This is a follow-up to this post.
As a TL;DR for context: my best friend from high-school, for whom I’d developed the first batch of unreciprocated romantic feelings in my life, reached out four weeks ago, after almost two decades of not being in touch. I started falling in love hard again, and I thought it was a bad idea.
Well, right now it seems as though I was right about that. I came clean about two weeks ago with the intent of backing off. Told her I’m falling for her again, hard, and that I don’t want to do another stint of carrying it alone. I apologised profusely, told her this wasn’t on her, no hard feelings, and wished her well.
She replied and told me that she really didn’t want to lose this, because she started looking forward to our conversations and was excited about potentially meeting up next month (relative to the present moment), but that she didn’t want me to suffer in any way, so she’d understand. She said that I’m definitely not indifferent to her, but that she’s struggling to figure out her feelings - later on, this turned into “[I’m] very dear to [her] and [she] missed [me] so much without even realising it.”
I, being the moron that I am, decided to stick with it for her, as she’s clearly not having an easy go of things at the moment and thought that this was one thing I could do to ease her pain.
Trouble is, I started spiraling around the thought that I’ve just set myself on a trajectory of pure pain, again. I’ve had two episodes since then, let her know both times as I could tell it was affecting my “just chatting with a friend” mode. The first time, she stuck with me and gave me hints that there’s a chance that pain is not inevitable. The second was last night, and it was significantly stronger. We ended the night with quite a bit of tension between us (she told me she’s more of a “taking things as they are in the now, not defining anything,” while I’m the kind of person who needs a bit of clarity in my life as an anchor point). We’d discussed where each of us stands in relation to continuing this interaction between us: I told her I’m choosing to stick with it even with the looming inevitability on my horizon, she avoided answering entirely, citing the aforementioned “taking things as they are in the now,” and this just served to further fan my destabilisation.
It’s clear to both of us at this point that there is a major mismatch of investment. My side is significantly more defined than hers (I’m not judging her, btw, every person has their rhythm and that’s ok), but I genuinely see no way this could end up somewhere along the lines of where I’d like it to end - a mutual romantic attempt. This is for a number of factors, such as:
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we live in different countries - I would have no issues uprooting myself and moving for a relationship, but I most certainly won’t do it without anything clearly defined; she told me she needs something “real,” a.k.a. no long-distance; establishing myself in her country would most certainly not be an easy process, with zero guarantee of success;
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while we do get along in general (very well, I might add), it’s clear that we have two very different approaches to this whole “relationship” thing, which is only amplified by the aforementioned mismatch of investment;
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I’m not getting any concrete intentions from her in… well, any direction, to be honest; actually feels like it’s a bit of a rollercoaster, with some days being almost lovey-dovey, and others being brief and devoid of any such elements - I’m not talking about just not discussing it, I’m talking about things feeling distant; as an example, one day she even told me I’m very dear to her and reacted positively when I hinted that I would love to hug and kiss her, now she’s avoiding even saying anything concrete as to whether or not she’d want to continue interacting (not “let’s give a relationship a chance,” literally just “do you want us to still keep talking”);
I’m genuinely suffering. It’s painful, because I’m not only carrying the intensity of things as they are now (and they are intense in their own right, with every interaction just further solidifying everything), but I also have our shared history piling up on top of that, making everything significantly more intense - I’ve realised my feelings for her are on a continuum spanning from the first day I saw her and up to this very second, while she barely remembers anything from back then. She tells me that my being certain that this’ll end up with pain on my end will serve as a self-fulfilling prophecy, while I genuinely see no chance of success.
Right now, I’m leaning toward cutting it all off. The pain will be guaranteed as-is, but I’m thinking that I will at least not let things grow any more than they already have, thus avoiding an even greater amount of pain, not to mention avoiding doing any more splash damage than I’ve already done. The tension at the moment isn’t world-shattering, or anything, but it’s noticeable - we both ended the night relatively upset. On the flipside, there’s a dumb and stubborn flicker of hope which popped up after the first time I tried to pull away, and it’s yelling at me that I’ll lose her from my life again and that backing off is certain to end… whatever this is for good.
At this moment, I’m stuck oscillating between a rock and a hard place, my reason went out the window, and I’m severely emotionally compromised. I could do with any insight anyone might have and I thank you profusely for it.
Sending hugs while you figure this out friend. FWIW I think you’ve already assessed the situation clearly. It sounds like you know what you need, but are concerned about the anticipated loss of friendship with this girl. As is, this relationship doesn’t sound sustainable, and this girl sounds unsure of what she wants. Moving country for someone who isn’t into you has certainly happened before and sometimes it works out, but it doesn’t sound like thats really what you want.
Make the best decisions for you that you can. People who care for you should always support you in that. And good luck!
Thank you!
That’s what I can’t shake, how clearly doomed to failure this is in my mind. I’m the type of person who overthinks what toilet paper I should buy, so I can guarantee that I’m not the type to hastily go out and conclude “yeah, this is shit” just because someone had a bad day. I’m just good at noticing patterns, and there’s nothing but confusion in this case.
Plus everything on her end started feeling… I don’t know how else to put this - non-committal and avoidant, even. This is what generated the tension, actually, I said this is what it feels like from where I’m standing, then she accused me of attacking her (which I genuinely wasn’t… I’m just really fucking sad and worried, nowhere near frustrated and/or angry, I can’t do anything other than accept her for who and how she is).
I just feel like I need to distance myself from this whole deal, with regret and fear in my heart.
I just feel like I need to distance myself from this whole deal, with regret and fear in my heart.
You may feel regret and fear now, but be open to feeling differently about this as you continue to process it. You’re making a decision that’s firmly in line with your own beliefs about the level of respect you want to feel about yourself when in a relationship. That’s a huge position of strength, even if it doesn’t feel like it now.
Again, good luck while you navigate this. Every choice you make that reinforces your confidence and self-esteem can be a foundation to work from going forward. It takes effort, but I’m confident it will be worthwhile.
Oh, right now I’m feeling anger.
She replied and threw my being honest and open about what I was going through as guilt-tripping her. She said my asking once if she still wanted to talk to me knowing my truth as me pressuring her into defining a relationship. And she told me that, yes, she saw potential, we were a good match so far, and that she just wanted to get to know me better, after giving me not even a hint of this before I called it off.
So, yeah. I’m feeling pissed off.
I stuck to my guns, started doing reading comprehension with her, basically, and she replied essentially realising that she kinda’ fucked up on the understanding front. I tried to explain things clearly and comprehensively one last time, because I’m a moron who still believes in trying to communicate even when there’s really no reason to do so anymore. We’ll see what comes out of it. At this point, though, I gotta say, I’m not all that keen about being honest and open with her, given how she reacted when I tried to be genuinely vulnerable…
I get it, I’m an intense person, but why the hell does everyone assume that means I expect them to manage my feelings for me… Why the hell can’t people understand that I’m just trying to open up…
Anyway, thanks so much for the insights and the follow-up, this thing has certainly been recontextualised since yesterday…
I get it, I’m an intense person, but why the hell does everyone assume that means I expect them to manage my feelings for me… Why the hell can’t people understand that I’m just trying to open up…
The fact that you said “everyone” here gives the impression that this has happened before. If that is the case, this may be a signal that you should try to hold back. You don’t owe everyone complete honesty, and depending on a person’s communication style and history, they may assume subtext / ulterior motives even when you tell them exactly how you feel (ex: you saying “this is 100% a me problem and I don’t want anything from you”). She probably thought “okay, then why is he telling me this?”
How long have the two of you been talking? And did you ever tell her your feelings from before (in high school)? If not, does she know about that now (how you felt back then)?
Honestly, because she asked and kept probing. I am being very serious, she has presented explicit curiosity in my side of the feelings, several times - even while I was not going through the two aforementioned spirals, and that’s when things got, as I said “lovey-dovey,” on both our ends.
I always started off vague, not giving too many details. The details came out through continued questioning, and, yes, I was 100% honest with her. I genuinely don’t see why not, she wanted to know, so I told her.
As for the “everyone,” that was mostly a frustrated exaggeration on my part, apologise for the confusion. It most certainly has not happened every time and with everyone, but during moments of emotional turmoil (with or without relation to romantic aspects), I have received that observation before, in other relationships, yes. It feels as though it tends to occur when what I say is an uncomfortable truth for the other person, mostly.
We’ve been talking regularly for a month. If you mean historically, we spent almost every other day together, whether skipping classes to go for a coffee, or spending afternoons together, doing whatever. We were very close. And, yes, I always came clean, both in high-school and now. Both times she mostly avoided the subject, then presented openness to bids for affection - nothing intense, holding a hand, pecking her cheek.
Both times she mostly avoided the subject, then presented openness to bids for affection - nothing intense, holding a hand, pecking her cheek.
That is tough, because it definitely could be her needing affection in her life and kind of leading you on to get that even if she doesn’t want to reciprocate or fully commit, but it could also be her feeling it out to see if she could return feelings for you.
In either case, though, if you will crash from heartbreak if she doesn’t reciprocate, and you can’t really compartmentalize the feelings of love, you probably are making the best decision for you right now - walk away and don’t look back. I don’t know what kind of person she is, obviously, but I have seen girls/women dangle that “could be a relationship someday” tidbit so they can get the affection they want without actually committing while also looking elsewhere. I mean, if she was at all interested in a relationship, why not agree to date casually? Not to mention LDRs are a bad idea if you don’t have actual plans to be with them irl.
I think you made the right choice.
Thank you so much for sticking with this and for the insights!
Honestly, that hadn’t even crossed my mind and I don’t even need that much to see that there is a potentially insurmountable dynamic mismatch between the two of us in terms of “the basics,” so I genuinely don’t see how trying to push things any further would help.
I’m also working on the “what she’s giving me” principle, and right now all I feel is (like a broken record, I swear…) confusion. Now it’s just straight confusion, everything else is on hold… Kinda’ sucks, because I really liked what I saw so far.
Part of the reason why rememberance had such an impact as an extraneous factor was that the current dynamic was very much familiar when compared to the old. Interactionally, the dynamic is spot on. Then it hits a wall.
Anyway, sent her a last expository regurgitation of semantic explanations as I just want to clear up any confusions she may have had about my side of things, but the hang-up around literally anything “romance,” even just referring to it specifically, persists throughout my attempts at clearing up what I meant (I even started trying to find milder synonyms for “dating,” I kinda’ lost my mind at 3AM a bit, that’s on me… But nothing egregious other than… y’know… the volume😬).
No reply, open for two days now. I’m not looking forward to a reply, or at least I hope she understood when I told her that I do not expect instant or regular replies - I completely vanished after high-school, and I’m no hypocrite.
Edit: I honestly don’t want to suspect her of anything. Until clearly proven untrue, I want to believe her, as she presents herself. I have such respect for her, that I cannot allow myself to offer her any less than that. Even if just based on where and how we left things way back when, I held her very dearly among my friends.
Heyo bud. Following on from your last post, it doesn’t sound hopeless. It sounds like she wants to see if feelings can grow for you, by reconnecting with you, and you’re demanding to know if it’s going to happen when she doesn’t know herself. She’s going through a lot, as you said, and investing in another person is work she might not have the capacity for right now, some days anyway - the days where you feel things are distant.
That said, this doesn’t sound good for you as things stand. She likes you, clearly, but isn’t “fuck yeah” about you yet, and that is tearing you apart because if she’s not locked in, she might disappear again, and that’s obviously very scary.
By “fuck yeah about you” I mean, if the idea of doing something with you came up, she might be interested, but she wouldn’t necessarily feel compelled to drop everything immediately to run to you.
Thing is, there is someone out there who will feel that way about you. I feel that way about my wife, and she about me. You deserve that, for your partner to love the shit out of you and then love you more, boundlessly and effortlessly. It might happen with her, but it almost definitely won’t if you can’t rein in your need to have it defined and set in stone before she’s ready to give you that.
This caught my eye too and I wanted to address it: She accused you of attacking her, and you didn’t mean to… It sounds like the conversation was intense, would “onslaught of emotion” be a fair way to describe what she might have perceived from you?
Sorry if this is a bit disjointed. Routines are being done.
Thank you!
It is now. I sent her a “goodbye” letter explaining everything as well as I could, with heavy repetition of the fact that none of it’s on her and I’m not blaming or judging her, just working with what I’ve got. I did leave space for “if you ever feel that you want to try something in a romantic sense, then I’m open for it,” but made it clear that I can’t deal with this as it is. No stuffing that shit back in the box.
As I told her, I’m not the kind of person who can dial it down when shit’s screaming in me. I can’t explain just how solid everything is in me, how well-defined this stuff is. She remembers nothing from back then, to me it’s as clear as yesterday. To quote myself, “it feels like trying to stave off a river with a teaspoon.”
I can’t do this. There’s far, far too much uncertainty, around pretty much every aspect and level of this interaction for me to be able to deal with it. Plus, I forgot to mention, she’s currently in a relationship. Long-distance, she said it’s ended in her mind for a while now (I told her I’d back off without hesitation if ever it were to reach the point of having to choose between her current partner and myself, she said it’s not the case). I am deeply uncomfortable in this context. I’ve made this mistake once before, and ended up hating myself for it.
Bottom line, absolutely nothing was clear out of this whole situation for me. Not a single thing. And I get that it’s difficult if she really is trying to figure out if there’s anything there for me, but our interaction so far most certainly didn’t indicate any such attempt all in all, I’ll be honest. It just feels like I’m barking up the wrong tree entirely.
As for your note about her not being “fuck yeah” about me, I wouldn’t even need that. Honestly. I’d just need to see that we’re both on the trajectory of “seeing how far we can take things romantically.” As it is now, however, it’s closer to “I can’t even say why I reached out to you” from her end.
Related to the whole attack debacle, things were, indeed, intense, but I tried to make sure to clarify that it was all expositional on my end, repeatedly stating none of this was her fault, any guilt is unjustified because it was MY choice to accept this interaction in the first place, and that the only reason why I was laying out my side of things was to make it clear that I’m not being weird for any other reason than the fact that I’m struggling with myself, within myself. The “avoidant” observation came after things started calming down a bit. But she did start focusing on my tendency to prepare for the worst, saying that it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy, that every interaction contributes to the end result. I said I understand that, just that I need a bit of clarity and there was none to be had in this case. She then switched to “if only things were so simple in life,” and that’s when I said that statement just feels avoidant from where I’m standing.
I’m a decisive person. If I feel something, then I feel it, and I feel it strongly. Call it my particular flavour of neurospicy, call it my temperament, whatever. That’s just how I am and how I function, the highs are very high, the lows are very low, and everything in between is vivid and concrete. And if I feel love at this level, then it wants to be manifested, I need it to be manifested. So I’d rather just call it off than wallow in uncertainty for not even a “maybe,” but a “maybe it’ll one day be a maybe.” Plus it’s fucking uncomfortable for the unrequitting party as well, and I genuinely don’t want to be a source of discomfort in her life. As such, removing myself from the situation is the best I can do, for both of us.
Bottom line, absolutely nothing was clear out of this whole situation for me. Not a single thing.
Yeah, I think that right there is the crux. She reached out for something but didn’t know what, and you need clarity that simply isn’t available. For what it’s worth, I think you’ve made the emotionally mature, extremely difficult, and entirely-correct decision.
Plus, I forgot to mention, she’s currently in a relationship. Long-distance, she said it’s ended in her mind for a while now (I told her I’d back off without hesitation if ever it were to reach the point of having to choose between her current partner and myself, she said it’s not the case). I am deeply uncomfortable in this context. I’ve made this mistake once before, and ended up hating myself for it.
This is pretty important context. Immediately, it shifts the perspective on her, because unless they have a specific explicit agreement about some level of openness of the relationship, it’s a betrayal of trust, and there’s a nonzero chance she’d do the same with you if you did get involved. You definitely made the right call to cut it off.
Regarding what she felt was an attack, please try and remember that regardless of your intention, you can’t explain someone’s feeling away. You even acknowledged your own experience with that:
As I told her, I’m not the kind of person who can dial it down when shit’s screaming in me.
I know what you mean - I’m the same way. Coping mechanisms get swept away before the sheer power of the storm within, hey. Your “river with a teaspoon” analogy hits home too; it sounds very much like something I’ve said before, about dealing with life’s slings and arrows more generally:
It’s like we’re all bailing water out of our little life rafts, but neurotypicals get a bucket, and I have a thimble.
As well, I hear you that you wouldn’t “need” someone to be “fuck yeah” about you. I’m saying you deserve that, to be loved back as much as you love them. I sincerely hope you find it!
Thanks so much for your patience and depth!
I genuinely hope she understands that it’s nothing personal. I really do love her, and it hurts like hell, but, I gotta say… it hurts a helluva lot less than it did yesterday…
Any time, bru.
I genuinely hope she understands that it’s nothing personal
Isn’t it? It’s sure not business. I think it’s okay for it to be personal (though you probably did right to emphasise that it’s not, because of how people normally mean those words); I think you’re trying to say it’s not her fault, which is true - she wants what she wants (whatever that might be). Meanwhile, it feels like I need to remind you that it’s not your fault either. You need what you need, there’s no getting around that. If you even managed to figure out how to give her what she wants, it wouldn’t be giving you what you need. I hope that helps it hurt a little less <3
Yes, that’s what I meant, thank you - that I don’t see this as being her fault, simply as a mismatch in dynamics.
Anyway, now it thoroughly “became personal:” she replied. Threw a lot of stuff in my face: that I pressured her (by asking once if she still wanted to continue the interaction knowing everything she knew was going on on my end), that I’m contradicting myself by choosing to not continue the interaction after saying that I would (because I received the new info of her trying to poke holes in my way of handling my side of things - preparing for the worst), and, the cherry on top, by now throwing at me “if you really want to know, yes, I saw potential, good dynamic, intellectual match, but I wanted to get to know you better.” She told me precisely none of this while talking, and I swear on my mother’s grave that would’ve been enough…
Sorry for the vent, hurts a lot more, but I’m also fucking pissed off now. Not as much for the above, but because she said I was insinuating ulterior motives by simply stating that I didn’t understand why she reached out, and that I was guilt-tripping her by being honest about what and how I feel…
Talk about self-fulfilling prophecies… guess her dreams came true.
It should have been expected she’d reply; this is the mismatch in action, it’s just a bit more defined now.
Talk about self-fulfilling prophecies… guess her dreams came true.
That’s the hurt talking, but it’ll peter out like it did last time. Don’t forget, she’s in a relationship, and even if she considers it over, she didn’t take that step before reaching out to you.
I’m sure this is going to get to you too late, but please don’t reply to her. Archive or delete the messages, write what you need to in a Notepad file or something (or vim, if you wanna make sure it stays buried ;P). You made your decision, you said your piece, and you’ve got to stick to it or it’s likely that both of you are going to hurt each other a lot more than you already have.
I replied, but I stuck to my guns - I reiterated exactly what I said in my initial message. Whatever at this point, it’s clear that this would not have worked out between us. If my being honest about my side of things is pressuing her, then I have nothing left to say or do.
Is there any possibility that you could visit for a vacation of sorts, and try to sort this out in-person over a more significant stretch of face-to-face time?
If it truly was infeasible, this would help give you closure, where you wouldn’t have to worry so much about what-ifs and could-have-beens. You would be able to walk away knowing that you genuinely did your best to explore the possibilities.
To be very honest, I had closure long before she reached out again… I’d moved on with my life, made mistakes, learnt lessons, and at the moment when that request popped up, my life finally had a bit of clarity in terms of goals and direction - I was on an intentional break from any and all things “romance” because I had other things to do. Then,… this happened.
I had actually talked to her about this. She sent me a buttload of photos from all over the place, both old ones and ones from where she was going as we were talking (as did I, it was sweet, we took each other out for walks in the only way we could). My initial plan was to visit some time next year, as I felt I didn’t have much travel in me this one. She told me to come any time and (I think) jokingly said I should visit in November, as it was grey and depressing, just as I like it (I’m an autumn/winter person), and I told her (only half-jokingly) that if she wanted me there, I’d be there. Conversation dropped off immediately after that, subject shifted like whiplash.
It’s too late, anyway, sent her a comprehensive “goodbye” letter today. Left the possibility of trying to see where we could get romantically open, but specified that only if she was sure she wanted it. Otherwise, I made it pretty clear that I can’t deal with this as-is. As I see it, I’ve been perfectly open and honest with her, not once did I expect her to define what this was, I only wanted to… understand at least something out of this. Got tension and mini-aggression as a response. No, thanks…
If you don’t mind me asking, when did the topic of your romantic feelings towards her first come up? And did the intensity of the feelings come up at the time?
I first mentioned it a week after I realised I started falling in love, I saw no point in disclosing that before I was 100% certain it was happening. Once that became clear, I decided to back off for both our sakes, and I wrote a message saying I could feel it coming on again (I specifically said “falling in love again”), and that I really didn’t want to do any more unrequitted stuff, because they suck for both parties. I just thanked her for reaching out, said it’s been lovely to chat, then told her to take care and wished her well.
After receiving the “I really don’t want to lose this” message and deciding to stick with it a bit more, she started probing. I was 100% honest, didn’t dump more than she wanted to know, and was receptive to all of it (she said she liked the intensity, just that everything felt undeserved, as she did nothing to sustain it - I clarified that I don’t need anything active, the fact that I could form that sort of connection with her, plus the respect and admiration she generated in me, were enough, and I was speaking the complete truth).
In terms of intensity, I didn’t hyperbolise the affection, I was just honest about the fact that I was a bit concerned that it was happening again and mentioned then that I still thought there was absolutely no way in which things could end up working in sync with my affection, so to speak.
If you’ve never heard the term limerence, look it up:
https://livingwithlimerence.com/why-limerence-is-not-just-a-crush/
Thanks!
Believe me, that was the first thing I went to. I cannot begin to explain the sheer panic I felt when I realised I was falling in love with her after a day’s worth of constant texting. I was desperate to explain it away somehow, because I REALLY didn’t want to go through this again.
It, very unfortunately, isn’t. My reasons are concrete and very much present in the Now, the only thing similar to Limerence would be the added weight generated by the rememberance of our younger days, that’s it.
And I can tell it’s present in the Now, because it shifted heavily into… not “that” after our last interactions. I feel very, very tired.
Do you have a way to reframe your feelings / have other outlets? It seems like she started to want to get close to you, but is maybe putt off or scared by your intense feelings. If you can put these feelings in to perspective- like “I care for her very much and I want to help her with what she’s going through, but I am going to temper my feelings because I know that there is a good chance she doesn’t reciprocate. And if the best comes to pass (a relationship blooms), it will just be fate (or a miracle or what you like to call it).”
I’ve reframed… a great deal about this entire situation, to be perfectly honest. These past few days have been very revealing if nothing else.
I think I’m done. Not holding it against her, honestly, but I need something different from a potential partner. I need a partner to be a bit more decisive and forthcoming with things - and I’m not talking about her reciprocating, I’m talking purely about the way she’s disseminated information so far.
At the end of the day, this entire debacle has been, basically, debating semantics. I asked something clear and straightforward, while things have oscillated all over the place in what I’ve been receiving from her.
I’ve honestly been managing not my feelings, but the way I interacted with her - I didn’t want to pressure her in any way, I didn’t want to be overbearing or intrusive in any way, which is why I’ve mostly kept it restrained to “speaking only when spoken to,” letting her define the rhythm of conversations. Honestly, I’ve even been reticent to ask her about her life, her day, things which would have genuinely interested me, precisely because I had no idea how much was appropriate (again, due to the oscillating “returns”).
Every time anything about “feelings” came out, it was when prompted by her - I’m serious. And when prompted, I’ve been nothing but honest and transparent about how I was doing and dealing, but I’ve tried every time to properly (and insistently) frame it as “this is 100% my problem, it was 100% my choice to continue knowing the full parameters of potential, it is 100% mine to deal with, you are not to blame and I don’t expect anything from you.” The only times when I expressed feelings without being prompted have been the two times when I sent her an “I’m sorry, I’m backing off” message. That’s it.
Again, if my being honest about my part in a non-intrusive, non-gratuitous way, with full awareness of where the onus of managing it lays, and absolutely no request of any kind made other than “do you still want to talk knowing what you know” is me pressuring her into… anything, really, then there really is nothing left to do in this case.
To be perfectly honest, I started getting the feeling that, even with the intensity on my end, this didn’t really have as much to do with me as it had to do with her side of things, because I genuinely insisted on nothing other than trying to clarify that I wasn’t trying to do what she felt I was doing. Dunno if this makes sense and I don’t want to sound accusatory in any way.
As a bottom line, I may still be open to a friendship later on down the line, but as things stand now, I need space from this situation entirely.
