Dr Love with Mid-Day: She wants us to get back, but...

Illustration/Uday Mohite

My girlfriend broke up with me around four months ago because she felt we were too different. She said we had little in common, which wasn't reason enough for me, but I agreed because I didn't want to force her to be with me even though I knew I loved her. She recently messaged me to ask if we could give this another try and I don't know what to do. If she changes her mind again, I won't be able to handle it because I have already been through a lot of pain. I still miss her a lot and would love to try, but I am also afraid of putting myself through this. My friends also say I shouldn't because they saw me struggle. What should I do?
You should tell your ex-girlfriend why you feel this way and ask if she can be more specific about what went wrong and why she believes it won't this time. You are under no obligation to accept her into your life, or put yourself through this again, but you can always take it slow and ask her to do the same. If she can explain what has changed, and you can both spend more time trying to understand each other first, you may be in a better position to understand where things stand and decide if you are prepared to try. All relationships can be risky, so that shouldn't be your only reason to reject her.

Is it okay for a partner to say that they may cheat on you casually and ask you to be okay with it? My boyfriend says he's doing it to be honest with me because he doesn't want to lie. I would never do something like this to him, so I don't understand it. How should I respond?
Respond with the truth and tell him this won't work if his idea of a relationship is so radically at odds with yours. Without compatibility and shared ideas, this won't last for very long.

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