Too good friends to ruin it...

[Tosso]

Ok, here's the situation - I'll give you some background story even though it's insignificant to the actual dilemma.

 

My mate got a girl's number and after a while asked her out. Being the interested friend I am I thought I'd take the time out to get to know the girl and we really hit it off. After about 4 months into the relationship my mate was getting really paranoid (probably from all his weed smoking) and really possesive over her and she wanted out. There was always a slight attraction between me and the girl and one night when we were a little drunk (while she was still with my mate) we kissed. We decided it was a stupid thing and we'd blame it on the drink and just not tell anyone. Being the nice girl she is she wanted to try and let him down gently (not to be with me, just because she wanted out) but she went about it the wrong way and managed to drag things out for another month or so. In this time we hung out a lot and I really got to know her and knew I had stronger feelings that just friendship. After they broke up we both realised that we felt the same way but couldn't do anything about it except share the occasional kiss.

 

Now recently she's been going through a hard time (with fallings out with her family, living in a small rented house and not knowing when they're going to be able to buy a house or where it will be) and she really depends on me and says she loves me, and I love her too. Anyway, recently we started doing stuff again and she was like, "We're too good friends. If we get together and then break up we're not going to be able to stay friends." as this has happened in her past experiences. So we stopped doing stuff and went back to being just friends yet every now and then we'll just end up kissing anyway but the next day it'll always just go back to being friends and her saying she couldn't deal with losing me if we broke up.

 

My problem is, I really really really want to be more than friends with this girl. I'd do anything to make her happy so if she really doesn't want to get with me I'll accept it but the thing is she does, she's just scared of what might happen. I know I would never let anything come between our friendship but she says that it just happens, we can't control it etc. I don't know what to do because I know if I really pressured her she would go out with me (although I don't want to do that because it's unfair) and yet if I agree to what she wants then I'm going to be unhappy. What I'm trying to do is find a middle ground but it appears there is none.

 

Argh!!! That probably made no sense whatsoever but if anyone can help me or give me suggestions on what I should do, please do, I really feel I need the help as it's hard to talk to anyone about this (considering it's my mate's ex and all my other mates are also mates with him).

[sean001]

This situation sux.

 

First of all, do you have "rules" with your friends about dating their exes? I know that any one of my friend's girlfriends automatically becomes off limits -- usually forever, but there can be exceptions depending on how long they went out and how it ended, etc. I wouldn't risk your friendship over some girl, unless he's OK with that (and I mean REALLY ok with it -- sometimes he may say it's ok but inside hate you).

 

So the first thing you need to do is find out if you could actually DATE her without losing your friend and having all your old mates give you a smackdown. I wouldn't go and just ask him about it because that creates a whole set of problems -- for a girl that may not even be into you. Just make a judgment call.

 

So far as the thing with her -- forget it. You can't be friends. I don't ocassionally "kiss" my friends. That's just BS. These problems don't come with real friends. Either you're both on the same page (what you want is what she wants) or you're not. No middle ground. Besides, how can you really be "friends" with one of your buddy's exes? What are you going to do? Invite her out with the guys for a night of drinking beer and pool?

[LucreziaBorgia]

Originally posted by Tosso

"We're too good friends. If we get together and then break up we're not going to be able to stay friends."

 

Generally speaking - that can be translated as "I like you and like hanging around with you, and kissing you is great, but I don't see enough potential in you as boyfriend material."

 

Put it this way. Would you go about kissing your male friends like that? What you have with this girl is not 'friends'. It is a lukewarm, halfhearted, romantic involvement with no commitment - she gets all the benefits, while you get the heartache.

 

The way out is to be direct. Tell her that you are not interested in being just friends, as you have an emotional attachment to her that goes beyond friendship and being 'just friends' would be too painful. The friendship thing (friends in a real sense) will work only, ONLY if you both are willing to give up any romantic feelings or attractions you have for each other.