I Actually Like Someone, But It's Complicated!

[cbzfmoc]

I'm about two months out of an on-and-off, 3.5 year relationship. I had liked my now ex for over a year before we started dating, so he is literally the only guy I have had feelings for, for about 5 years. I don't have feelings left for my ex. I care about him as a person but I would never EVER want to date him again. Anyway...

 

I recently became friends with a guy who I am starting to develop feelings for. He is one of my classmates and is sort in my group of friends now. I think he's very attractive and I'm pretty confident he's attracted to me too. I started flirting with him at one of our parties about a month ago, and he was very receptive to it. And then a couple of days later I got drunk and kissed him. Not the best move... because he stopped me mid-kiss and said, "I have to tell you... I am seeing someone, but it's not exclusive." He then told my friend he had to tell me that because he feared I "wouldn't be cool with it." I was pretty shocked and basically wouldn't give him the time of day for a short while because I usually know whether or not my friends are seeing someone (and def don't kiss those who are), and he was very quiet about that, and I felt SUPER embarrassed about kissing him. We've been able to put it behind us and are still friends. It's not awkward between us, but I still kind of like him. I can usually control myself when I am sober, but otherwise, I can't keep myself from flirting with him which is a little embarrassing. I don't know much about the girl he is seeing, other than that she is 3 years younger than us and still in college. I've never seen her around even though he lives in my building and he doesn't bring her to any of our parties (I guess partially because she is underage).

 

I don't really know where I am going with this, other than, that he is a nice guy and I am interested in dating him. Obviously he is seeing someone, and even though it's not serious, it's probably not my place to intervene. Also I get that he probably would have made a move if he was actually interested. I'm also pretty sure he doesn't want to date within our class. I rationally know I should back off but when I hang out with him it is hard. Sorry for all my blabbering - I had to get this off my chest. Single life is so hard, I'm clearly not doing this right, am I?!

 

I never thought I'd have so much high school boy drama in graduate school!! What a whirlwind.

[Smiley Saba]

I'm in a similar situation, cbzfmoc. I've been friends with a guy for six years, I've liked him for six years, but he's had an on-again, off-again girlfriend for the last year and a half, and yet he kissed me, and we did other mostly mild physical things together a few months ago. Now, after lifting my six years of hopes up, and after us sharing our first kiss in six years, he says that we can only be friends. I've never really had a boyfriend, so maybe my advice is invalid, but I certainly know when a guy is not treating a girl well, because I have a heck of alot of experience in not being treated well by a guy. And the fact that he's kissing you, and indicating to you that he wants to be with you through his body language, whilst saying he has a "non-exclusive" girlfriend is a significant red flag to me, a red flag illustrating that an uncaring, neglectful, player, wants to use you for as long as you let him use you, by giving you some fake honey talk promises of future exclusive commitment. His kissing of two girls in the space of a few months indicates to me that he doesn't really have any concern for your feelings, or for her's. It's pretty hard to establish mutual trust, and mutual respect, in a relationship, if you're going to attempt to establish a relationship with a male who's significantly emotionally and physically invested in another girl. I know this in my bones, because I'm wanting to be with someone who has a girlfriend too.

 

Please read this post, and please believe it, you deserve to be treated better than that, girlfriend, because from reading your story I can tell that you're an intelligent girl with a sense of integrity, just like I am, you're at graduate school after all, who has never before this situation, ever kissed a boy who has an on again, off-again, girlfriend, like I hadn't. I reckon you should forget about him, have fun with your friends at parties, and find someone else. Someone who treats you like you're the only girl in the world, like you're his one and only. I itilicised, underlined, boldened, lol, that sentence because I want you to remember it. Like my best friend's boyfriend of eight years treats my best friend. I've visited my best friend's house while my best friend's boyfriend's been there, and it is actually, physically, like he can't even see another girl apart from my best friend, like the room could be filled with girls pining for his attention and he'd be absolutely blind to them. I only want the best for my job, and my study, and I should only want the best in a boyfriend, and personally I want a boyfriend like that, not someone who screws with my mind, and my heart, and makes promises with me and then breaks them, and every time I spend time with him I have a sickening feeling that the next day or the next night, he'll be in the arms of another girl, and you shouldn't either.

 

Would you try to drive a car that had no engine, would you try to live in a house with no door, would you try to sit on a backless chair, would you try to use a fork with no handle, or would you try to use a textbook that had no words? No you would not, you wouldn't try to use something that is significantly flawed in some way, or is missing a significantly important part of it, that renders the function of it useless. So please treat your heart with more compassion, than running it through the mill with a half guy. Please don't try to be with a guy who's heart is split between two girls. You know those couples, like my best friend and her boyfriend of eight years, that you see around campus or around where you live, or places you visit, who only have eyes for each other, with a boyfriend who takes his girlfriend's views and her feelings into respectful consideration, as if her views and feelings about something are important to him, which is the minimum of what you should have? You, and I deserve that kind of a boyfriend. We don't deserve some cold-hearted, cruel, and indecisive, player that goes through girls as if they were disposable plastic plates. Because I have been desperate enough to be used by half guys, and one guy who frequently slept with an alarming number of other girls, as if I was a disposable plastic plate, just so I could have some love from him from time to time. I know it's hard, honey. I know this in my bones, because I've jumped from guy to guy, revolving door style, for two entire years, from the ages of 19 to 21, because I'm turning 21 in a week. I have a pretty dysfunctional family, so that's the majority of the explanation as to why an intelligent girl like me, who dresses modestly, and is a book worm, who works hard to get straight A's, allows herself to be so cruelly used, so often, and get used so many times, again and again, as if it's the same guy, in the same situation, but only with a different face. s: Luckily for you, there seems to be alot of people around you at your campus in graduate school, which you are lucky for, unluckily for me, I'm at a small campus with guys from ethnicities who treat girls like their personal assistants, and who I don't find attractive, so there doesn't seem to be good guys with integrity to choose from, but yeah.

 

If I can give up on this six-year dream, which I'm in the process of giving up on, through many hours of crying and pain, then you can definitely, give up on a player guy you met not so long ago. Please just forget about him, and find someone who treats you like the queen that I and you, know that you are. I'm sorry my reply was so long, but I guess I was kind of giving myself therapy when writing it, too. I'm in pain over a situation, as well, which is almost exactly the same as yours. Please have enough self-compassion, and enough self-love, to let him become a friend or an acquaintance, a nd find someone infinitely more delightful and respectful, because a respectful guy who treats you as the only girl in the world is definitely out there waiting for an intelligent, nice, girl like you to come into his life. We can pull ourselves off of this dangerous drug together. I know it's hard, but focus on things elsewhere. I definitely know that you can do it. Let us know how you go,cbzfmoc. Love, Saba.