12/17/10
Your Call: Should She Dump Him Before or After Xmas?

We get a lot of advice questions coming in at EMandLO.com, but sadly, we just can’t answer them all. Which is why, once a week, we turn to you to decide how best to advise a reader. Make your call by leaving your advice in the comments section below:

Dear Em & Lo,

I’ve been dating this guy since the summer but it’s just not working out, and that’s become abundantly clear to me in the last few weeks — we’re just too different, I’m not into it, and I don’t have any hopes for the future. He’s not a bad guy, he’s just not for me. I know I have to break up with him, but my question is whether I should do it before or after the holidays. Christmas and New Year’s is right around the corner. I know he’s bought me at least one present and we were planning on going to a friend’s New Year’s party together. Is that just heartless to dump him only days before Christmas, or does prolonging the inevitable somehow patronize him and make it worse?

— The Grinch

What should the Grinch do?



21 Comments

  1. Many thanks to the girls out there reading this for NOT taking my previous comment as an opportunity to ‘flame’ an insensitive slob.

  2. Still no word back from the Grinch? WTF??
    She couldn’t still be in her room lying on her
    bed crying her eyes out because she made the wrong
    decision could she? Oh she could. Oh well, in that
    case; never mind.

  3. I’v been dating a guy from Uni for about 2 months now, and he then went and dumped me on Jan 2nd. Just after i’d spent Christmas with the family, saw loads of old friends and told everyone how lovely this new guy was and what a great time we were having.

    So although i would have felt shit over the holidays, i really wish he’d done it BEFORE so i wouldnt feel so damn stuipid now!

  4. OK, it’s after Christmas and it’s after New Years.

    We’d all love to hear the outcome of this situation.

    Hello, Grinch???

  5. I too am in the same situation as the Grinch. I have been dating my boyfriend for the last 4-5 months, but after 2 1/2 months, I realized that I wasn’t happy with where things were going and wanted out, but wanted to give it a chance and completely make sure that I was sure of my decision before I made any drastic changes and pulled the rug out from beneath his feet. Then, event after event popped up on the calendar and I didn’t want to ruin it for me as the big event that I dumped my boyfriend at, and for him to have gone to the effort to come to see me and then find out that it was all for nothing. Then we had auditions and exams and still didn’t dump him cause i didn’t want there to be long term damage from the break-up in his academics. I have now waited and waited. When I found out that he had already gotten my present (found out online that it was a $20 necklace that if he really knew me i would never wear it cause i would have no idea what to wear it with), and I agree that I should have dumped him then but I was an idiot and didn’t. He has wanted to hang out all of Christmas break, and now that we haven’t hung out, he wants to spend New Years with me, no matter who I’m with or what I’m doing. Unfortunately, there is this other guy that started talking to me for the last 2-3 weeks who doesn’t know that I have a bf, and i don’t want to ruin the friendship/possible relationship by telling him i do. There is a new years dance that I was going to go to and see this friend, but now i might be stuck bringing my bf, and that might ruin everything. I don’t want to lie to either of them, but i have been lying to my bf for virtually months because i haven’t dumped him. I think he knows something is up, but I feel as tho it might be awkward to sit next to each other in some of our classes when we aren’t together. idk. I broke up with my last bf on New Years eve (BIG MISTAKE) and don’t want to ruin the holiday for my bf like that again. Dump now that it is a few days after Christmas and a few days till New years? or wait until after we go back to school and have new seats in classes that we share and lie to him even longer?

Comments are closed.