u/Awkward_Low_8898

I’m in my early 20s and I’ve become extremely close to a guy around my age over the past year. But because of our family/social circumstances, we can’t realistically be together. I’m not asking whether I should confess or pursue him. I’m asking because I genuinely can’t tell whether this is platonic, romantic, or some intense emotional attachment neither of us is naming.

When we first got close, I was going through a very rough period and he started helping me in practical ways: driving me to exams and appointments, helping with university, waiting for me, picking me up, etc. At first it felt like normal help. But over time, it became constant. He started keeping track of literally everything about me. He remembered details about my health, medication side effects, food preferences, fears, routines, and emotional state that I barely expected anyone to remember. He keeps finding similarities between us and telling them to me and our mums.
I also thought that’s probably how he acts with a guest in his house. But he has another guest in the same exact category as me, and the bias and difference in behavior was too obvious.

I also thought it was all because of the proximity given we live in the same house and that distance would help detach.
But he travelled for two month and that only intensified whatever existed, even from his side it seems.
He went to my home country (and that of his parents), and spent days at my house, learnt my love before I met him, took photos of my childhood pictures and showed them to literally anyone who would see, won over my parents and whatnot.

We’re both not openly emotional person. He’s introverted, practical, sometimes blunt, and can be impatient with other people. But with me, he is unusually patient and attentive. From health to logistics to happiness, he takes care of everything.

There’s also physical closeness and ease, but not obvious romantic. Individually, all of these can be explained away. Together, they feel emotionally loaded to me.

He always takes pictures and videos of me doing ordinary things, like learning to bike, discovering rivers, reacting to animals, and then narrates them to his mum, my bestfriend (his cousin), my family. It feels affectionate, almost like he’s collecting memories, but again, it’s all plausibly deniable.

He also talks about future plans with “we” and “us” language. Walks we’ll take, places he’ll bring me, things we’ll do later, things we’ll fix or figure out together.
When there was a possibility of me leaving, he made comments about trying to make plans so I wouldn’t leave, and he got involved in conversations about my future in a way that felt more emotionally invested than casual concern.

Sometimes it feels like there is something neither of us is saying because we both know it can’t realistically go anywhere. Also we both know that we don’t want a relationship until we’re settled.
I know I’m attached to him. That part is not confusing.
What I can’t tell is whether he feels anything too, or whether I’m romanticizing someone who cared for me during a vulnerable time.
So I’m asking:
Can this kind of closeness be completely platonic?
Does this sound like caretaking/responsibility, or romantic feelings being suppressed?
How would you read this if you saw it from the outside?

I’m in my early 20s and I’ve become extremely close to a guy around my age over the past year. But because of our family/social circumstances, we can’t realistically be together. I’m not asking whether I should confess or pursue him. I’m asking because I genuinely can’t tell whether this is platonic, romantic, or some intense emotional attachment neither of us is naming.

When we first got close, I was going through a very rough period and he started helping me in practical ways: driving me to exams and appointments, helping with university, waiting for me, picking me up, etc. At first it felt like normal help. But over time, it became constant. He started keeping track of literally everything about me. He remembered details about my health, medication side effects, food preferences, fears, routines, and emotional state that I barely expected anyone to remember. He keeps finding similarities between us and telling them to me and our mums.
I also thought that’s probably how he acts with a guest in his house. But he has another guest in the same exact category as me, and the bias and difference in behavior was too obvious.

I also thought it was all because of the proximity given we live in the same house and that distance would help detach.
But he travelled for two month and that only intensified whatever existed, even from his side it seems.
He went to my home country (and that of his parents), and spent days at my house, learnt my love before I met him, took photos of my childhood pictures and showed them to literally anyone who would see, won over my parents and whatnot.

We’re both not openly emotional person. He’s introverted, practical, sometimes blunt, and can be impatient with other people. But with me, he is unusually patient and attentive. From health to logistics to happiness, he takes care of everything.

There’s also physical closeness and ease, but not obvious romantic. Individually, all of these can be explained away. Together, they feel emotionally loaded to me.

He always takes pictures and videos of me doing ordinary things, like learning to bike, discovering rivers, reacting to animals, and then narrates them to his mum, my bestfriend (his cousin), my family. It feels affectionate, almost like he’s collecting memories, but again, it’s all plausibly deniable.

He also talks about future plans with “we” and “us” language. Walks we’ll take, places he’ll bring me, things we’ll do later, things we’ll fix or figure out together.
When there was a possibility of me leaving, he made comments about trying to make plans so I wouldn’t leave, and he got involved in conversations about my future in a way that felt more emotionally invested than casual concern.

Sometimes it feels like there is something neither of us is saying because we both know it can’t realistically go anywhere. Also we both know that we don’t want a relationship until we’re settled.
I know I’m attached to him. That part is not confusing.
What I can’t tell is whether he feels anything too, or whether I’m romanticizing someone who cared for me during a vulnerable time.
So I’m asking:
Can this kind of closeness be completely platonic?
Does this sound like caretaking/responsibility, or romantic feelings being suppressed?
How would you read this if you saw it from the outside?

I’m a woman in my early 20s. There’s a guy around my age in my extended family circle. We’re distantly related, met and became close recently, as adults after I moved continents. Because of the family context, I’m not asking whether I should confess or pursue anything. I just want to understand how this dynamic reads from the outside.
I was going through a rough period, and his family took me in for a while. Over time, he started helping me with almost everything: driving me to classes and exams, waiting during my exams, helping me study, speaking to advisors with me, tracking my timetable, checking if I ate, remembering my medications and side effects, asking about my pain, and generally acting like my life was partly his responsibility. He fought for me when my parents wanted me to go back to my country forever.
He’s not usually very emotionally expressive. We’re both introverted, nerd, awkward, family-oriented, and can be impatient with others. But with me, he’s unusually patient and attentive. He teaches me things, walks or bikes with me for hours, fixes things for me, gives me head pats, pulls me away from traffic, gives me his tinted glasses when the sun bothers me, notices when I’m stressed, and remembers tiny details I mention once.
He also buys me small things without making it a big deal, like bubble tea or brownies, remembers what I like, takes candid pictures and videos of me when we go out, and shows them to his mum or others while narrating stories about me. He talks about future plans involving both of us, like biking routes, errands, projects, or places he wants to take me. We’ve become basically ‘best friends’ tho we won’t explicitly say it that way. We spend all the time together. And now joke around, tease each other a lot. He keeps bringing up my future relationships as jokes all the time. Also so many things happened (physical ease and proximity, that can be plausibly deniable tho they felt charged to me at times. )
His mum seems to notice too. She often sends us to do things together, jokes that he listens to me, says he’s “busy with me,” and smiles when he remembers things about me. My own parents have also noticed how much he takes care of me. His neighbor thought I was his gf.
The confusing part is that nothing is openly romantic. We both clearly know that we don’t want a relationship until we’re settled. And because of the family context, I don’t know if either of us would even allow ourselves to think about it that way.
From the outside, does this sound like normal platonic protectiveness, intense attachment, or possible romantic interest being suppressed or unacknowledged? I especially want to hear from emotionally reserved people or people who show care through actions more than words.

I’m currently in the process of trying to figure out what’s causing my symptoms, and I’m wondering how other people handled the period before they had a diagnosis.
My family doctor suspects fibromyalgia as one possibility, but nothing has been confirmed yet. I’ve been going through different tests, seeing specialists, and trying to rule out other conditions, including autoimmune diseases. So far, I don’t have a definitive diagnosis or official documentation stating exactly what I have.
The problem is that my symptoms are very real regardless of whether they’ve been given a name yet. I have days where the pain and fatigue significantly affect my ability to function, study, or attend commitments, but I often feel like I can’t justify asking for accommodations because I don’t have paperwork that says, “This is what’s wrong.”
For those of you who went through a long diagnostic process, how did you handle situations like school or work before you had a confirmed diagnosis? Did you explain that you were still undergoing investigations? Were people generally understanding, or did they expect formal documentation before taking your health seriously?
I’m not asking how to get accommodations without evidence. I’m more wondering how you approached these conversations while you were still in that frustrating “we know something is wrong, but we don’t know exactly what” stage.

I’m currently in the process of trying to figure out what’s causing my symptoms, and I’m wondering how other people handled the period before they had a diagnosis.
My family doctor suspects fibromyalgia as one possibility, but nothing has been confirmed yet. I’ve been going through different tests, seeing specialists, and trying to rule out other conditions, including autoimmune diseases. So far, I don’t have a definitive diagnosis or official documentation stating exactly what I have.
The problem is that my symptoms are very real regardless of whether they’ve been given a name yet. I have days where the pain and fatigue significantly affect my ability to function, study, or attend commitments, but I often feel like I can’t justify asking for accommodations because I don’t have paperwork that says, “This is what’s wrong.”
For those of you who went through a long diagnostic process, how did you handle situations like school or work before you had a confirmed diagnosis? Did you explain that you were still undergoing investigations? Were people generally understanding, or did they expect formal documentation before taking your health seriously?
I’m not asking how to get accommodations without evidence. I’m more wondering how you approached these conversations while you were still in that frustrating “we know something is wrong, but we don’t know exactly what” stage.

I’m currently in the process of trying to figure out what’s causing my symptoms, and I’m wondering how other people handled the period before they had a diagnosis.
My family doctor suspects fibromyalgia as one possibility, but nothing has been confirmed yet. I’ve been going through different tests, seeing specialists, and trying to rule out other conditions, including autoimmune diseases. So far, I don’t have a definitive diagnosis or official documentation stating exactly what I have.
The problem is that my symptoms are very real regardless of whether they’ve been given a name yet. I have days where the pain and fatigue significantly affect my ability to function, study, or attend commitments, but I often feel like I can’t justify asking for accommodations because I don’t have paperwork that says This is what’s wrong.
For those of you who went through a long diagnostic process, how did you handle situations like school or work before you had a confirmed diagnosis? Did you explain that you were still undergoing investigations? Were people generally understanding, or did they expect formal documentation before taking your health seriously?
I’m not asking how to get accommodations without evidence. I’m more wondering how you approached these conversations while you were still in that frustrating “we know something is wrong, but we don’t know exactly what” stage.

This has happened to me multiple times now, and I genuinely don’t know how.
Over the years, I’ve had around five people refer to me as their best friend, either directly or in conversations with other people. The problem is… I never consciously thought of them as my best friend.
It’s not that I don’t like them. I care about them, enjoy talking to them, and consider them good friends. I just don’t mentally categorize people into “best friend” and “friend” the same way they seem to.
I also don’t feel like I’m doing anything special. I’m just… being a friend. I listen, I remember things about people, I check in occasionally, and I enjoy spending time with them. Somehow, that has repeatedly resulted in people deciding I’m their best friend.
Then I feel guilty because I can’t honestly say I feel the exact same way back. It almost feels like there’s an expectation of mutual intensity that I never realized I had signed up for.

I’ve been thinking about how much a situation can change the way we experience feelings for someone.
Have you ever had feelings for someone where, because of the circumstances, you couldn’t just… act normally?
Not because they rejected you or because the feelings weren’t real, but because the situation itself made everything complicated. Maybe they were a close friend, a coworker, someone you lived with, someone you couldn’t date for whatever reason, or there were family, cultural, distance, timing, or other factors involved.
Did you find yourself overthinking every interaction? Did you become more reserved than you normally would have been? Or did you just try to ignore your feelings altogether?
I’m curious how other people navigated situations where the feelings themselves weren’t necessarily the hardest part. It was everything surrounding them.

I’m Mauritian living abroad, and one thing I’ve noticed is that almost everyone assumes I’m Indian. I understand why. Most people simply haven’t heard much about Mauritius, so they go with the closest identity they recognize.
What I struggle with is when conversations about India, or even anti Indian stereotypes and comments, are directed at me because people assume that is my identity. Sometimes I get approached by people asking if I’m Punjabi, or by Indians themselves who start speaking to me in Indian languages without checking first.
I want to be clear that I have nothing against India or Indians, and I’m not trying to imply that racism toward Indians is acceptable. It absolutely isn’t. But I’m Mauritian. Our culture, history, identity, languages, and the way we see ourselves are different, even when many of us have Indian ancestry.
For Indo-Mauritians living abroad, how often does this happen to you? Do you correct people every time, or do you eventually just get tired of explaining?

I’m Mauritian living abroad, and one thing I’ve noticed is that almost everyone assumes I’m Indian. I understand why. Most people simply haven’t heard much about Mauritius, so they go with the closest identity they recognize.
What I struggle with is when conversations about India, or even anti Indian stereotypes and comments, are directed at me because people assume that is my identity. Sometimes I get approached by people asking if I’m Punjabi, or by Indians themselves who start speaking to me in Indian languages without checking first.
I want to be clear that I have nothing against India or Indians, and I’m not trying to imply that racism toward Indians is acceptable. It absolutely isn’t. But I’m Mauritian. Our culture, history, identity, languages, and the way we see ourselves are different, even when many of us have Indian ancestry.
For Indo-Mauritians living abroad, how often does this happen to you? Do you correct people every time, or do you eventually just get tired of explaining?

For context, I recently got rather close to someone, that’s caring, protective, and whatnot towards me. It’s a relationship difficult to label, which can be interpreted as romantic to me but not necessarily to him. But the context and situation is complicated where defining what we have can be really complex and problematic . Neither of us ever had a relationship, we’re both rather introverted, low social circle. And now we’re in this kind of forced proximity situation where we got very close.
I used to be someone very different before, living alone, my solitude was my best friend and I genuinely loved and seeks being alone. And then he came into my life, and being alone and being alone with him felt the same.
Idk when I grew this emotionally attached to him. He is not controlling in any ways, but it’s more like I can’t help but like him control. He makes me happy. I don’t feel like meeting anyone else, going out with anyone else, except him. If we don’t speak in a day I go crazy. The idea of him not being around physically hurts me, actually did when he had to travel for a bit. I thought distance would help but it intensified the attachment. From both side it seems. I constantly seek for him all the time emotionally even thought I don’t explicitly show it.
The worst part is that I cannot cut him off in any sense even if I want to(in order to detach) and people around us are doing everything to further strengthen this bond by continuously pairing us together.
We are not even, we’re not even supposed to be this close given context. Yet I’m this attached.
Him, he’s acting attached. Idk how men are. I never had male friends before. But even his and my family see that this is not his normal self. He is clearly much more involved and attached to me.
Eventually I know that our situations wont allow us to end up together. But despite that, the attachment and emotional dependency I have on him is not healthy. It’s driving me insane and I keep wanting more of it.

For context, I recently got rather close to someone, that’s caring, protective, and whatnot towards me. It’s a relationship difficult to label, which can be interpreted as romantic to me but not necessarily to him. But the context and situation is complicated where defining what we have can be really complex and problematic . Neither of us ever had a relationship, we’re both rather introverted, low social circle. And now we’re in this kind of forced proximity situation where we got very close.
I used to be someone very different before, living alone, my solitude was my best friend and I genuinely loved and seeks being alone. And then he came into my life, and being alone and being alone with him felt the same.
Idk when I grew this emotionally attached to him. He is not controlling in any ways, but it’s more like I can’t help but like him control. He makes me happy. I don’t feel like meeting anyone else, going out with anyone else, except him. If we don’t speak in a day I go crazy. The idea of him not being around physically hurts me, actually did when he had to travel for a bit. I thought distance would help but it intensified the attachment. From both side it seems. I constantly seek for him all the time emotionally even thought I don’t explicitly show it.
The worst part is that I cannot cut him off in any sense even if I want to(in order to detach) and people around us are doing everything to further strengthen this bond by continuously pairing us together.
We are not even, we’re not even supposed to be this close given context. Yet I’m this attached.
Him, he’s acting attached. Idk how men are. I never had male friends before. But even his and my family see that this is not his normal self. He is clearly much more involved and attached to me.
Eventually I know that our situations wont allow us to end up together. But despite that, the attachment and emotional dependency I have on him is not healthy. It’s driving me insane and I keep wanting more of it.

Please shower and use deo. Thanks.