The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Feelings for friend
Forever
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I'll keep this as short as I can, since I know you guys get these threads frequently.
The only thing different about my situation is that we're both in college and we're taking all of our courses together, so we see each other at least twenty hours a week, mandatory. (We're good friends and it was intentional).
Of course, it is now that I realize I have feelings and I honestly can't read how she feels about me (she's very shy).
Should I tell her or wait until the end of the semester? The common advice is to tell her, and then if she says no, put a little space between you and her until you get over how you were feeling and are able to accept friendship, but the longest I can go without seeing her is two days so there's no way for me to do that.
The only thing different about my situation is that we're both in college and we're taking all of our courses together, so we see each other at least twenty hours a week, mandatory. (We're good friends and it was intentional).
Of course, it is now that I realize I have feelings and I honestly can't read how she feels about me (she's very shy).
Should I tell her or wait until the end of the semester? The common advice is to tell her, and then if she says no, put a little space between you and her until you get over how you were feeling and are able to accept friendship, but the longest I can go without seeing her is two days so there's no way for me to do that.
Forever on
0
Posts
I think you answered your own question. If you feel you have to say something, keep yourself in check and wait until the end of the semester.
Even if it works out, and you date, what happens if it goes sour in a month? That's even worse than a simple rejection.
Warframe: TheBaconDwarf
Your situation is pretty unique since you guys are taking EVERY class together. If it were just one class it'd be one thing, but with all of them you together you should probably wait like everyone's said unless you feel like your friendship is solid enough to handle something like this. That's something only you would know, and even if you guys are tight like that you should expect some feelings from yourself, some awkwardness and confusedness.
I agree you should probably wait, but that doesn't mean you can't advance things and get a general feel. See what movie she wants to go see, take her out, pick up the ticket for her and shrug it off. See how she responds. You can do a lot of pre-producing before even hitting the set so to speak.
This. This. This. I always advocate this instead of the bull-in-the-chinashop approach that so often gets tossed around in here. Have lunch and grab the bill, do the movie ticket thing, etc.. Check her reactions. It's not foolproof, but it helps.
Why do you disagree? He's got the rest of the term to wait. Why not try and subtly gauge her response?
And again, some people get weirded out when things like this happen. He's going to forever alter the dynamic of their friendship by doing this. And don't try and feed me some "Oh, if she's a real friend it won't matter.". People can't help how they feel.
I'm not saying he shouldn't, but he's got plenty of time to prepare for this.
We only met in September, but we've already hung out a bunch of times as friends (movies, dinner, etc) and I have picked up the bill a few times, but only because I'm employed and she's not and I didn't want her dipping into her savings. I'm not sure what I should be looking for in her reaction when I do that? To be honest, I didn't know paying for a friend was romantic; she's covered me a few times (mostly to get me back for paying for her the time before).
It's not necessarily romantic, but like, you can check to see how she looks at you after you offer to pay, little things like that.
I've been at this for a lonnnnnnng time, so maybe it's just years of practice that enables me to see these things, but I can tell generally in the first hour whether it's a date or just friendly. If you want, I can shadow you guys the next time you go out and let you know. Kidding. Sort of. That might actually be fun.
If you see a lot of each other already and can't change that (as mentioned) it could be a bad thing. The just-ask approach works best if you're not too close and can take some distance for a while.
Its a massive weight off my mind. No point letting it float around in your mind all semester. It'll drive you insane -especially if there may be another nice dude in the same situation as you who comes along and tells her first.
Did you miss the "We take every class together bit"? Seriously, I don't understand the people who act like if they don't get it off their chest they're just going to explode and the world is going to end. Don't be so dramatic. It's not going to drive anyone insane. Have some patience.
I'd rather be a little antsy than have to deal with that awkwardness almost every day for the rest of the term. If you don't have that sort of patience, you probably shouldn't be trying to date anyone.
That would be a great Woody Alen movie :P
do that thing
fuck the consequences
hell, a good hearted rejection in this case could likely make you better friends
Just be all "Hey do you want to do something this week" and go for a snog instead of a hug
In fact, do that.
/leaves
If you can't handle rejection well, don't do it.
I guess I'd still suggest waiting out the semester, but whichever path you choose I hope it works out awesomely for you both.
Well, it depends on how smitten he is with her. I think it's perfectly possible to have romantic attractions to a friend, not act on them, and still be friends. I don't think once you become attracted to someone that it's not possible to just be their friend and to only be hanging out with them under pretenses. I have several female friends who I'm attracted to and would definitely date given the chance, but it's secondary completely to their friendship and it's not why I spend time with them.
Honestly, the weekly "ZOMG, Do I tell her how I feel threads" are not as world ending as most people here seem to think. Just because you fancy someone, doesn't mean you can't put it on the back burner or forget about it. These things aren't as life and death as a lot of posters and responders seem to think.
Waiting until the end of the semester seems somewhat cowardly to me, doesn't show the kind of self-confidence that is attractive to many girls, and also doesn't show a lot of faith in your friendship.
No, what it shows is intelligence and the foresight to not make things awkward and trap her in a potentially weird position.
I don't think that calling someone or their actions cowardly is exactly helping here.
I don't often find myself agreeing with Esh, but this is a pretty unique situation. While self-confidence is obviously important (and not just from the perspective of appealing to a woman), there is a lot more going on here.
This woman isn't living in a vacuum. It is possible -- in fact, likely -- that if the OP comes onto her now, no matter how low-key, straightforward, and light he keeps it, her immediate internal response will be to wonder why he wanted to sign up for all the same classes together.
Fair or not, she may be immediately and lastingly creeped out by him. In my opinion, if he respects her and actually does value her friendship, he will wait until she is no longer forced to constantly be in the same room with him. Additionally, I feel this will only help his cause.
Twitter | Facebook | Tumblr | Last.fm | Pandora | LibraryThing | formspring | Blue Moon over Seattle (MCFC)
So it seems the general consensus is to wait. Which I'm obviously comfortable with, but it will be a little strange since I'm used to just telling girls how I feel. But I can do it.
There does seem to be an option C, though: I've become relatively good friends with her best friend, let's call her Sarah. I imagine Sarah would know if she likes me or not. Would talking to Sarah and getting her opinion on things work? I don't know, I've never done that, either, and it seems a little immature, but I'm considering any option right now.
If you have to say something to somebody, just say it to her.
You can trust your guy friends to keep whatever you confide in them a secret, if you want to talk about this to them. Unless the Sarah girl has a really good head on her shoulders, talking to her about it would be a mistake.
Again, as we've been over this already, he's not being cowardly, he's being respectful at this point.
Also, doing a little investigation to suss out if something is worth going for is generally not a bad idea. Though with a best friend, unless they come to you to say something, that's probably the exception.
I'm pretty sure @Sentry was just talking about asking her friend vs. asking her directly. Basically, he's saying asking her friend is an even worse idea than asking the girl directly because it's kind of a cowardly way to find something out from the girl's perspective. I think we can probably all agree that it's at least similarly bad because she's likely to go straight back to her friend about it sometime soon if he asks.
I know, I addressed that with my second point. There's nothing wrong with some independent investigation to save oneself the face.
It's not like a "Hurp durp, does she like me?", there are ways of being subtle. Also, I've never heard of a girl going "I just heard that so -and-so likes me! What a coward for not just asking me! No way is it going to happen now.". Generally, they're flattered and intrigued at that point if the interest is returned.
EDIT: I just really hate how the word "coward" gets tossed around in these threads when the person asking does anything but blunder in like a bull in a china shop.
Because that is what she's going to think of you when her friend tells her. And she will.
Just wait until the semester is over, and talk to her directly. Be frank and respectful, and don't make a huge, meaningful, emotional production out of it.
Twitter | Facebook | Tumblr | Last.fm | Pandora | LibraryThing | formspring | Blue Moon over Seattle (MCFC)
My inclination is still to say wait. The last time I was thinking about asking a girl out I took everyone's advice and hit the breaks and a few weeks passed and it seems just like a fleeting thought. She's an awesome girl, but when I looked at the situation objectively it was just best to move forward. We're still great friends and there's no awkwardness between us.
Of course your situation is unique, you know it better than we probably do.
I never said he is a coward for not asking her, but not asking her is significantly better then doing it in some roundabout way that absolutely is cowardly. Either ask or don't ask.
And, it's not like talking directly to the girl he's interested in would be 'Hurp durp, do you like me?", you can be just as subtle talking to the girl straight-forward as you can being round-about and trying to see what's up from her friend. And I think it can come off weird if by chance she picks up that he's interested from her friend rather than getting any hints directly.
I know and that's always what I stress in these threads (gauging for signals, etc...), but the majority of the people in these threads feel like just walking up to her and asking her straight out "Do you like me???" is the only option.
are you two touchy feely at all?
eg: what if you had held her hand - to say lead her somewhere - would that put her off or she would be ok?
does she look at you during class? i dunno...theres always some kind of interest shown if someone is attracted to someone else
Right now we're focusing on the advice 'talk to her friend'. The majority feels that talking to her directly, whether that be subtle or straight to the point or whatever, is better than going around her back and talking to her friend using the same amount of discretion. In my personal opinion, it's probably best not to involve a third party.
Yes, I know. Thank you. We were just on a slight tangent.
And I really don't know if she likes me. She'll do something that might make me think she could be interested, but then do something that makes me think she's not ten minutes later. To be honest, I've stopped trying to analyze things because I'm terrible at it. A few years ago, I used to be way more "go and get 'em" with female friends that I'd fallen for, and of the three girls I confessed feelings for, only one reciprocated (which I don't even think she really did; we just went on one date. I think she was too scared to say no). The only really concrete reason I think that she might like me is because she's turned down at least half a dozen guys since we've started hanging out. Which in itself is fine, but I know that she used to have tons of boyfriends in high school so it's just a little strange that she hasn't even gone on one date in her two years of college. But see? Even that is probably nothing and me just looking for evidence to support my hopes.
I really like this one so it's probably best not to trust my gut; just looks at its track record. I'm trying to look at things from a more distant point of view, because I obviously can't judge things well when I'm in the middle of it all.
I think I'm going to wait until the end of the semester, and just focus on making myself the best me I can be between now and then.
The only sucky thing is that Valentine's Day is fast approaching and the hopeless romantic part of me is getting antsy. xD Which I know is silly, because it's really just a Hallmark holiday, but I can't help it.