'I am in love with my best friend but he thinks a relationship is doomed to fail.' UPDATED
"I am in love with my best friend but he thinks a relationship is doomed to fail."
About a year ago, I started a "Friends With Benefits" relationship with someone in my friend group who I was not necessarily close with. We both took it in the wrong direction by going on pseudo dates and having really poor communication skills, so of course I had to catch feelings which was 200% not the plan.
After a few months he broke it off because he said he wasn’t interested in a relationship due to his life situations that he wanted to work on. I respected that decision and did my best to move on.
Cue this summer where he has met most/all of his life situations he wanted to fix and we go on an international 2 week vacation together because goddamnit if he didn’t become my closest friend.
He informs me that he doesn’t want to date me because he believes that we would only be happy for a year and he would remain in the unhappy relationship longer than he wants to because he doesn’t want to see me upset.
Seems like BS answer, but whatever I can just squash those feelings deeeep down never to be seen again. It worked for a while as I tried my best to date someone else and find a connection akin to what my best friend and I had together.
In the last few weeks though I have found that despite dating other people in the mean time and talking myself out of feeling things for him that I can no longer deny that I may actually be in real love with this dude.
The realization came when We talked about the possibility of moving in together with his other roommate in order to save on rent in the city. When I thought about him bringing other girls back to the shared space I immediately got that foreboding pit of jealously feeling of hopelessness.
We had a thirty second talk about why it wouldn’t work and how my jealousy was my problem and not his, in which he did agree that we had amazing chemistry, would be good for each other, truly cared for me, and that the intimacy had been great. Again he brought up how we would only be happy for a year and that it just wasn’t worth it.
So my dilemma, is it selfish of me to ask for our one good year? The more he talks to other girls and sets up other dates, the more I feel like either way I will be losing his friendship.
We spend a significant amount of time alone together but always as “just friends”. He is someone I want in my life, but being stuck in this limbo is making it incredibly difficult to focus on anyone else as a potential partner.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s initial post:
You may think his reasons are BS, but that doesn't make them not valid TO HIM.
Hope this is a lesson to not go with fwb if you aren’t ready for it.
ImNotAlwaysCrying (OP)
Definitely was not my first time around the block having a fwb. All the other times they had ended amicably and I am friends with almost all of them platonically now. This is just an unfortunate exception :/
Six whole years later, the OP returned with an update.
6 years ago I was here lamenting the feelings I caught for my 'friend with benefits' turned best friend (let’s call him Franky). After the initial pain of rejection, we both agreed to stay best friends.
We moved in together with 3 of our other friends, and lived as platonic roommates. We confided in each other all our dating woes, cooked together most nights, and continued having fun nights out. During that time I grew equally close to my other roommates, and had a casual Covid lockdown fling with one who is now one of my closest friends (shocker).
After 3 years of living together, I had finally (mostly) gotten over my feelings for Franky. We were both casually dating other people and in a good place. I had spent many holidays with his extended family as his best friend, and was content knowing that I had a life long friend.
Then he had a big health scare. It ended up not being anything major, but at the time put a lot of things into perspective for the both of us. The night Franky returned from the hospital we had a heart to heart.
I cried as I told him how scared I was during the emergency and it ended with us both deciding to try dating seriously. We moved out of the group house with our friends to a small condo together.
It took some time to change from an awkward platonic relationship to a truly romantic one, but we allowed the relationship to take its own time and course. It’s been 3 years together now. He is currently cradling our shared cat as we plan a romantic weekend get away to New York. He was right, after the one year mark we sat and had a big talk.
We talked about what each of us needed to work on to continue the relationship. Instead of it being a relationship death sentence, it lead to both of us getting therapy, making positive changes, and brought us even closer.
We now have such open communication that even after 3 years we have not had a fight. I could not be happier to have my person, as well as the wonderful family that I now get to be a part of.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s post:
Sometimes you just have to get your 20s out of the way.
There has never been a truer or a more concise way to sum up my feelings about that decade of my life.
A good example of how you shouldn’t let fear hold you back.
Dating your best friend can be awesome. On a friend trip, mine asked if he could kiss me, and I told him that I didn't want to ruin the friendship. We ended up kissing anyway. We've been together for 10 years, married for 8. We have a 5 year old and another on the way.
Ha, basically did the same thing with my husband, but I didn't ask him if I could kiss him first. I just went for it 😂 to be fair, the rum we had been drinking helped. Together for 10 years, married for 6, two (feline) babies!
I’m happy for OP and her boyfriend, but I’m also rather shocked by the amount of casual relations in this story. I can’t imagine NOT catching feelings when you’re having regular intimacy with someone.
Having relations with friends is bad enough, but starting a fling with one friend while still living under the same roof as another friend you were regularly sleeping with sounds like a recipe for disaster.
It’s not like I’ve never heard of FWB before, but seeing it in action is always a surprise. It’s either the first step of an incredibly successful relationship or a messy drama. Kudos to OP and her compartmentalization skills.