Dear hjanimal:

You wrote in your original post that your boyfriend “seemed to be making excuses and backing off. He told about a situation with one of his friends that was upsetting him…but it kind of sounded like another excuse for not making an effort with me (he also might have broken his toe…”-

But the situation his friend is in is very serious. Because of the seriousness of the real life situation of his friend, if your boyfriend is close to his friend, it is way more than an excuse, and more serious than breaking his toe.

The situation with his friend might fill him with such a sense of powerlessness and (if his friend had no idea the girl was underage), such a sense of injustice, that his whole life feels to him out of his control.

You asked how to go forward. Maybe to go forward you don’t either put the relationship behind you OR go back into it full force, but take the middle-way: put on hold, or end, for now, the relationship of a bf/gf, and see the two of you as friends. In the context of friends only, you can try to help him.

anita