Dear Eric: I am a male, a new female coworker started around Halloween 2025, and I introduced myself on day one. The next week she comes over to my work area and asks me why I am so quiet and then she asks me a lot of personal questions and I answer only a few.
Later, she tells me she is good at stalking people, and she looked me up online. I laughed it off and said, “thanks for the honesty.”
She tells me she has no friends and I say I don’t either.
Around the holidays, I gave her a Christmas gift, and she was so thrilled and happy. Then I gave her my phone number around New Year’s because I had a promo code for streaming that I was not gonna use. She was happy. We had talked about watching a DVD or a movie on streaming together.
I reminded her in January of her offer to watch the streaming service together. She seemed nonchalant but also unsure. I text reminded her a couple days later, she replied she has been seeing someone and does not know how he would feel about me being in her house.
So, the months go by and we are very friendly and cordial. She had her birthday recently and told me she was going to see family. There has never been any indication of a boyfriend, she carpools sometimes with other coworkers, and they have never mentioned her having a boyfriend. I am sure she lied to me about having a boyfriend. Why would she lie about that?
We are close coworker/friends; it seems real, she is not a fake person. She is very friendly with everyone but more joking with them and more serious with me.
I enjoy being her friend, but I’m confused about what kind of relationship she wants.
— Work Friends
Dear Friends: I think there might be some misread cues here that are tripping you up. Suffice it to say, itap best to treat this friendship as platonic. Whether or not your coworker has a boyfriend isn’t relevant and it would be best to drop it. If it was a lie, it could be that she was trying to ensure that this friendship didn’t cross over into a romantic place or she simply wanted to set a barrier between her work and personal life.
I know that the beginning of the friendship may have had some moments that seemed especially personal — like the questions she asked and the discussion about watching a film together. There’s nothing wrong with following up about those plans, as you did. But for now, take the “no thank you” as the final word.
And if you’re uncomfortable with some of the more personal aspects of your work friendship, itap OK to say so, too.
Dear Eric: My husband and I have known a couple for 25 years, and we had a lot of fun times together. I have always been the person who hosts dessert after every occasion over the past 23 years plus many dinners.
They participated occasionally in the first few years but do nothing now. I have begun to pull away from them, and they just keep trying to make plans with us.
I’m tired and disgusted with myself for allowing this to go on for so long. It seems petty to me to say anything about it, but surely, they know they have really taken advantage of the situation. Should I say why to them?
— Party Planner
Dear Planner: Itap not petty; itap just the truth and the truth is going to keep you from developing deeper resentment. Itap natural for even the most willing social planner to get tired of holding on to that responsibility after a while. And every friendship goes through changing stages, especially after decades. So, it should come as no surprise to your friends that things have shifted for you.
If you want to pull away, thatap fine. But it seems worth a conversation to see if you can shift things in this longtime friendship. It may be possible to make it work for everyone.
You can tell them how you feel simply. “In the past, I’ve organized our plans, but it has started to feel like a burden rather than a joy. Can you take on the responsibility of hosting dessert from now on?”
Ideally, even if they are aware they’ve been taking advantage of you, they’ll quickly agree to pick up the slack. Itap also possible that they don’t see the arrangement as them taking advantage of you. Often, when one person or one couple in a friendship is adept at planning, others assume that they just love to do it and neglect to ask if the role has become a chore.
(Send questions to R. Eric Thomas at eric@askingeric.com or P.O. Box 22474, Philadelphia, PA 19110. Follow him on and sign up for his weekly newsletter at .)
