Submitted on Thursday, June 12, 2008
By kirsten, 40, from ohio:

You had commented on a situation I had in May. At that time I had told you that this guy and I had been dating almost 2 years and he does not include me in his family events. You had suggested that perhaps this is coming from his family and suggested I talk to him, letting him know how important being a part of his family was. I did talk to him after he told me he was going to his family annual reunion with his daughter, where over 100 relatives meet in Florida for 1 week. I asked him why he was not including me in this vacation and he could not give me a straight answer. He finally said that since he and his daughter are staying with his parents and his parents pay for the condo, he did not feel comfortable asking if I could come, which seemed like a reasonable answer. However, just last week, his mother asked me to join them on this vacation and told me that she had told him that I was more then welcome to join them this year. He never asked me and I did not want to bring it up again, because I figured he would have asked me it he wanted me to go and per your earlier advice I did not want to be a nag. But I am really hurt by this whole thing. Mostly, because he can't tell me the real reason he doesn't want me there. He has been divorced for 4 years now, but still seems uncomfortable with our relationship. He dated 2 other women before he met me (1 for 6 months and 1 for 9 months), so I am not his first post-divorce relationship. He seems very committed to me, but his inability to include me in his family "events" makes me question a lot of things. Perhaps I'm reading too much into not being asked, but I am confused and perhaps our relationship is not where I think it is. He is a very closed person, so talking is almost painful. Please - any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated.