I’m a young girl of 18. I have a boyfriend I love very much, but the problem is that he doesn’t call or text me except when it suits him. He will only respond if I call or message him, otherwise, he will not initiate such communication with me.

He lives far away from me in another city, so calling and texting are our main means of communicating! Initially, he visited our house and asked permission to court me and it was granted. At first, I only accepted him as a friend but did not agree to courtship. He used to send me letters and gradually I accepted his courtship. But now I am facing the dilemma I mentioned above, I complained to him several times about how this disturbs me but he never said anything as a way of explanation and he never changes his ways. I asked him what’s my position in his heart and he said he doesn’t know. All my instincts are telling me he must be having another girlfriend that he is showering his love and attention on while ignoring me. I plan on travelling to the city he lives in and confronting him face to face about the issue. What can you advise me? I love him so much and I want our relationship to be back on track.

-Girl, Ignored

Dear Girl,

I think your instincts might be correct. Your boyfriend most likely changed his mind about courting you because of some particular personal reasons of his, or because he’s simply no longer interested, or because he is actively courting another girl and doesn’t have the guts or posses the wisdom to end things with you in a nice and proper manner, he lets you take the hint and figure it out on your own. I advise you to follow and use your instincts because they are mostly always right. I also strongly advise you not to confront him and demand he change his ways etc, because you will end up becoming more hurt and humiliated if he refuses, it is better to give him the same medicine he’s giving you, ignore and stop initiating any communication with him. If you can do it, block him from seeing any of your social statuses, and do not view his own statuses, give him the complete silent treatment. If he really has any true feelings for you, he will seek you out and do the needful to bring your relationship back on track. And if he didn’t, then you will know that he really didn’t care much and he is no longer interested in pursuing a relationship with you. Then you will be better off without him, and the best thing is that it ends without jeopardizing your respect and self-esteem by being whiny, needy or worse, begging him to acknowledge you because if you have done any of the above without the intended result, it will hurt your heart very badly and bring a heavy dent to your self worth and esteem.

Further advice is, if you are not ready to get married now, especially if it’s because of your studies, I advise you to chuck off any dating, courtship or relationships from your life and fully concentrate on your studies until you are ready for marriage. I know most young girls keeps these so-called boyfriends in order to be trendy and go with the crowd, in order not to be the odd one out, but telling you the best thing, the most honourable thing is to actually be the odd one out in issues like this. It will make you become more valuable among your peers because it takes a lot of courage not to follow the crowd. Another reason for having boyfriends by young girls is so that they can enjoy material and monetary gifts from their so-called boyfriends and brag to each other about their good fortune. But if you want to maintain your good honour and self-respect, it is better to be content with what you have and what your parents provided for you and not to sell your innocence and coyness just for a few material pleasures.

Another valuable advice is that you should remember that dating, long courtship, exchanging romantic messages and sweet-nothings between unmarried couples is something disliked by Allah your Creator. There is no blessing in partaking in such things and no benefits except the temporary impermissible pleasure felts in the hearts. Furthermore, dating and long courtship mostly yield bad marriages or no marriage. And you will see that most good and durable marriages emerge from no dating and short courtships. So you will surely lose nothing by avoiding dating and concentrating on your studies until the time is right for it.