I am not my soul mate's soul mate...

[Yaz]

I haven't posted much recently, I've been busy with my soul mate. Ha.

 

Sooooo... this is the situation. I've been friends with this guy for over ten years and I feel like I share a connection with him - basically because we've grown close over time, talking, sharing etc. We just know each other really well I guess - familiarity:

Smokin' blunt after blunt and steady drinkin'

Hung around so much, you knew what I was thinkin'

 

We do all the normal friend stuff together, and see each other a few times a week. Plus sleep together when we need it, because we're both notoriously bad with relationships. I do not consider him to be my lover, boyfriend, anything of the sort - in fact, I hate the girl that broke his heart and hope they get back together. I just think he's my soul mate, and thought he felt strongly about me, too.

 

Last night, he was feeling low and started talking. He mentioned a dead family member, the girl that broke his heart and a friend that had stopped talking to him. Then he said "The three most important people in my life, the ones I care about, respect and like the most, the ones I value more than anyone, I can't talk to." I was staggered. What about me?

 

After that I didn't know what to do. Conversation finished, we went home and I haven't spoken to him since. I understand the upset over the family member, however the two others (who have known him about 5 years) haven't spoken to him for over six months. They actively avoid speaking to him and seeing him - they hate him and don't want him in their life (I won't go into that stupid rubbish). I'm his friend.

 

A friend told me to say this:

"You're really important to me. I was dumbfounded at what you said the other night. If you don't consider me to be an important part of your life after all the time we've spent as friends, I can't continue to see you."

 

I don't know how to handle it. Every time I think about it I want to cry. I thought friends were forever. I thought soul mates were forever.

 

Is it possible he's my soul mate and I'm not his?

[lavenderdove]

Maybe you're discovering why his GF dumped him and his other friends won't talk to him. What he said was pretty insensitive considering you're his FWB he sees 3 times a week.

 

But he was being honest (and feeling sorry for himself). And the concept of 'soul mates' is just a concept and not any true special state of being... it is a way of framing/phrasing someone you feel very close to... But calling someone a 'soul mate' is your own personal interpretation of your feelings for someone, that you feel close and bonded to them, and it is not an actual 'state' or guarantee that this is someone who feels the same way about your or is destined to be that close to you forever.

 

So I think you have just learned that he values you enough as a friend to confide his sense of loneliness and lack of connection to people he feels are most important to him. But he's also shown that you are a second stringer in his life if he is outright naming other people who are more important to him and whining about missing them when you are right there offering him consolation.

 

I think it is a very good thing though that you have discovered where his emotions stand. I wouldn't invest so much in him, because someone who says something like this sees you as a 'fill in' until he does connect with someone else as much as he did those other 3, then i suspect you won't hear from him all that much or will be pushed out of your seeing him so much.

 

And i'd stop the booty calls with him too because that stimulates your own feelings of bonding with him. I think if you are actively doing that, if he does meet a girl he wants to date (or gets back with the ex), it would be awkward because if she knows about the FWB situation with you she'll be threatened and want him to cut you out of his life (or he might do it spontaneously on his own if he finds someone else he really wants to be with). At a minimum you will certainly stop seeing him 3 times a week once he gets a new GF or a new best guy friend, so you need to ramp back this friendship to being less dependent on him because it really isn't a sustainable friendship once he meets someone new.

 

You're really into him, but he is letting you know that this is fun FOR NOW when he has no connections to others, but his emotions just aren't that invested in you and most likely will turn elsewhere entirely when he has what he sees as a better alternative. From that standpoint i think he is using you as a fill in until something better comes along, and you don't want to be so attached to him if that is the case.

[mouseno4]

I dont believe soul mates exist. What people consider their soul mates, are just people who they get used to.

[CatsMeeoow]

Lavender said it very well....

 

As much as you think you've known him for as long as you've known him you admitted yourself you are not in a relationship - sure FWB but that isn't a relationship. He doesn't see you as someone important unfortunately and well over time you've created your importance to him in your head as a way of rationalizing this FWB.

 

This is why FWB is so dangerous. Rarely does it remain just as it is... usually at some point someone starts to have feeling and expectations which throws the other participant off guard because they just thought you knew and accepted the rules.

 

You're best bet is make yourself less available to this situation.

[livelarge]

Lavender is right. I have a "friend" who tells me often that his favorite people are visiting him or that he just spent time with his favorite person. Obviously, I'm not anywhere on that list and I definitely know now that I am a fill-in friend. He views me as somebody to fill in the voids that his favorite people can't fill. Yuk. Before he would say that all the time, I could pretend that we are good friends. Now that I've heard it several times over as many years, I know we are not that close.

 

It was like a hit to gut every time I heard it, so I know how you feel. You could tell him how it hurt your feelings. There's no shame in that. But it probably won't change the fact that you are not one of his three favorite people. It might get him to stop saying it out loud though.

[Yaz]

You're all very right, and thank you for validating what I already knew. It's dangerous to have relationships, but it's more dangerous to have friends. It's all in my head. It always is.

 

He sent me a text this morning saying I didn't call him last night, asking what was wrong. Also he said that that I was fine when he saw me last and "please don't be mad at me."

 

I responded:

I'm not mad, I just don't care anymore. You made it clear I'm not important to you as a friend. That's fine. Maybe we can catch up in the next few weeks. Have a good weekend

 

I think that was the best F-YOU message I have ever sent. I'm better off alone. People suck.

[Yaz]

Lavender is right.

 

And this ^^^ is pretty much where I am now. I can't pretend to myself anymore.

[Yaz]

He responded. Saying I'm more important than I think, and that he's sorry he doesn't show it.

 

Sorry is an action word, though. I just read link removed

 

NO CONTACT FOR LIFE.

[Capricorn3]

I'm going against the grain a little here and see it a little differently. I don't think he was disowning you in any way, and I don't believe he meant that you don't mean anything to him at all. We all have friends and some just happen to be on different levels but they all mean something and are valued. I think you overreacted and took it completely the wrong way. I think ignoring him now and going no contact is really exreme, but that's just me.

~waiting to be flamed~

[Yaz]

I'm going against the grain a little here and see it a little differently. I don't think he was disowning you in any way, and I don't believe he meant that you don't mean anything to him at all. We all have friends and some just happen to be on different levels but they all mean something and are valued. I think you overreacted and took it completely the wrong way. I think ignoring him now and going no contact is really exreme, but that's just me.

~waiting to be flamed~

 

I think you're right. I think more highly of him than he thinks of me. And I can't be in an unbalanced relationship like that.

 

I guess it makes it worse that he's very thoughtful, and lovely to me. What he said came as a complete shock, because his actions said otherwise. We spend a lot of time together, our families know each other, we've been through a lot of hard stuff together (suicides, accidents, deaths etc.). I guess I was just offended that he places more value on people he's only known for a few years, even though they hate him and treat him really poorly.

 

I felt I gave a lot and invested, and a to find out it was only one-sided? I feel ripped off. And like an idiot. I can't deal with it any other way than to ignore him completely and spend time with people who respect me and value my presence in their life. So I guess I'm going to be spending a lot of time with my cat!

[Lady Rashomon]

Did he try to contact you again? It sounds like he's completely oblivious as to why you said what you said, and didn't connect it to the tasteless and insensitive comment that he made. What if, instead of playing it cool, you said something to him along the lines of what you said in this post? I don't know this guy, but it sounds like that statement was delivered in the spirit of hyperbolic self-pity rather than genuine emotion.

[BlueMilk]

I agree with Lady Rashomon on this one. I think he might have said it in an episode of self-pitying without real thought behind it. He apologized and said you're more important than you realize. Since he is still trying to offer an olive branch (what more did you want him to say?) why don't you do as Lady Rashomon advises and lay it out flat? That way he knows exactly how he * * * * ed up, which gives him a chance to fix it.

 

10 years of friendship that has survived suicides, deaths, accidents, etc. Are you really going to toss it away over some grief-stricken words?

[Yaz]

It was a bit emotional, and I guess that's why we're friends. We understand each other.

 

We have spent a bit of time together since, he seems to be trying hard to make it up to me, and keeps telling me how important certain things about me are to him... it's nice I guess. He had an argument with another friend when I was with him - he kept on saying to me "I don't know why they're so upset with me, we're not best friends, we're just mates, you understand right?" Yeah, I understand alright! Way to drive the point home.

 

I'm kinda over it. Willing to accept that he doesn't consider we have a genuine connection. Friends come in all shapes and sizes, I guess if I am to have a mutual genuine connection with someone it'll be another person and take a while longer.

[DoubleRainbow]

I agree with BlueMilk & Lady Roshomon. Sometimes, in such a close friendship, people take each other for granted, or presence/ availability of one becomes a habit for the other..so they forget to appreciate what they have thru the other.

May be you can try to withdraw yourself for a couple days...may be LC..and see what happens. I know its also a kind of torture to yourself but may be he will realise ur worth that he already knows about but can feel it strongly!

[PetiteGirl]

So correct me if I assumed wrong. Your friend seems to be the type that goes after people who don't care about him or are absent from his life. Sounds like he only values what he can't have, and takes what he have for granted. If that's the case, either he's an idiot or he has issues. Pardon me if I presumed wrong.

[Yaz]

So correct me if I assumed wrong. Your friend seems to be the type that goes after people who don't care about him or are absent from his life. Sounds like he only values what he can't have, and takes what he have for granted. If that's the case, either he's an idiot or he has issues. Pardon me if I presumed wrong.

 

Yes, after what's happened this weekend, you're spot on. Correct. I just have to cut him out of my life. I don't need this anymore!

[tresqua]

He mentioned a dead family member, the girl that broke his heart and a friend that had stopped talking to him. Then he said "The three most important people in my life, the ones I care about, respect and like the most, the ones I value more than anyone, I can't talk to." I was staggered. What about me?

 

NO CONTACT FOR LIFE.

 

You were the friend that stopped talking to him. He must be psychic and was having a premonition.

[BrokenSmile]

I read one of your other threads- is this the same friend who you slept with and then found out that he didn't tell you he had a girlfriend?

[Yaz]

Yeah, it is. I've cut him off. No more BS for me, it's too complicated.

 

I thought he had issues, that because we were friends for so long, we'd be friends on the other side of him sorting himself. And likewise for me. Not so.

 

Last night we arranged to see a movie together. About five minutes after he arrived, I noticed I had no cigarettes - and he went out to get some for me. He turned back up at my house four hours later (after midnight), blind drunk. He had been at his mates house. I asked if he still wanted to watch the movie, and he said no. I asked why he was at my house, and he said he needed somewhere to sober up before he drove home. I asked him to sober up outside. Haven't spoken to him since.

 

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

[PetiteGirl]

Huh. Some "friend" he is. You don't need this guy. He sounds like a handful anyway!