5 signs your band guy is a dirt bag
While I was surfing around Huffington Post looking for inspiration for this evening’s blog post, I came across the headline, “Why didn’t anyone tell me I was marrying a jerk?”
First of all, once you’ve made the decision that you’re going to marry someone, the likelihood of anyone changing your mind is incredibly slim. Second of all, you probably had some idea that the guy was a jerk before you married him.
Band guys are somewhat of a different breed. They’re constantly around people, looking for attention (hopefully in a musical way) and they’re often on the road. So, how do you know that your band guy is a dud? Here are my top five red flags to watch for.
1. He doesn’t invite you to shows or to hang out with his friends. Unless you’re the kind of girl that is constantly causing drama anywhere you go, it is highly unusual that your significant other doesn’t want you to see him (or her) doing what he loves or that he doesn’t want you to spend time with your friends. It’s likely he’s hiding something — or hoping to do something to hide — so he’s leaving you behind in an effort not to get caught.
2. It’s one-way communication. You’re always the one initiating a phone call, text, or email conversation. His phone regularly “dies” and you get his voicemail. No matter where in the world he is on tour, unless he is a complete idiot or doesn’t have a smartphone, there is WiFi somewhere. Plus, there’s this super cool thing called a calling card — yes they still make them and they’re fairly inexpensive. Even if you don’t have in-depth phone calls or conversations every single day, there should be some level of communication. Or at least communication about when he will be out of range before he is out of range.
3. He can’t commit to plans — or you. He doesn’t know if he is free, but he isn’t scheduled to work and he doesn’t have a show. Or any other prior commitment. Then there’s the whole, “I really like you, but I’m not ready to make this official,” when you’ve been seeing eachother regularly for months. It should be abundantly clear that he is looking for something better to do. In both areas.
4. He hates your friends. And your family. Sure, we all have friends that won’t be a favorite of our significant other. What I’m talking about is the hatred of your beautiful, intelligent, mild-mannered, fun, couldn’t be a better person if she was Gandhi best friend. Not only does he hate her, but he refuses to spend time with you and your friend, even though it would make you happy.
5. You constantly have that nagging feeling something isn’t right. This seems like a no-brainer, but I can’t tell you how often people ignore the sick, paranoid sensation that their significant other — or dude that they’re seeing — is doing something awful behind her back. If you have to ask yourself, or him, if he is cheating on you and you’re constantly looking for signs that he is — that’s your sign. It will suck to admit it to yourself and he will most certainly lie about it, but you need to do yourself a favor and get out.
The truth is, people don’t often change and they only way they can change is if they admit that they need to and really want to do it. It won’t necessarily get better the longer you stick it out or the older the person gets. Everyone has to learn their own lessons, and sometimes it means missing the one who got away.
I realize that giving you these five signs is counter-intuitive to that last part, but the truth is, if you’ve picked him, no one — not even your family — is going to tell you how terrible he is. You have to figure it out for yourself. Because even if you get there on your own, it takes a lot of strength and courage to leave someone that you love and hope will change.
Of course, you can turn this around on women and any other relationship situation. But that’s my unsolicited five cents. With that, we now return to our regularly scheduled program.
