Heart broken, loss of friend and love

[QuestionandKnow]

So this is kind of a long story. I apologize for the length but this has really been bothering me. I would like to hear the opinion of men but anyone please feel free to share.

 

So there is this guy I use to work with. We became friends and we were extremely close, we hung out often and when we weren't hanging out we would text consistently. We were cool, almost a year into our friendship I found myself falling for him. This was not the plan because if you would have suggested romance with him at the beginning I would have been mortified. But as time went on and I got to know him more and more I found myself falling. We have so much in common. Our interest overlap, we have the right amount of agreeing and disagreeing, we came from different economic backgrounds but a lot of our family and home issues are relatable to each other.

 

Background on us as people…

 

He is Puerto Rican 23 year old from the hood, single mother, lives in a multi-generational/ extended family household, has a sister with autism, hates some of the family members in his house, his father is a heroin addict and has other sibling by that father he doesn't know. His grandfather was his father figure but they had a falling out and he died before it was resolved.

 

Me, I am 26 year old black woman who grew up in an upper middle class suburb. My father died and caused a financial and emotional strain on the family. My home became multi-generational when I was in elementary school. I don't really know my extended family.

 

He is a big drinker... Alright he's an alcoholic. It began when he turned 21. I’ve known him since he was 20. He didn’t drink underage, he basically became an alcoholic overnight. We had been out drinking quite a few times but he only got completely wasted around me once. I cut him off, held him up, took him home with me. He told me that I was the real friend because I cut him off. The other people in our circle find it funny and sometimes scary. He gets angry and violently shouts at people. He commented that I am the only one who's not scared of him. He’s never violently shouted at me but would come to me for a hug after he's done it to someone else.

 

Getting to know him I would say he has self-worth issues and abandonment issues. If he goes into his dark place he would tell me how he hates his face because he looks like his father and his father is the devil. Talk about his strained relationship with his mother and the uncle he hates. (Note he wouldn’t have to be drunk to tell me things like this). I would be just as open about my life with him.

 

When I realized that I loved him, I kept it to myself. I didn't know if he felt the same and I didn't want to risk ruining our friendship because it was awesome! I have never felt so understood and appreciated in my life. I’m not really an open person unless I get really comfortable with someone. I can count the number of real friends I have on one hand. I don’t have meaningless friendships. When I make a good friend it’s a big deal.

 

One night we went to a late movie with friends. We were killing time at a bar beforehand. He was telling me how everyone always leaves him and asked me not to leave him and I said I wouldn't. There was a moment when we found ourselves alone. He rested his head on my shoulder and placed his hand on top of mine and thanked me for coming. Later when we went into the movie, I had my face pressed into the back of my seat (scary movies aren't really my thing lol), he rubbed my back comfortingly and kissed me on the cheek. I was surprised we'd only shared hugs and when I finally stopped cowering and turned my face around, bam. He came right in for my lips and I liked him so I accepted the kiss.

 

Later when we crashed at a friend’s place, we were alone again. He told me he had feelings for me, that he loved me. We made out a little but I kept pulling away from him and he asked what was wrong. I told him that I was worried he would never speak to me again and he assured me I didn’t have to worry about that. That's where our non-dating began I guess there was just a new element to our friendship. We would hang out have a great time, talk about any and everything, snuggle, and make plans. Although sometimes out of the blue he would tell me he was a scumbag. It would be like, will you please pass me the ketchup, I'm a scumbag. I'd ask why and he would say because I am.

 

I was foolish. I thought we were getting ready to become something. I didn’t see a white picket fence in our future but I thought we were getting ready to have a real relationship. All inclusive of bumps and joy.

 

About six weeks in we went out drinking after work with some coworkers. He was tipsy and told me he was going to hurt me, I said I know. (The guy I like telling me he liked me is not something that happens to me). He asked if I was ready for it and I just shrugged. He went on to say "we're just having fun right?" My heart sank and he explained how we're young and don't need to be in anything serious. I still can't wrap my head around the idea that someone I knew for so long just wanted to hook up. And to make matters worse, that he didn't know me well enough to know I would never agree to that.

 

It was the delusional hope in me that allowed myself to still go home with him. Tonight he decided to try and escalate things because we hadn't slept together, I was hesitant. He asked what was wrong and I told him he wasn't mine. He told me he was never anybody’s and didn't understand why I would want that and that he was bad at it because he's lazy. But he understood and still loved me.

 

So after that night he changed his schedule at work so he would never be there at the same time as me. At first I thought it was coincidence but it happened consistently for about three weeks. I never saw or heard from him.

 

At a mutual friends party is the next time I saw him and he ignored me until he was sufficiently drunk. He asked why I didn't say hello to him and I said why should I, you haven't spoken to me in three weeks. Then he shouted I don't want to be in a relationship and that we were nothing I explained that wasn't a reason to stop talking to me.

 

So we were social for the rest of the evening and when he was fall over drunk our friend said I could put him in his bed. When I was doing that he told me he was a scumbag. I asked why and for the first time he told me. He said because he wasn't going to be with me because he didn't want to hurt me and that everyone in his family hurts everyone and it’s hereditary.

 

After this night he began being friendly towards me again but not like before. If we made plans he would start canceling at the last minute. He stopped talking to me like he used to.

 

We have this friend who would always try to get me to talk to her about him but I was hesitant. I usually don’t kiss and tell. But she would tell me things he said to her here and there anyway. He told her that he felt like he was pressuring me. Which is weird because he never made any real moves to get into my pants again. He told her that he tried to make out with me in the back of a movie theater and felt bad about it.

 

I began suspecting him of messing around with some of our other coworkers. I ultimately left the job because it was hard to look at what I couldn't have. My friend and the guy I had feelings for. He always said if I quit he would quit, the day I gave in my notice he called and quit on the spot.

 

We saw each other a couple times, the two of us just hanging out and at mutual friends parties and constantly updated each other on our lives. He would initiate plans with me and then cancel. Back in the spring I initiated the plans and he said he was broke and wanted to go out the following week. The day before the day we had decided on, I texted him to confirm and he just responded with I’m a terrible friend. I said I guess that’s a no and I wouldn’t ask again. We didn’t see each other but she still text.

 

So back in July he invited me on a hiking trip with friends for his birthday. He also informed me that the new job I had applied to had called our ex-manager for a reference. I asked him how he knew and he explained that he had seen him the night before.

 

There was a going away party for the ex-managers roommate. It bothered me because the same guy who won’t see me made an effort to see someone else we know. This isn’t the first time he’s done this and I know because of the wonders of social media. Not to mention at least a month before his birthday he made plans with them for his birthday.

 

August came as it got closer to the date I asked for the finalized details for this hiking trip. Turned out the location had changed there was a decision to drive in a car that had no room for me. He didn't uninvited me he just told me who was taking the seats and he wanted to invite more people. So I wished him a happy early birthday and said to have fun. When he lol-ed me back "but my birthdays not for two weeks" I just had it. So I sent him a long text about why I wished him a happy birthday now instead of on the actual day. It stated how I was delusional to believe we were ever friends and I guess I'm the one he doesn't mind being terrible to because among the people we know I am the only one he does this to. I told him to note that I didn't leave him I got pushed away.

 

So almost 12 hours to the minute I got a ten message long response from him about how he's still messed up, still a drunk, has a hard time living with himself, that he does want to see me and not just select people, he told everyone he wanted me to come hiking and he's trying to change. I guess he decided to change in those 12 hours because he did the same type of thing he always did ever since he told me he liked me. That's where our friendship falter when he admitted to having feelings for me. He also assured me that he cares about all his relationships that he’s trying to get a grip on the fact that people out there who care about him, that he considers me a great friend and that he was confident that we would see each other again.

 

In this message he also decided to tell me he has been dating this girl for quite some time and that he gave her a hard time too and doesn't know how she puts up with him. Which was an eye roll for me, she puts up with him because he lets her.

 

I've seen other people since him and this just broke me because he was using the word dating he doesn't do that. They're still together (it’s been 5 months) so he's in a relationship which he also claimed he doesn't do. Not to mention all this time he had been talking to me, he never mentioned her. So on this day of long messages he also decided to join Instagram, he had no social media. He followed everyone we know except me.

 

The weekend of the hike came and early in the morning a got a text from one of the people going saying that they were throwing him a last minute birthday party at someone's house. So I asked him if he knew I was invited. He said yes and a little later he texted me again saying he called off the hike because his mother had lost her job (he helps out at home).

 

I did not go to this party and I am glad I didn't due to the wonders of Instagram, the girl he called "this girl" he took with him. Discovering him dating someone brought up so many questions and it broke me. I spent two and half weeks crying, throwing up, and not eating. I just couldn’t.

 

Why didn’t he ever tell me about her? They had already been together for two months. He takes photos with her and posts them all over Instagram. He would never take photos with me even when we were just friends. He would always make up some excuse. Why wasn’t this girl invited on the hiking trip? He’s acting as if he doesn’t want a thing to do with me but keeps talking to me. Why not just tell me to piss off?

 

On his actual birthday a very good friend of ours tag us in post about missing us, he moved away. That day he began following me. I personally think it was guilt or shame or a little of both.

 

Later it all made sense why the girl wasn’t invited on the hiking trip. The following week they went away alone to DC. A trip he and I were supposed to take but he gave me the run around on. While away he texted me to ask if the reason I wanted to know if he knew I was invited was because I no longer wanted to be invited to things like that. Because he would be there and I no longer wanted to have anything to do with him. I told him that it would have been awkward. He assured me it wouldn't have been and that he was upset I wasn't there. That he was sorry, he understood, and that maybe sometime there wouldn’t be any awkwardness. I explained it would be awkward for me because he broke my heart he seems to have an issue with me that he won’t tell me about. And that he was so adamant about not wanting a relationship and now he's in one. He didn't respond but precede to like a photo of me a couple days later.

 

I still can’t believe he didn’t think it would be awkward. Me the girl who wanted to be with him but he only wanted to sleep with in the room with the girl he decided to be in a relationship with. To make it worse everyone else in the room knows about me and him. I would have felt like a bigger fool than I already do. It would have been like that scene in “Gone with the Wind” when Scarlet O’Hara goes to Ashley Wilkes birthday party in the red dress after they shared a moment earlier on in the day. I would have felt like the mistress.

 

I stopped looking at Instagram. I didn’t follow him back but his page is public. I didn’t go on facebook because he sometimes pops up in the photos of my friends. Sometime between last Thursday and early September he stopped following me. It was probably at the beginning of the month I asked him a question. He didn’t respond but last Thursday I logged into Instagram for the first time to post photos of a trip I just took and he was no longer in my followers list.

 

He's never been good with questions. You just have to let him tell you.

 

I was someone who encouraged him in everything he wanted to do. Just went out and had fun with him. Assured him that just because of circumstance does not make him the bad person he thinks he is. I was someone he could be real with and talk about his home life with because he didn't do that with our other friends unless he was wasted. They probably don't know why he canceled his hike.

 

He's never said it to my face but to our friends that I'm too good for him. It usually went ... he would get drunk claim no one loves him and they would bring up me and he would say I'm too good. He got drunk one night and told our friend that he thought he could get me. He got quiet for a really long time and didn't say anything. Then said he really likes me. She suggested he approach me from that stand point and he said that didn't make any sense.

 

But he decided to try for a white, purple haired, vegan, culinary student. I guess the black, curly hair, vegetarian, design student wasn't worth the effort. I don’t know if race has anything to do with it. But since we were friends first I know who was before me and they were women of color. He never committed to any of them.

 

I can only speculate. Which I do a lot because I have this terrible affliction with liking to understand. It’s better than being angry. I think this so called new him/ trying to change is fake. Although this is so long there is so much that’s happened and been said not included in this. I think his Instagram is too make himself look happy. Because he doesn’t like to think about the past which is why he is so scarred and refuses to deal with it. It’s almost as if he’s putting on the happy show. He’s posted drawings he’s done which he wouldn’t let anyone see and I think it’s so he looks like he’s something to this girl. So he won’t just be another Latino guy working a menial hourly job who dropped out of community college.

 

She’s only been in town since April and two months in started a relationship with him. She’s one of those kids that move to Brooklyn with roommates and works part time and can call home for money. Essentially she’s like a character from Girls. A life I think he admires in a way because it’s not like his. It seems like she’s just like the circle of acquaintances we have they don’t make him look at himself.

 

I can write him off as a jerk or just an emotionally unavailable man who’s using this girl to stroke his ego, have sex with him (I amuse she’s slutty because she posted a photo of her new apartment building online with the caption she has a new place to **** him in), and make him believe he's not a jerk.

 

He can’t lie to me, I know his tells very well. I think the problem is I make him feel like the scumbag he said he was. Because I’ve done nothing to him but care about him even when he’s been a jerk and I can see right through him. If I do see him again I’ll know whether or not this is all the sham I think it is. And he knows that. As hurt as I am some parts of me hope that I’m wrong. Because in the long run this will only hurt his mental stability more.

 

I also find myself wondering if we'll ever be friends again. I also find myself wondering if we were ever friends or if trying to sleep with me was the plan from the beginning.

 

He was a big deal to me and I guess I'm just trying to get peace. I don't talk about the affect he had on me. It's almost sad that I felt more comfortable venting like this to strangers.

[mystikmind2005]

Long story there, but it seems fairly clear to me what is going on....

 

He has tried to tell you many times, but you don't seem to get it? It is simple, he loves you and does not want to ruin your life by dragging you down with him.

 

He won't love this other girl like you, because he is in a relationship with her!

 

He is a guy, so he has attraction for you to deal with, but aside from that, all his actions are consistent with a guy who who does not want to let you get to close in order to avoid dragging you down with him.