Friend used me for sex

[Drawingperson]

Hi, new here and looking for some wise words of advice!

To keep it as short as possible, I’ve been good friends with someone since we were at Uni together and stayed close ever since- so it’s been around 10 years of friendship now.

It’s always been flirty, when we were at uni his close friends were always telling me how much he likes me. It stopped afterwards when we both got into long term relationships. However they ended around a year ago and since then it’s been obvious how much he likes me and sees me as more than a friend.

We had sex last week and it was great. We then caught up with the old group and had a blast. But today I heard from some friends that he had been saying he only wanted to have sex with me, he doesn’t want anything more, and sees me as his best friend, almost like a sister. You don’t have sex with your sister, surely. He then told mutual friends that I’ve been in love with him since we were 18 and it’s getting ‘boring’ now. He claims he’s never flirted with me or shown me any signs of interest. This is categorically not true. Especially when it’s just us two, usually on holiday, he’s always been very intimate with me, in a way he isn’t with others.

I confronted him this evening and he admitted it all and begged for my forgiveness but still claims he was right and it’s been nothing but platonic apart from the sex, which he now regrets.

I just feel like I’ve been led on and off for the last decade of my life and am devastated that it’s ending like this. I don’t know why I’m not good enough for him or what I’ve done wrong.

He may be the funniest, wittiest man that draws you in, OP, but he isn't wanting a relationship and isn't in love with you. It sounds like you are half in love with him. You read his funny jokes, significant glances and finally sex as meaningful- that you were sharing something. He's decided you are not, even if perhaps back in the day you did nearly have a few moments.

He's not all that and one day you will realise that, he's just a guy. There are other witty funny guys who will be much better for you than him and who are really into you.

What were your motivations for having sex with him if you didn’t want a relationship with him? If you wanted to just go back to being friends then it sounds like what you’re really upset about is the fact that he isn’t more into you than you’re into him. It sounds like for 10 years, you’ve really enjoyed the sense that he had deep seated feelings for you.

I get it. Who wouldn’t want to be the subject of someone’s unrequited yearning? You obviously feel that he was in love with you and that the reason you weren’t together is because you made a conscious decision to keep it as “just friends”, he obviously views it as being the other way around. The truth is likely that you were both flirtatious and enjoyed that aspect of your relationship but neither wanted to be the one to be seen to pursue an actual romantic relationship.

[quote Drawingperson]@PleasantBirthday
That makes me really upset. I don’t want people to see me as a starry eyed idiot. I really don’t.

But I’m also being honest when I tell you that yes I know he’s a user, but he is also genuinely the funniest, most interesting person ever. It’s impossible to not laugh when he talks, it’s impossible to not smile to yourself when he says stupid things. It’s also not just me, I know most of our friends feel the same way. He’s just incredibly charming and I don’t know how overnight I can ignore that.[/quote]
I don't want to upset you, honestly. But I don't want you to waste your young life on this. No matter how superficially charming or funny, he's selfish and it's from the mouth out.

You deserve better and I wish you knew that.

The flying half way around the world, is the point I knew he was an A grade dick. You think he did it for you, I'm sure he did it for him. He knew that it would make him look like a hero, to you and anyone else he told the tale to.

[quote Drawingperson]@UserBot989
I know I may seem like I’m not listening but your posts are really comforting. I’ve read most of them twice. Thank you, genuinely.[/quote]
I'm relieved you don't think I'm being horrible.

After I learned this harsh lesson, the next man I slept with was 100% certain about me. He would never have risked losing me. he never chatted casually about anything that happened between us to anybody at work. he said he loved me and he acted like he loved me. It was simple it was clear.

i really think that the whole placeholder chapter of my life was a lesson I had to learn.

[quote Drawingperson]@PleasantBirthday
Even if I told him to go to hell, when I see him in person he’s one of the funniest people ever, it’s impossible to not be drawn to him. He’ll also keep asking me questions and attempt to include me in the conversation. I can’t really escape him as our uni group meets up quite often, at least once a week after work for drinks and often on the weekends too.[/quote]
This charismatic man is going to steal your youth. By the time the penny drops and he marries someone else, you will be complaining that you can't find a decent man and time is running out to have children.

You talk about your "uni group." You are 28! Don't you have any other good friends you have made since being an undergraduate? Can't you make a new social life without this man in it?

@Saradegrey

He is a Beta orbiter. If you thought he was good enough, you would have had a relationship with him a decade ago, but you never did. He was in the friend zone, giving you loads of support, a shoulder to cry on, coming running when you called, like a knight in shining armour.

That is not a real friendship in either direction. He eventually got what he wanted from you. It will never be the same. He won't cross the world when you have a problem now.

And I do actually also agree with this. It seems a mess all around.

You are making way too many excuses about a friend that's treated you like shit.

At the rate you're going you will have "been neutral" to the point you rationalise it to nothing and just let it go.

It's sad, but true, this one needs to go in your "Fuck off and die" bin now.

ps, i don't see you as a starry eyed naive fool. I think this set up is an easy trap to fall in to and you just need to recalibrate slightly. You just need to get turned off by men who erode the boundaries between friendship and relationships instead of finding it all a bit elusive and out of reach. Out of reach doesn't mean valuable!

I think it's poor form for him to be discussing having sex with you with mutual friends.

That's private - regardless of who wanted it more etc. he should have respected you enough as a friend to not kiss and tell. (Telling people you've been after him since you were 18 - what an idiot - how did he expect your friendship to survive such a betrayal?)

He sounds like a dick, like he has a massive chip on his shoulder and he sounds incredibly immature.

I'd take a massive step back from this friendship, maybe forever but certainly for a very long time.

He doesn't have a decent character. Sounds like he used you as an ego-boost, enjoyed the connection and flirting, but didn't give you the real him. Running off to gossip about you to his mates is immature, nasty and unkind. Step away from the drama and look for friends who actually care.

@grapewine
I don’t know how to do this. How do I break a decade long pattern of finding him hilarious and interesting. I mean, he is. He may be a dick but he’s still not someone who’s easy to ignore.

@MadameMinimes
You are probably right. I mean, you definitely are. I did enjoy being the person he couldn’t have but still enjoyed the flirting and the care he showed me.

Men aren't all the same, anymore than women are.
What's he's done in misrepresenting what happened to mutual friends is a lie and a betrayal of the truth and therefore your relationship as it was in reality. This is very hurtful and the betrayal of the lies is huge because this relationship is long standing and not insignificant.
It is true that we never can really really know someone until we have seen them in every situation, you can be really really close to someone and still be wrong about aspects of who they are and be surprised. I have had this with a close female friend, the longer you know someone the less likely it is that there are surprises but it still happens sometimes.
His behaviour is nothing to do with who you are or are not. It does though, reveal an aspect of his character /ego that has previously been well-covered/not been revealed. He is capable of betraying you and in a really fundamental way publicly, it would take a lot of mitigating explanation to understand and forgive that, even if he is really regretful it would be reasonable that the consequences of this are that you tolerate him as an inavoidable member of a wider group, but he no longer has your trust or your confidence... Relegated to someone you are civil/friendly to for group social reasons, if not ejected from your life.
Maybe he has admired you for years, fantasised and built you up to be this unattainable person whom he wanted to conquer like everest but now that's happened you are ordinary again and devalued in this internal fantasy, no longer an object of unattainable desire.
Maybe he felt exposed, knowing the group would know and gossip, that he'd chased you all this time and felt he would be a figure of fun... So many possible theories why he chose to act and say as he did.
But whatever the reason he was willing to throw youunder the bus of public opinion to save whatever cracks were appearing in his own ego within this scenario.
This is the reason why he has to accept that you might accept his apology but he has lost his privelaged position in your life and you should make no promises to cover his tracks in front of others. His choices, his consequences and if that means people hear and know that he lied about who wanted who and whether it meant anything that's just tough.

I wasted more than ten years from university being in love with a friend
or what I believed to be love until I read up on limerence
I know this isn’t the same as your situation but I urge you to be open and clear with him and yourself and get this firmly back on an honest friendship basis with no unspoken stuff.
That time doesn’t come back later and you have a life to live.

@UserBot989
Totally. I think when I was 18, like every other teenager, I enjoyed the whole elusive storyline. But whereas a lot of my friends drifted from the boys they had a similar relationship with, because him and I stayed so close, it dragged on for ages and ages.

Watch St Ellis Fire OP; you're the girl that loves Billy.

He’s just incredibly charming and I don’t know how overnight I can ignore that.

It won't happen overnight but you can turn it around. Every time you start to see him as charming, envisage him telling your friends that you're in love with him and he finds this boring. Charm is a very superficial quality. It does not make him a nice person. It's a gloss or a smokescreen. Underneath his charm is someone who is at best very immature.

@Saradegrey
I do have other friends. But my uni friends are incredibly important to me. We all moved to/back to London after uni and see each other regularly. My other friends are more people I see individually or in a smaller group, rather than a big family environment.

He is spiteful and immature. Making himself look good to friends is more important than your feelings. I would distance myself from him. As my Dd would say, anytime he speaks, suck your teeth and say “say less”. If you let people disrespect you they will continue to do so and also
show your friends that it’s ok to do so. Your feelings matter as much as his.

I've been there OP.

You will get over it.

In my experience, he liked me enough to have sex with me eventually but not enough to be in a relationship and I was his emotional crutch for some time before, and vice versa. It's nice feeling needed and wanted and it's a nice feeling flirting.

I know he cares about me and loves me. He seems really sad about the whole thing.

Ah, now he really doesn't! He doesn't care about you at all. He's told all your friends intimate details about you, that you hang around him, desperately in love and it's becoming 'boring'. That's so cruel. True or not.

Stop finding him 'hilarious' and interesting, for God's sake. He's made you into the cheap butt of his jokes - because getting a cheap laugh and being the centre of the group's attention was more important to him than your feelings or his 'friendship' with you.

And honestly? The people that you hang out with all sound superficial. Are they all thinking he's funny and marvellous? And then running to tell tales to you about what he's said? I'd distance myself from them all.

@VodkaSlimline

This exact thing happened to me - I could have written your OP. I had always thought we would end up together one day when the time was right and a few days after sex and being super lovely he switched and basically ghosted me. Within 3 months he had moved in with someone else and they have since had a child together.

Everything that had ever happened between us was initiated and driven by him and I didn't see the rejection coming at all. It is one of the most painful things that ever happened to me and really the only things that helped were:

• cutting him out of my life completely
• continually reminding myself that he was not who I thought he was if he could lead me on, use me for sex and then try to gaslight me that I had imagined 10 years of build-up.

I've also had a very similar experience. One of the worst "breakups" I've ever experienced in terms of lasting emotional pain and loss because you're losing a friend, even though it's not a breakup in the normal sense as there was no romantic relationship.

Eventually we got back in touch but much more on a couple of emails a year basis than the former close friendship.

And that was WITHOUT what the OP has had which is him trying to put her down to their mutual close friends. They must have thought he was a real twat to do so, surely.

What helps, OP, is to try and learn the obvious lesson: he's not a good person. I went round and round the houses trying to work out what had gone wrong, what had happened, if I'd done something wrong. But in the end I realised he's not the warm person I thought, when it comes to women he's actually a real snake who coldly manipulates. I'm sure he's an utterly terrible boyfriend. In other words - he's a complete dickhead. I'd never have believed it but the evidence was in front of me and it's in front of you now.

Take a step back, avoid the drinks for a week or two, if you see him just find an excuse to go and talk to someone else. Fade him out.

You'll never heal this because it's not a rupture, it's that you've learnt new info about him which is that he's cruel and selfish.

OP - you don't have to react to this in a certain way. No one can or wants to force you to ignore him. You clearly love him. And his disrespect for you isn't enough for you to change your opinion on him.

That's ok, you're an adult. Your life, your choice.

My only caution would be, if you want to meet someone, then you should think carefully about what you're doing with this guy. He has apologised and you want to accept that. Then what? What happens when you next have a drink together? I suspect you'll get in a habit of having sex; you will want more, he won't.

Just don't let it ruin anything meaningful that may come along. All the while you're thinking of this "friend", you may not be open to more positive relationships.

Darling girl, he’s awful. Just tell all your friends you had a lovely time, but it didn’t last anywhere near as long as you would’ve hoped. They can interpret that as they will
Fm

It really doesn’t sound like a healthy environment for you. I think you need to step away from the group a bit. If this is how he treats his best friend/sister figure he’s dreadful.