Why oh why do you refrain from your own feelings, girl?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Yes, the “let’s be frieeeeeeeeeends” is pretty much the Doom of Romance. The problem is that the “romantic movies” are basically written as “Stalker Male” gets “Severely Dysfunctional Female” writ large.

In real life, NO means NO, and “let’s just be friends” means “LET’S JUST BE FRIENDS”.

This from a straight male with a bunch of female friends. Trust me, they really, really, really mean it when they say that. Friends who want to be your friend are …nice to you. And people have a way of projecting onto other people, especially when sexual drives are involved.

So humor her, and believe that what she says is literally true.

In the .0001% of cases where they don’t, in the vast majority of those cases, she’ll only express interest when you’ve either moved on, or have an actual, functioning girlfriend (or reasonable facsimile thereof), or if she’s raving psycho.

None of those contingencies work in your favor.

In short, the well-adjusted, sane, good-for-you women don’t pull the “friends” bit as a prelude to encouraging stalker-grade behaviour from a possible beau.

So, nothing to see here, move along.

22

Ok No. No. You are all just (well, almost all of you… John Carter I agree with) wrong. She likes me. She messages me like a gazillion times a day to inquire how I am. And frankly, her “i wanna be friends” line is meant to be interpreted like “I like you, but I don’t really know you and I’m afraid you might not be exactly who you seem to be… but please don’t give up on me, please be who I hope you are… and then we’ll be something more than friends”.

And you say I don’t get it… damn it, I think I’m one of the few people who do get it. I just can’t believe the luck of this girl, most other people - boys or girls, from the look of this thread - would totally think she just wanted me to go away. And frankly, part of why I’m so pissed off at this is because I guess I knew that… and the imature part of me seems to want to “play along” with believing that, even though I really don’t…

To be fair, I have more information than everyone else in this forum about her, of course. Not that I’ve known her very long, but still… For instance, the minute after she told me the LBF line, she grabbed on to the chance of going with me to the blood donor event I was attending next saturday… She doesn’t want me to give up, I tell her. Damn it, I “get” what she is thinking… even if I don’t understand it clearly, I’m not used to this… I just wish she knew that.

I think she will be one lucky girl if by miracle we still end up together. Oh, and to everyone who still thinks she just wants to be left alone… I think you’re wrong. But please, continue hitting me with your honest opinion, it seems to make me get into gear thoughtwise and, by explaining what’s going on to you, I’m also explaning it to myself…

To everyone who thinks I’m right (or might be right… I guess not even I can be sure I’m right, but… I don’t think now is the time to be flaky), thank you for believing me.

Keep those opinions coming.

23

And of course that should read: " I tell you".

24

How fortunate to be able to read her mind and know what she really means. Must cut out an awful lot of misunderstandings. Pity she doesn’t realise you have this gift.

No, you’re simply deluded. She does want you to go away. I would too, in her position; this is bordering on an unhealthy obsession: you think she’s lucky that you won’t leave her in peace because you alone truly understand her.

So you haven’t known her long, but are still able to infer from her going to give blood with you that she means the opposite of what she says and wants you to harass her. How do you say “John Hinkley” in Portugese?

I think you will be one lucky guy if you escape a restraining order, if you carry on this way.

25

I whole-heartedly disagree with you, but this was hell funny :).

Anyway… you can relax because I’ll leave her very much alone until that event. And in that event I plan on giving her nothing more than a friendly side of me.

Anyway 2… I couldn’t resist and I sent her a message (SMS… she seems to like using it a lot) saying I think I understood what she wanted more than I seemed to demonstrate. See, all you worried people out there, I’m not some psycho guy that simple makes up stories in his head and only sees his truth… I communicate! She asked what exactly did I understood (smart reply that), and I gave her a short version of what I said in this thread… without the judgemental part. Added some humor at the end, something like “And that sums it up. When are we eating popcorn?” (cause that’s her nickname for me) (now that I think about it, this was very nicely done… I think I have more people skills than I realise… I hope they develop).
She replied “could it be cotton candy?” (which is my nickname for her)

And that, ladies and gentleman, is the sign of someone who acts acording to my theory of the first post. Hopefully.

26

Errrr…

an answer from Spain, which for some reason I think Joazito may appreciate.

  • The barriers are worn by people of both sexes. And yes, they suck.

  • I know this girl, see. She’s from a town 100km from mine. She met a guy in an Easter celebration in my hometown and this guy and his best pal would go to her town, and these guys and this girl and her friends would meet and go to the public pool or for a walk or movies or whatever, and this girl’s friends would tease her about her boyfriend but she’d say, with complete sincerity, “oh, no, we’re just friends!”
    Wedding date, November 20, 1999. Their firstborn, aka The Nephew, is one year and one week old today :smiley: and I know several dozen couples with similar stories… mind you, all from Spain, not the States.

27

Thanks, Nava. Yes I do appreciate it.

I just have to go offtopic for a second and point out the humor in the google ad displayed for this thread is from a site called noonebelievesme.com… priceless :slight_smile:

28

Mine are for April Fools :snerk:

29

Just to play Devil’s Advocate for a moment:

You say you haven’t known her long. Could it conceivably be possible that she enjoys the romantic attention you give her because it makes her feel good about herself, makes her feel pretty, rather than because she likes YOU?

If she liked you, she’d take a chance on you. If she’s that “scared”, she’d say “I like you and I want to be with you, but I’m scared, so let’s take it slow.” Then you would be dating, albeit…er, slowly.

“Let’s be friends” unfortunately means nothing else is likely going to come out of it. Take a giant step back. Tell her, “I don’t feel like “just your friend”. I really like you and I want to be with you. If you don’t feel that way about me, or you aren’t ready, I certainly can’t judge you for that, but I can’t pretend to just be your friend.”

Then, don’t call her or text her. If she texts you, respond “Seriously, I can’t do the “friends” thing. I still adore you. If you ever feel like we can be more, I’ll be here.” Then leave her alone.

If it’s meant to be, it will.

30

Joazito, I propose a litte experiment for you. She IM’s you thousands of times a day, but she says she wants no romance with you. This kills you because you want romance with her.

I propose that you stop answering those IM’s for two full weeks.

If she loves you, she’ll track you down and profess it to you. (Or hunt you down and kill you, I forget how the saying goes)

If she doesn’t, I’ve just given you two weeks of your life back to try to find a girl who actually does have chemistry with you.

Your Welcome.

31

I hope things work out for you.

I’ve been in a very similar situation and ended up finding out the hard way she really had no interest in being BF/GF and was just manipulating me. The friendship we did have ended up going very sour and she never spoke to me again.

It’s going to drive you crazy if you continue down this road without specifically finding out her level of interest in you. Tell her point-blank what you think is going on with her. Tell her exactly how you feel about her and find out if she really does want to take your relationship to the next level or just be friends. If she really does have a fear of commitment, a fear of being emotionally hurt, maybe talking about it with her will help her to overcome it with you. As you said earlier, you haven’t known her for very long so maybe there is something in her past that is really holding her back. Maybe not, but until you get that conversation out in the open, you will never know.

32

Alas, I sympathise, because I’ve had these “I’ll call/message you incessantly, but always keep you at a distance” gal-pals.
They are all crazy. Try answering her calls/messages occasionally- not every time.
Either she’ll stop toying with you & leave you alone or decide to actually get serious with you. The latter may or may not be a good thing.

Do not, in the words of Sam Kinison, let her use you as her emotional kotex to cry about other guys that she’s banging.

And yes, there are women who do that.

33

Please note a false friend here:

most Americans seem to think that “romance” means sex. In Spanish, Italian and from what my Brazilian friends tell me, Portuguese, it’s the other bits.

I’m assuming that Joazito wants both :wink:

34

I agree with Count Blucher, and would also like to add that I’m glad that you’ve moved on from this rude excuse for a SO.

35

You give me a creepy vibe when you talk about her. For that reason, I think she’s not into you.

However, if she is. She is obviously not ready for a relationship. I would suggest you give her some space until she is.

36

Even if she’s into you (and that’s a pretty big if IMO - even if you believe she likes you, from what you’ve told us it sounds like she doesn’t) she doesn’t want a relationship for some reason.

Maybe she just got out of a bad relationship. Maybe she’s just into being single right now. Whatever the reason, you forcing the issue is only going to push her away. You’ll end up without her as a friend or a girlfriend.

37

Back when I was much younger, I had a real crush on a young woman who really did want to be just friends, and nothing more. So eventually, I eased up on her, then we drifted apart, and she spent some time living in another country. Some years later, we met again, and this time she was ready for a more passionate relationship. And this time I no longer had that cruch on her, but I still liked her a lot. So we finally consummated the relationship, and it was wonderful while it lasted. However it didn’t last all that long, and we went back to being just friends again.

So I have two morals out of this:
(1) Don’t push women too hard, because they will just take things at their pace, and can get turned off by your being so pushy.
(2) Sometimes, if you relax, and wait, you can get want you want (or think you want) in the end.

38

you**'re**, dammit! YOU**'RE**!!!

  • wanders off sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet *
39

Well, the IM-ing you a “gazillion” times a day does seem to contradict the “let’s just be friends” line. I can understand your confusion.

I agree with Dragwyr that you should tell her how you feel and that you want to be more than friends. Get it out in the open, it’ll be so much easier to deal with.

40

It’s common enough.

Love is not safe and cannot be made safe; to make oneself open to love is to take a risk, to care is to leave oneself vulnerable to being hurt.

People run out on budding relationships due to the intensity of their feelings all the time.