He (m18) wants me (f18)to either date him or we can’t be friends

31 comments

1. If he is pressuring you to do something you don’t want to do then he is not your friend. He is an opportunist and bully masquerading as a friend and trying to use guilt to gain your trust so he can manipulate you into the type of relationship that he desires without caring about what you want. I can’t imagine you wanting to keep this person in your life at all.

2. He’s not your friend. Accept that and move on.

3. He has been hanging on, hoping you’ll change your mind. I’ve had so called friends get very upset I wouldn’t date them. Some men don’t want to be in the friend zone.

4. Do not let him pressure you into dating him. The friendship with him has started to end. Him pressuring you to date him and eventually sleep with him is no way to start a long-term relationship. You have not accepted him as a bf as you feel uncomfortable with it.

   Take this time to expand your group of friends as he will likely increase pressure and coerce you to be intimate with him. You will feel trapped without other friends’ support and make a decision you will regret.

   Get ready for the friendship to end as he has ulterior motives to be friends with you.

5. Friends don’t bully us into relationships – he’s not your friend. All you can do is be honest with him and tell him you don’t feel chemistry with him. Life’s too short to settle.

6. I’m sorry, hon, but he’s not your friend. Real friendship is never conditional like this and healthy people move on after rejection.

7. He is tired of being emotionally invested in you and u not feeling the same… the friendzone isnt somewhere hes ok w being anymore. Nothing worse than having to pretend the woman u love is only a friend and having to pretend to be happy while she explores her life w other men.

8. If he can’t accept the fact you don’t see him that way, then it is what it is. Let him go and you will find other friends that don’t pressure you I to relationships.

   You’re 18, many opportunities ahead.

9. Hate to break this to you… but he’s not your friend

10. You don’t need a reason NOT to date someone. It doesn’t matter why you don’t want to date him, you don’t, and that should be the end of it. Him insisting you need to date is him putting his own feelings before yours, and disregarding what you want entirely. Do you really want a friend that cares so little for you?

11. He’s more right about the future than either of you realise. Or maybe he does.

    You are friends. But he has been hanging around the entire time, hoping for more than friendship. You’ve tried to date him twice, and both times you ended it. So he’s never given up hoping.

    Now, when you get a bf in the future, how’s he going to feel about your friend. I’ll tell you. He’s going to see how close you’re with him. He will ask questions. You will have to tell him that you dated. At that point, your friend becomes an ex in your new bf’s eyes. Then he tells you that your closeness makes him uncomfortable.

    Then you have to decide between bf and friend. Friend gets ditched. You can say that this won’t happen to you. That you will never allow it to happen. But it will. So your friend is mot wrong. He will be replaced by a new man. This is the full story.

    I’m not saying date him. But it might be better to allow your friendship to fade away.

    Good luck

12. He has let you know that his friendship is conditional on you submitting to his manipulation. A real friend would NEVER want you to do anything you’re not comfortable with. I know it’s hard to let a friend go when you don’t have a lot of them. But he is not your friend, and the less time you waste on him, the more you can spend finding new and better friends.

    You deserve better friends than this, OP!

13. Time to move on and find a new best friend, he’s made it clear he wants more than a friendship.

14. He was never your friend. He only befriended you with the intention of getting in your pants, and now that he sees thats not an option, his true colors are coming out. He was never interested in a friendship with you, and now that he sees he isnt going to get what he *actually* wants from you, he wants to stop wasting his time pretending to care about you. Let him go, theres better friends and boyfriends out there

15. A genuine friend doesnt pressure you into relationships with them.

    Tell him he can go date one of his other friends then, if being good friends and dating is all the same to him anyway.

16. I’m sorry bc I know you didn’t want this but you will have to reject him and accept that the friendship you once had has ended.

17. This sucks and I’m sorry. Do not let boys pressure you into that doesn’t feel right. I stayed friends with a guy like this for ten years, and he ended up raping me. I never saw it coming. I thought we were finally actually getting past him not being able to see me as more and someone to date and not a real person.

    It’s not always this extreme of an ending, but you truly never know what someone’s intentions are when they can’t hear no as a full sentence. Be safe, be careful, and listen to your gut. It’s trying to protect you, even if it’s just from heartache and not the physical danger I found myself in.

    Never trust someone who doesn’t hear no as a full sentence.

18. This is the kind of situation where you get a genuine relationship and they ask you about your best friend and you say “yeah we’ve dated a couple times” and they say “…what?”

19. You tell him exactly what you said in your post: you are not romantically interested in him and you won’t date him.

    And honestly, in my experience it won’t be a good friendship if one of the friends has strong feelings they can’t let go of. There will be that longing for something more, and that’s not good. What your friend needs is distance so he can let go of his feelings, move on and grow up a bit.

    I’ve been on both sides of this and going no contact has been key to solving the issue.

20. He wants to be more than friends. You do not. Friend relationships, any relationships, can have breaking points. Incompatibilities. This is one. It’s time to move on. It’s not fair to you to have to date someone you want to be friends with. It’s not fair to him to stay friends with someone he’s intent on dating. This is an impasse.

21. His end goal has never been friendship

22. He was never your best friend. He was always trying to date you and being friends was never good enough for him.

    Don’t date him if you don’t want to date him. He’s the one pulling gross ultimatums because he can’t separate his desire to sleep with someone from his ability to be in their life.

23. If it’s true what you say about him being one of your only “actual” friends then it’s time for you to make new friends. Hes trying to emotionally blackmail you into a relationship with him, that’s a huge red flag …and that’s not a true friend.

24. You say no and dodge that massive red flag.

25. Hi girl. I am sorry to say this, but that friendship is probably already gone, however, please please know that it is his fault and not yours. The whole ultimatum “we are frends, we have good chemistry so just date me already” thing is absolutely horrible on his part.

    ***He is not entitled to a relationship with you because you guys are friends.*** It is 100% normal that you guys have friendship without you having any sexual attraction. But that’s something he does not understand. And taht’s his problem not yours. You shouldn’t have to say yes because he cannot take a no.

    Let me tell you what happened to me. It was basically a similar scenario to what happened to you. I have a very good friend, we get along great and everything. And one day he suddenly tells me he has feelings for me. But just like you, there is zero sexual attraction. None, nothing at all. He is a good friend and it’s already a lot. But that’s it. I tell him that and he gets upset. About how he thinks I lead him on and about how he does not want us to be friends anymore because “it hurts him so much”.

    At first I felt sad because I lost a friend and I was blaming myself. But after some toughts, I got upset, at him. He was a friend and I never implied he would be anything more. I never lead him on, if he made a whole scenario in his head, I had no part in it. He was asking me to value his feelings without ackowledging mines. And the fact he was ready to cut our friendship like this, means he did not value it from the beginning.

    Next time he contacted me I ignored him. I am not here to be emotionally available for him if he does not consider my side at all.

26. Bummer. This is “young love” stuff. I know you see him as a friend only, but his feelings are deeper. It’s painful for him to be close to you, but not as close as he wants. He’d prefer to end the friendship rather than continuing to torture himself by forcing a friendship when he wants more.

    There’s nothing for you to do. If you don’t have feelings for him, then you need to respect his choice to move on.

    It’s hard and painful for him, too. But he’s looking out for his own feelings. He’s doing the right thing.

27. You don’t have to date him. Honestly starting a relationship based on an ultimatum is a terrible idea.

    But he doesn’t have to be your friend either. He’s made his feelings for you crystal clear. He’s well within his right to end the friendship to protect his feelings.

    It sucks but you just have to move on.

28. So this is maybe an unpopular opinion but I don’t necessarily think this boy is terrible and manipulative. It sounds like you two tried being a couple (twice) and then tried to remain friends after breaking up and he’s realized that isn’t working for him. Plenty of people don’t remain friends with exes because they find it painful after a breakup. Now it’s bad if he goes about this by ending the friendship and then dangling the possibility of it continuing it in front of you to try to pressure you into dating.

    You’re best bet is to be mature about this and agree to end the friendship. Then if he tries to take that back and hang out again and be your friend decline because then you will know it will just lead to drama and pressure to date. You’re allowed to still have mutual friends in common btw- you can and should still be cordial to each other at events your both invited to.

29. Be careful that he doesn’t turn into a Nice Guy – friendly and your “soulmate” while he’s still hoping you’re going to give in to his emotional blackmail and date him – about to turn really nasty once you make it clear that that is not going to happen.

    Say after me: “I’m sorry my friendship is worth so little to you that you can kick me out of your life because I don’t feel more than friendship for you. So if your friendship to me was only a means to an end to get me to date you, I guess it wasn’t worth that much, anyway. Goodbye.”

30. Ugh. Just because you get along with a guy doesn’t mean you have to date them. You need so much more to start a relationship, don’t settle just because you are friendly and close.

    Men will settle for anything. Any dude you show a crumb of kindness to will fall in love with you. He probably has no game with other women so he’s latched on to you.

31. He wanted to date, you didn’t. He moved on, why can’t you. Why would a man willingly get friend zoned by a woman he is interested in dating?