It is hard to spot a professional relationship cheater, a Maneater Woman, especially if you are under Cupid’s arrow. You will be blindfold. That’s when good friends are a blessing. There is no doubt about that. You may like your friend to the point of “inseparable,” but if there is no respect for one another, you two will not bond like glue.

My friend is a cool guy. Geeky, thin, and intelligent just like me. He likes a lot of the things that I also like. Playing video game is one thing. Playing soccer is another. But, he has something which I didn’t: a decisive and quick thinking mind.

We help each other out often. We are a team. While we both weren’t that financially well off back in the old days, we always bought each other our favorite gifts, mostly being video games. We always shared lunches, did each other’s homework, all that kind of stuff.

While I’d consider myself as decisive, my ability to perceive situations and act according was muddled. However, he was the opposite.

What happened?

When I was in middle school, I crushed out hard on this girl. She was intelligent even though not the prettiest girl in the class. She seemed to have a great personality. The only flaw was, she used boys. This fact, I didn’t know.

After approaching her in the cafeteria, and asking her to be my girlfriend, my heart was pounding, legs were shaking, and skin was dripping with sweat. She sweetly replied yes.

That was it, I got a girlfriend, someone I really liked too.

A few weeks later, she asked me to bring her lunch every day. The first day, I happily agreed to do that. Everyday after the first seemed like a routine: got her lunch, spent my lunch money which was like $5 to $10, and stayed hungry for the rest of the day.

She also seemed to be reluctant to talk to me in her group of friends. Her acting was way too uneasy when we were relatively alone.

My friend understood her intentions on the first day and warned me too. But me, having found “love” for the first time, didn’t seem to care.

What was the transition like to survive from a maneater woman?

One day, she came up to me, crying and sniffling and telling me that a guy called her names and slapped her. I was shocked to hear that. And whatever she said, I believed without doubt. My friend suggested me to investigate first before going ahead and making harsh, middle school decisions: fighting the other guy of course.

Although I did agree to my friend, I had my fury hand clenched into a fist. Bring it on “bastard.” I was about to fight him.

It turned out at the end, she made it all up. She got caught stealing that guy’s belongings and she wanted me to hurt him. Although I was rather skinny, my dad did teach me how to “defend myself.”

It was a scam and something that broke my heart horribly. She was a Maneater Woman starting from day 1 she wanted to be with me.

Like a snap of a finger, I shifted my focus from pure emotion to rational feeling.

What lessons did you learn?

1. Listen outside: When you are blindly in love, you won’t listen to anything negative. However, there must be a reason your friends or whoever the third party person says such things. Listen to them. They can be more objective than what you think and feel. I’m not saying to disbelieve your girlfriend as a maneater woman and act on whatever your friends tell you, but keep their comments in mind. They can be your life savers.

2. Trust you gut feeling: When your girlfriend is reluctant to introduce you to her group or show up at your group, something doesn’t look right here. You’ll have to find out why. Is it because of timing? If yes, what’s the “right” timing. If she can’t even publicly acknowledge that you are her boyfriend, you are probably not anyways. On the other hand, when both of you feel uneasy when you guys are alone together, something must be wrong here. A healthy relationship should be full of laughter, chemistry, and easiness. Even during silence, both of you should feel naturally comfortable. If you have a feeling that you’d rather to stay alone and play with your mobile phone instead of having your”girlfriend” in presence. She probably should not be there to begin with.

3. Men pay for everything: In some culture, men do pay for everything; but hello we are in 21st century and we are talking about gender equality? Show back some love to your men who makes you happy. I’m not saying guys should tell their girlfriends to pay like exactly 50% of the time. That’s not a gentleman at all. What I’m saying is 70/30 to 80/20 split is fair. DO NOT ask girls to pay for the taps directly. Find out some creative ways to get her to pay for something. For example, pretend you forget to bring your wallet; say you like a reasonable priced gift when you two are shopping together (i.e. a PS4 game). If she’s reluctant to pay for anything in the relationship, she’s probably reluctant to invest in any further emotion with you too. That can be a potential sign of a maneater woman. It should be a two-way street, not a one-way street. Unlike in the old days, women do have economic power today.

What are the outcomes of this change?

Ironically, this experience was a gift to me. I become more open to suggestions and more rational thinking. I also started to think more deliberately before I act. While I haven’t become cold-hearted, I have become keener in differentiating between things that can harm me and things that can help me. No one’s worth trusting blindly unless you know them very well. If you believe that you’re being used foolishly, you don’t need to keep up with it.

It hurts when you find out your so called “girlfriend” is actually a maneater woman, but you have to be bold and move on. Check out this 10 ways to recover from a breakup here.

I’m sure you may have different experience than I have. Comment below or even better, share your journey of change with others!

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