I 21F am dating a 23M. We started dating about 4 months ago. When we first met, he almost instantly started liking me and pursued me hard. I finally accept because he was a nice guy and I liked him. Now I feel like I was pressured a bit. When I think about him now, I see him as a friend and not a lover. I know he likes me a lot and even talked about marriage to me. I don’t want to hurt his feelings. He also told his friends about us recently and i don’t want to embarass him. How can I breakup with him in a nicely?
TLDR: how can I breakup nicely with my boyfriend that I see more as a friend than a lover after he told his friends about us and I dont want to embarass him?
3 comments
A great way is to break up and not be his friend, this is only going to hurt him and he will not be able to move on if you right there and when he sees you with other guys is only going to hurt him more, you don’t have be friends with every ex. Also, he may be offendend that he is only good enough to be friend and not boyfriend
Just gotta do it. The longer you delay the worse it will be. Don’t leave it until the proposal.
You must not decide *not* to do something that you must do to meet your own needs, simply because “I don’t want to hurt his feelings.” If one person’s feelings could create an obligation for anther person, then we’d all be hostages to what everyone around us wanted, all the time.
Having hurt feelings is part of the relationship experience. This will not be the first time, and it will not be the last time, that his feelings are hurt. Hopefully, he will learn something from the experience, so that the hurt is not wasted, but that is neither your responsibility nor within your control.
So don’t come at it from the perspective of “no hurt feelings”. Come at it from the perspective of “no *unnecessary* hurt feelings”.
And to that end, be firm (so that he doesn’t have false hope that will cause him hurt later), be *clear* (so that he doesn’t have to go through uncertainty that will cause him more hurt *now*), and be forthright and honest about how you feel.
Because you never owe *anyone* more than honesty.
“[Boyfriend], this relationship is not working for me, and I need for it to be over, so I am breaking up with you” is sufficient.