The Frankenstein Boyfriend Project: Unhealthy Love Triangle

What you should do if you find you are in a love triangle with a woman as part of her Frankenstein boyfriend project.

In this video coaching newsletter, I discuss an email from a viewer who is in a love triangle with a woman who has been in a relationship with another man for 4 years. She won’t leave the other guy so they can be together. Her therapist tells her the relationship is unhealthy, but she says she can’t leave.

The viewer is ignoring the fact he is part of her Frankenstein boyfriend project and is hoping to rip off another man’s woman. My comments are in bold italics like this below in the body of his email.

You guys have probably heard me talk about the Frankenstein boyfriend project, and that’s where you’ve got a woman who has two or three different guys, and each one of those guys brings something to the relationship that she’s not getting from the other guy or the primary guy. In this particular case, we have a woman who’s been with her boyfriend for four years, and the guy who wrote the email is her side piece, I guess, and he feels like she’s the one for him. So, he’s got a case of oneitis going on.

So, he’s involved with her and they’re both seeing the same therapist. The therapist is going, “Yeah, your relationship with your existing boyfriend is unhealthy, and you shouldn’t be with him,” but the girl says, “Oh, I’ve been with him for so many years, I can’t leave.” And so, this guy is kind of stuck in limbo because he’s like, “I want her to leave this guy so we can be together.” Meanwhile, he’s ignoring the fact that she’s cheating on her boyfriend of four years with him. He thinks that once he’s able to rip her off from this other guy, that of course she’s going to be loyal and faithful, because “she’s the one” and they’re going to live happily ever after.

And so that’s what you see in a lot of these cases. Like this particular woman is obviously not getting the emotional and the sexual connection with her boyfriend that she’s getting with the guy that writes the email. And so, there are some things she’s obviously getting with the boyfriend. Maybe she lives with him. I don’t know, it wasn’t really clear if she’s living with the other guy. The bottom line is they’ve been together. And so, women that do this might have two or three different guys. One guy that might actually be sleeping with her, and there might be one or two other guys that they occasionally go out on dates with, guys that are the emotional tampon, if you will. Every time there’s a problem or she’s unhappy with her boyfriend, she calls the other guy, the nice guy, male orbiter, who’s kind of in backup position, hoping to get his shot.

And the important thing is, if you’re looking for a relationship, a loyal, monogamous, exclusive relationship, you’re not going to find it by being some chick’s side piece, who doesn’t want to leave her boyfriend. But it just goes to show, I say this all the time – and I learned this 30 years ago when I got into sales – that people buy based upon emotion, and they use logic and reason to justify their decisions.

And so, this guy, even though he says he’s been following me for several years, I seriously doubt whether he’s actually read 3% Man, but he’s involved in something that he shouldn’t be. If he knew the material and was actually applying it, he would have never gotten involved with this chick. But because he’s all wrapped up in his emotions and his feelings, he’s getting dragged through the mud, basically, and he’s doing it to himself. He’s sitting around putting his personal life on hold thinking it’s going to change and that somehow she’s going to be the perfect girl.

Viewer’s Email:

Dear Coach Corey,

Thank you for all your videos and advice. They have been very helpful for many years!

Well, you should have read the book, dude. You didn’t mention the book, so that tells me you probably never read it. You’re just cherry picking videos, and this is why you’re in the situation you’re in. You don’t follow the instructions, and you’re suffering tremendously because of it. Because you want to be with this girl, but she’s with somebody else, and she won’t leave the other guy.

I would like to know your opinion on my situation and what would be the right thing to do. I have been in a love triangle for 6 months now. I am in love with a girl who is in a 4-year relationship with another guy.

Come on, man. You don’t mow another man’s lawn. Trying to rip off some other dude’s girl for six months now, that’s the opposite of what I teach. You can’t cherry pick things and think you’re going to use it to manipulate and steal some other guy’s girl because you think she’s “the one.”

We met at work and both knew what we were getting into. I know it sounds cliché, but we both feel like we met “the one.”

“We both”… If she really felt like you were the one, she would have left this other guy, dude. That’s the reality. You’re part of her Frankenstein boyfriend project. I know you probably don’t want to hear that, and you don’t like to hear that, but that’s the truth.

And our relationship ticks every box.

Well, except for the fact you’re in love with a woman who’s in a relationship with another man.

She says she loves me. She wants to be with me, we had multiple serious conversations about the perspectives of this working out and both really want to get through it and start our own “normal” relationship.

Okay. So, if we look at this from reality, “she loves me and wants to be with me,” if that were true, she would be with you. She’s actually still in a relationship with the other boyfriend. So, it’s nice that she says these things and she may feel these things, but if we bottom line her actions, she’s voting with their feet and she’s staying with her boyfriend. She’s not staying with you.

Men do this to women all of the time when they’re married and they have a mistress. “Oh, it’s just not the right time. My wife’s going through a tough time. In the spring, I’ll definitely be able to leave her. She just has got a lot on her plate, and she can’t do it right now.” Meanwhile, years go by and these guys have no intention of leaving their wives.

But she is still with the other guy, can’t let him go, says it is very hard for her. They have been together for a long time and she can’t cut him off, even though she mentions a lot of things wrong with their life together on many levels and how our connection is what she always wanted and dreamed of.

Well, she may want it to be true, but if we just look at her actions, bottom line the actions, what’s bottom line of the actions? She’s with the other guy, and you’re her side piece. That’s the bottom line. Six months, it doesn’t matter. “We both feel like we’re the one.” No, you feel like she’s the one for you, but she just tells you that and yet stays with the other guy. That’s reality.

We both go to therapy and even her therapist says he is wrong for her and there is no perspective.

I don’t know what that means.

I feel like is going on for too long and doubt whether I should still be invested in this…

You shouldn’t. If you’ve been paying attention to anything I’ve been teaching for the years you claim to have been following me, you have to know that this is the opposite of what I teach. I would never say you should get involved with somebody like this, because once a cheater, always a cheater. If she cheats on him with you, guess what? As soon as she gets to a place where she’s not that happy with you, she’ll be doing this same exact thing with another guy. That’s just who she is.

She’s not loyal at all. She doesn’t value loyalty, she doesn’t value monogamy, she doesn’t value exclusivity, and her word doesn’t mean anything. I mean, look at all the BS she’s giving you, “We’ve been together for a long time and I can’t cut him off. I know the relationship is wrong on many levels. And our connection is so wonderful and it’s what I’ve always dreamed of, but I just can’t leave him. I just can’t.”

…but really feel that she is the one for me and don’t want to lose her and all the potential of our future life.

What, the potential life where she cheats on you eventually, just like she did on him with you? That’s delusional. I mean, seriously, dude.

What should I do? Thank you in advance! 

Best regards,

Bob

What do you think I’m going to tell you to do? If you want a healthy, loyal, monogamous, exclusive relationship, it’s not going to be with this chick ever, even if she does leave this guy. As soon as she’s unhappy with you or you go through a rough patch, she’s going to be hooking up with somebody else. That’s just who she is. It’s not your job to fix her. It’s not your job to save her. You’re not, Captain Save-a-Hoe. I mean, if you consistently hang out with people that have no integrity, what does that tell me about you? Well, you obviously don’t have any integrity, and maybe you deserve it then. Maybe you should stay involved in this.

But these kinds of love triangles are dangerous to your health. And, you know, I’ve talked off and on many times over the years about a friend of my brother’s that got murdered because he just happened to go home with a cute hostess that he worked with. He had no idea she had a crazy ex-boyfriend that was stalking her, and he got murdered when he went back to her house. It’s like, you never know what you’re dealing with.

And this kind of thing, this is what happens when you watch too many movies. I mean, how many movies have we all seen where there’s two people, there’s a woman who’s unhappy in her relationship, and there’s a guy who’s unlucky in love. And then he meets this girl who’s unhappy in a relationship, and he’s such a great guy, and their connection is so amazing, and the guy that she’s married to or in a relationship with is just such a jerk. And then, at some point, she leaves the jerk, and then they live happily ever after in movie and TV-land. Because that’s the fantasy of the geek that sat in the back of the class in high school and fantasized about getting together with the hot girl. And so, he gets into the movie business and he thinks, “Oh, I’ll just write this script this way.”

And then we grow up, and over the course of our lives, we see this same thing over and over, thousands of times, and you go, “Oh, it’s the one. It’s meant to be.” It’s just some BS from some loser geek that never got laid in high school, wrote a movie, and literally it’s brainwashed and propagandized billions of people around the world. And this is not how things work in the real world. In the real world, this is what happens when you get into a love triangle. You become part of her Frankenstein boyfriend project, or his Frankenstein girlfriend project, for that matter.

If you want to be with somebody that loves you and only you, you’ve got to make sure they’re ready, willing, able and open to dating you. And you’re her side piece. You’re just the guy that she’s sleeping with on the side. And so, the way to handle it is to say, “I’m not going to stay involved with this. You tell me I’m the one, yet you stay with this guy. Obviously I’m not the one, and I want to go find the one,” (if you’re going to believe in that fantasy).

Because we all have lots of soulmates. We don’t just have one, we have many. And there is somebody out there. It may take a few years, several years even, before you meet somebody that you really click with. But if you continually get involved with people that have no integrity, and you project your feelings onto them, and you ignore the fact that they’re cheating with you, for you to think that somehow, once they are no longer with that other person, that they’re going to be loyal and faithful to you, that’s just so ridiculously delusional.

I mean, there are so many things I’d like to say about that, but I can’t really say the things I used to say on YouTube, just because things have changed over the years. But at the end of the day, if you want a healthy, happy, loyal, monogamous relationship, it ain’t going to be with this chick, dude. That’s just reality.

So, if you’ve got a question or a challenge and you’d like to get my help, go to UnderstandingRelationships.com, click the Products tab at the top of your screen and book a coaching session with yours truly.