Ended Situationship
I’m 20F and he’s 25M. I’ve been dealing with a really confusing situationship/friendship for months and I genuinely don’t know if I’m overthinking it or if this dynamic really was emotionally deep but just unhealthy timing-wise.
We were never officially dating, but we basically acted like we were in a relationship without the label. We talked every day, hung out constantly, made out/hooked up, sexted, were loyal to each other, and emotionally relied on each other a lot. He would call me “his girl” around his friends, get jealous/protective if guys hit on me, and even told my cousin (his best friend) he wanted to try dating me and didn’t want another girl ruining it for him. He constantly talked about “us” in the future, like me eventually seeing him in his work clothes, him dying before me (dark joke conversations lol), wanting to come to my birthday because he “wouldn’t miss his girl’s birthday,” etc.
What really messes with my head is the way he treated me in person. Multiple people noticed he would literally just stare at me all the time. He would look at me with what honestly felt like admiration. Even when I was doing something random like talking to a dog at a Super Bowl party, he’d just stare at me smiling. When we were out places together, he’d stand extremely close to me and just analyze my face like he was studying every detail. He was also weirdly obsessive in small ways — constantly asking for mirror pics, complimenting me, saying I was “wifey material,” loving my plaid pajamas for some reason, wanting pictures of me all the time, etc. He genuinely made me feel admired and emotionally safe for a while.
But at the same time, he also admitted he wasn’t emotionally or mentally ready for a relationship. He told me he wasn’t in the right headspace, that he felt like he was putting pressure on himself to make things work, and that he didn’t want both of us getting hurt if we got into a relationship and it failed. He works insane hours too (Monday–Saturday, usually starting around 4 AM until whenever the job is done), and he said during the summer he barely even has time for himself. He kept saying he wanted to take things slow because he didn’t know if he could properly handle a relationship.
The thing is, despite saying all this, his actions toward me were SO relationship-like that it confused me emotionally. We basically acted like a couple without the label. I genuinely believe he cared about me and I don’t think he’s a bad person at all. I actually think he was confused too. But recently after we hooked up/sexted again, he suddenly started leaving me on delivered for almost a full day while still clearly active on Snapchat and snapping other people. We had a streak too and he basically let it die. What hurts is that he always told me things like “if you ever need anything or advice I’m here for you,” so now the inconsistency feels really painful and confusing.
I genuinely cannot tell if this was:
a guy who really did want something with me but mentally/emotionally could not handle a relationship right now,
OR
a guy who liked the emotional/physical closeness but never truly intended to commit.
I don’t hate him at all, which almost makes this harder. I still care about him deeply as a person and I know he has goals and works extremely hard. But I’m emotionally exhausted because I feel like I got attached to someone who made me feel deeply cared for while also giving mixed signals the entire time.
Am I overanalyzing this or does this genuinely sound like a confusing emotionally intimate situation?
Him and my cousin would talk all the time about me and how he liked me etc. I'm just not over him yet and i'm being delusional by thinking something will magically change. I'm still holding on hope.