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I think it's really stressful - primaily because we tend to invest so much of ourselves in mere possibility. I seem to go between feeling nauseas with nerves/adrenalin and being despondent! hah! what fun!

That is the best descriptiong yet - that's exactly how it feels! Because we've never spoken over the phone before. It's always in person. Also i don't like to ask men out because it seems to always ruin things. I sese that he's just taking time to suss our potential out, seeing as i've only been officially single for jsut over a week now.

Definitely. I think so. My housemate's sister is good friends with him and recently he said they couldn't meet up one on one anymore - weird! Im not sure if it was for his own conscience or to not lead girls on. Completely whacked! i know! I would get over it, but we have so much in common and i reckon he's hot stuff hah. As for the "just ask him" thing... it just seems a bit forward. We have a friendship which started at a 2.5 hour conversation in a car, and it seems to have complicated thigns because we never did the whole "hang out in a group of friends then move to hanging out one on one thing". Like it went from really intimate to less intimate to uncertain. I think we both want to be friends, because we have a lot in common, i just can't work out if he wants to take it further. I've pursued boys in the past and it hasn't worked out. I'm tempted to wait and see if he makes any more advances,i just didn't know if what had happened so far meant anything. I left a few details of last night's conversation out in my last post as well: when we were chatting he actually referred to our first conversation in the car and said "I might've said this in the car on the way to the moutains". I found this surprising as he's never referred to it before. The other thing was he invited me to his album launch. I guess i sense that now he knows i'm single he's changing the dynamic of our relationship?

The background is that we go to church together. When i first met him 2 years ago i'm sure I probably thought he was attractive but nothing more. I was in a long-term relationship at the time and perfectly content. But just this year i've started leading some kids at our youth group. I look after the 17 year old girls and he looks after the 15 year old boys (I'm 20, he's 21). About two months ago all of us leaders went on a weekend away to plan for the year ahead. As it happened, I had to get a lift with him to our destination - just me and him, which took about 2.5 hours and as you can imagine, it's enough time to work out if you enjoy each other's company. Basically we got on very well. Didn't stop talking the whole time about really meaningful things but also how he had been producing a cd with his new band. Over the weekend there wasn't much time to talk one on one because we were in a group of about 8 others, but he approached me one night to listen to the recently mastered tracks on his new album. To do this, he had to sit down with me on the sofa and let me listen to his ipod. It seemed weirdly intimate at the time, possibly because he was sharing something pretty personal and it was just me and him. Afterwards he suggested that I might write the press release for their cd (i'm a trainee journalist). This whole weekend experience started my head ticking and my heart racing. At the time i was going out with someone who i'd been seeing for just under two years. I felt pangs of guilt etc. because of these feelings i was having for this guy and so I chose to bring it up with my boyfriend. This was helpful, as i was able to pinpoint what it was about this new guy that had me swooning. From my perspective, it was his emotional frankness and love of art in its purest form, both things which my boyfriend perhaps didn't share with me. Ever since this weekend away i've been struggling with my feelings for this boy... and i've been receiving mixed messages. So we communicate in person quite frequently and he's always really engaged in our conversation and smiling/laughing, but there are times when we frequently "ignore" each other, or it seems like that anyway. I notice that if he turns up in a room among others and i'm there, he might wait 10/15 mins before saying hello. It started to feel like a game of playing hard to get. I thought it might be a symptom of going too deep too quickly, like we started our friendship off in such a meaningful place that normal ways of relating to eachother were kind of weird. A few weeks after the weekend away, he gave me a promo copy of his new cd, and said "you're the only person who's heard this outside of the studio". I did wrote him a press release for the cd and we had some friendly if not slightly weird banter over email about what i'd written. During this time, i should explain i was still dating my now ex-boyfriend. I was trying hard to just see this boy as a friend and nothing more, meanwhile my relationship wtih my boyfriend was spiralling. Then, because of very separate issues, my boyfriend and i broke up. There had been tension there much longer than this boy had been on the scene. Now this is the important context: "The boy" came up to me at church of his own volition last weekend and was chatting away for ages. At one point he thanked me for writing the press released and asked if he could take my photo for the profile page of his band's website, i said no because i hate having my photo taken.He got a phone call at some point and rushed out, but then came back in and continued our conversation. Then somehow it came up that one of his friends had this policy of not meeting up with girls one on one (i think not to lead them on). I was slightly perplexed and thought it was a weird policy to have. I got home and mentioned to my housemates this policy of not meeting with girls one on one and they told me that it was the boy that i liked's policy too! So being cheeky, I messaged him on my phone and jokingly asked him out for coffee and he replied "haha that would be fine if [insert my ex boyfriend's name] came too." I wrote back that it was just a joke, but that we'd broken up. He replied "Which bit was the joke? sorry i put my foot in it" and i said, "well i coffee would be lovely, except i was only joking. But [insert ex-boyfriend's name] and I have actually broken up." To this i received no reply. Tonight was the first time i'd seen him since this incident. There was no mention of the incident, only eye contact, joking around and lots of good conversation again. In fact, I purposely didn't seek him out after church, and it seemed he came looking for me. We had a good chat again for about half an hour. When he said he would be going home he asked "how do you normally get home on a sunday?" knowing that i live about an hour away because i just moved out of home. I knew from what he said he was implying he could give me a lift - or at least that's the way it came accross because he seemed concerned. Anyway, i explained that my mum was giving me a lift tongiht and then I said something like "you should come see our place sometime" and he said yes and then we said our goodbyes and he left. Now...all of this excited me...and maybe i'm just reading too much into it, but if his policy is not to meet up with girls one on one incase they get the wrong impression, then how is offering to drive someone home not giving an impression? Also, since he's just found out i'm single again, could this mean anything? My doubts lie in the fact that he's friendly with a bunch of girls at church, one of which he gives lifts to church every week. But i think it really is just because they're good friends and live nearby. She's older than him too. Any thoughts? And how should i be behaving considering the circumstances?

mmm.... but like i said, when girls have let the guy know they don't think of the guy more than a friend, they will act like a friend (ie. responding online).. talking to someone online isn't really flirting with you. It's what friends do. yeh, i know what this is like. You like someone, have invested so much in them, that as long as the answer isn't a total NO, you won't give up on the hope... but... if she has responded and said "i like you just as a friend", then i'm sorry.. but she doesn't like you more than a friend. If she liked you more than a friend, she would flirt with you, talk more actively with you, ask you to do stuff, get your number etc. and definitely, if you said "hey i like you" they would say "hey i like you too" back. when you like someone, you let them know. ESPECIALLY when they person you like has already put themselves on the line and said hey i like you. dude, that's what friends do.. if she was interested, she would be actively asking questions, chatting away etc. i always answer ppl online, it's the polite thing to do. I wouldn't read too much into that. Like i was saying, if someone likes you, there is no doubt (usually).. and if there is doubt, then they're probably the wrong person for you as your communication isn't 100%

YES... most of my close friends consider me confident, a leader-type. inside i find myself shy and insecure. It's all about comfort levels in certain situations and particularly at school, i found i developed a defense mechanism... that was instead of being willing to be a doormat, i took a stance and was firm/assertive with people, but not rude or unfriendly. just self-assured. this was all in order to keep afloat in a school full of very confident/eminent young girls, yet inside im still a pretty shy person.

i talk to a few guys online that have expressed interest in me (that is said to me, you are exactly the sort of person i want to be with), and i have explained to them that i don't have the same sort of feelings. This might just be me, but with these people, i seem to talk to them more freely, i chat away, without much concern. With people i like, i take much more care and consideration. It's pretty illogical and unreasonable for the person i'm talking to i guess, but i would say that if i don't really like someone and they know that, i feel like that's all out in the open and there's nothing to hide. With people i like, i haven't let them know yet, i'm a bit more cautious, not wanting to be hurt. I act a lot more bubbly and friendly around people i don't care about/don't like, thatn people i do. People i like, i'm usually intimidated because i'm most likely in a position of admiring them, or i don't want to stuff up. I really would like to change this behaviour. ANYWAY...stl123 - i would say she enjoys your friendship, and nothing more. She is willing to chat with you - doesn't want to be rude, enjoys talking to you, but she doesn't like you in that way.

Unfortunately, he's only my friend as i met him where he works. I have friends who work in the same complex, and have seen him around, but they don't atually know him and i think going up to him and asking about me would be entirely the worng idea It is true that if i've waited 6months i can wait... i guess what is most annoying is that it's always been so on and off with him, i thought finally i was going to do something with him outside of the place he works.. but no. Things have always swung around with him, like he gives me his number, then i call, he's out, doesn't return my call, then he calls from a friends place, then he barrs me off in person, then he messages me at 1am... you know? it just seems to go round in circles, i want a resolution, even if it is that he doesn't like me. thanks heaps for you support secret girl!

No, he doesn't know we split up... i want to tell him, but that would require having to speak to him... i sent him the message but he hasn't replied... i think maybe he doesn't have access to the mobile, that would mean he couldn't get my phone number (home or mobile) as they're on the phone only... maybe the phone really is his mum's and she's got it and she's away or he's not home or something. i dont know, but it's really frustrating and disappointing

I have liked this guy for over half a year now. I've posted about him before, he works in the cd store i used to walk through to get to school everyday. He used to give me cds and we'd chat a bit. I'm now finished school, but in my last weeks of school he gave me his number. I called him up a few times, he was out. He eventually returned my call, there have been some confused signals like his strange behaviour when i've said hi to him at work and he's acted completely indifferent towards me, yet in phone messages puts lots of emotion in through smiley faces and punctuation.. anyway, the most recent thing is that before i went away on schoolies (holiday/party when you graduate), he messaged me at 1am in the morning saying hey how are you etc, we should go to a gig together, when are you 18? etc... it was a pretty flirty convo through mobile phone messages... anyway, i was in the middle of courting another person, so i tried not to be to responsive. He asked me to call him when i got back. I didn't call him when i got back as the person i had been courting had asked me out. Then, one night i got a message from the other guy (cd guy) letting me know about a music journalism course i might be interested in. I said i would call him that week, that i'd been quite busy etc and was he going to see THe Strokes? and he said yeh, we should go together and yeh to give him a call when im free. So i called, i dropped in "my boyfriend" once just to let him know without directly saying - i have a boyfriend. Soon after, he started talkinga bout his ex girlfriend and how she's his best friend but he sometimes thinks it's a bit complicated etc. i totally didnt expect him to discuss this with me! some of my friends thought he might've felt intimidated by me talkinga bout my boyfriend. ANYWAY... i said - we should do something sometime... and he said yeh, weekends are good for me. this was about 4 weeks ago. I've now broken up with my boyfriend. Last thursday i messaged the cd guy and said - hey what are you up this weekend, want to do something? he replied only on monday! so 4 days later... saying "hey dude sorry about the delayed message! but we should do something soon? maybe this week one night? let me know what day is cool for you cos i'm pretty easy " so i replied "yeh whenever, i'm free all week. Give me a call sometime [home phone number]and we'll organise something! Talk to you soon!" it's now sunday and i haven't heard from him...which is really disappointing. this is the first time he's ever had my home phone number. i've called him at home though.. also i'm not sure if he owns a mobile, because when we first exchanged numbers he said he didnt have one, but then he's messaged me since and i've been on the phone with him when his mobile has rang.. it could be his mum's but i dontknow.. something might explain the delay of his reply to my initial invite. Basically - do i call him up or message him and say "hey its sunday and we still havent done anything! if you dont want to that's cool, just let me know" or do i leave it? and what to think of the signals?....they've always been so mixed with hiim for the last 5 months. i used to put it down to the fact i was finishing school and had important exams so he wouldn't be asking me out. on a side note: he's going overseas this year, in feb/march i think.. so there would be no chance of a long term relationship, but i dont want to lose contact with him... some part of me longs to see if we'd ever make a good match

doesn't really bother me.. i think girl in general are much more accepting of guys looks than guys are of girls... i see so many amazingly pretty girls with what i would NOT consider to be the most amazingly good looking guys. but anyway, yeh, i dont really care that much, so long as they have ace personalities

Two months ago was my end of school formal (what in US you call Prom). I didn't take a guy, but my friend had her long-time friend/neighbour Phil there with her... but she had a bf at the time, so he wasn't actually there as her "date" date, he was asked before she had a bf so was there for etiquette reasons. Turned out Phil and i hit it off really well. He was flirting with me alot and i'm not used to guys doing that. We were mucking round the whole night, and then at the after party, we were just standing close, hugging, i was sitting on his lap and whatever... (at one point we fell off the chair that was hilarious...) anyway... my friend had told me he was interested in a girl at his uni and so he was probably just flirting with me for some entertainment. At the time, i was interested in another guy, so i wasn't concerned, i was just having fun too. We never kissed, but he was, as i said, being very flirty/suggestive. I just left it as a good night with him, and thought he could be a good friend later on. A few days after the formal, i was talking to my other friend who had a boyfriend there that night. She had told me that night she really liked Phil - he's quite a looker (hence my surprise at his interest in me...) - and i could see her flirting excessively, even in front of her boyfriend that night. On the phone with her, she said that when they'd been alone in a room together (her and Phil) he'd made a slight move on her, begun to put his hand down her skirt. The thing is, this girl is such a flirt, a stunning girl, he was drunk and she has a tendency to need attention, so how much of the story or its detail is true, is another question. Apparently she said to him at the time "There's someone here who wouldn't like you doing that" (ie. her boyfriend) and he said.. supposedly "What they don't know can't hurt them". And that was all.. but later when saying goodbye to her, he apparently lingered a kiss on her cheek to tease her boyfriend. Once again, i wasn't there so can't verify it. This all made me think hrmm.. this phil boy's a bit of a flirt possibly not very loyal. I spoke to phil again for the first time in two months last night online, and he was flirting ALOT. kept saying how he wanted to talk all night, kept saying like xxoxoxoxoxo to infinity and stuff. it was all just fun, but anyway.. my friend asked him if he liked me (Without asking me first!! ARGH) and he said he did, but wasn't sure how seriously yet. He is a gorgeous guy- really nice, funny, smart, loveable, i am very attracted to him.. The friend who knows him well says with his last gf he was very loyal, and she was shocked when she heard what the other friend said about him being sleazy. The question is- should i pursue this - give him a chance? or not... i keep thinking he's teasing me by flirting, like it's a game for him, cos he makes it so overt it seems like a joke!... but he's older than me, and is that sort of larrakin character, so i don't really know, and i asked him if he was being sarcastic when he said he could stay talking for hours and he was like "no".

i'm shy, but i'm good at covering it up to a degree, so when i like someone. i'll cover up my nerves by making jokes out of things... but if i'm intimidated by the person i like, i will yes, avert my eyes etc. i want to know what shy guy's do when they like someone!

who the hell calls someone at 3am if they're just 'nice'.. it's like - HELLO I CARE ABOUT YOU AND ARE WILLING TO WAKE U UP TO TELL YOU. take a risK (although doesn't sound very risky!) and do what comes naturally.

yep, sounds pretty normal