Why “Better Than Nothings” Aren’t
Dear Duana,
Cora and I have everything in common. We go on outings anyone else would call a date, take care of each other when we’re sick, and talk every day. But there’s no physical intimacy, and never has been. More than once she’s said the vibe isn’t there for her, and friendship is all I can expect.
A year ago, I took a break to check my emotions, and all that broke was my resolve. I called within a month. Now I’m in love. Is there a way to remain Cora’s friend without it getting in the way of my finding someone else? How do I get over her? Last time, that didn’t work so well.
Judson
Dear Judson,
You’re lonely, but hardly alone. Taylor Swift song notwithstanding, most guys pining for more than platonic love are actual guys, with around 50/50 odds that a man is Into a female buddy.
Meanwhile, few women return the sentiment. So Cora can spend years truly being Just Friends, while you’re involved in something else altogether: The BTN*.
Beware The BTN.
BTNs, or “better than nothings”, tease us with finite fixes for infinite yearnings. They’re the dead-end relationships, the otherwise-perfect commitmentphobes, the people who’ll never be that Into us, the Friends who can’t be more. The Coras.
Yet if BTNs served no function, we wouldn’t spend years waylaid—if not actually laid—in them. Among the popular rationalizations are these:
—Some intimacy feels better than none at all, so we hide ourselves from the trade-off we’re making against our future happiness;
—We wonder if real love is a fairy tale, and whether we should settle for what’s in front of us despite the gnawing loneliness and insecurity;
—We think pain means love, so we forget —or never knew?— that returned love exists and feels fan-fricken-tastic;
—Or we falsely believe love is rare, so we’d better hold onto even a bad match (Note: someone who doesn’t want or isn’t ready for us is a bad match no matter how wonderful otherwise);
—And sometimes we think we’ve already spent so much time here, we can’t or shouldn’t leave now.
Yet in reality, BTNs are much worse than nothing at all.
—BTNs erode your self-confidence and self-esteem. BTNs don’t just cost your resources; eventually, they cost your *you*. Especially the sexy self-confidence chicks universally dig.
Throwing yourself at anyone whose truth says, “I’ll never really be yours” undermines the foundation of your allure and self-worth. “This is all I can have with Cora” can stealthily devolve to, “This is all I can have, period.”
Or worse, “This is all I deserve.”
—BTN’s demotivate you to find someone who loves you back: If you’re taking care of Cora when she’s ill, squiring her to dinners, and calling her daily, the time and money and head-space and heart-space you’ve got for courting a woman? Are already spent, along with your motivation to meet someone new.
Fortunately, you get it that putting everything into this Friendship is corroding your drive to pursue someone truly available. And you don’t sound utterly beaten down.
Which means I’m betting you have the considerable strength Step 2 will take:
Break The Addiction.
If you wonder why men have a tough time with the Just Friends arrangement, look to male biology. Apparently, your Genes want a partner who will make babies with only you. What better way to ensure fidelity than to have you fall madly for She Who Is Hard To Get?
So men’s brains are literally wired to develop addictions to women who make guys wait for sex. The longer you chase a woman, the more bio smack, aka dopamine, your neurons release; the higher you get; and the harder you fall.
This usually leads to a deep and lasting bond between two people who are mutually in love—unless you fall for the woman who’s making you wait because she’s *impossible* to get: Cora.
Upshot? Love is not like a drug. Drugs are like love. And Cora’s your drug and dealer.
As with any other substance of choice, you’re best off quitting cold-turkey. No contact, no phone calls, no emails, no texts, no notes, no accidental-on-purpose meetings, no messages through other friends, no nothing. Anything more strings out the addiction, adding to your pain when what you need is a total break.
How long? Don’t communicate again until you would feel okay if you ran into Cora in public and she was kissing another man.
That’s not a litmus quickly or easily met; it might never happen. But think of it this way. If you were quitting heroin, and you stopped for a month and then shot up just once, what would occur? Yep, the same as last time you quit Cora for only a month. The drug drip resumes, the one-sided attachment roars back to life, and the BTN lingers.
I wish I had an easier solution, but there is no easy way to lose someone you love. There are just harder, less effective, more emotionally wasteful ways than cold-turkey.
Judson, you might give yourself a few weeks to go through the worst of the very real biochemical withdrawal you’ll feel.
But the best cure for an old love is often a new love, and I’m hoping you’ll take your life back soon by pursuing women who are open to you. Don’t sneak dates in the back door by doing date-like things with another Friend. Openly ask a woman out for a date, call it a date, and treat her like a date.
Women who don’t want that aren’t who you need. No matter how wonderful she may be otherwise, anyone who can’t even admit you’re dating is avoiding intimacy. And it’s totally unimportant whether she’s a commitmentphobe in general or just not Into you. She’s not worth your time.
Meanwhile, there’s someone out there who is waiting for you to come along—someone ready and right, someone who is avoiding a BTN because you’re worth being available for.
Which leads me to the final Step:
Go Find Her.
Cheers,
Duana
*Term from Susan Page in “If I’m So Wonderful, Why Am I Still Single?
If this article intrigued, captivated, elevated or explicated you or your understanding of relationships, please click “share article” below to distribute to your favorite social media websites.
Do you have a question for Duana? Email her at Duana@LoveScienceMedia.com.
Related Love Science articles:
—Can Women & Men Really Be Just Friends—and nothing more?
—Q&A for whether men and women can be Just Friends
—How to tell she’s just not that into you (or is she?)
—Getting Over Her (how to heal a broken heart)
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/getting-over-her-how-to-heal-a-broken-heart.html
—Settling 101 (Are your standards too high?)
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/settling-101-traits-for-a-mate.html
—When Men Wait For Sex (why men do and don’t get addicted to love)
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/when-men-wait-for-sex-dumb-like-a-fox.html
—Sex & The (Happily) Single Girl (how women get addicted to love)
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/sex-the-happily-single-girl.html
—How To Break Up
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/texting-your-breakup-whether-when-how-why.html
The author wishes to thank the myriad sources in the above Love Science articles. Additionally, I thank relationship author Susan Page for her insights into BTN’s (Better Than Nothings). Although Ms. Page’s work is not based in science, it is startlingly correct as viewed through social science’s lens, and I highly recommend this book in particular for singletons who want to be paired:
If I’m So Wonderful, Why Am I Still Single?: Ten Strategies That Will Change Your Love Life Forever
All material copyrighted by Duana C. Welch, Ph.D., and Love Science Media, 2011.
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Reader Comments (8)
Great article! My heart aches for Judson, and I'm intrigued by the statement, "We falsely believe love is rare ..."
It isn't?
Might it be that Cora is Judson's only match? Or does each of us have many possible love matches ...? (What a relief that would be. It would make it much easier when dating to say "NEXT!")
Hi, Joan,
Astutely put as usual!
Not only isn't Cora Judson's only match; she's no match for him at all. By definition, anyone who doesn't want us--for whatever reason--is wrong for us no matter how well-suited otherwise. A true match loves us back, unreservedly.
Which means that...
The right person at the wrong time? Is still the wrong person.
The Friend who seems ideal but can offer nothing more? Is still the wrong person.
The commitmentphobe who wants enough of us to use up our time...but not enough to publicly or permanently acknowledge the relationship? Is still the wrong person.
Yet I think you're very close to the Core of why folks stick it out in many a doomed affair: The Myth Of The One True Love.
Science strongly suggests that there's not just One Intended Lover for any of us. To wit, people don't avoid marriage forever because they haven't found The One (for instance, because The One is in Greenland where you'll never meet, because you hail from Uganda). Instead, people all over the world tend to marry the person they fall in love with when they are of the average marriageable age in their culture. In the USA, that's around age 27 for men and 25 for women.
The odds that all those people just happen to find The One And Only Possible Match at just that age, right there in their own neighborhood/university/job are scant at best.
Instead, the explanation that makes sense is that there are many someones for everyone. Put prosaically, love is as real and beautiful as wildflowers--and equally common. And just as the wildflowers return each year, chances at love do come 'round again.
So although we often believe we'd better make it work out with whomever we happen to love, the smarter thing would be to try to increase exposure to genuinely good matches--and then choose the good match who returns our fervor.
Or as I told Judson in a private letter, "Why put off happiness any longer when you don't have to? There is a woman (no, there are several!) who wants someone just like you. And she's having to wait while you putter around with a woman who can't give you her heart."
Next!
So what do you do if you are the girl, who is someone's BTN and just aren't that into them.
I cared about this guy a lot...a ton, like more then friends, but our personalities clash and our relationship was toxic. It hurt us and our friends. So I broke it off cold turkey and that lasted for about a month in a half till I was really done being obsessed with him.
Now I don't want a relationship and he does and its turned me into that girl stringing him along, when he knows I don't want anything with him.
Do you have any tips for those of us who have to be the bad guy?
Thanks for your reply - I love it. What a relief! Having known this information earlier would have saved me a lot of angst in the dating years. I'm waaaay past that now, but my daughter is just approaching ....
I plan to start planting the seeds in her mind right now that there really are many fish in the sea ... and many wildflowers in the field ... and that holding out for the genuinely good match who returns her fervor is in her best and most enlightened self-interest.
As mothers, don't we all want the best for our daughters? And to save them as far as possible from the painful mistakes we have made? Personally, I don't want my own daughter in the painful position of either Judson or Cora ... no offense intended.
Also, I agree with "trying to increase exposure to genuinely good matches" in my daughter's marriageable years as you define as around age 25. (So young?!! I thought women were having careers first, and then marrying and starting families later ...?)
Accordingly, the conniving (sp?) portion of my protective Mom Brain thinks that sending my daughter to a small, elite college of the highest academic quality she can handle (and that I can afford ...) would be a swell idea. In other words, get her in the right place at the right time.
Don't students tend to pair up with whomever is available at school? Having my daughter in a virtual sea of well-educated and potentially excellent providers I think would be perfect. Add the idea of NEXT! if the man in scope doesn't return the fervor, and I could emerge as the World's Best Social-Engineering-Meddling-Mama ever (as Kate Middleton's mama has been accused of by some unkind commentators ...) but ... well.. so what.
All kidding aside, is this a scientifically-sound plan to get my daughter on the right track? (And, seriously, I *do* want my daughter to marry for LOVE, not money --that's been working out very well for me :-) She's an only child, and I won't be around forever. I want to be sure she is well-provided for (don't all mothers feel this way?), and *of course* I am insisting that she get the best education possible and be able to take care of herself. At the same time, I'd like to set up her for success, rather than failure in love. While I'm a big believer in the power of the Almighty - i.e, the Universe will bring us what we need when we need it -- I also believe it's enlightened self-interest to generally place oneself in the general right place at the general right time. For example, an excellent university during the age 20's, and stay for an advanced degree so you're still in the right sea at age 25 ...?
As my Grandma used to say, "Honey, it's just as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor one ..." I think I'm finally beginning to get what she was trying to say ....
I'm interested to know your take on this.
Dear Ronda,
I've gotten a couple private responses about this article that said, in a nutshell: "Hey, Cora needs to quit letting this guy hang around if she knows he's in love and there's no hope. It's cruel."
Well--maybe, maybe not. Fact is, Cora had been honest with Judson on more than one occasion, at least in terms of her words. She had told him from the start that the spark wasn't there for her, and had reminded him of that when he expressed More to her later on.
Yet she continued *behaving* in ways that could readily be construed as leading Judson on. She allowed him to take her on dates (whether or not that's what she called them), she let him take care of her when she was sick, she permitted all the non-sexual attentions a lover would lavish.
And in my view, she shouldn't have. But I wonder what you and other Wise Readers think? Is Judson solely responsible for taking care of himself? Or does Cora bear some responsitibilty in her actions and not just her words?
??
Which brings us to your question of how to be the bad guy: Break up cleanly, quickly and honorably. Tell your Friend--for whom you're the BTN--that "I enjoy our friendship very much and I value your presence in my life. But I do not have romantic or sexual feelings for you, and that is not going to change."
And if your conscience guides you to spend less time with him--or no time at all--then you can add this: "I'm taking up the time you'd need to find someone else, and I need to free up my own time, too. I'm going to need to stop spending any time with you for a long while." You can work out what details the timeframe needs to follow, but my recommendation to your Friend remains what I told Judson: When your Friend could calmly see you kissing another man, the Friendship can safely resume, but not before.
Ronda, if you'd like to see how men and women said they want to be broken up with, I did a small study on that, and the Love Science article is posted here:
http://www.lovesciencemedia.com/love-science-media/texting-your-breakup-whether-when-how-why.html
Thanks for your question--and good luck as you determine next moves regarding your Friend.
Dear Joan,
I hear you and would not feel one whit bad about having the feelings you do, nor about planning accordingly. In fact, I share many of those feelings and plans regarding my own children :).
Before I give you the science, here's a true story that underscores the point.
A woman I know of wanted to marry for both love and money. She had come from poverty herself and felt ground to dust by it. So she hatched a plan to rent the garage of a home in an elite neighborhood. Every day, she wore her cutest outfits while taking her dog on a leisurely stroll; single men approached her to talk. Eventually, some of these men asked her out. One fell in love with her--and she with him. They married for love.
I know of her because I watched a televised interview where her rich husband was present. Was he upset? Not at all. "Look," said he, "What my wife did was to make it where she only met rich men. But she did not marry just any rich man who wanted her, she married the one she loved in return. And I adore her." Or words to that effect.
Social psychology shows that the single biggest predictor of who we're going to marry is geographical nearness. It is literally true that 90% of Americans marry someone whose home or office they could have *walked* to from their own home or office.
The woman in the story understood--as you do--that when we pick environments, we are not merely selecting places to shop or live or worship. We are picking *people*. She picked an environment where all the people met a core criterion--and then wed the one she loved who met that criterion.
In her case, she valued money. But I've had clients who wanted a beautiful partner, or a Catholic partner, or a Jewish partner, or an educated partner. And in every case, those folks who knew of a rock-bottom Standard were best off when they put themselves in an environment where that kind of person was to be found in abundance.
Which is waaaay smarter than wanting a Jewish mate but failing to attend synagogue--or wanting a well-educated partner but staying away from universities!
Upshot? Joan, if you choose an environment for your daughter that reflects what you'd like her to have in a partner, she can then fall in love with one of the men who fits your bill. It won't ruin her happiness, and it will help ease your mind.
Families around the world still do this with great formality. It's called an arranged marriage--and it very often works.
So go forth guiltlessly if not guilelessly. Thanks for a good question!
Thank you, Duana! I love this!
And what a great illustration regarding the lady and the garage apartment.
I will hereby go forth guiltlessly planning (and saving ...) to place my daughter in my idea of the premium environment from which she can make her own choice of a mate. Give me about 15 years or so, and I'll report back to this column with the results :)
Your work and articles have helped me tremendously and thereby my daughter as well. I wish this information for all our mothers and daughters everywhere because I want everyone to have a good life!! !
Joan, thank you so much. I look forward to being around in 15 years to hear how your plans have progressed :).