The One That Got Away

This is just based on my own experience, and I understand that my advice is not going to help EVERYONE, but it can help some, and that is all that I care about.

We started off as friends and eventually I began to like him, and I later came to the conclusion that he liked me.

My problem was that I was nervous to initiate a relationship; "Maybe I'm not ready for a relationship right now," "I didn't want to make him feel obligated to go on a date," "I want him to choose me." These were the insecurities that I had in my mind that prevented me from pursuing a relationship with a good friend who might have been a compatible companion.

I had high hopes that he might wish to pursue a relationship with me, but the fact that I didn't talk to him as normal changed everything. I found that he had pursued another instead of me. It hurt, because I knew that he liked me, but did I show him any sign of reciprocating his affection?

Apparently not.

Then my mind began to worry about whether or not he thinks that I lead him on, that I had hurt him, because the next time I saw him, he seemed awkward and began to distance himself from me. Which made me believe that I had done something wrong.

I had agonized over my worry for over a month and a half before I finally had the gall to ask him if we were still friends. He was very good at responding quickly, stating that we were, in fact, still friends and explained that he did not like talking to other girls while he is dating someone else. Which is something that I can understand and told him that knowing that we were still friends took a weight off of my shoulders.

My friends warned me not to text him, but that reassurance that we are still friends was all that I needed to hear because even though nothing blossomed between us, I wanted us to still be friends. I value my friends very much and hate to lose them.

The advice that I have for others is that if you want to resolve things, you should resolve them in the way that works best for you. For myself it was the straight forward approach, but I let the advice of my friends make my worries worse and I waited until I couldn't take it anymore; it would have been a worse outcome had I waited any longer.

I have closure now, that was what I needed, and I had to get it by myself; because if someone else had done it for me, then it wouldn't have been enough.