One of the hardest conversation topics you’ll ever broach
in a budding relationship involves three little letters. And no,
I’m not talking about
S-E-X.
Rather, it’s the stress-producing acronym, DTR. The
define-the-relationship talk is a necessary benchmark along the
road to every relationship, but popping the “what are
we?” question too soon can cause your partner-to-be to
skedaddle sooner than an STD.
In this case, there is no timer to let you know when the oven is
preheated, no step-by-step procedure instructing you how to ask.
But you can count on your intuition ““ it’s what led you
to this person in the first place.
If you’d rather just skip this ordeal altogether, think
again ““ ambiguous or assumed relationships end up being
one-sided or misunderstood.
For example, a friend of mine is paired with Guy A on a blind
double date.
They talk a few times afterward. A week or so later, they hook
up ““ nothing serious.
Then my friend meets Guy B, with whom she has more in common,
and overall he suits her much better than Guy A. He also happens to
be foreign, which always garners extra points.
So the next time she talks to Guy A and he suggests a date, she
tells him she’s met someone she’s really interested in,
Guy B, and doesn’t want to go out with Guy A again.
Guy A is furious ““ and not just because he likes her.
It’s because, according to him, she was “two-timing
him.”
Yet it’s kind of hard to two-time if you’ve never
defined the relationship. These two were, by modern dating norms,
in the free-trial, no obligation to buy, send back within 30 days
for your money back guarantee, period. If every first date
immediately became a relationship, there would be millions of
commitment-phobic people who never would date.
But this undefined status is the best thing about dating ““
as long as you make those definitions as a unit when and if you get
to that place. Just as Guy A should not have assumed he and my
friend were a couple without discussing it with her, inquiring into
the status of a relationship too soon can cause more claustrophobia
than an MRI.
But if you’ve hung out almost every day in the past two
weeks, have been out on a date or two, and you’re not
pursuing anyone else, or any other casual dates have been less than
stellar, a status discussion is probably timely and necessary.
But what if all this is happening now? Then things can get more
complicated. As fifth week is winding down, many of you are already
looking forward to summer plans you made before you were a party of
two. Securing a job, signing up for summer school, or making
vacation plans is only a piece of the puzzle if you’re dating
someone ““ officially or unofficially ““ at the
moment.
While asking your spring sweetheart immediately after agreeing
to go steady, “What should we do over the summer?” can
force anyone into hyperventilation, the topic should be addressed
before you’re pulling all-nighters and furiously writing
papers during 10th and finals weeks. Unlike finals, these
conversations cannot be aced by reading half the book and eking out
an A.
For instance, don’t agree to do the long-distance thing
for three months if you’d rather have a summer fling. And
don’t pretend not to care about taking a quarter-long break
if the thought of your sweetie kissing another tears you up inside
and leads you to tears.
There is no formula into which you can enter your age, length of
relationship and destination after graduation to come up with an
answer for this variable, but you can listen to your heart ““
a process that doesn’t involve any math, thankfully.
Bonos is the 2003-2004 copy chief who tries to keep acronyms
out of headlines yet loves to write about them. E-mail her at
lbonos@media.ucla.edu if you have an obscure dating acronym to
share.