Although I doubt if there's much harm in trying to resurrect the relationship, my forecast is that even if LW's girlfriend is willing to give him a second chance, the likelihood that she will ever trust him seems rather remote. LW gave her good reasons not to trust him, of course, and probably sent out all kinds of signs to that effect, even if she misunderstood the cause of LW's deception. Just imagine: LW's cellphone rings and he always excuses himself to another room to take the call out of her hearing. It's no wonder she thought he was cheating. But after having been deceived for so long, the possibility of building trust is quite problematic. The temptation to "do what it takes" to restore her trust probably requires LW to debase himself and give her more control than is healthy for any relationship that is supposed to be between equals.

And you know what? LW, you are getting what you deserve and you should be grateful that your life is being upended only by the normal disruptions of boy loses girl, instead of boy loses girl and is sentenced to a minimum mandatory term of jail that would all but moot whatever advancement you had planned to earn from your college education. I too had the misfortune of being associated with a drug dealer while in college and I resented his drug dealing maneuvers even though I wasn't his girlfriend. He nearly did get caught, and prospective medical student that he was, he panicked and one of my more vivid memories is of being rounded up for a "de-drugging" of his house, going through dressers with a hand held vacuum to make sure there was no drug residue anywhere, and then taking the bag and emptying it somewhere in the woods.

When she said that it was possible for sexually active women to have deeper friendships only if they're married. What a mindlessly stupid thing to say. Is there anyone who believes that to be true?

Per Beth Lifson: Yes, analyzing the quality of human relationships as a function of what kind of coitus one is having (or not) is quite reductionist. In fact, it reduces us to one of our keenest biological impulses. Imagine viewing people in approximately the same way but using "eating" instead: I overate, used food as a means of shoring up my weak self-esteem and comforting myself, and now, I plan to fast forever. We all know the formerly overweight who become obsessed with healthy living and eating. We can usually see them for what they are, well, she is who they are, except that her unhealthy impulses involved copulation and not mastication. But this reduction of everything as a function of coitus is not just used to define male/female relationships, it is also being applied to the "whole family," in the sense that, for instance, some churches consider that using assisted reproduction makes children commodities, as opposed to the God given blessing they are when the are the result of "natural" procreation. It's really quite stunning, when you think about it, how organizations whose rationale for existence is minding the soul have adopted positions that see humans as not much more than a function of their most basic biolgoical processes.

There seems to be a belief among many posters that American children of color are just waiting to be picked up for the equivalent of a song by any prospective adoptive American couple of any racial description. It just isn't so. Using foster care as a means of starting a permanent family is uncertain at best, and possibly a prescription for true heartbreak. There are many couples who start down this road and decide to pursue international adoption after realizing how easy it is to lose foster children they have bonded with to parents with low skills and very limited future prospects. Not always, but often. Alternatively, those children are eventually placed with other, more suitable family members. These are among the reasons why the foster care system relies so heavily on "professional" foster families, people who do not see adoption as a goal, though they might in fact adopt foster children from time to time.

I have qualms about international adoption, especially in countries where it often devolves into thinly disguised baby selling, and overall, if Chinese couples are sincerely interested in adopting girls, that is such a positive development that I scarcely care about disappointed foreign couples.

But setting aside all considerations of availability of Chinese or foster children for adoption, no one, including the harpies on this board, should be guilt tripped into adopting or fostering a child when their better judgment or plain instinct tells them that they would not be a good parent to that child.