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Girlfriend said she loved me, I replied with silence...
ChillyWilly
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Yes, it's another relationship thread. Don't murder me.
Concise version of the issue, which is a bit complex:
I was hanging out with my lady a couple of weeks ago. We were having a nice, quiet evening. We were watching some movies and drinking a bit. She is much more toasty than I am. We start talking about random things and get on to the subject of how we feel about each other. She tells me that she loves me. She had her back to me at the time (we were laying down and spooning), so she didn't see my face change to abrupt shock. She was both tired and drunk and went to sleep shortly after, so we didn't discuss it that evening.
We hang out the next day and says she doesn't remember having the conversation, being both sleepy and super-duper panda like she was (yay for rum). I let it go at that, hoping that what she said was just her drunk self and not her true self. Before the day ends, she soberly reveals the same feelings. Seeing as she is in the right mindset to discuss such a thing and being that we have always been completely honest with each other, I tell her that while I certainly appreciate the sentiment, I am not at that point yet. I very much enjoy her company and I do like her, but it is much to soon for me to say such a thing to her, especially since I don't feel it. "I love you" is a phrase that changes relationships is a major way and I don't use it lightly.
A few things before I get to my question:
* We have only been dating for 3 months
* She has never been in any good relationships. Of the two major relationships we've spoken about, both were physically and emotionally abusive, including rape at one point. Part of me thinks she only feels like she loves me because I'm awesome in comparison to them (not me patting my back here...just that her last guys were complete assholes)
* I have a bit of a white knight complex and feel the need to protect her and keep her safe from horrible boyfriends/being hurt/etc. As such, my first natural reaction was to tell her I loved her in the beginning to keep her from being hurt by me not reciprocating her feelings. I held off on that because I realized it would be amazingly stupid and would create more problems than it would solve. But I know it hurts her and the nice guy part of me feels guilty for not feeling the same way about her.
So my questions are these, H/A: Have any of you been in this situation, either on the receiving end or the giving end of having "I love you" brought into your relationship when one side didn't feel the same way? How did you handle it? Were any of you way too nice for you own good like me and did you feel guilty about not feeling the same way, even though you knew there was nothing you could do to change your feelings?
I just want some perspective on the subject. Thanks ahead of time.
Concise version of the issue, which is a bit complex:
I was hanging out with my lady a couple of weeks ago. We were having a nice, quiet evening. We were watching some movies and drinking a bit. She is much more toasty than I am. We start talking about random things and get on to the subject of how we feel about each other. She tells me that she loves me. She had her back to me at the time (we were laying down and spooning), so she didn't see my face change to abrupt shock. She was both tired and drunk and went to sleep shortly after, so we didn't discuss it that evening.
We hang out the next day and says she doesn't remember having the conversation, being both sleepy and super-duper panda like she was (yay for rum). I let it go at that, hoping that what she said was just her drunk self and not her true self. Before the day ends, she soberly reveals the same feelings. Seeing as she is in the right mindset to discuss such a thing and being that we have always been completely honest with each other, I tell her that while I certainly appreciate the sentiment, I am not at that point yet. I very much enjoy her company and I do like her, but it is much to soon for me to say such a thing to her, especially since I don't feel it. "I love you" is a phrase that changes relationships is a major way and I don't use it lightly.
A few things before I get to my question:
* We have only been dating for 3 months
* She has never been in any good relationships. Of the two major relationships we've spoken about, both were physically and emotionally abusive, including rape at one point. Part of me thinks she only feels like she loves me because I'm awesome in comparison to them (not me patting my back here...just that her last guys were complete assholes)
* I have a bit of a white knight complex and feel the need to protect her and keep her safe from horrible boyfriends/being hurt/etc. As such, my first natural reaction was to tell her I loved her in the beginning to keep her from being hurt by me not reciprocating her feelings. I held off on that because I realized it would be amazingly stupid and would create more problems than it would solve. But I know it hurts her and the nice guy part of me feels guilty for not feeling the same way about her.
So my questions are these, H/A: Have any of you been in this situation, either on the receiving end or the giving end of having "I love you" brought into your relationship when one side didn't feel the same way? How did you handle it? Were any of you way too nice for you own good like me and did you feel guilty about not feeling the same way, even though you knew there was nothing you could do to change your feelings?
I just want some perspective on the subject. Thanks ahead of time.
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a) String her along, or
b) Force yourself to feel the same way.
Neither works.
Now, if she's okay with you not being there yet and you think it's something that could develop, there's nothing wrong with the both of you being on the same page and going forward. This is a scenario that is not very likely to play out in a fairy tale way.
The worst thing you can do is think that you can "fix" her and try and stick it out so that you don't hurt her. It will only end up hurting her in the long run, and possibly at a time when it "not working out" is much more of a serious issue. You can't fix people, and you can't let people's personal issues dictate your life. It never works out for the better.
You can be supportive of people, and help them as best you can, so long as it's not causing you to sacrifice things you aren't willing to sacrifice.
So yeah... maybe not that helpful, but hopefully it's some insight.
We were about 6 months into our relationship when I felt comfortable saying I love you. I didn't feel like waiting for him to say it first (why do we always have to wait for him?) so I told him. Granted, I also told him that he did not have to feel pressured to say it back and I was comfortable with saying I love You without hearing it back (and actually meant that) so it was a bit different in that regard. (He has since said it and we're living together 3 years later.)
If she's ok with saying I Love You and not hearing it back (and some of us really are) then this isn't a problem. You handled it really well by telling her that you feel strongly for her but aren't ready for that first step. Feel good about that, too many people would have awkwardly said I love you too or would have run from the room screaming. The issue will just be seeing if she really is ok with you not being ready.
I wouldn't worry about it
But if you've been dating for three months? Dude, that's actually a pretty reasonable amount of time for someone to give herself before identifying whether or not the emotion that she's feeling really is or isn't love. It's actually the exact point in time that most psychologists will tell you that your brain chemistry finally starts getting close to evening out around a member of the opposite sex for whom you've been harboring romantic feelings.
I know it's really tempting to tell yourself that she was drunk at the time or that she thinks she means it but she doesn't, not really, and from there you can go into rationalizing how it's okay to just sort of move past this and pretend it's not a big deal.
But in this case, I think you really need to be willing to take her declaration at face value as a truthful sentiment.
And you need to ask yourself why after three months you don't feel the same way.
This happened with me and my wife (then girlfriend), only I was the one who said "I love you" first... She reciprocated right away and then later renegged (which confused the hell out of me). But she explained herself, and while I was a bit upset that she lied initially, we got through it. Probably about a month later, she reciprocated it when she felt that she was ready/was in love.
The fact that you didn't reciprocate just to save her feelings is good, I think. You just need to go on and explain that you're not quite there yet.
Pretty much this.
If she's okay with you not being ready, everything should be hunky-dory.
If she's not okay with you not being ready, then there's pretty much little if anything you can do about it.
I'm sure you already know this, but dating a person with a history of the types of things you mentioned means she might have problems with communication, intimacy, etc. down the road. She may need therapy as well, if she hasn't already gotten it. Just try to be supportive.
This. Don't feel pressured into saying something you don't mean.
My brilliant response in this same situation was "me too." I still get shit for it eight years later (in a funny way).
Sounds like you dealt with the situation very well.
She played it cool thou and said she need more time for things to develope...
I think you should stick to your guts and tell her how you feel, which is what you did. That's pretty cool and you did nothing wrong.
Seriously It would be way more more awful if you said the 3 magic words back to her if you really don't mean it and saying it just because you are sympathetic to her.
On the way home, I told her "My dear, I do believe I've fallen in love with you."
To which she replied:
"Huh."
Eight years later, we are still happily together and laugh about that moment. She wasn't ready to explore those feelings at the time, and wasn't sure she felt them. I was. That was all there was. The weekend after I fretted day in and day out, waiting for her to call me back. I was tempted to call 30 times, sure that I blew up a good thing. Happily I refrained. A half week later, she called and we went out again and no mention of love was made until she decided to say it to me (a week or so later).
I wouldn't worry about it. If you feel that way later on, tell her. If not, be honest with her if she brings it up. The fact you are still talking afterwords is a good sign.
Yeah, I think I said "That's...great!" and then got out of her car and went to bed.
For some reason we're now married and have been together for ten years.
You handled it properly, talking to her about not being there yet. It's really on her now whether or not she accepts that, rejects that and leaves or tries to pressure you to respond in kind.
I did forget to mention that when we talked about it, she was clear that she didn't expect me to feel the same way since she (admittedly) fell for people easier than I did. As I said, I know that it hurts her that I don't feel the same, but she understands that I don't and is fine with that.
SammyF: You make a good point. I can't really pinpoint why I don't feel this way after 3 months. I just...don't. As I said, it feels too early and, frankly, I just don't feel it. I told my last girlfriend that I loved her after 3-4 months and that one blew up in my face about 3 months later, so I guess I'm just wary about love in general.
Don't get me wrong...I'm a romantic type of guy. I have nothing against being in love. I want to be married, have a family, etc. one of these days, but saying those 3 simple words can have so many unintended consequences. I don't want to be hurt and I don't want to hurt anyone else. Which is why I've been honest with my lady from the beginning. I've flat out told her since we started dating that, "I like you a lot, you're awesome, etc. but I can't tell the future and I don't know how long we will date, if we will get married or any of that". It may sound horrible and noncommital, but it is my way of trying to protect her should we split in the future. I don't want to be the asshole the promises the world to someone and then hurts her in the future. She's had enough of that.
Just realize it probably means you have some issues of your own to work through, and you'll want to find a way to do that, rather than string her (or someone else) along because you're scared to commit.
And I'm not saying "fix your shit now!"... like you'll be over it in a month... just be aware of yourself is all.
Sounds like she's willing to give you a chance, so if you're willing to give her a chance, best of luck to you both!
Yeah I was kind of getting the gist from your OP that the problem you're actually wrestling with isn't actually about how you replied to her declaration -- I noticed that you iterated a couple off different times that you didn't feel the same way. Not even an "I'm not sure I love her or not" sort of thing, not a "maybe," just a "no."
So I'm not here to disagree with, um, apparently everybody else and say that you need to be reaching for the ejection handle or anything like that. I just want to suggest that you owe it to yourself as well as to your lady friend to spend some introspective time sorting through your own feelings and your own dating history.
Some questions that might get you going:
1. What do you consider the "ideal" relationship? Is there a couple in your life -- your parents, for instance -- where you look at them and say "I hope someday that I'm lucky enough to have a relationship like that?"
2. You seem to be associating the fact that you told your previous girlfriend that you loved her (around the same point of time in that relationship) with the fact that your previous relationship "blew up," even though it took it three more months to fail. You also seem to treat the words in general like some sort of game-changer. So, two-parter here:
B. Would your last relationship have failed if you hadn't told her you loved her?
3. You seem to assert that you are "protecting" your current lady-friend by being very guarded with your emotional sentiments, but your justifications for doing so seem to relate largely to how your previous relationship failed. In what way are you also "protecting" yourself? From what?
You don't have to answer any of those online if you don't want, I'm just hoping that maybe it'll help you sort through whatever's going on inside of you that has you concerned.
My boyfriend wasn't ready to say it at 6 months partly because his prior relationships ended up being with crazy women including one who ended up stalking him. So he was a bit hesitant about taking that big jump. He did it when he was ready (and it ended up being a lovely way to end a very nice birthday.)
There is no set time-line for saying I love you to someone. Personally, I find 3-4 months to be a really short time to start saying I love you in and was surprised when I felt ready at 6. To me it's a special term of endearment I only use when I know I really love someone.
Other people say it after a few weeks and while I think they're nuts it works for them. I have a friend who says it as soon as she's in a relationship with someone but that's what it means to her. Don't be too concerned about what other people do, when it's right for you you'll say it whenever that is.
I didnt take it very seriously because earlier I was on the other team as her and made a cup and she screamed "I hate you!"
Later in life I said I loved her and she said it back and it was awesome.
Dont say it if you dont mean it, that would feel...empty. Feel free to say it if she makes a game winning cup in beer pong though.
One night she came over and we were in my room making out and she took off her shirt and got on top of me. She then said she loved me for the first time, in a sort of gatekeeper play.
I said thanks, but we just haven't had enough time together for me to say it, but I still liked her a lot.
The rest of the evening was fine, nothing awkward. But after she slept on it, she just went crazy and began making up all kinds of stories about me to her friends (This was in highschool). Hopefully the girl you're dating isn't a crazy.
Keep on keeping on, she's also learning how things can be different than her past (bad) experiences and that the words "I love you" are worthless unless they are real.
She's not a crazy, thankfully. Which is amazing for the relationship crap that she's been in (she was actually engaged to one of the assholes I mentioned earlier). I've actually known her since grade school. We went to the same one. Same high school, too. And the same college. We had silly little crushes on each other at different times in our lives, so it's actually funny that we've ended up dating.
Couple of funny stories: I was band captain in high school. She was head cheerleader. Who's laughing now, bitches? 8-)
We went to the same college for 3 years and never saw each other. She was on one end of the campus doing one major and I was on the other side doing another major. We never saw each other a single time. Not in class. Not walking around on campus. Very odd.
Thanks for those questions, Sammy. I'm usually very good at being introspective and knowing exactly how I feel about things, but I will certainly take your post into consideration.
To be clear, I'm not looking to bail out on this girl just because she feels differently. I really do care about her. Our hearts just happen to be in slightly different places right now. If I feel the same way in the next month or two, I will certainly have to ponder on where the relationship is heading, but I can't predict that type of thing.
She never went to that college. During this time she was being turned into a deadly cyborg assassin. Saying "I love you" to her will activate her latent murder protocol.
Tread carefully.
So your basically saying he is dating river tam.
Also for my "I Love You" experience: the first time my wife said I love you, I responded with a joke. Apparently that wasn't what she was hoping/expecting to hear. I would not recommend this course to anyone.
The first time I told my husband I loved him, he said "...Okay."
In fairness to him, he'd never heard it said directed at him before. He was caught a little off guard.
My feeling on the matter is that if you're in the "definitely do not love" camp, unless you really see that changing, you might end up hurting her more if you drag it out. I can understand having issues with saying words, but if you really aren't there, what makes you think you might be later?
Because some people put a huge amount of pressure on top of those words, like its some big life changing event, saying I Love You, almost like getting married.
For me, its not. But some people get freaked out. They dont want to make that commitment now, even if their feelings dont change later, theyll be more comfortable admitting that they love someone.
If she wants you to say it back now, and youre not ready, thats your call. If she cant deal with that, her loss. Ive said I Love You first before (actually, almost always) and if i dont get it back, thats fine. If it makes things awkward, whatever, i can deal with that. But if it puts this huge pressure on both of you, maybe its time to have that "What do we want out of this?" discussion, because maybe you'll realise youre both going in opposite directions, and you can just break up now instead of wasting a year of each others lives.
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Chilly, there's nothing wrong with not tapping out those words, bro. You'll figure it out if/when it's the right time to verbally submit your love.
Probably this ^
It's good advice.
The woman I had been talking to (and had never met) was at the point where she apparently felt comfortable to say that she loved me. I felt that this action was grossly premature and immature, especially since the relationship was so new and uncertain.
To put it simply, it creeped me out. The red flags kept popping up and I eventually stopped feeling...anything towards her.
I would suggest that you evaluate your feelings and move forward with the understanding that either you really DO care for this person, or (like what Chanus said) that you'll be forcing yourself to manufacture a synthetic, loving relationship.
Or worse "I love... spending time with you."
I don't have a whole lot of advice, it sounds like she's pretty understanding, I just want to commend you for not just jumping in and saying it because it would've been the easier and less painful action. Lord knows I probably would've
Don't do what this guy did.
or in high school?
I think you might be suffering from a bit of the RomCom media overload - you know, the one that tries to tell us that happy couples fall in love with each other simultaneously. Realistically this just ins't true. It's perfectly normal for one person to be in love and the other to not be (but potentially headed in that direction). If/when you realize you're in love; great! Unfortunately there are no cookies distributed with making a Grand Pronouncement about being in love.
I think the bigger issue is the baggage you admit she's got. Tread carefully. It's sweet to look great in comparison but that doesn't necessarily make the old baggage disappear; you can trust me on that one.
I think the best thing to do in your particular position is to just keep things at the level which you are happy. So your girl got a little buzzed and said the big three words - it doesn't mean Something Has Changed, especially if she doesn't remember the conversation. People have been known to say things they don't mean when they're drunk, you know.
The big minefield I'd watch out for is if you guys talk about it while sober and she says something like "I do love you, do you love me?" because then you're on the spot and there is no answer which will both satisfy your internal desire to tell the truth and her desire to have her exact feelings reciprocated. Just try to be gentle if that conversation occurs, with something like "I don't know, but I do know you are growing on me every day" etc. It's not perfect, but neither is the relationship monster.
It's not a deal breaker as long as nobody makes it into one. Just say it when you feel it (if you do).
If you enjoy her company, and she is what you want right now, just let it go from there.
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Thinking back on it, I really should have pulled this line out.