Advice urgently needed! (girl issue)

In My Humble Opinion (IMHO)
#1

Backstory: So there was this girl in 9th grade who I had quite a crush on. Never had the guts to talk to her, spent all summer wishing I had, start 10th grade, and she had moved away. I had missed my chance.

I’m in my 3rd year of college. I started a myspace account and decided to see who I could find from the area. “Hmm…that girl looks vaguely familiar.” Holy shit!

Anyway, I took a chance and IM’ed her (she said in her profile that she was welcome to meeting new people and making friends). Surprisingly we hit it off and talk for about 5 hours about almost everything, including my shyness in high school.

Now, obviously I’m quite interested in this girl. After finally talking to her after all these years she’s turning out to be an even cooler person than I had imagined she was back when I didn’t have the guts to even say “hi.”

Anyway, on to my conflict. Tonight we got to talking about currently relationship status. She’s single (for the time being) but her best friend goes to another college, and after having spent the last two weekends up there, she has a crush on a particular guy who might like her back. We actually started talking about crushes and I made the following point, without specifying who I was thinking about:

I made a point about how bad the odds look for someone who has feelings for a girl, considering that
-The girl probably already likes someone else (or more than one person)
-The girl probably also has numerous male friends who have feelings for her

This makes the situation rather dismal because it means that a guy has to practically sweep a girl off her feet if he’s to have any shot in hell with her. He has to get to know her, get her mind off of the person she’s smitten with, and show her that he can provide something that all her male friends lack.

Now, given this girl’s particular situation, I’m afraid that if I wish to have any chance I may only have a 4 or 5 day window, maximum. Granted, I didn’t want things to be this rushed. I would have liked to take it slower and gotten to know each other, but it’s seeming like I might have to forgo all that and take the big plunge. It was already my plan to see if she wanted to hang out this weekend, but now it seems that I’m going to have to ask her out or make some kind of move after only just meeting her.

Is this a smart idea? Is there any other option? Any way I can just take her mind off this other guy without having to profess my feelings and face what could bring this new friendship to an end? I feel like for some reason I’ve been given a second chance with this girl, but I don’t want to blow it by rushing things if I don’t absolutely need to. Help!

#2

trust your instincts. your instincts say rushing it is a bad idea, and in all honesty, they’re probably right. most people aren’t going to be swept off their feet in a matter of days, especially not over the internet, so any advances you make at this point would likely just alienate her. so what if she hooks up with another guy? yeah, it’s not ideal, but if she’s going to be overwhelmingly attracted to you, the fact that she’s with someone else won’t stop it.

I had a similar situation, actually, now that I think of it: I met a girl on the internet, fell in love with her very quickly, and as soon as I realized it she was hooking up with someone else. oh well-- we stayed in contact, and eventually she fell in love with me anyway, and now we’ve been together a little over a year. I don’t believe in fate or destiny or “the One” or any of that starry-eyed fairy-tale bullshit… but I do believe in compatibility, and human ability to recognize it over time. if you’re really compatible, she’ll see it, but maybe not right away. if you’re not, well, you’ll find that out too. at any rate, rushing into anything relationship-wise is almost categorically a bad idea.

#3

Did she end up leaving that other guy to be with you, or did you just have wait out a long relationship? If the latter, you must have nerves of steel my friend.

#4

So ask her out. Remember, you haven’t really “met” her, this time at least, until you’ve spent some time together IRL. Spend some time with her this weekend, and after that you’ll know whether to worry about this deal or forget it.

#5

Ask her out.

#6

Too many “ifs” in your scenario - let’s just stick to the facts, Jack. You like this girl, you have some history with her, and you are getting along just fine with her. Don’t even think about any other guys she may or may not like - just proceed as naturally as you are able with her. If she’s interested in you, it will work out, if she isn’t, it won’t, and you’ll move on to someone who IS interested in you, possibly having made a good friend in the process.

#7

Take it slow!

It’s a hard lesson in life, but you may have to grow some nerves of steel. If she likes another guy, let her do what she’s going to do. If it doesn’t work out, you’ll have developed a friendship with her, which could turn out to be the most important thing in the long run.

I’m speaking as a girl who would be “faithful” to my crushes, though. I’m not saying* all * girls, but IME, many girls will turn down someone who asks them out if they have their hearts set on another. We are female. We have spent time planning, daydreaming, imagining every possible scenario, hoping to catch a glimpse, speak to, or brush up against our crushes each and every day.

If you ask her out and she says yes, be prepared for her to still be attached to her crush. She’ll always be getting a little thrill everytime she sees her old crush… and wonder what would have happened if she had gone out with him instead. Nerves of steel? You’ll need balls of steel to handle that scenario. These are the relationships that turn into insecurity, smothering, and sometimes cheating. Is that what you want with this girl? :frowning:

Take it slow. If she goes out with this other guy, suck it up and stay friends with her. You may be the shoulder she cries on when things turn sour. That’s how I met my husband. :wink:
This is all just my very humble opinion, based only on my own experiences. YMMV, naturally, but I did want you to be able to see another possible side of this situation. Think of the big picture.

Good luck!

#8

There’s the key.

When you say “take the plunge,” what do you mean exactly? Having some serious conversation where you discuss your crush on her is not a good idea. Far too much of a plunge. Just ask her if she wants to hang out this weekend and see how it goes from there.

#9

Updating…

So as of right now she says that the chances of her going up to PSU are better than her chances of staying here this weekend, but she’s still not 100% sure. But considering that she may still like the guy up there who probably also likes her, if she goes this weekend, my chances are pretty much gone.

Following my instinct, I wouldn’t admit my feelings to her, and I would settle for being friends why she engages in a new relationship. But here’s the thing. For me, personally, my instincts have never gotten me anywhere. If I had followed my usual instincts I probably would not have IM’ed this girl in the first place. But I really think she’s worth the risk.

So I might have to fess up to her tonight or tomorrow over the phone if she does in fact decide to go up to PSU. Granted, I don’t expect her to have a change of heart, but we haven’t even had the opportunity to see if we’re compatible in person yet, and already I might miss that chance forever. Losing this opportunity essentially gives me the following options:

  1. Hold out through her new relationship, with all the mental anguish it will bring, and pray to God it will end someday and I will have a real opportunity.
  2. Begin looking for a girl that I probably won’t be anywhere near as crazy about because I’ll still be hung up on the first girl.

And given my current average of about one girl every two years that I’m in anyway compatible with (not even taking into consideration if they’re single or not, which they usually aren’t), she’s likely to be single again before I find another girl anyway, assuming the relationship doesn’t last.

I want to be friends with this girl, that is important to me, but I also need to consider what I might say to her tonight or tomorrow. I missed my opportunity six years ago. I don’t want to miss it again. :frowning:

And to repeat my question to nevermore, did the girl realize she was in love with you and then leave her current boyfriend to be with you? Or did you have to wait out the whole relationship?

And Anastasaeon, same question. Did you fall for your husband and leave the guy you were currently with or did he have the fun of waiting out the relationship?

#10

Yeah, might as well. What’s the worst that can happen?

#11

She could reject me. Which would be bad enough. But if it damaged our developing friendship it would be even worse.

#12

Ask her out. Or at least say “you know, I had this absolutely huge crush on you in high school. Right now I think you are really cool and I really want to get to know you better, but I’d rather not date you and ruin a chance for a great friendship. But part of me really has just wanted to ask you out.” If you want to wimp out and wait until after the weekend when she has a boyfriend so you can pass this off as “relieved you don’t need to do this now” …

Personally, I suspect the whole crush conversation was leading and she wanted you to fess up. But you were there and I wasn’t.

As someone who spent my 20s and 30s discovering all the guys who thought I was cute in high school and college and never asked me out because they didn’t think they had a chance…I say plllllllllhfffffffft! Yeah, there were a couple who I felt no chemistry for and would have turned down, but most of them I had just been confused over why they never asked me out. You’d be surprised how often great, pretty girls don’t get asked out and don’t get the guy.

#13

Because then you’d… have to change your name, and go live amongst the creatures of the forest, so that no one would know your shame?

Seriously – it’s no big deal. You try, you get shot down. What of it? If she likes you as a friend, then she can still like you as a friend.

(Although I have to admit that when I was single, there were times I’d tell a girl I was interested and I’d get the, “Oh, I just like you as a friend,” and I’d reply, “Thanks, but I have enough friends already,” because frankly, I did. I was interested on a romantic level, and that was that. Equally curious – in two of those cases, she ended up dating me after all. Go figure.)

#14

The human mind tends to put a greater emphasis on a small loss than it does on a big gain.

She can’t say no until you ask her. If she says no, life will go on. I promise.

#15

The girl that I fell for knew I was interested in her, wasn’t interested in me that way, but we became great friends. Meanwhile, she was interested in my best friend, and despite the horrible crush I had on her, I ended up HELPING her try to hook up with my best friend. It didn’t work out. I was there for her through all that.

We’ve been married six and a half years. :slight_smile:

#16

Aah, if only my mind worked like that of a normal person’s. You know that fluttery feeling you get in your stomach when you have a crush on someone? Well for me, when I either miss an opportunity (as I did with this girl 6 years ago) or realize that nothing will ever materialize out of something, I become clinically depressed.

I lose my appetite. I lose my ability to focus at work or pretty much anything I do. And on top of that I become one of the most bitter and morose people to be around. These feelings have lasted me from weeks to sometimes years on and off after I am forced to come down from crushes. I simply become unable to function. Go do a search for my user name, and you will see that the majority of my early posts were me posting about how utterly hopeless I felt. Most of those feelings were the product of past crushes on girls I either didn’t feel I had a chance with or girls I know I didn’t have a chance with.

I always get told that women can smell desperation from a mile away. Well I don’t really know what to do about that, because I am desperate. I am absolutely desperate for human contact and affection. But what sucks even more is that if things don’t happen with this girl, I would end up being hung up on her and would just compare any other girl I might have feelings for with this first girl, and they probably won’t stack up in my mind.

I have never had this close of a chance with someone I’ve actually liked before. I dated one girl in 11th grade out of (you guessed it) desperation and that ended up going no where because we had been setup by friends and weren’t compatible in the slightest. At least I had the experience or else I would currently be a 21 year old guy who hasn’t even kissed a girl. Right now I’m just filled with a sense of dread that I’ll never actually get to be with a girl I’m really crazy about, and I’ll just have to settle for a girl who’s willing to settle for me. :frowning:

Fuck. I haven’t even asked this girl out yet and I’m already feeling depressed about the potential negative results.

I think I’m just going to go for it. Through talking to her I’ve learned that I wasn’t out of her league in 9th grade, as I thought I had been. I missed my chance with her then and regretted it for years, I don’t think I’d ever forgive myself if I had to face that kind of regret again.

#17

Good for you. Faint heart never won fair lady.

Be honest, don’t come on too strong, be yourself, and don’t wimp out. Tonight’s the night to be fearless.

Good luck. :slight_smile:

#18

Great, turns out the friend I thought she was going up to visit won’t even be there this weekend.

She might be going up to spend the weekend with this guy she has a crush on. She’ll probably stay at his place.

Oh well, better get my feelings out in the open now so I can just go crawl into a bottle of bourbon. Or a hole in the ground.

See you all next year.

#19

Well, apparently, my husband says he had a huge crush on me since the first day he met me - while I was engaged to another man. Want to talk balls of steel? The other man was his best friend. :eek:

My relationship with the other guy lasted two years. While my husband had been dating another girl at the time, they broke up about a year after I’d met him (she was cheating on him). He had a crush on me, but it was not relationship-threatening. After they broke up, his interest in me became much deeper.

So, for about a year, he and I were just friends. We talked a lot, and he became one of my best friends. Finally, the awful day came when my fiance left me… and moved in with another woman. My husband was enraged… but secretly hopeful, too! He thought my ex, his best friend, was possibly the stupidest man who ever walked the earth. My ex didn’t want to deal with the mess he left behind, so he said, “you talk to her.” Basically, “you take care of my mess.” He practically handed me over to him.

And so, when my heart was broken and my world was crushed, he was there. He listened, and was very patient. He let me blubber on and on and on (and on and on) as long as I needed to, whatever it took. He encouraged me to talk about how I felt, encouraged me to cry when I needed to, and never once implied he was in love with me. He was just there for me, the one person who let me get it all out, who let me cry without acting embarrassed, who just loved me for who I was, even at my worst. A year later, he invited me out for Christmas…

And confessed his feelings for me…

And I looked at him and saw what kind of person he was… and I fell deeply in love. Yeah, just like that. Three whole years. :eek: We’ve been happily married for two years. Some people seem to think that we got married so quickly, and we did, but really, it took a* long * time to grow that relationship.

I sincerely hope that if your situation turns in your favour that things progress quicker than that! However, I have to say, patience may be a bitch, but my husband and love each other very deeply and have an enormous amount of respect and trust for each other because of our past experiences. If I had run off with the man who is now my husband five years ago, our relationship would have been* HELL * - because I didn’t know then what I know now. I had major insecurities, trust issues, just ISSUES that would have been awful to bring into the relationship.

As I said before, this is just my personal experience, your mileage will certainly vary. Pining for someone sucks, and I’m so sorry you have to go through that.

Whatever decision you ultimately make, whether you end up with her or without her, I hope it is what ends up being what’s best for you. Like I said, I just wanted to show you another possible side of the coin… not to be too negative, but just food for thought. None of us here can say definitively what will happen, no matter what you choose to do, and can only speak from our experiences, so go with what feels right for you.

Once again, good luck. I wish you happiness no matter what happens.

#20

Soapbox, seriously, there are 3 billion women in the world. You really need to get some perspective here. This girl is NOT, I repeat, NOT your one and only chance at happiness. As you get older and meet more people and get more confident and comfortable in your own skin, you’ll look back at your 21 year old perspective and laugh at yourself, and how you got yourself all tied up in knots over asking this one girl for a date.

Ask her out. Ask every girl you meet out. Develop your dating and social skills and get better and better at them (they are skills, and they can be developed - people aren’t just born magically knowing how to date). Do yourself a huge favour and ease off some of the pressure you’re putting on yourself.