Sigh. As the title says. I kind of hate myself. (you can see my profile for a previous post) regarding the situation I am currently in with a friend. I think I am repeatedly fucking it up but not on purpose. I feel like a coward and I wish I had the balls to just grab this.
He is annoyingly great, we get on so well. We met in October and have always got on, but the contact has increased more and more since then. We have in the last 2 months started hanging out one on one, we go for dinner, walks, movies, we’ve been shopping. We share music and movies and recs with each other. I am extremely attracted to him. We text, speak on the phone, share a decent amount of interests. There is a quiet intimacy between us. Lots of eye contact and contact that feels intense but is never scary. To be quite honest, we do talk 24/7. I constantly hear from him. He remembers the small things I say and the food and things I do and do not like. He is attractive and smart and exactly my type. I like him, I know I do.
The only issue is my dating history (or lack of). I was never pursued at school and didn’t really date growing up. I am a certified late bloomer. Dating apps have never been for me (I worry my own lack of experience is an issue) so it just hasn’t happened yet. At my age (26) most people have already experienced these things. This guy specifically I know has had a reasonable level of dating experience and has also taken part in casual sex. I just have also never really found a man I was interested in, my friends often say I just haven’t met my match yet. It sounds cringe but also just true, nobody has interested me. Until now.
I think I am just spiralling about my own level of worth in this situation. I know our behaviour screams more than friends, if a gal pal was telling me this, I’d say the same thing to her, that her and this man were not friends. Other people that see us together notice this. I have met him at his house and his parents and siblings have known I was there. People see how we are together, people know we hang out and it genuinely feels like when it’s the 2 of us, there is nobody else around (from my perspective anyway). It doesn’t feel like any situation I’ve ever had with anyone else.
However. I just cannot seem to figure out if he’s into me. He’s been single for maybe 6/7 months (only a casual thing before that), and things between me and him have only gotten more intense in the last perhaps 2/3 months (that is when this started). To me, the interactions were implying one thing, I felt so certain I wasn’t misreading this. He’d mentioned before about for the right woman wanting to take it slow and soaking up the moments. I felt so certain it was going in a specific direction.
Anyway. Recently, we were in a group setting and I randomly overheard that he’d been back on the dating apps and gone on a date / had a one night stand (I do not know specifics but this is assumption). This kinda threw me, I’d been speaking to him in the lead up of this and he never told me he’d been on apps / had a date lined up. I feel so blindsided. Not sure if I have a right to care or not. (For context I am not currently dating / on apps, it just isn’t for me).Him and I have never really branched into convos about women, he doesn’t ask me about men and besides the random story involving an ex / time I see him glancing at other women, he doesn’t clue me in to his life with women. We don’t talk about his type and that just isn’t a boundary we cross. It felt like I had been punched in the throat.
Upon dissecting this with my friends, they worry that I haven’t made my interest clear. They worry that yes, I am doing all of these things and spending time with him. But I am not making it clear I am interested in a romantic way. Here is where my fuck up lies. I do not know how to do this. I have no idea how to navigate this situation and it is silently killing me. I feel so thrown off by my own level of inexperience that I just cannot fathom him actually being interested. I listen to the random comments he’s made about previous ex’s (obviously it didn’t work out) and I sound completely different. Looks, personality and vibe. I know its normal behaviour but occasionally I’ll catch him glance a look at women (I guess I do the same to men, it’s normal) and the women never seem to be like me.
As a result I feel like such a coward for not being able to own how I feel. I want to tell him but I chicken out at every opportunity. I am scared of how good it feels with him and how easy and not scary it is (which is the exact opposite of what I thought finally being interested in someone was like). My friends and other people I have asked about the situation all agree that his actions are displaying a certain level of interest.
Right now I feel like a coward for not being able to own my feelings and make clear how I feel, but I guess having never been the chosen one of pursued or reciprocated in any way, I just feel like I am already at a disadvantage. That its almost incomprehensible that despite all of these very obvious behaviours, he just views me as solely a friend (despite treating me very differently to his female friends and investing all of this time in). I know I am finding these comments about previous partners or glances at random women as fuel to sabotage this in my own head.
I just do not know how to not be a fucking coward. I do not know how to accept that I might be in with a chance here. I can’t let him slip through my fingers. (OBVIOUSLY I AM ALSO AWARE HE MAY NOT ACTUALLY BE INTERESTED IN ME BUT I CANNOT SPEAK FOR HIM SO I AM JUST SAYING)
There is also such a level of fear that he could very easily turn round and say I have misread all of these things and never presumed I was interested and that he isn't interested. Being friends, that is also my concern. I am just scared and a coward.