'AITA for wanting my BF to distance himself from his "close" female friend?' UPDATED

"Me (23/F) and my BF (26/M). Am I wrong for wanting him to distance himself from his "close" female friend (24/F)?"

My boyfriend "Justin" (26/M) and I (23/F) have been a couple for 7 months but started dating a couple months before that. So in all I've known him less than a year and I'm already head over heels for him and feel like I've known him forever. It's still our 'honeymoon phase,' but I've genuinely never felt this strongly about another guy before, and have definitely never thought as long term as I'm thinking with him.

Justin is confident, charismatic, passionate and driven, intelligent and emotionally mature, values his family, is especially kind to children and elderly people, and just has a presence that lights up the room. (It also doesn't hurt that he's 6'1, handsome, has a yummy body, and is an amaaaazing lover)

Anyway (lol), the only real problem in our relationship - from my point of view - is his friendship with "Olivia" (24/F), who has has known since her first year of university (~6 years). BF is smart with women, used to attention, and doesn't cross boundaries with them.

The only time he comes close is with Olivia, and even then, it's mostly her initiating things, but the way she behaves around him is honestly the number one source of conflict in our relationship. I am quite friendly with Justin's circle of friends now and I hang out with them at least once per week, so things can be pretty uncomfortable for me.

Things that make me uncomfortable:

1.) She is exactly my BF's type (not really her fault I know). I have seen a few girls that my BF has been with from his social media, and they all look more or less like Olivia. She's 170cm (5'8), athletically built, has cat eyes and a pout-y mouth, and just gives off a sexy aura. I'm 162cm (5'3), in shape, and have a decent face but 1) it bothers me that I'm nothing close to Justin's type and 2) that Olivia is his type

2.) Olivia has always been nice enough to me, but when I first met her she gave me an eyebrows-raised, "let's see how long you last" kind of look. I admit that I could be overthinking this one.

3.) She's ALWAYS finding excuses to touch Justin. An example is brushing food off of his clothes/face (hello, that's my job!!), or fixing his shirt collar. She also likes to give him backhugs. Once, she hugged him from behind and I overheard her saying "How come you never give me backhugs anymore?"

The way she said it was low and whispery and rubbed me the wrong way. I'm 99% sure an objective passerby could have interpreted her tone as seductive. When I brought it up to Justin, all he said was "Yeah, that was weird I guess."

4.) She has this cute act that she does for Justin when he doesn't want to do something for her. Sometimes (this is probably weird in itself) she'll ask him to buy her something, like an ice cream, and when he says 'no,' she'll stand in front of him and pout and make deer-eyes. Or sometimes she just grabs him and pushes him towards whatever she wants, points to it, and does the cutesy act.

5.) She greets him by saying "Hey, you!" and winking and pretend shooting him.

6.) Justin only listens to Olivia. He's a pretty stubborn guy and doesn't really follow others, unless it's Olivia. One of the things that bothers me the most in this regard is an incident that happened in a club.

Justin and I were drinking with his friends, when another group of people got in an argument with some of Justin's guy friends. Justin tried to diffuse the situation at first, but the others guys were extremely disrespectful and he was on the verge of fighting three guys at once. I kept telling him to leave them alone, but he just wouldn't back down, even after the bartender threatened to call the police.

Then Olivia walks over to him, pulls him by the arm and yells at him "Stop. You're acting stupid." She dragged him to the bar and they were talking there alone for 15 minutes. I know I probably should have went and checked on him but I was pretty shocked/angry considering what just happened.

One of Justin's friends noticed me watching and told me, "Don't feel bad. It's always been this way with them" which obviously made me feel worse.

7.) Yesterday we went to dinner with his friends. The day was pretty warm, so Justin was only wearing a t-shirt, but by the time we finished it was windy and quite a bit colder. We decided to take a walk along the riverwalk, and Olivia suddenly wrapped her cardigan around my BF's shoulders.

He started joking around and posing like a model before giving it back, but I kind of wish he would have just given it back to her right away. There are a lot of these kinds of instances where Olivia will do small, caring things for him, things that a GF does.

8.) My woman's intuition just tells me that Olivia wants more from Justin than he's giving her. She's sarcastic and rude to him half the time because that's their dynamic/her personality. However when he's not paying attention to her, I sometimes catch her stealing glances at him.

Sometimes she looks smitten, sometimes she looks straight up lustful, and sometimes she looks sad. I think it's obvious she has feelings for him, but when I brought it up with my BF he told me they were "just close."

9.) There is much more to add, but I'm just going to end with this: I understand that some people are natural flirts, but Olivia doesn't act like this to any other guys in their group. Her personality is pretty strong.

She's sarcastic and relentlessly teases them, but no touching, no cutes-y act, none of the small, thoughtful stuff, and definitely none of the misty-eyed gazes. Some of the guys even jokingly complain that they're jealous that she "only acts like a girl to Justin."

Yesterday, after the cardigan thing, when Justin dropped me off I asked him to talk because I've been growing more insecure about his friendship with Olivia. We talked in my apartment for around 1 hour about it and didn't really make any progress.

Basically, he agreed not to meet Olivia alone, but said that she was important to him, told me some things they helped each other get through in university, and that he wanted her in his life.

I tried to hook up with him after that but he said he was tired and left. I cried after that and called my older sister and talked about the situation. She told me that since Justin hasn't done anything to break my trust, that I should continue trusting him and that there's a reason he's with me and not Olivia.

She also said that if he crosses the line, I need to be strong enough to leave him. I also called my best friend this morning. She, on the other hand, is convinced that Justin and Olivia were or are more than "just close." She thinks I need to give him an ultimatum - choose the friendship or the relationship.

Basically I'm at a loss for what to do now. I love Justin and really think we have a future together, but this friendship with Olivia is driving me crazy. Is this just jealousy/my insecurities or do I really need to give my BF an ultimatum? I really, really like him but I don't know if I'll ever be comfortable in this relationship as long as Olivia is a part of his life.

Tl;dr BF of 7 months has a close female friend (~6 years) that constantly flirts, touches, and generally seems romantically interested in him. I've brought this up with BF, and he agrees not to meet female friend alone but doesn't want to give up friendship. I'm extremely uncomfortable with this girl. Do I need to work on myself, or should I give BF an ultimatum?

What do you think? AITA for wanting her BF to distance himself from Olivia? This is what top commenters had to say:

clanatk said:

Not going to touch too much on what other people have, but something I noticed: "it bothers me that I'm nothing close to Justin's type and 2) that Olivia is his type"

If you weren't "his type" in the ways that matter to him, you wouldn't be together. Type is about a lot more than just your physical appearance. I would go as far as to say that it's one of the least important characteristics for most successful long-term relationships.

dankbot2024 said:

I think there is an argument for both sides. He can't help the way other people feel and when you snag a looker who happens to also be amazing then you are in for a lot of uncomfortable situations.

However, as time goes your insecurities will pass and I think maybe you can ask him to compromise saying that its fine if she's around (because it's important to him) but no more intimate hugging bs. If anything her comment to him about why he didn't hug her back anymore just shows that he is being respectful of you. He did before and now he doesn't.

Lastly, you are pretty young still and it takes forever to realize what actually makes you happy. She's more his "type" but that's just more of the same shit that didn't work for him before. You are the evolution of what he's looking for. Be confident in yourself, let it go and find comfort in the fact that if he ever DOES mess up, you'll drop him like he's hot and find someone better!

Kelleeeee said:

I'm kind of confused as to why most of the comments are focusing on all of this as just you being insecure. I would not be comfortable with my husband acting like this at all. In fact, my husband and I have sat down before and I've straight up told him that sure, I know he's naturally a flirt and he's loyal, but the cutesy/handsy shit with girls was not gonna fly.

Example, we were at a board game night with friends and he doesn't want to sit on his wallet. His first action is to turn to our (very attractive) friend Denise and try to put it in her back pocket. It doesn't matter his intentions, his hands were on her ass and he knows I am not ok with that. Your BF sounds like he enjoys the attention and willfully refuses to see that it's inappropriate between friends when he has a GF.

You are in a relationship with that person and it is DEFINITELY OK to have boundaries, especially with physical touching! Have you tried asking if your BF would mind rebuffing her touching? It doesn't have to be a big deal, but even if he would say, "Olivia, I don't appreciate how handsy you are with me, tone it down ok?" Good luck.

And Patriciap13 said:

Just tell him that he needs to have a talk with her about the way she acts towards him. She needs to know that there are boundaries she shouldn’t cross and that she needs to respect that he is in a relationship. If he refuses to have that talk with her, or she continues to do those things and he never calls her out on it, then you should consider breaking it up because that’s disrespectful and completely unnecessary.

EDIT from OP:

Thank you all for your replies, I tried to respond to as many as possible. In reading your comments, my own post and some self-reflecting I realize that a lot of the issue has to do with my insecurities/fears about what could be happening or what may happen in the future.

I don't know why it's been so hard for me to stop rationalizing these fears and accept that they aren't indicative of what actually is happening.

That being said, though I realize that a lot of the points of discomfort I've felt are purely a result of my gut feelings, there are still several things that Olivia does with my BF that are personally not okay with me. I understand that it was wrong of me to even entertain the thought of asking Justin to distance himself from her.

But at the same time, if they really are that close and nothing farther than platonic feelings are being shared, I think that 1) my BF shouldn't have a problem establishing within reason boundaries with a female friend whose behavior makes his GF uncomfortable.

2) that female friend should understand and respect those wishes. I understand that some of the things that bother me, like her cute act or some of her other affectionate gestures, might just be part of her personality towards him and that I'll probably just have to suck it up and deal with it.

But for me, it's within reason for him to ask that she cut out the intimate physical stuff like the backhugs, grabbing his arm incessantly, brushing his hair/face, clothes, etc.

Justin and I haven't talked much today, but I'm meeting him later tonight and I will tell him exactly what I've written above. I'm not going to ask him to stop being friends with her, and I'm not going to ask her to "distance" himself from her. I'm also going to ask him to clarify some things for me, like the extent of their physical relationship/if there's any romantic history between them that I'm not aware of -

Some people might have a problem with this, but I think that given the nature of their relationship/the fact that they see each other so often, he should be transparent about it. I think this conversation will help me decide whether a compromise can be made and I can learn to deal with their friendship healthily, or if I will have to do the hard thing and walk away (which I really, really don't want to do).

Three weeks after her original post, she shared this update:

I met Justin the night after I added the 'edit' to the original post, with the intentions of telling him that I was wrong for wanting him to distance himself from Olivia, but that I wanted 1) for him to ask that she tone down the physical intimacy.

And 2) that he disclose the extent of their relationship in the past (i.e. how far their physical relationship has gone, if either of them has confessed romantic feelings), which was something I previously wondered about but always avoided asking him.

That 'talk' didn't go as planned at all...I thought he was going to be understanding of me and honest about his feelings but he stonewalled me and was super rude and an all around asshole to me. As soon as I brought up Olivia he laughed and shook his head and asked me if I was "really gonna do this shit again."

I tried my best not to get emotional and just explain my point of view, the whole time he was leaning his head against the wall, didn't make eye contact, and was playing with his earrings. So when I asked if he understood my feelings and was okay with what I was asking of him, he smiled sarcastically and said "Of course honey" with a fake tone.

He was extremely angry when I asked if they have hooked up before, his exact words were "You haven't even been my GF for a year, if you think you're entitled to know every little detail from my past, f@#$ yourself." He walked out after saying that, and I cried. He'd never talked to me like that or expressed anger towards me before...I was shocked, hurt and angry.

Obviously he was hiding something, I didn't know if something had happened between them or he had feelings for her or what, but I wanted to talk with him again so I messaged him telling him I wasn't trying to make him mad, but that I felt like we needed to talk again.

He didn't reply to my messages that night, and the next morning he still hadn't replied. I never thought I would do this, but I sent Olivia a message asking to meet for a coffee. Surprisingly she answered almost immediately and agreed to meet in the afternoon.

When we met I told her about my feelings about their relationship, how Justin had reacted the other night, and straight up asked her if there was any romantic feelings between them. She admitted that she has feelings for Justin, but that it was complicated. She said she loves him and hates him at the same time.

She told me that I should leave him, that she wasn't just saying that because she wants to be with him instead of me, but that it was because Justin has always been a player, has been charming and leaving girls for years, that she's waited for him to change, that she knew she could never be truly happy staying by his side as a friend, that she should leave him too but couldn't.

I thought she might try to BS me but she seemed very sincere when saying these things. I asked her what the extent of their relationship was like in the past, and she told me that basically, she was attracted to Justin at first sight when they first met in university, but that Justin had a long distance GF at the time.

Justin broke up with his LDGF, they got closer, Justin had some problems (she wouldn't tell me what they were) that he counseled to her about, this led to them kissing one night and having sex. That was her first time. She confessed feelings to Justin but he said he didn't want their friendship to be effected if the relationship didn't work out. They were on and off FWBs throughout college.

Justin had a handful of short-lived relationships during that time and he cheated on one of his GF's with Olivia (She claimed at this point that they haven't had sex since he's been in a relationship with me, idk what to believe). When they graduated, their friend group rented a vacation pension on an island, one night their friend Ashley walks in on them in the bathroom.

Justin told Ashley that it was a "drunk mistake," Olivia was extremely hurt and refused to see or speak to Justin for weeks. After being ignored, Justin apologizes to her, tells her he has feelings for her, and they go on a few secret dates but Justin never commits to a relationship and then backtracks and says he's confused about his feelings not ready for anything serious.

From that point on, they went back to being FWBs until Justin met me. I'm a little confused and skeptical as to why she's told me all this, so I ask if she has any proof. She searches chat logs and shows me multiple messages of him booty calling her.

She starts getting emotional and tells me that Justin has amazing qualities but that he has some deep personal issues that he refuses to work on that prevent him from being a good partner right now. I asked her what she meant, but she wouldn't tell me. I could tell that she cares about him a lot. She's been single this whole time.

There were likely many opportunities for her to end up in a happy relationship but she turned a blind eye to them all for Justin, who can't even admit that he has feelings for her. Even though I didn't like some of the things she did before, I actually sympathize with her a lot.

It sounds like Justin put her through a ton of shit, given her false hope and taken it away, and she's always stayed by him for whatever reason. After, she tells me not to worry about throwing her under the bus because she was going to tell Justin herself that she told me about them. She said she wanted him to be mad at her.

Later that night Justin called me trying to explain himself to me, but I broke up with him. I was crying on the phone, I really didn't want to break up but I knew it was the right thing for me to do. Regardless of what was true or false about his past, it was just too much drama for me handle and the way he reacted to me when I had originally wanted to talk to him scared me.

He didn't try to fight me or ask me to say, we just kind of sat in silence on the phone for a while before hung up. It's been about two weeks since then...I know that Justin was probably a bad boy and it was only a matter of time before he broke my heart but I feel devastated. I'm just starting to be able to get back into my normal routines, but even then sometimes it's just so hard to get out of bed.

I think about Justin every day. It's like the more I'm away from him, the more I think about the good things we had together. I miss his smell, his laugh, his touch, just being able to be with him whenever I want. Part of me hoped he would reach out to me, but he hasn't. I met Olivia last week and she told me that Justin wasn't talking to her anymore, and that it was probably a good time for her to move on from him.

My ass. Last night I saw Olivia uploaded a couple-y picture of her and Justin on Instagram (they were in a nightclub or some dark place, he had his arm wrapped around her with a drink in that hand and she was sipping from the straw). I know it was a mistake not to block/unfollow Justin and his friends.

After I saw that I blocked and unfollowed them all. That was kind of what inspired me to post an update. I don't know if Olivia played me or if Justin is working his magic on her again, but I just feel shitty all around. It hurts know but I know these people would have been toxic for me if I had stayed with him. It just hurts so much more than I'd imagined.

Tl;dr Boyfriend is a complete asshole to me when I asked him to establish some boundaries with his 'close' female friend. I meet with the female friend, she tells me that she and BF have been hooking up almost ever since they met, that she's confessed feelings to him and has been waiting this whole time for him to commit to her, which he never does.

BF tried to 'fix' things, but we break up. I feel lost and devastated for the weeks following, but last night I see a couple-y Instagram post of BF and friend. It still hurts, but at least I know I made the right decision.