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Hey :) So, because I (18F) am a very shy person (I've never been diagnosed with social anxiety, but I relate to a lot of the symptoms), I have always been scared to date - scared to put myself out there and actually TALK to the people I like (scary thing). But some time ago, I have visited a city which is like 6 hours away from my home with my sister and we met a friend of hers there. And well, we spent some time together. Even though it was mostly my sister who talked to him, I developed a crush on him. (I don't think he really felt the same, although he spent one hour editing a picture which only I was on - he's into photography) My sister and I have been home for some time now and I decided that I want to try and act on that crush - which I have never done before. But now I feel kind of powerless and miserable since he lives so far away. He and my sister know each other from playing games together, so she suggested I join them when he's there. But she also said that it'll probably take some time until she can arrange something. Now here comes my big problem where I hope u guys can give me some advice: How do I get in contact with him without being too obvious? My sister gave me his number, but texting him would be obvious, wouldn't it? I know he does live streams (sadly not that often), so would it be weird to interact with him via life chat? Or do I text him via discord which he uses sometimes? Is it a dealbreaker to make your interest too obvious? I'm so clueless honestly, and so scared of butchering it. Help :c I know this crush will go away as time passes but I've never felt so close to actually acting on my crush and getting out of my comfort zone. Thank you so so much in advance for your advice!

First of all i think I'll have to give a warning because this might be a heavy subject for someone. Hello everyone! Me and my bf are dating for one year (long distance) , everything was fine until yesterday. He came to my hometown to see me and everytime we see each other we have sexual intercourse. Yesterday I wasn't really feeling it, he gave me the signal that he wants to do something and I said "I'm not im the mood today" he said "okay" and after 5-10 minutes he started touching me even when i clearly stated that i didn't want to do anything sexual with him. He was grabbing me inappropriately and I just froze and didn't say anything at that very moment (that was my fault). He didn't go any further than that but it still felt wrong. After he went back home he started texting me and "joking" about how I didn't give him what he wanted, even if it really was a joke I was offended (he's that kind of guy that almost jokes about everything) I confronted him about it and told him that what he did was wrong. He told me that he didn't know that I felt that way and said that he was very sorry that he hurt me in that way, and that he'll never do that ever again. One part of me wants to forgive him because I still love him but the other part is still confused about the situation that happened. I really don't know how to feel right now, if anyone has advice i would be very happy to hear about it.

I've been depressed for years and then this year I met a uni classmate on Zoom who made me feel good for the first time in awhile. I haven't had friends in a long time ever since my depression hit. We became friends and I developed feelings for her after some months. She felt the same. However, we're no longer in the same class in the new semester and I can feel her pulling away. I don't know if it's paranoia or just gut instinct but I also feel like she's falling for someone else in her new classes (recently came to know this person exists through an extra curricular group we happened to all be in), which hurts, even if I don't have concrete proof of it. I feel myself sinking back into that depressive state and it's affecting my coursework. Couldn't even bring myself to attend classes this morning. What do I do?

I was out with my friends at a gay bar in my hometown in California, A super cute boy approached me and asked to dance. We kissed and exchanged social media and left. He was from a different state about 600 miles away, and he was just visiting for the weekend. He asked if he could take me out on a date and I said I would love that. We met on a Saturday and planned our date for Monday but we ended up going back to the same bar and seeing each other again the next day on Saturday. We spent the whole night together, dancing, kissing and flirting. We went our separate ways, he was staying with a friend and I was staying with my parents (we are both 21 and In college). The next day we had our date and I picked him up and took him to a pretty spot on the beach and we had a great time, we ended the night with some of my friends at my friends apartment because it was near where he was staying. We planned on seeing eachother one more time before he left, I was going to take him to the airport. I picked him up for the airport at 7:30 AM and we got coffee and cuddled in my car and kissed again before he left. We made plans to see eachother again, he wanted me to come with him to Hawaii, Coachella, New York all this! We kept talking on snapchat for a week and a half after he left, flirting and giving eachother compliments, asking about eachothers day and everything. Then, one day two weeks into talking, everything just changed. He became super dry, stopped asking about my day and giving me compliments. I started getting super insecure, I thought "am I not good enough?" "Did I do something wrong?" "Is this normal for a long distance situationship. I never truly planned on dating him, he lived 600 miles from me, I just wanted him to be someone I can see again when he comes back to California (he says he comes to my hometown every month or so) or maybe travel together with this summer. It seems like he has lost interest, but I might just be overthinking. We still talk, he never leaves me on read, but its just dry. I want to be able to have my hot boy summer, dating around and meeting new boys with no strings attatced (and im not necessarily talking about sex, thats not very important to me)but he is the only boy I am talking to at the moment so he is all I think about. All my friends say I need to give him the same energy he is giving me, but I dont want to lose the possibility of seeing him again. He is so cute, smart, fun and sweet. What should I do?Should I try to plan something for him to come visit or should I let him make the move? Help!!!

So this is fairly complicated but I will try my best to explain the situation I am in. I met girl 1 the end of last year and we became really good friends and grew really close. She had told me multiple times that she just wanted to be friends as she had just gotten out of a toxic relationship. However, I failed to control my emotions and ended up falling in love with her just 4 months into our friendship. I told her that this is how I felt, even though we weren't dating, because I just wanted to be honest with her. We tried to put that behind us and move forward as friends but as you can expect it didn't last long. She felt as if there was a disconnect and she wanted to talk less to me so that I could stop being in love with her. That didn't work either and so we stopped talking all together. Its been about 3 months since we last talked and to this day I still have feelings for her and would love to start fresh and be friends. It seems cliché but I really haven't met a girl like her before and I can't seem to forget her. Honestly if the timing was better and she was open to dating, we would definitely be dating by now. Girl 2 I had known for roughly the same amount of time but we were just really good friends and neither of us were attracted to the other. Girl 2 lives across the country so we have never met in person. Couple weeks ago she came to hangout with me and by the end of the night we both could tell that we liked each other but we didn't say anything. I felt confused because I loved spending time with her but at the same time I am still not over girl 1. Girl 2 and I later talked about this whole mess and she told me to pick one or the other. She also knows girl 1, and does not like her. In fact, girl 2 said if we were to date, then I would have to block girl 1 on everything and forget her. For a while now I have been considering reaching out to girl 1 and trying to make things right and continue our friendship. To my surprise she has been thinking about doing the same. I know this because girl 1 is in contact with one of my other friends. She told him that she hasn't said anything to me because she doesn't know how I feel about things and that she will not reconcile with me if I still have feelings for her. So now I am stuck in this awkward place and I don't know what to do. I know that whatever decision I make, girl 2 will support it so its not like I will lose her as well. The only problem with dating girl 2 and forgetting girl 1, is the distance. We are busy with our lives and so it will be difficult to meet each other in person often. At the same time I don't want to forget girl 1 and I want to rekindle our friendship. I truly believe that one day girl 1 and I can date if we are both in the right headspace. During the time we were talking it was pretty much as close as you can get to dating without actually dating. I also know that girl 2 likes me a lot and is in it for a potential long term relationship, however the distance is an issue for me even though she doesn't care about distance. I just don't want to make a hasty decision and end up having regrets. What the hell do I do? Thank you guys for all the help!

So, in one of my previous posts, I expressed how my boyfriend (19M) gave me (19F) his chain to wear to keep him with me and stuff while we do long distance, and then I found out his ex wore his chain, too, which made me uncomfortable. So, I am going to give it back to him, but I kind of want something else to remember him by now since I'm no longer wearing his chain- I literally feel naked now without it... I never took it off and I legit fell asleep holding the cross in my hand... I'm trying to find a way to tell to him that I want him to get me something FOR ME, more personal you know? ... NOTHING BIG!!! I literally went on ebay and saw these $15 customizable necklaces *wink* *wink* Is it bad to ask for something straight up or is hinting the way to go? Especially since I want it to be sincere... should I just wait and see if he gets me something? :) thank ya!

My boyfriend (19M) and I (19F) are now long distance due to going home for summer. We are used to not texting each other pretty much all day because we know we will see each other the next day in class, but now that we’re long distance, that isn’t working for me. I expressed to him that he needs to text me more or something because I get a text from him at 5pm and then we ft for a couple hours at night. I want to hear from him more in the day, so I told him that I would like him to text me in the morning. I do text first, A LOT, and if I don’t, I get the text at 5pm. Am I overrating? I don’t think I am because we are now long distance and I can’t just say “see you tomorrow,” it’s now, “see you in a couple weeks.” Whenever I have brought this up to him, he just brushes me off kind of or says that I’m saying he’s a bad boyfriend and not trying (which I’m not! I just want him to text me more! is that too much to ask ???) and says “so you want to text all day and then facetime for 5 hours at night?” and I’m like no, I never said that. But then, he says he’ll try harder. I feel like I shouldn’t be asking him to text me, I feel like it should be a given. If he wanted to text me, he would, so? He also says he’s really giving 100%, and I believe him, but his 100% cannot be the same as it was in school, things are different now. He also kind of has this high school relationship mindset where a relationship should come with no problems and if there are problems then he gets upset or doesn’t really want to hear it. I’ve told him that i’m not close to breaking up yet, not even close, but if this continues the whole damn summer, then it’ll be too hard.... So, Help! Please! PS I don’t think he’s hiding anything from me or anything, I just wanna communicate with him more during the day. also i have some lowkey trust/abandonment issues because as a child i was abandoned then adopted so im going see someone about that lol but that is a factor i think

Hey, I started dating this angel since the beginning of covid-19. it has been hard for her specially she is younger than me 5 years younger. and we are from different countries and so far away from each other like there is an ocean between us. but i really love her and she does too i had so many relations before her so i know this one is true we are together for almost 2 years now since 2020 as i said. the problem now is in the distance i am planning to meet her when i can but this can happen so late cause i still have military or army to go to also i am feeling helpless cause i am not there for her when she needs help and even us talking about a problem i feel i am not good enough in it cause i don't know how to deal with bad things to be honest and i don't know how to make her feel better just over text. so can anyone help me ? i really want this to last and i really love her i want to know how to make her feel better at least just about the problems she is having i am trying to only listen though i want to know if there is more we are in that struggle phase where we fought 3 times now and it keeps getting to the point where we say we should break up and i don't want that to happen neither is she.

My ex and I were together for 2 years, long distance (even though his house is just 30 mins away from mine). We met in high school through a friend and I liked him since we met. I have to admit our relationship was toxic back then since he was going through a tough time in his life. He called me names and cursed at me but I still loved him. Even my friend told me to dump him but I didn't. I decided to take a break from him for at least a few months and after that, I got to talk to him again and he told me "Thank you so much for loving me all this time." and he got a little better than he was before. The relationship was slowly getting better and we grew together but since last year, I have gotten busy and hadn't had time for my partner. This went on for 9 months and by the time I could talk with my partner again, he was acting aloof. And then he dumped me. For a downgrade. This new girl apparently seduced him while I was gone and he gave in to her. He was disguising her as a friend and then when he dumped me, he said she is better than me. He apologized to me and he said he'll "gladly" be friends with me. But his new rebound relationship is more toxic. He literally controls the girl's choice of gender (she is part of the LGBTQ fam) and her speech (don't really know why). I'm in the middle of no contact and I'm slowly healing. Is there a chance that we can get back together again?

Hi all! I'd really love some advice on a confusing situation so here's what happened: Ex and I dated for five great years, doing distance the last year and a half. We're both moving soon to new cities and were excited to make that jump together. Then last year, COVID hit, he lost his job, and started struggling with mental health. I've known before that when he gets stressed or overwhelmed he retreats from everything. I think when we were doing distance he'd take that lack of feeling and just assume it meant he doubted our relationship or that we were a bad fit. He ends things last summer (on the PHONE) saying he felt like he needed to be alone. We didn't talk for about a month, met up again, and had a big emotional reunion. I started going to visit him every 3-4 weeks and it was always great. However, I noticed some signs of trouble. When I was there he was extremely happy. But the second I left he'd go back and forth mentally with this push/pull of sometimes being really into it and sometimes pushing me away completely. I knew he was still struggling with mental health so did my best to be patient and talk through things with him. I knew he was struggling but I was still hopeful we were getting on the path to moving to the same place and that the distance/covid was the only reason we were in limbo. He FaceTimed me again about a month ago (after a great weekend and ~4 months after we reconnected) saying it was too hard and that we should stop talking. I'm not trying to minimize his feelings at all, but it really felt like a slap in the face to me after we had been rebuilding our relationship and looking at cities together. I feel like I've been discarded like it was nothing so he can live the single life with his guy friends and try to distract himself from his problems. He also has some commitment-phobic tendencies I've always known about, but I can't help but feeling t was his recent struggle with mental health that's caused all this to happen? I'm having a tough time moving on because I'm not sure if this is the kind of situation where he will eventually "wake up" and realize he was treating the person he claimed to love really unfairly and pushing me away. And I do know I deserve better at this point I don't even know what to think.

I work all around the country and I started dating a girl about 6 months ago. So I wake up and we talk on the phone for about an hour, then we text every few minutes all day at work until I get off then we talk on the phone or video chat every day until I sleep. If I have. Day off away from home we will talk for the entire day with the only time when we are not in the phone or in a video being when I use the bathroom, shower, or when I can convince her to go to sleep. Then I will stay up every night to relax and read or watch YouTube. When I am back home I spend every night at her apartment. It's like pulling teeth to get her to come stay at my house because of her dog who has already attacked my cat. I maybe stay one night at my house with her and her dog when I am home every time and I never get to give my cat any love cause I have to lock her in another room and bar it so her dog can't get to the cat. We talk about the future a lot but it is basically that I need to get rid of my cat, sell my house, quit my job, sell my vehicles, take a job near to her apartment at half the pay, and just live there. I feel like I can't make her happy and her future is so stifling... I want to be with her but I can't give anymore of myself without giving up everything I have worked for in my life. It was hard to buy a house and get there vehicles paid off and keep them up. Not to mention I do very well with my job....

I (25 M) like a girl (21 F) from another state. I met her about six months ago in a group for theater nerds that is run by one of my best friends. For much of the time since I've known this person, she was just someone my friend and I would occasionally watch movies with over Zoom. Unfortunately for me, that has changed. Last month, this girl told me she liked another of my friends who is also in our theater group. Alas, he rejected her because he didn't feel the same way. I tried my best to be there for the girl and make her feel better; consequently, I had to hear all about her interactions with this friend of mine, as well as about all the other guys from her state who like her but she won't go out with for one reason or another. The girl video called me almost nightly, and we started growing closer. We found ourselves planning to watch movies but preferring to just talk, instead. We would laugh, and joke, and it turned out we had quite a bit in common. For better or worse, it was during these formative weeks that I started getting feelings for this person; she is the first girl I have had a real "crush" on since my first and only relationship ended in late 2015. As my feelings set in, I found myself pulling away from this girl. I wasn't sure how real my emotions were, and I didn't want to hurt her, because I at least cared about her as a friend. Call me crazy, but on some level, it felt as if she liked me back, at least in a way. She would often video call me just to show me a random YouTube video, she demanded we start a Snapchat streak, she always laughed at my corny jokes, and she kept telling me how much I meant to her (even going so far as to say she "loved me" during one of our calls). Frustratingly, the girl also sometimes approached things from the opposite end of the spectrum (eventually blaming it on school and her acting job): she would forget to Snap me, go several hours without replying to my messages, and even ceasing to video call me. It was a constant back-and-forth; I felt like a plaything to her, and I hated it. I went to my friends, and they eventually persuaded me the best thing to do was tell this girl how I feel about her (it was this or lie when the girl asked me why I was pulling away from her). A few days ago, I confessed my feelings over a video call. The situation was not the best; it was late at night when the girl called me to talk, so she was super-tired. I also have never told a girl I liked her before (with my last relationship, I was confronted about my feelings instead), and I'm sure I babbled like an idiot or said things I shouldn't have. The basis of what I said was I felt the same way for this girl the way she was feeling about my friend who rejected her (she claimed she was over him, at this point, even though they still talked). Despite her exhaustion, the girl was seemingly genuinely moved; she claimed she was "blushing so hard," did an audible "aww," and so-on. I told her that I don't expect her to feel the same way, but I came clean about why I was pulling away: I was scared she'd stop being my friend once this came to light. The girl promised I could never scare her off, told me she loved my company, and felt the same way I did as far as us just "clicking." Since the other night, my female friend has continued to message me on Facebook chat, our main form of communication, but she has not said a single thing about what I said to her. She mostly talks to me in the evening or late at night, and I try to let her initiate most of the conversations because I honestly don't want to feel needy. She occasionally uses heart emojis, alternates between lengthy messages and one-word responses, and keeps trying to be "cutesy" with me: she is planning a reading in our theater group of Disney's Moana and wants me to be "her Maui," and she also came to me terribly upset last night because she had to pull out of one of my readings and really wanted to do it "with me." Before my confession, the girl said "I don't know what I'd do if you stopped talking to me." Again, I'm left feeling like a plaything. I came forward about my feelings, and the girl isn't being open or honest with me. I have no idea why; we had our first video chat since that night yesterday, and it was very awkward for me. Sometimes, I feel like this girl likes me back somehow but is choosing to hide or ignore it. Other times, I feel like she just embraced my desire to at least keep our friendship and is just using that as an excuse to "like me only as a friend." It's so tough to gauge where I stand with this person because of the distance between us. She lives halfway across the country, so there's no way I can ask her out or get close to her apart from video chat. I've spent the past several nights unable to sleep because I can't stop thinking about her or this situation. The girl claims she is often oblivious, and I get that feeling sometimes. What do/should I do? I can't take this anymore, and it's not like I can just "drop her and move on." She's my friend, I care about her, and I can't just turn off my feelings. Please help!