasy. For example, when the colleague travelled overseas with his wife, his girlfriend asked him to go to a boutique and help her buy a luxury item worth S$4,000 “to save on GST”.
“To me, it seemed like a really big favour to go to a boutique to make such a large purchase and bring it back for someone. I raised this with her, but she went ahead with it anyway.”
He also mentioned that his girlfriend and this colleague used to text about non-work-related topics after work and on weekends.
“It doesn’t make sense to me why anyone would feel the urge to talk to someone they already see nine hours a day, five times a week, if there isn’t some insidious subconscious reason behind it. I talked about this with her quite a few times before and she’s since stopped texting him outside of work other than the occasional text, I think.”
“Your insecurity is your own problem.”
Many Reddit users weighed in with mixed reactions. Some sympathised with the man, saying they too would feel uncomfortable if their partner was constantly spending time alone with a married colleague, especially one of the opposite gender.
“She doesn’t respect you,” one user said. “If the tables were turned, she’d be the one feeling like crap and probably be throwing a tantrum and making it a bigger deal.”
“Don’t give her any more ammunition to harm you with,” another chimed in. “Drop the relationship. This guy won’t be her last. Don’t expect people to change. I speak from personal experience after being married for a decade.”
Others, however, felt the man was just reading too much into the situation.
One user pointed out that all the things he mentioned in his post, such as giving lifts or texting outside of work, are normal in any kind of friendship. “Why are you so suspicious and jealous?” they asked.
“Hard truth, but you’re too insecure, man; you need to work on yourself. If you break up with her, you’re only doing her a favour to find someone else who can trust her more than you.”
Another remarked, “Don’t think she has crossed any lines here. Your insecurity is your own problem.”
A third added, “As a woman, this is 100% your problem. Your GF has a friend, and they do each other favours. She’s driving him home to his wife, for god’s sake. She surely knows about the lifts and is probably happy that this favour gets him home faster.”
In other news, a 22-year-old woman who graduated with a private diploma in IT (Network Defence) took to social media to share that she now regrets taking up a legal administrative job that pays below S$1,500 a month.
Sharing her experience on Reddit’s AskSingapore forum, the woman explained that she accepted the position only because she was unable to secure a role in her chosen field. “I accepted it because I was desperate for a full-time job,” she said. “I couldn’t find a job in that line, so I decided to apply for any admin-related role, and now I’m stuck with my current one.”
Read more: IT diploma grad regrets taking up legal admin job that ‘pays less than S$1.5k’ out of desperation
