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ET ITOV hey, bonita...
I’m Dating a Dirty Dude
ADVICE FOR ATHENS’ LOOSE AND LOVELORN
By Bonita Applebum advice@flagpole.com
r ive Points Bottle bnop
TOWN!
Hey Bonita!
I’ve been dating a guy for a few weeks, and
it’s going great—mostly. I’d like to get more
serious with him, hut a deal-breaker has reared
its stinky head: His housekeeping and table
manners are AWFUL. When we “go home’’ at
the end of a night, it’s always to my place, and
that’s because I’ve only been able to sleep at
his house once. I won’t sleep over there again,
because the place is foul—dirty dishes all over
the kitchen, filthy floors, mold smells every
where you go and a bathroom that is truly
disgusting. I won’t even describe it. Also, I have
only one roommate, and he has three.
His personal hygiene is not perfect. Though
he showers and wears deodorant, he re-wears
the same clothing for days, and he never wears
socks, so his feet smell terrible. I actually have
had to ask him to leave his shoes on my porch
to cut down on the smell indoors. When he
does laundry, he just drops
his clean clothes on
his filthy floor. On
top of all that,
this man eats
like a pig.
house. But you really like this guy and see
yourself spending years with him, so y’all
are gonna have to figure out how to truly
share a space. I believe that this should
involve him rising up to your level, not you
gritting your teeth in a disgusting home
day after day or—even worse—you doing
all of the cleaning and eventually resenting
the hell out of him for it. You’ve described a
pretty amicable guy here, so I imagine he’d
be receptive to your issues and willing to
make some positive changes.
You wanna move forward and get seri
ous? Say so. Let him know how much you
like him, and you can make the hygiene
conversation part of it. Tell him you have
real concerns about sharing space with him,
and come clean about why y’all spend so
much time at your spot. You say he washes
dishes at your place—does he stay generally
tidy there, as well? I’m positive you could
blame some of the messi
ness on his three
Keepin’,
When it comes to cleanliness and
hygiene, you two are gonna have to find a
common ground. Have you tried talking to
him about this issue, or are you avoiding his
dirtiness until you can’t anymore? Sounds
like the latter when you ask him to leave
his shoes outside and refuse to sleep at his
roommates,
and maybe
he’s given up
fighting the good
fight over it all and lets
his room go south out of
pure despair. Who even knows. Wearing
dirty shirts is a habit that I had to break
myself of a few years ago, actually, and it
was initially because I got sick of my mom
complaining about every single stinky hug
I gave her.
Why did I wear dirty clothes? I didn’t
care about my scent until someone I loved
let me know how smelly I really was. It’s
fine to request that he wears a clean shirt
on your date nights, and being more direct
about his foul odor might lead him to take
his personal hygiene more seriously. If he
wants to get serious and grow closer to you,
he won’t see these concerns as an affront
on his humanity. He’ll see the value in pre
senting a clean vessel to the world and to
his partner. ©
Need advice? Email advice@flagpole.com, use the
anonymous form at flagpole.com/getadvice, or find
Bonita on Twitter: @flagpolebonita.
Chewing
with his
mouth open,
loud smacking, and
food gets all over his face.
His personality is great! We
like to spend time together (outside of his
place), we laugh a lot, and we have the same
values. The idea of spending years across the
table from him makes me wanna gag, though!
And if he doesn’t clean his own house, what
would that mean if we eventually moved in
together? (FYI, we do the dishes together at my
house, if we cook or eat there.)
Any tips on moving the relationship for
ward and having a “come to Jesus’’ talk with
him about his gross house and habits?
Thanks!
Keepin’ It Clean
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