I am probably quite insane but can't seem to help myself...

[CarryingTheCanAgain]

I am desperately madly completely head over heels in love with a man who doesn't seem to feel the same... We currently consider ourselves flatmates, although we have slept together on and off ever since meeting.

The trouble is he went through an awful separation with his ex a few years ago and has had a nightmare of access issues regarding his DC ever since because his ex is a total cnut.. He's been upfront about his feelings right from the start - his ex put him off relationships and he doesn't see himself getting into that position ever again (although he occasionally softens on this point and says he might some day).

Sometimes it seems like something could happen with us - although we are just friends we quite often get really close and spend evenings cuddling etc and on the very rare occasion we even sleep together.. But then after a while things go back to normal, this platonic misery.. I'm sure he has some feelings for me but suspect they are limited to fondness rather than passion or love which breaks my heart because I truly adore him.

I don't know if I should keep hanging on to see if he'll realise I'm nothing like her and totally perfect for him or somehow separate myself from it and walk away.. We have plans to stay as flatmates for a few years as we both have plans for the future that involve saving every penny.. I cannot bear the thought of abandoning him..

Sorry this has gotten so long... I guess I just want someone to tell me how to stop this madness.. Please?

I had one of these, although we didn't live together. It was absolutely killing me because I loved him so much! He was quite honest about his position too, but I didn't believe him because of being such good friends and all the cosying up togther. I think I thought I could heal him and then he'd commit to me. Of course that was bull. I pulled away from him and ironically it renewed his enthusiasm for me - he came seeking me out, but ultimately he didn't want to commit he just enjoyed a friend with benefits. It took it for me to pull the plug, and essentially end contact, go cold turkey. I was pretty devastated, but you can't even start to get over him until you get away from him.

Yeah, even if you do get involved with him, who do you think he'll be calling a 'cnut' in a few years time?

My ex would have put me off relationships, except that I realise all men aren't the same! If he doesn't realise that, he's really messed up more than you can sort through for a relationship.

I think you need to move out and find yourself a new flatmate, and allow him to do the same. Doing so is not abandoning him, he's an adult and so are you, you're not his mother or his saviour. On the off-chance he's madly in love with you and this will awaken his ability to verbalize it, great. But more likely it'll simply enable you to move on and get to the point where you believe you are worth more than the occasional shag with a user. Because lets face it, we're not all just saying this for kicks: he is using you for sex. If you're both fine with that, well and good. But it doesn't sound like you're fine with it at all, and I really think you need to put some distance (physical and emotional) between you very swiftly, before you get even more hurt.

You're not listening to what he's telling you. He is probably assuming that you're fine with it - you may even have TOLD him that you're fine with it. Do him the favour of believing what he says and give up. One of you will need to move out.

It's very sad, but people cannot be persuaded to want a relationship if they really really don't want one.

Your post has got to me in a way that nothing on here has done before as it was like reading my own words from 10 years ago.

10 years ago I fell in love with someone, but he didn't feel the same as me. He was in the process of getting divorced from his 'psycho' ex. I wanted to go out with him and he knew it, but was up front with me saying that he didn't want a relationship, as he was getting over his ex.

That didn't stop him cuddling up with me, sleeping with me or letting me buy things for him. Oh no.

I fooled myself for nearly two years that something could happen between us - after all if he was sleeping with me and being with me all of the time it had to mean something.

He would do the same as the target of your affection. We'd cuddle, sleep together and the next day he would distance himself as far as he could, knowing that I would let him get away with it.

Sadly, it all came crashing down around my ears when we went for a night out at a club, he pulled and brought her back to the house that night and slept with her in the bed we usually shared, while I had to listen to it from my room.

I was a "psycho" for being upset and he treated me like shit until I moved out. She them moved in and they are now married with children.

Nothing has ever hurt me as much as that, but then the hurt turned to feeling like a completed idiot and I would end up going over and over in my head about how stupid I had been. It took me the best part of 10 years and a good year of counselling until I could forgive myself for being such a mug.

Move out. Or if its his flat, get him to move out. You need to get over him and deal with how you are feeling and that won't happen when you are in the same place with him every day, playing at being a couple.

You will never meet someone who will feel the same way about you if you are with someone who doesn't as you will appear off-limits.

Who knows - maybe if you move out and make yourself unavailable, he will suddenly realise what he's missing, but I seriously doubt it. Its more likely that he will move on. So should you.

I can't stop you from making the same mistakes as I did, but I really hope that you take this on board and save yourself the heartache as it will be much worse if you carry on like this until he finds someone else.

He's not likely to just pick up some random, he barely spends time with anyone but me (we're thoroughly co-dependant on each other - yes, I know that is terrible) and he never looks at anyone. I think he hasn't really been into sex since his ex. I have to find a time to have this talk.. God, what do i even say? "Yeah, I know you said you didnt want a relationship but I dont care how you feel, its that or I'm leaving?" What a bitch... What do i say?

Not exactly! It sounds like you have a lot of affection for each other, so think how uncomfortable any resulting relationship would be if you were always wondering if he'd gone into it just to avoid losing your friendship altogether.

I think the thing to do is sort out somewhere else to live and then present it to him as a fait accompli. Not in the hope that he'll crack, but in the realistic knowledge that it's the right thing to do, and that if by some amazing chance he realises his feelings are different to what he'd thought, it won't be that hard to make a relationship happen just because you've got your own space.

Good heavens, you're not a bitch at all. You say something along the lines of, 'I'm sorry, but my feelings for you have become too strong for me to be able to cope with this inbetweeny sort of relationship. I respect that you don't want a proper relationship at this point, so for my own mental health I need to distance myself from you and move out.'

If he actually just needs a kick up the arse to declare his undying love this will do the job, but if (more probably) he is fond of you but not that fond he'll have to face up to the facts and let you go.

Yes, I thought that as well. We did everything together, spent most of our free time together, went shopping together, went on holiday together, but we were not a couple. Then as I said, one night when we were out together, he met her in a club. They got chatting and got on really well. They started seeing each other and I think that he didn't know how to handle the situation with me so acted like an arse.

I am not saying it will happen to you, but if it does, it will be more devastating than you making the choice to put an end to this situation.

How about - "I know you are not in love with me and don't want a relationship, but the fact is that I have very strong feelings for you and while I am here with you I will always be living in hope that one day things will change and its destroying me. The best thing for both of us is for me to move out so we can both move on with our lives."

There is nothing bitchy about that. Its honest.

p.s. I am aware that I am being very subjective rather than objective, but its really taken me back.

I'm gonna lose my best friend.. This is so hard!

BH , I am sorry you went through that

what a despicable, cowardly man he was/is

Yes, and it's scary, especially if you spend so much time together that you have neglected other friends. How about giving yourself a couple of weeks where you try to get (back) in touch with as many friends as possible, or organise stuff with e.g. workmates, NOT with him, to show yourself that he is not your whole life. Then when you move out, you will have a social life that doesn't require him.

I am desperately madly completely head over heels in love with a man who doesn't seem to feel the same...

I got to the end of that sentence and thought walk away RUN.

He is not your best friend, you are his fuck buddy. all the sex, with none of the niceness and relationship stuff.

You are being used.

You need to get fucking angry and dump him, and move.

What LittleHouse said. Ask him point blank, be prepared for the answer to be not what you want, and find a new flatshare pronto if that's the case.

As things stand, you're just engaged in a kind of long, drawn-out self-torture with side helpings of humiliation and low self-esteem.

I say this as someone who's done similar things in the past and suffered for it.

Oh, and OP: you say he's your best friend. I respectfully disagree. This 'best friend' is using you at the moment.

Are you me Babyheave? I had EXACTLY the same scenario, right down to the pulling her in a nightclub. Although she was my friend's sister and she knew exactly what had been going on. I did lose it slightly but it devastated me, like you. So can I second what everyone else is saying. a)he's not your friend B)this way, heartbreak lies.

Mind you, I suspected that then and still didn't do anything to change my situation.

Travis - I don't know whether to be comforted or sad that I'm not the only one.
I knew I was kidding myself. I knew it, but I still let him do it. I got over him a long time before forgave myself for letting it happen.

I really do feel for the OP. Its bloody hard to give up that hope.

I dont think he is using her, she wants the same as he does, the closeness, the knowing he is there.

Life is a two way street, they both walk it.

Nothing is going to happen for you with this guy, if anything was going to it would have by now. So you have to get your own life, there is no reason to move, you just have to have a life outside of him and your home.

Get yourself some new interests, go out with friends, join a dating site and meet other men.

Get some attention from elsewhere.

This is almost a mirror image of how someone felt about me a year after a very painful divorce for me. I slept with her just 4 times in two years but we maintained a friendship. I was raw and to be Frank messed her about. I saw someone else during this time and in her words "to get at me" she had numerous short term flings as I showed no sign of committing.

Eventually the penny dropped. She is now my wife. We have been together for 10 years and we have a child together.
Looking back I behaved like a total dick and was lucky she stuck at it.

There is hope but set a time frame and stick to it. My wife did and when that time came I couldn't bear the thought of not being with her.

OP, please listen to babyheave and save yourself a huge amount of pain. You are way too available to this man. You have to move out and start seeing other men if you have any hope at all of getting him to commit. It's total BS that he's too hurt/traumatized/blah blah to commit. Men commit because they don't want anyone else to have their girlfriend. Right now he doesn't feel that way because you are literally waiting at home for him.

Note that although Maleview's story has the fairytale ending you were hoping for, the girl didn't sit around moping and hoping. She got on with life and meeting people and he was lucky she was still available by the time he'd sorted his shit out. In other words he could see a capable, independent person, not a comfortable piece of furniture. A woman worthy of being his wife, or someone else's if he didn't buck his ideas up.

You're a woman, not a sofa. Stop letting him park his bum on you.

"He's not likely to just pick up some random, he barely spends time with anyone but me (we're thoroughly co-dependant on each other - yes, I know that is terrible) and he never looks at anyone. I think he hasn't really been into sex since his ex."

Sorry, apart from completely agreeing with everyone telling you you are being a mug, I would like to add that you are definitely, and pathetically, deceiving yourself. He is not co-dependent on you. He is using you until he finds "the one", which I predict will happen very soon. You are the one who is co-dependent on him, because you are in love with him. In you, he has the mother figure who takes care of him, cuddles him, listens to him, adores him, and every now and then shags him... not too often, because he probably is not that attracted to you either (if he was, he would have sex with you much more often).

I am sorry if it hurts you to read all these posts, but you do need a cold dose of reality. You are saving yourself for someone who does not love you. Leaving him will be painful, but nothing comparable to what it will be if you keep following him like a puppy. There is a whole World out there in which to find your true love. It is NOT him. Get out and live your life!

Agree with everyone else.

have seen and heard men say they are not ready for anything- then suddenly a woman comes into their life and they fall head first- usually dumping the friend who gave them the unconditional support immediately after their break up.

But the point is- you are not friends. You have crossed a line. Even if sex is infrequent, it has happened so you are not platonic friends.

Painful- but what he means is he is not ready for anything with you. He may not be actually thinking that- but that's what his behaviour shows.

He likes your friendship and the cosy chats- but he is not offering anything else is he?

Either tell him how you feel (I suspect he knows already) or don't but find yourself another flat. he will either miss you madly and chase, or he won't.