Q - Dear Annabelle, I am in love with a guy who is in his late forties, yes I know we are illegal, but I still love him. I don't know if he is using me or not, how can I tell? He is always sweet to me, and I known him for at least 4 years, I don't think he would ever do that to me, but he might, I trust him with my life, how can I tell if he is using me, and if you have time could you also tell me how to get him to say I love you, I told him this enough times, he never told me though. HELP!!!!!!!!!!! A - Dear Crystal, Oh, this is so romantic I can hardly stand it! (Isnāt that what YOUāRE thinking? Why does it sound sarcastic coming from me?) Crystal, Īhow can you tell if heās USING youā??? Crystal, no guy in his right MIND has a relationship with an almost 16 year old! Sigh. Look, you wrote and asked a, (I think), serious question. THIS is a serious answer. Someday when youāre HIS age and looking back over your life, youāll understand, Right now, you're just all a twitter thing you have this really terrific power to reach oh, so far ahead of you and draw in at guy in his late 40ās. Look, why are you telling me this? DO you REALLY want an answer, or is it that you have to tell someone...did you tell your parents? Have they regained their normal color and have they gotten back on their feet? Crystal, the reason he hasnāt told you that he Īloves you';...is that is doesnāt! And, YES...he IS using you! Now, if you keep this up long enough, (and from what you say, youāre having a sexual relationship with him), .......YOU, Crystal, are going to have not only trivialized sex to where it has no meaning, but you will begin, if you havenāt already, to dissociate yourself FROM yourself..and the rest of your life will be a good deal less glorious than it was meant to be. You know, Crystal, regardless of which culture youāve been born into, or what you THINK you believe or what youāve been told by those you live with and around.....deep down in your very soul......YOU, Crystal, know the truth of what your are doing. You know that what you are doing is making you Īless thanā......and you also know that thereās a better way. Crystal, at 15 going on 16, your Ījobā in this world is not only to get the best schooling that you can, to prepare yourself for being a successful person in the Īgrownup worldā, your job is to find out who YOU are...and to polish and perfect the inner beauty that was given to you before you were born. You know, in your heart of hearts, that what I am telling you is true, Crystal. The very next time you find yourself with this guy.....after youāve been with him....go home, stand in front of your bathroom mirror and look deeply into your own eyes....just stand there and look. Somewhere in there is the person you were MEANT to be.......and you are betraying that person. - Annabelle Q - Dear Annabelle, OK so you say he is using me right? But I AM NOT having a sexual relationship with him. I was raised a Catholic, and I do not believe in premarital sex. Another thing I may have forgot to tell you, if he is using me, he sure does spend enough money on me. I know money isn't everything, but to make a point, if he was using me I hardly doubt he would have bought me 2 dozen roses. No my mom doesn't know about him, BUT my dad does, I feel more comfortable telling my dad these things, maybe it's because I only see my dad 2 times a week. Thanks for the advice, read this and write back. I think this man, who also happens to be my best friend, just might be the right one for me. On the second part, he has not told me that he loves me, but he tells me all of the time how much he thinks about me, and how he dreams about me, so if he IS NOT in love with me are these lies, NO!!!!!!!!!!!!! A - Dear Crystal, Thank you for the additional information. Last night, when I was writing the original answer to your inquiry, I almost asked you...and then didnāt....āhow old is your FATHER?ā (Thereās a whole complex bit of information that would have gone along with that one). You have now told me that youāre not close enough to your mom to tell her, you ARE close enough to your dad.......and you see your dad just 2 days a week. This love of yours is beginning to make more sense now. Iām glad to hear that you arenāt having a sexual relationship with this guy, Crystal, I had extrapolated that from your statement that the your relationship is Īillegalā. (You can see now why the Īwords matterā and why itās important in our lives that Īweā have a common language.) You say this fellow tells you that he Īthinks about you all the timeā. Well, he may be obsessing about you. Now, as a point of, (perhaps some), interest. Remember ĪAlice in Wonderlandā? Well, Lewis Carroll had an obsession with a 12 year old girl..named Alice and wrote about her. This kind of thing is not uncommon with Īolderā men. (I say older) because you and I have different vantage points), and older people have lived so long that theyāve found that, sometimes, life doesnāt always go as planned . Sometimes, when remembering THEIR hopes and dreams, older people are seeing, in young people, the early promise of what theyād desired so strongly for themselves. That YOU are so attached to this fellow tells me volumes about your need for a strong and consistent love object in your life and about your fantasy of love from the viewpoint of a three or four year old. Itās completely understandable, given your lifeās circumstances. If the disturbance between your parents began anywhere near those early years, you began to construct a Īrescueā fantasy where, if you just Īloved your daddy enoughā everything would be all right and the family wouldnāt break apart. (Or some variation thereof). Children, even children whose parents have abused them, harbor the fantasy of a perfect and whole family.....(thatās one of the places where fairy tales come from.) We all have deep yearnings for the love of a mother and father. Since your were Īraised Catholicā...take a look at the church structure...youāll see the intense need for a Īwholeā family. Now, I donāt want to go on about this, but I will tell you that the happiness that you feel is real, that, as long as youāre not having ANY sexual contact with him..and that includes kissing or touching in the way a boy and girl might touch, things arenāt too terribly bad. However, the situation IS distorted and is delaying the work that YOU need to do, which is learning how to Ībeā with other kids your age. The adolescent developmental stage is SO very important and, if missed, usually results in an adult with stunted emotional growth. Youāre not old enough to understand that there are Īimmatureā adults, yet there are. From a grownup adult viewpoint theyāre sad and pathetic.....and, well, Īoddā. You speak about this fellow as being Īthe oneā. Well, if he is, this wouldnāt be the first time this sort of thing has happened, Charlie Chaplin and Oona OāNeal had about this spread..but the Īpower positionā still distorts the relationship. I know you LOOK like a young woman, but your emotional growth wonāt even begin to stabilize until youāre well over 25, at which point you will, likely, have an entirely different viewpoint. Itās well in life, to avoid absolutes, and I KNOW that youād like to stay in this comfortable, and happy, spot just for ever. Well, that wonāt happen, under any circumstances. You donāt believe, at least in your conscious mind, that anything I've said has any meaning in YOUR life, (because in YOUR case things are Īdifferentā.) Given your family history, and everything else youāve told me, and that really annoying thing called Īrealityā....well, the odds are that what Iām telling you is, not only true, but pretty darned invariate. Now, do yourself a very BIG and important favor. Reserve your judgment on this for a few years. Just observe how you respond..and are responded to....by the outside world. AND, (and this is very important), ..attend to your schoolwork. Your schoolwork. ĪTraining your brain to thinkā, is the most important thing you have to do right now. The grownup world can throw some pretty interesting challenges at you....be prepared. Youāll be much happier if you can move some of the fantasy stuff that is buzzing around inside of your head aside for a few years, and leave enough room for learning how to take care of yourself...no matter HOW this turns out. Take care...you know, deep inside, what you just do. Follow your instinct on what will keep you safe and provide you with what you need. Hint: (Itās YOU). - Annabelle