I desperately need some advice on this and I have no one to discuss this with. I have n/c to avoid being outed. Here goes... I have a school age child and I have been single since dc was a baby. Not even a whiff of a man and for the most part I wasn't bothered. I also felt so bad about myself that I couldn't believe that any man that I was interested in would like me.
Last year I met a man who is single, but due to other circumstances he was 'off limits' to me. I fell for him and I knew my feelings weren't going to go away, so I joined a dating sight to distract myself and to make myself consider other possibilities and just to see if there were any men that I liked that I could build a friendship with. This worked, I got to 'know' a couple of men and I met with one and it helped boost my self-esteem. I was upfront about just wanting friendship so no one was deceived.
My feelings for the original man persisted, as I had anticipated, and I got to know him better over the course of this year. I felt he respected me but I didn't know if his feelings were deeper than a professional relationship. I learned that our circumstances were going to change and that a relationship would no longer be a complete non-starter, but not necessarily without issues. So, I made a decision to ask him out at the time this change would occur and I have spent ages looking forward to it, as well as feeling pretty hopeless and anticipating rejection, but I felt I needed to do it as I have liked him for so long.
Just before my opportunity came to ask him, I was contacted on the dating site by a guy who really stood out to me. I put him off as I was busy and I wasn't really interested, but I thought I really should at least see if there could be anything between us as I thought I was a bit obsessed with the original man and I may have been just imagining mutual feelings between us. In the meantime, an opportunity to see man 1 fell through so I asked him out by text and heard nothing back. I got in touch with dating site man and it turns out there really does seem to be something. We have spent many hours chatting online and I am aware of all the pitfalls of OD but this feels very good and he has talked about meeting up more than once and I would like to meet him if the current good feelings I have continue.
In the meantime, before I started to have strong feelings for man 2, man 1 texts back and says he would like to meet up and we made arrangements to meet next week. I had only suggested something very low-key and day time, not a 'hot date'. However, my feelings have really changed and I care for him but when I think about him, I see him in a different light. Now, I know this is only a low-key friendly thing, but my original intentions were much more than that and I expect my feelings have been very plain to him as I'm not good at hiding them. I like and respect this person. I also know he is vulnerable and I don't want to mess him about. Of course, he might be thinking, ok I'll just meet her and let her down gently. I cannot believe he will think I have no agenda at all. I also don't know what to say to OD man, whom I have been very honest and open with about everything else. There is a feeling of warmth and intimacy between us and I want to be honest with him and not mess things up.
Please can anyone help me make sense of this and work out what to do?