So, I’m in a situation that has been the most emotionally confusing place I’ve ever been. I (27M) have had v e r y strong feelings for my friend/coworker (25F) for a few years now. We’ve both gotten out of long long term relationships in the past year. And the reasoning behind me ending my relationship wasn’t to pursue this girl, but the strong feelings I had were very clear signs that the relationship wasn’t right for me or my ex.
She on the other hand, had gotten out of a very emotionally abusive relationship. The guy she was dating was someone I used to be somewhat close with so even I know how unhinged he is. And a point worth mentioning, because it will matter in a second, is that her relationship before him was physically abusive.
Now in the middle of May of last year, were both newly single. We have a very close friendship at work, are constantly joking with each other and being playful, and sometimes go to a bar or other events outside of work.
So I decided in October to let her know how I feel about her. I don’t go into crazy detail or emotionally unload I pretty much kept it to “I have very strong feelings for you”. She tells me that she has feelings for me as well. But, because of how stressful her last two relationships were for her, she says she’s enjoying the time to herself and doesn’t want to jump into another relationship. Which is obviously totally understandable, and was left at that.
The shitty part is, this kind of really distanced us for a while. There was a strange tension that developed at work, and every attempt I’ve made to just simply hang out outside of work (which we used to do on at least a weekly basis) ended up with her canceling on the day of. And this had been going on for the last 5-6 months leading to now.
Fast forward to now, the past month has had no tension at work and things feel like they had before. Very playful with each other and very close at work. We met up briefly on st Patty’s day, but that’s been the only outside of work contact.
I could list things that could be over examined in her behavior. But I don’t read too much into subtexts because I think there’s too many ways to read actions as signs of attraction when really they’re just signs of a really nice girl who’s a close friend.
Like the title reads, I’m not specifically looking for advice. Cause at this point, I’m just fine doing me. I don’t think there’s any sort of “move” or “play” that could push things the way I’d like our relation with each other to go. And obviously bringing up my feelings for her again would most likely put a more permanent awkward tension between us and kill our friendship.
I’m just curious on a third party opinion on what’s going on here. I don’t really have anyone else I can talk to about this sort of thing. And past relationships I’ve had never had weird back and forth elements, it’s always been a clean cut display of affection from both parties.
Sorry for the wall of text, I appreciate you taking the time ♥️
TLDR: I revealed my long time feelings to a longtime friend/coworker who said she had feelings too, but wasn’t ready for a relationship. After months of distanced behavior, things are almost back to how they were before. I don’t know what this means.