| Hi all. First time posting on a forum about a personal issue, but I'm kind of at a loss, so I figured I should see what sort of insight I can pull from those on the interwebs, so I appreciate the time you take to help me out! I really want to save one of my friendships that has already gone up in flames. It involves a girl and the story starts out involving a crush, but it is a platonic relationship with this person that I am trying to save. Several months ago, I meet a girl at a local coffee shop. Eventually, I get up the nerve to ask her out. To my surprise, I get her number and I am thrilled! We proceed to go out several times and it goes swimmingly. I have a remarkably bad batting average with the fairer gender and I would say that this was the best series of dates I had ever been on. I felt a true chemistry, bordering on infatuation. One night, I am house sitting for a friend of mine. I had to stay in to watch the dog, and I had been texting with her so I tried to get her to come over and watch a movie. She sounds set on staying home so I, due to my total smittenedness over her, end up calling her to tell her how much I like her. Obviously, this was a mistake, as you cannot force anything like that. A lesson hard learned. She proceeds to relay that she, being new to town, is very happy to have found someone that is so like-minded, but cannot return those feelings. We decide to remain friends. And we did. It actually went really well, considering. We hung out several times over the next month or so and got along as if everything was totally fine and normal. I should have been satisfied. I knew it was going to be platonic and I was cool with it. Then, one night, we drive a few cities away to see a rally for a presidential candidate (we both support a third party which, as silly as it is, is kind of why we got along so well). The night goes great and we get some dinner after with a friend of mine who lives in that town. Driving home that night, she is exhausted and falls asleep, once in a while waking up long enough to apologize for falling asleep, but then nodding off. Maybe it was the full moon, or the sound of her sleeping, but it made me feel like I was in some sort of bittersweet Hollywood scene where I was one foot away from her, yet 1000 miles in my heart. I realized that I was not going to be happy with a platonic relationship. The next day, I told her that w as how I felt and then proceeded to move on and get over her. I would not say that I was angry with her or anything. I just felt that we wanted different things and, being of a romantic unbalance, it seemed very painful to continue on. I did not contact her again and I had no intention to do so. 3 weeks later, us having not communicated at all, i get a text from her. a short one saying that she is not happy with how things are. I tell her that I would have to think about it, because I would have to put my feelings for her aside for it to work. I text her a couple days later asking if we should get together. I do it jokingly, which she picks up on. she says yes, obviously, but does not offer any potential plans. This begins an odd exchange. Periodically for a month or two, I would text her (like once a week or two, nothing overboard or crazy) and she would deffer whatever plans i offered, but always insisting that she will get back to me or asking me to let her know once I know what my next schedule was like. Normally, I would see someone acting this way and know they are just avoiding me and perhaps not wanting to outright say it to my face. But in this case, I did not see it that way because it was all instigated by her contacting me after things we, by all recognition, over. It was for this reason that I assumed her busy schedule and general nonavailability was genuine. But, it eventually became quite transparent that she is avoiding me and I call her out on it. I tell her that I had been reaching out to her repeatedly because she came to me saying that she did not like how things were and that I was upset that she deflected all of my invitations. I told her that I did not deserve to be treated that way and that I was done. She says that I am right to be done and that she had been hesistant to follow through on any plans because she felt I was mad at her. I feel that this assumption was a little odd on her part, because I was reaching out at all, so how could I be mad at her? Either way, our friendship was over. Again. 3 more weeks later, I see her at the grocery store. We decide to give it one more go-around. We get coffee once, which was a little awkward, but mostly awesome. And I meet with her and her friends for trivia night at a local bar a few weeks in a row. Everything seemed cool. I am now at a place where I am happy with a platonic relationship and I am thrilled that we are hanging out. I play it cool and wait a few days before texting her to hang out. For what seems like no reason, we get thrust back into a cycle like the one from before, where she is unavailable, but always suggesting that next week would work, or telling me what days she has off. Finally, I text her one day, kind of already feeling like this was a lost cause. I hear back from her 2 days later apologizing and saying she has been busy, but also that she is going on a month long hiatus to save up money for a trip she is going on. I read this as "dont contact me for at least a month". She ends the text with " hope you had a good birthday!" (my birthday was the day between the text i sent and her response). I will admit that I proceed to act like a huge child from this point on: I flip out at the month hiatus comment. Already feeling like we are in a cycle like we were before, I tell her that if she already knows that she can't find an afternoon in the next month to hang out with a friend on the free (we both need to be tight with cash right now) then I didn't think i wanted to try to hangout anymore. she responds saying that she was being honest and sharing something with a 'friend'. (she put the quotes, not me), but that she is also over this and does not want to put any more energy into this. I, like a jerk, respond with a text something to the effect of: "energy into what? making up excuses to avoid me? I'm not stupid, you should have just told me you didn't want to be around me." I talked to one of the girls I worked with about what all had gone down. She pretty much says to move on, and that I had been strung along. But I couldn't help but escape the feeling that I actually messed things up. The next day I type out a text and get the o.k. from my female coworker. I had her read it to make she thought it wasn't across the line or anything. I basically asked this girl to be straight up with me as to what happened this last month. I expected her to answer as she did before: that she felt it was awkward or whatever. But she pretty much just said that she was just busy working all the time and trying to save money, but also that she does not like feeling pressured to hang out. And that after the last few texts she wants to be done. (I can't tell the reader of this post how far from 'pressuring her' I feel like I was. I never said anything that I think sounds like I was pressing her. I would tell her what days I was free, if she wanted to hang out. She never hinted that she didn't want my company, but, instead, always suggested next week or a specific day coming up, that she would back out on) I respond telling her that I knew my last texts were not nice at all, but that, before those, I don't know where it got to the point that I was pressuring her. I said that I am now left like I screwed it up and don't know wha t I did. That last exchange was 3 weeks ago. Unhappy that it ended this way, I go ahead and move on. And I do. For the second time, I ruin what is, apparently a good relationship with an awesome person. I get over it after a few days. Then I saw her around town twice within the last week. We made eye contact both times, but neither of us waved of really payed heed. But I sure noticed, and I really want to fix things. And that is why I come to you, oh wise sages of the internet. If you have read all of this drivel, I thank you greatly. I have questions for you, but please consider a points first: -I mentioned earlier that we almost exclusively texted. Neither of us seem to care for the phone much. I feel that this was a HUGE source of miscommunication throughout out entire relationship (non romantic). It is so easy to read into texts, or even how long it takes someone to respond to a text. -We never really talked about the elephant in the room. all of that stuff transpired over text, but when we hung out, it was kind of ignored. Personally, I feel like one conversation at any point that we were hanging out would have cleared the air tremendously. -A lot of this story ended up unfolding as a result of her getting back in contact with me, so I know that, at some point, she also cared about our friendship. Should I contact her? It has been three weeks since we have communicated (as bad as the communication was), aside from the eye contact only run-ins that we had this week. I truly feel like if we had a genuine, verbal conversation (not text!) and just cleared the air, we could both fully appreciate that our friendship was the victim of a ridiculous string of miscommunications and childish assumptions on both of our parts. I, of course and foremost, want to respect her wishes if she wants to be done with this and don't wish to impose any discomfort on her. I just one chance to talk face to face with her about everything. I think we could actually save our friendship. How can I get in touch with her without crossing any lines? Will waiting long enough suffice? Has it been long enough (3 weeks seems to be the magic number)? Thank you so much. | |||
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