I have been best friends with a man for about 7 or 8 years. Our relationship has always been flirty and a lot of the signals I have received from him have been mixed since the friendship began. 2-3 years ago, I realized I had developed feelings for him but never said anything because I didn’t want to risk the friendship and I wasn’t confident enough to ask. In the last 6 months, his behavior changed in a way that I was more sure the feelings might be reciprocated. More touching, attention, and communication in general. About 3 weeks ago, I decided to tell him that I had feelings for him and he rejected me. I was pretty surprised and I have been struggling some since then. My feelings were/are pretty strong and the rejection has been painful. I fully respect his “no” and would like to move passed this. I don’t want to lose my best friend, but I don’t know how to navigate this. Does anyone have advice on how I can let this go, move on, and go back to being a good friend?
TLDR: Told my best friend I had feelings for him and got rejected. How do I move on?
7 comments
You aren’t going to automatically go back to viewing him only as a friend/ not having feelings for him- especially if you’re continuing to talk to and see him as usual. The only way to really get over someone is to take space- I’m not saying you need to end the friendship, but maybe tell him that you need some time before you can go back to being close friends.
My girl.
I have been in this exact situation. Twice. 🙁
The answer is surprisingly simple: it will only ever be as weird as the two of you make it. Of course you aren’t going to be able to instantly switch back to “friends only” mode right away, but you just need to pretend like you have when y’all are hanging out. After faking it long enough, it will get easier, and your feelings will fade.
So that covers you, but the one thing you can’t control here is: him. If he makes it weird – then it’s gonna be weird. In my case, I stayed friends with one, and was fully prepared to with the other, but she ghosted, which was a complete shock.
Maybe the confession puts him in such a weird spot that he can’t make it NOT weird. All I can suggest is: *talk to him* if that happens. If y’all have been close friends, there’s no reason you can’t have a “serious talk”.
If you feel like the two of you being flirty/touchy is too much to handle right now while your feelings are still raw, then it is 100% okay to ask him to not be that way. Don’t be vague.
“while I do enjoy the flirty/touchy nature of our friendship, it’s a little much for me right now, and I am trying to put you back into the Friend Box in my head. Is it okay if we tone it down for a while?”
or something similar.
At any rate, sorry your feelings weren’t reciprocated. That’s such an awful feeling. There’s never anything wrong with taking some time *just* for yourself to sort out your head a bit. So don’t be afraid to ask for time if you need it.
Good luck, friend.
Set new boundaries and be direct. If this friendship is going to continue. Flirting and touching need to stop and you probably need to limit contact temporarily while you try and get over your feelings. The friendship won’t be the same because it can’t be as it wasn’t a genuine friendship while you were pursuing him. Be firm and direct and follow through with consequences if he won’t respect your new boundaries.
It sounds like you want a relationship. You probably want to be married and have kids. It isn’t going to happen with this guy. You are putting way to much energy into him that you are essentially shutting the door on others. Do you really think you can be eternal best friends with this guy? You are holding yourself back for him. You should have asked him out 6 or 7 years ago.
Figure out what you really want in life and work towards it. My guess is that although you like this guy, your ultimate goal only includes him tangentially at best.
I’m gunna assume he likes attention. Friends don’t flirt and touch their friends, but he rejected you as well. That probably means he wasn’t in this friendship for the right reasons and you need to be prepared for the nature of the friendship to change.
I think some people, when they’re single, have a tendency to use friends as a bit of a crutch to get some of the intimacy they’re craving. Like, they don’t have a reliable, safe outlet for flirting and romance so they just start doing that with whatever friends seem receptive. Sometimes it leads to feelings/a relationship, but just as often it leads to a confusing situationship that really messes things up.
Now you know that this guy isn’t necessarily safe for you to be friends with. Not that he’s a dangerous or bad person, but that you need to be careful about making sure you have distance from him and don’t engage in these behaviors/dog yourself deeper.
You may have realized it now, but if you’re getting feelings for someone in your life who’s single, it’s better to address it quickly, when the stakes are low. It always sucks to like someone who isn’t interested, but letting the feelings grow until they’re so big that popping them leaves a huge gaping wound in the relationship is always gonna be worse in the long run than putting a little scratch on it up front, by being like “I realized lately that I really enjoy the time we spend together and I’m wondering if there’s something more there. If it’s mutual, maybe we can see where things go over dinner? But if you aren’t interested, then that settles it for me and I’m happy to lose interest and stay friends!”
But what’s done is done. I would think about whether it’s possible for you to stay friends with this guy in a healthy way, and what that friendship would look like. Do you need a break? Do you need to limit the nature of your interactions or time you spend together? What’s the best way for you to care for yourself and move on from the formation of things aren’t salvageable? Look after yourself.
I have close friends of the opposite sex and there has never been flirtiness or touchiness from either side. It sounds like he was leading you on a bit here and that he my have even know what he was doing and liked the attention. I think the easiest way (which will unfortunately also be very difficult) to get over him will be to distance yourself from him for a while. And when you do start hanging out with him more again, if he is still flirty and inappropriate with you, set some firm boundaries- but tbh if you even need to have that conversation with him you should reconsider what kind of person/friend he is to continually lead on someone he calls a friend knowing your feelings