Dear Lauren:

Welcome back. I re-read your posts of June last year.

You wrote here: “I don’t know what hold she’s managed to create on him so fast, especially since they’ve only talked on the phone, and for a whole week“. June 2017 you wrote about having dated him: “He asked me out… and things moved fast. He basically moved in with me after about a week“.

Well, he is amazingly consistent, one week. Although he is lagging behind with her, not living with her yet, and it is already a week!

About the relationship you had with him: “He would come to my house every evening, we spend all of our time together… it felt natural”. After a year, his parents put some pressure on him to meet and marry a woman of his culture, and he started talking to girls. You didn’t like it and broke up with him as a girlfriend, but remained his co worker and friend for about two years after, at this point. For about two years then, he has talked to you openly about girls. But the two of you “talk about everything and anything” and “he’s a fun person to be around”. What you called “the wife search saga” emotionally taxed you a year ago and it still does, as you described humorously on this thread.

My input: I agree with you that he is not sadistic (“I honestly don’t think of him as sadistic”), and I agree with you that he is clueless (“I think he’s absolutely clueless). But then, I don’t know if he should get a clue, because the clueless way he operates is working well for him. He is not  only easy to get along with (outside the talking to and about other women), but he is easy for himself to get along with, meaning, he is not conflicted, not that I noticed. So why get a clue.

Life with him was relatively simple, because his internal life is simple, so it was easy. It was convenient for you, after your divorce to be with an easy going person. I understand the draw.

He is impulsive and very unqualified, I say, to choose a wife for himself. His parents must be clueless as well to leave him to manage such a task.

You asked: “Am I just forcing a friendship that doesn’t have a reason to be in the first place?”-

You had a romantic interest in him but you no longer do and you are well aware that he will continue his impulsive, blind-in-the-dark search for a wife until he marries one (not you). The draw was easy-and-convenient. If it is no longer these two things, better end the friendship and keep it strictly a co workers friendly relationship within the context of work. Maybe an occasional lunch during the work day spent together, at the most, in a public place (no longer being alone with him in your place or his).

anita