Don’t Ask Me about Your Relationship Issues

I pride myself on being a good friend. I spend long hours listening to false break-ups, go out on the town whenever a girl’s night is needed and allow access to my Facebook page for “clocking” statuses.

One thing I cannot say is that I enjoy offering relationship advice. Every girlfriend I have knows my relationship status is very single, and it has been for some time. Yet females are often asking me for advice on some of the heaviest issues in their relationships.

I love to help friends and people in general with anything that I possibly can, but I’m probably not the best candidate for the job. If I were in their shoes, I don’t think I would be asking someone who is single what I should do with my relationship.

Usually my advice is ridiculously broad in hopes that the conversation topic would shift into a more single direction. Now I focus more on the friend that’s in the relationship instead of the relationship. I tell them, “Whatever makes you happy,” and “If that’s what you feel is the best decision for you.”

I have no personal issue with giving my opinion on relationships, but I do think it’s silly to take advice from someone who can’t relate. I no longer vocally express how I feel when friends talk about their relationships. Once, I was with a group of females when one of the girls started speaking about her troubled relationship. Her friend immediately cut her off mid-sentence and encouraged her to leave her “no good” boyfriend.

I sat in silence pondering how the friend knew the boyfriend was a jerk and how she could be so sure. Everyone let the friend continue and from the angle I was sitting, she sounded bitter. Bashing on her boyfriend elevated into bashing men; she clearly wasn’t over her ex.

I wonder if she was still with him, would her advice have been the same.

Ever since, I am cautious of what I say to people about their relationships.

Single people, whether bitter or single by choice, may not be grade-A relationship advisors.