this girl "recently discovered partying" and suddenly she's on her way to STDS, multiple baby daddies, synthetic self-esteem and painful hard choices?

Is no one else thinking that this girl could be exaggerating to get the attention of someone she likes? I mean, if we're discussing BDSM with the boss at work, she could be just trying to hang with the cool kids.

LW, you already have children. Be THEIR mother. Your feelings seem very misplaced: I imagine this girl would be of little interest to you if she wasn't cruising your man.

That these people know way, way too much about each other? I mean, I've worked with a variety of bosses for decades at a time and wouldn't have the foggiest notion about their sexual proclivities. This gives the term workplace camaraderie an entirely new and kind of creepy meaning....

Knowing that a man values her for a reason other than sex will do her a world of good. Her trying to become the most important person in your husband's life will do no one any good. If your husband doesn't get this, you're better off both staying the hell away from her.

LW, I am SO confused by your letter. You have kids, and presumably you have a stable, though unconventional marriage. Are those things important to you?

Because if they are--I've got some news. YOU'VE GOT A 3 ALARM FIRE ON YOUR HANDS! Wake up! What are you thinking?

If you've been into an unconventional lifestyle then you know it's for experienced grownups who don't form emotional attachments, or at least not right away. It isn't therapy--certainly not for messed up teenagers, and you know it.

Have you even met this girl? Everything you say about her you learned from your husband. You don't seem to have any independent knowledge of her at all. How can a girl who lost her virginity so recently be into BDSM? What does she know about her own sexuality, or even dare I say it, love? So far, all she knows is that the plumbing works. What kind of a boss talks about BDSM with a teenage employee just out of high school?

You casually mention that your husband "feels pretty strongly" that in a BDSM relationship the girl would do what he told her to. Huh? Just how strongly does your husband feel that the two of you should enter into a sexual relationship with a headstrong and volatile teenage girl for her own good? Please say that you have re-read your letter and see what lies you've been telling yourself to justify an absurd idea that your husband has planted for you.

Daddy is trying to get into the cookie jar and has got it figured out that the best way to get you to go along with all this is to get your maternal instincts going. He talks about her problems a lot--especially her sexual problems. I bet he does that in such a fatherly, concerned way. Because that is how to get YOU to feel maternal towards her, so YOU'LL think up the very solution he has so carefully planned for you to suggest. All on your own of course.

How like a 36 year old man to figure out that he's the solution to a young girl's sexual problems. You are being played for a patsy, honey. All those maternal feelings are going to disappear in a heartbeat the minute you get into a very messy and compromising situation with a kid who has nothing to lose and everything that matters to you to gain.

Didn't think I'd ever repeat this line, but STOP THE INSANITY!!

Take it from me--I've been on this path. The end of the road ain't a pretty sight.

when I was 31. Small world. No alterna-sex involved so far as I know. But she was very carried away by his seeming "adult-ness" and he was carried away by someone who hadn't the wisdom or experience to recognize his flaws.

It was hellish. There was no middle ground. She didn't have the capacity to say no to herself, to think of long term consequences, to understand the impact on herself, let alone on everyone else, by becoming involved with him. It was her whole heart, her whole body, everyone and everything else be damned. That's what teens in love do.

I, at 31, did not have the wisdom to understand what was happening with any perspective.

I'll answer from the perspective that you have it right, that she parties too much and she's needy and unbalanced right now, and she isn't some sort of wallflower trying to seem cool.

The best thing you can do for this girl is stay away. Build strong boundaries and offer help only as a detached adult. She already knows too much about your lives. Forgive me if I'm having trouble believing your husband isn't already fucking her (based on my experience alone so that's all it's worth).

What you do with this girl can have a devastating effect not only on her but on your marriage. Her emotional state is not stable and while perhaps adding your stability into the mix could stabilize her, it's also possible that adding her instability into your lives will spell disaster.

All I know is my life was never the same and it took me a long time to put this behind me. I had a more traditional marriage but still there are issues of trust and honesty and where the focus should be and she is not a good ingredient to add to any relationship.

If you can help her from a detached perspective, by all means. Don't make her a part of your lives. My 2 cents.

... that being 'good' enough (pretty enough, talented enough, funny enough, sexy enough clever enough...whatever enough) to 'get' somebody else's mate can be a powerful fix for somebody who's looking to shore up their crap self esteem. And even the most bumbling, cute, idiotic puppies can suddenly look like mean young bitches as they blithely walk out with everything you've built together. Polyamourous or no.