A platonic love, soulmate or more? (warning: very long topic!)

[shannon]

I came across this website and this topic when I did a search for ‘platonic love’ on google because I’m not quite sure as to what I’m feeling for a certain person for a while already. It’s something I’ve never felt for someone before. I read the topic and realised it was similar to how I was feeling too. Reading the comments on the topic have only made me more confused though. Lol. So I’m wondering: Is it platonic love, is this my soulmate or is it more …

 

I’m in a current online relationship with my boyfriend since 2,5 years now. This might raise some eyebrows but due to circumstances we’ve never met but if all goes well he’ll come and stay close to me as from October. I love him a lot. He’s perfect for me. My parents adore him and are very much looking forward to meeting him and stuff. I know he loves me to bits and he’s basically giving up his entire life to be with me

 

Yet; 4 years ago I met a man online to whom I became rather close at a certain moment. Right now I basically feel like I’m having two men in my life for whom I care equally but both in a different way. And it makes me pretty messed up because I don’t know how to deal with that or what to do about it.

 

A few weeks ago a good online (female) friend asked me if I had had many serious relationships before my current boyfriend. I made her a little list of people who had been important to me and people I had been important to. Like I just said I came to the conclusion I currently had two men in my life I cared deeply for. She was under the impression I couldn’t choose between the two and then I told her about the other guy who’s existence she never knew before.

 

I’ll copy/paste what I wrote her because it’s basically a description of my ‘relationship’ with this man

 

“Don’t get me wrong that I doubt between Nicolas and Jonathan. I know that a life with Jonathan can never be.

 

Hmmm; maybe I should tell you in short who Jonathan is because I’ve never ever talked about him to you, I think. Or maybe I’ve just mentionned I had a ‘good friend’ once.

 

Let’s see. I went into ‘online world’ somewhere August 2004. For my journalism studies I had to resit a particularly hard exam: statistics. I’ve always been terrible at maths but this was an obliged course. I didn’t understand a thing! The result was that I studied 10 days in a row before that exam, getting terribly bored and needing some distraction in the evenings. One evening I watched the movie ‘You’ve got mail’ on television. And the next day I was wondering if there would exist penpal sites nowadays because I used to enjoy penpalling a lot at high school. I searched and landed on such a site and bumpted into a funny, bald civil engineer named Lucas from London. He was so much fun that I started to think ‘If I meet someone so nice and funny already on the first day then there must be others like him out here’. So I kept talking to people until about a month later I stumbled across the profile of a 34 y/o man from Australia. It was Jonathan. He intrigued me from the moment I even just layed my eyes on his photo. There was something about him that was very intriguing and ‘pure’. I read his profile and noticed it was very funny with an extraordinary sense of humour and wit. Up until today I have never again come across someone as funny as him. So I started talking to him and it appeared he was a scientist, a sort of botanicus/geneticus; a nature loving guy. Very non-conformist, very bright and intelligent, witty, funny, etc. And handsome in his own way. He’s slim, tall, has long loose brown hair that he sometimes wears up untill his shoulders and a pair of … of … of … I dunno …. ‘sweet’ eyes. Kinda like the eyes of a dog. Lol. In one word: he had a huge personality. To cut a long story short. Over the next couple of weeks we started to write regularly and we became good friends. He told me about his childhood, uni life, relationships, etc. He totally let me look inside the deepest of his heart. It appeared he had had 2 online relationships and the last actually just broke off at around about the moment I met him for the first time. Timing couldn’t have been worse. He was emotionaly very vulnerable and I was not very well aware of that yet, plus I was just getting to know him and didn’t know yet how he reacted to certain things or situations. In one word: I had no clue yet how to ‘handle with care’. One day he talked me about another website he was at. Out of curiosity I started looking at the site and at the posts he was making because they were absolutelly hilarious. I thought it was so much fun that I decided to sign up too. Little did I know that Jonathan was this huge personality and everyone around the website knew him. So I continued talking to him, teasing him, etc. Very soon I got jealous reactions from other female members and realised I had landed into a snakepit. One girl in particular was very jealous. Her name was ‘Clarissa’. To make a long story short; she started insinuating I was in love with Jonathan and I started insinuating she was in love with him. I had a small fight with her and the whole thing ‘exploded’. Jonathan, having just come out of a relationship where he fled from a girl who behaved just as jealous as we were behaving, got terribly sick of it all and basically told us to get lost. The other girl did; I didn’t. I persisted but my friendship with him was ever since then sort of ‘broken’. We still talked but I noticed that he was carefull about what he did and did not say to me. Probably still wondering if I indeed was in love with him or not. I had however denied that to him, whilst he had admitted he could have fallen in love with either of us if we wouldn’t have started acting the way we had. He also added he had a real life girlfriend now (which was quite a surprise so shortly after his previous relationship and I’ve doubted her existence ever since). Though I had denied it I was not completelly sure myself. The only thing I knew was that he was amazing and I wouldn’t just let him go like that. I decided to stick by him and not let him out of my sight.

 

Meanwhile I had started a short relationship with someone else who showed a great jealousy towards Jonathan, even up to the point of breaking into his account once and sending me a message supposedly coming from Jonathan. It led to another incident where I got angry at Jonathan (not knowing the message wasn’t his) and so gradually the walls of our friendship slowly but steadily started breaking down. I believe I didn’t even get a ‘thanks’ for the present I sent him for his birthday back then.

 

Over the months it had also become clear that Jonathan had weeks/months in which he was perfectly nice and funny and open but just as many times in which he was cold, closed and distant. You never knew/know in which mood you’ll find him the next day. Almost like two faces. All of it leading to quite some deleted profiles from both me and him.

 

September 2005 meant a turning point in my life. I had a car accident where I almost drowned in a river during a terrible storm on holidays in France. Some say you see your life pass in front of you. It didn’t, but I did think about a few people. Countable on less than one hand. Jonathan was one of them. There and then in that river I realised I loved him. I was not just in love with him; I didn’t have a crush on him (though later it appeared that those rumours were going all through the website we were both on), no … a crush passes … this didn’t … I merely loved him. Unconditionaly. Without expecting anything in return. The purest love you can ever imagine

 

I came home and told some people about my accident; including to Jonathan. While I was overwhelmed by the ‘oh’ and ‘ah’’s and comford of friends I felt terribly lonely because there never came a reaction of him. His indifference towards my accident hit me like a bullet and I decided to never talk to him again and try to avoid him as much as possible.

 

I stayed away from the website, ‘moved’ to another and Jonathan after a while stayed out of that other website too. That lasted 9 months. After these 9 months the grief over his indifference had sort of passed and I decided to go back to the website and him. Meanwhile having embarked on my relationship with my current boyfriend that was going wonderfully well

 

I got all my courage together and started talking to Jonathan again. And though he talked back; he never really talked back. He had this alter-ego ‘fluffybear’ behind which he could hide the real him. It was like a shield or a wall around him. Not just to me but to everyone else too. To never again get hurt probably … . Almost 2 years passed like that. I talked to the fluffy and the fluffy talked back. I tried getting through to him but it was no use. My great friend would forever be history

 

Untill 2 weeks ago something happened. On another website we both started going to regularly he one day had created a whole topic with a story about him being in love with a 17 y/o girl. Not the story itself came as a shock but the mere fact that he had layed out his heart in public shocked me. The man who stayed silent and hidden for two years had suddenly crawled out of his shell. It made me realise how sad and hurt and miserable he must be feeling to make him do that. I started reading, it got so long that I had to stop reading to go and peel the potatoes for lunch, when I came back he had been online and deleted the whole story and I didn’t know how it ended. I didn’t know what to do. Pretend I hadn’t read? I felt so sorry and sad for what was happening to him. And I got sad myself. That has never happened to me before. If a friend is in misery or in trouble I sympathise and feel sorry but I don’t go up to the point of feeling actually bad myself. However: I felt terrible because he was feeling terrible. I decided to write a short note, kinda leaving it up to him if he would talk about it to me or not. I had not much hope, chances were 1 against 10. We hadn’t had a proper talk in nearly 3 years. I started wondering why he had written the topic there: it was a not very active website and he knew I’d be one of the only persons to see it. So maybe he wanted me to read it because he didn’t dare to just tell me himself?

 

The next day a reply came … and my astonishment and relief were big: because there he was. Not his alter-ego, no shield or wall: just Jonathan. The Jonathan I used to know, broken but him. It felt so good; it’s like we never stopped talking. We picked up where we left off. And I was so grateful and happy to have been given this ‘trust’ back. I could have cried. Yet I was very careful. Each word could make him crawl back into that shell and that was the last i wanted. So after some messages back and forth I was starting to feel awkward having to think over and over what I was going to say. In one message I had been a bit more harsh on him because he really was being stupid; there came no reply. So I thought ‘Oh there we go again, back into his shell’. I went to apologise the next day and apparently he had written a reply, rethought about what he had written and eventually didn’t send. So I said that I didn’t want to have to think for half an hour about what to write, etc. That I was done with that, etc. He agreed and we both felt very relieved about not having to be too careful about what to say to each other. It went good again until the day before yesterday he jokingly said about not being able to scare me: ‘I’ll send you a recent pic of myself: that’ll scare you’. I got quite surprised that he said that because in 3 years he hasn’t shown any photo of himself anymore. He was almost practically asking me to ask for a photo. So I was careful not to ask and I just said ‘try me ’. A day later he replied and obviously he had changed his mind and said he didn’t have any (yeah right). I pretended I didn’t care and said it was fine and worth the try . He didn’t reply anymore. Later I found in the channels a comment of him about me. He was saying to a mutual friend (who had read the complete story) that she had done the right thing to not respond to the topic because ‘Shannon had yelled at him for deleting it before she had read it completelly’. He added that he hated the fairer sex. That comment was a bit like a slap in my face. I didn’t get it: in the messages we’ve exchanged he was very open, very grateful I was there to listen to him and offer my shoulder. He even thanked me and apologised for telling me all of that. Believe me: it takes a lot for him to put his pride aside and actually thank someone. So it’s very black/white. He’s been very nice in his messages to me but to the outside world he pretends it means nothing, even up to the point that he almost humiliates me. That was yesterday morning and it bothered me the whole day. Today I’ve kind of managed to get over it saying to myself that you can interprete it in a lot of ways. And so; after a week we’re again back at the awkwardness and frankly: I’m sick of it. I’ve been through months of awkwardness with him years ago and I don’t want to go through all of that again.

 

I know that Jonathan and I can never become a couple. Even the mere word ‘couple’ probably would make him run a mile away in the bush. Lol. We’re completelly different people with completelly different lifestyles. I for example like travelling; Jonathan has never left Austraila. I like going out eating to restaurants; Jonathan hates restaurants and will only enter one after some serious blackmailing. I like shopping and clothes; Jonathan hates shopping and would just put on anything that has sleeves and pants. I like nice hotels and B&B’s; Jonathan couldn’t care a thing and would probably even sleep under a tree. I like a nice house and some certainty regarding a job in my life. As long as he’s got a roof over his head and just enough money to tie the knots he’s happy. You see … and that’s just practical stuff. Our personalities would click but I think we both have issues with jealousy; I easily get jealous and, though he’ll deny it, he gets easily jealous himself. Just the mere act of having male friends and talking to them he already kinda interpretates as flirting to them. So we’d be fighting over one or another male or female within no time. It would be passionate though, both in the fighting and loving. Lol; That’s the thing with Jonathan; you can’t live with him and you can’t live without him. A very double feeling.

 

And then there’s the sexual part of a relationship. I’ve never really thought about Jonathan in those terms, or maybe never really dared thinking about him like that. It just stops with giving some neutral compliments to one another. But knowing the stories of his other relationships I think he’s quite a passionate and loving man * okie; now chase these thoughts away shannon *.

 

And where does that all leaves my current boyfriend? Exactly where he’s always been. Nicolas and me go perfectly together. All the things I like, he likes. We don’t have much jealousy issues (mainly due to the fact that he’s not very jealous). We have great fun together and I do dare to think in a sexual way about him and I really do love him. He’s trying to do everything to come here and hopefully he will. He has always sort of known about Jonathan. According to Nicolas he’s an ******* and a bastard for treating me the way he does. But he puts up with him and so do I put up with his other good female friend. Though he does know Jonathan is very special to me he doesn’t know feelings go that deep that if we were in another place and time I’d try my chances with Jonathan. But we’re in this place and time and there’s no way that’ll ever happen.

 

My whole relationship with Jonathan has been some kind of battle. I can’t find other words to describe it. And I’m back again at feeling awkward around him, not knowing what to say, etc. And having thought about that I came to the conclusion that that awkwardness merely comes from the fact that we’ve never expressed our true feelings to each other. So I was thinking: wouldn’t it be better to just tell him but making it clear I don’t want anything to happen? That way the weight is of my shoulders and we can just stay (special) friends. Because there’s no way Jonathan would ever ever tell me himself. By now I know him and he only does so when he’s driven in a corner and has no way out. He is far too proud to confess his feelings and to take the chance that those feelings aren’t mutual and he’ll look like a fool. And that is one of the things that can happen to me: I’d feel awfull confessing my feelings to Jonathan and then having him laughing at my silliness behind my back. And what if I do tell him and he tells me the same and that triggers something inside us?

 

I have no clue as to how he feels. I can only conclude that because of the odd way he reacts sometimes I don’t leave him indifferent. He has given me compliments and when we’re having fun we get along like a house on fire and he does trust me to tell me private things. But that’s all I know. I don’t know how deep those feelings go because the next day he can act like I indiffer him. I might just be a nice, naïve girl in his eyes. Like quite a few others. I have no clue as to how special I am to him.

 

Pfffft: you know: I’m happy the way it is. I’m with Nicolas. Jonathan has his girlfriend (with whom he’s not very happy he confessed). I just wish I could have this deep uncompromised friendship with him. And that would honestly make me the happiest person in the world. I don’t need him to be my partner. I just want him to be there when I need someone to talk to, knowing I can tell everything to him and vice versa. And that is exactly my problem. In order to get to that deep uncompromised friendship in which you can tell everything, I need to tell him I love him. And the thing is: I don’t dare. I have no clue how he’ll react. He might just disappear alltogether. But leaving it like this makes it unbearable too”.

 

So there was the story of me and Jonathan

 

That is what I wrote to my friend. She didn’t reply me much … and now leaves me to consider how much of a friend she is. I laid my heart out to her, I desperately needed some feed-back and she took a week before even replying a bit. I later wrote her another e-mail back going further on the matter and she still hasn’t replied that one. I know she’s busy and I know she just found out she’s pregnant so I do understand a bit but still: I wanna talk about this to someone and therefor am posting this here now. Meanwhile things between me and Jonathan have grown all awkward again and it looks like he crawled back into his shell and I again have no way to get through. The wall seems up again

 

On top of that me and my boyfriend are fighting over a female friend of his which I consider to be a bit too close to him. And that makes me wonder: maybe we are both missing something with the other? I know that I have an almost instant understanding with Jonathan, conversation with him runs deep and are on another level then with my Nicolas. I love Jonathan’s wit; something Nicolas doesn’t have or even doesn’t have the intellect for. But that doesn’t mean I want something with Jonathan because Jonathan is an unpredictable and complex person

 

So right now I’m like ‘should I tell him, should I not tell him’? What will happen if I do? I don’t want to loose him. He’s got a girlfriend, I got a boyfriend. But we’re both obviously missing something. Something that we do are finding in each other. Jonathan’s girlfriend (if it is indeed true that she exists because he rarely mentions her) is suicidal. She’s had it tough. My guess is that Jonathan feels responsible for her well being and therefor stays with her and puts up with her because if it weren’t for him she wouldn’t be here anymore. I’m sure he loves her in a way but most of all he probably feels sorry and responsible for her and can’t leave her because that might literally … kill … her.

 

So we’re both cornered into a relationship of which we can’t get out, even don’t want out, yet love each other. Well, at least I love him. I don’t know if it’s mutual but I have a fair guess it is. But then again: I could be totally wrong

 

So bless you; the one who got to read to the end of this . Any suggestions? What should I do? What exactly am i feeling for this man

[Keridan]

I think you really need to figure this out before Nicolas comes to see you. He has the right to expect that you've settled your past before you promise him anymore of your future. You obviously care about him, but you spent the entire post on Jonathan and barely commented on Nicolas at all.

 

Think about this: What if Nicolas had made that post about the woman you are fighting over?

 

You are infatuated with Jonathan. He has been an icon for your desires for a long time now and he is a challenge and a fun thought. You know it's not going to happen, but you are so stuck on thoughts of him that you refuse to close the door entirely. You probably do love him, but that's not enough by itself. I don't think talking to him about your feelings would have the effect you want.

 

I think you do need to decide whether these feelings have kept you from honestly comitting to Nicolas. Suppose you two got together and made further commitments and then Jonathan came and said "I love you! I have to be with you! I'm not complete without you!" Would you be able to react in a way that was fair to Nicolas? I think he deserves to know so he can make an informed decision about the two of you. You also need to decide if having these feelings means you are not ready to be with him right now.

 

I don't mean to be judgemental. I have a bias against things that hint at dishonesty. To me, this reaks of it. Feel free to disregard my advice. I just had to share it. Al Gore invented the internet so we would all have a voice

[shannon]

Thanks for the reply . You indeed seem a bit biased. Sorry to say it. I don't know what happened to you but it obviously wasn't pretty

 

I know I mainly talked about Jonathan because if I had talked about Nicolas this whole post would have been twice as long . And basically Nicolas is not my problem but Jonathan is

 

And Nicolas basically knows. He knows how special Jonathan is to me.

[imagine]

Hey there S

 

This is a very interesting variation of what is called an emotional affair (EA).

 

Nicholas is your b/f and is tangible. He is your "in your face reality" and the "warts and creases" of everyday life.

 

Jonathan is unfettered by any of these. There is no baggage here and will always remain an exciting mystery.

 

You have possibly shared something of yourself with Jonathan. The internet has this ability of imparting a feeling of security and safety. He has interacted and met emotional needs. You connected!

 

Whether you like to believe it or not, you are splitting your emotional energies. This makes you a candidate to cheat. NOTE WELL: I am NOT saying that you are a wilful cheater. What I am saying, is that you are inexperienced in recognizing boundaries.

 

I commend you for seeking advice as this shows concern about a potentially difficult situation. Even though you think it is academic.

 

Strangely enough, I am going to recommend you to visit the "Marriage Builders" website. These folk that run the site have a program of study which is entirely beneficial to ANYONE in a relationship.

 

God bless your cotton socks!

[shannon]

Thank you; I might check that website out once. It sounds rather conservative but I'll have a look at it anyway