To keep in touch with lovely male friend

[blondieblonde]

Hello, I'm in a bad marriage but not left (yet). Had a difficult year & also we are all isolated. I have a lovely friend who is a man who is very supportive and a good friend to me. I adore his company and we are very close, and have been since we met about 6 years ago. Someone said AIBU to stay in touch, as the feelings could ebb over, but that seems ridiculous to me -- I don't want to break contact with one of my most supportive, kind, and just lovely friends.

I think the priority should be to focus on leaving your marriage. Not driven by this friend, but for yourself.

If your marriage is over I'm not sure why your friend is concerned that the feelings could "ebb over". To me the most material point is that you extricate yourself from an unhappy marriage and sort yourself out first before you worry about getting involved with someone else and you should be prepared to spend some time on your own and getting comfortable with yourself before getting into another relationship, certainly before your marriage is over. But if this friend is just that, a friend, I see no reason why you shouldn't maintain contact with him.

What are your plans to leave? Do you have somewhere to go?

I ended my ailing relationship partly because I had the support of a lovely male friend. He’d come out of a LTR six months before, was bruised but beginning to date, his experience helped me see there was life after and it needed time but being unhappy in a relationship was way worse.

He never did or said anything inappropriate just was there and helped me with subsequent weeks of bad depression, feeding me, taking me for walks, suggesting topics tor discussion for the next days walk so I’d have something to think about instead of spiralling down in self loathing.

He was just a really, really good friend. @Blondieblonde if you have such a friend value him and decide for yourself if it’s helping, if you feel it isn’t crossing boundaries and you’re not too dependent and you enjoy his company just as it is. Sod what anyone else says. If you aren’t sure though, please recognise you’re in a vulnerable place. Look after you.

As for me - he stepped back as I progressed, we met up for coffee and so on every week or so, just had a good time and had fun doing galleries or window shopping (remember that?). Nothing more. Covid happened. He virtually dated, met strangers for awkward walks - we had a laugh over his war stories...

4 months after I got better he told me he cared about me and would step back further because he didn’t think I felt the same. I realised like a slap on the head that I did and we’ve been together ever since. We’re getting married next year.

Leave your marriage, then you ca do what you like?