u/pliskinpenis

I had a coworker/friend (?) who would not stop finding opportunities to stare at me from the moment I met him. Many things happened in our relationship, and let's just say we began to drift due to a conflict in between the two of us. He was very hot and cold and there was clearly attraction between us but it felt like he did not want to give me the time of day so I put distance.

He did not stop staring, not even up until his last day. He would always hold doors with his whole body so I'd have to inch closer to him, would breathe heavily near me, accidentally grunt in my ear, and so on. But above all, he could not physically stop himself from looking at me incredibly often, to a point where others noticed. He is a huge flirt and had some people who were clearly into him, and he was even touchy with them, but for some reason he panicked horribly at the idea of me hugging him once. No matter what I did, he would look. Even on his last days, he would find ways to circle around me so he could get a 360 view, kept randomly looking at me mid conversation with others, and once snuck up behind me as I spoke with someone before walking away. Sometimes he'd even get into specific positions and angles just so he could see me. Despite this, he never actually wants to talk to me (even after I made attempts to treat him warmly), and would often sadly watch as I spoke with others amiably. Can anyone get a read on the logic behind this body language if there is no real engagement?

I love you back. Even despite everything.

It's a pretty long story but I'm gonna try to condense it. I have a coworker who flirted with me and went out of his way to do very laborious things for me from the moment I got hired at the place I'm at, to a point where he was reprimanded for how much he was doing for me. He left recently so I’m making this post. He also broke rules to make sure I’d have to interact with him for certain things that I shouldn’t have been. For the record, I wasn't supposed to know he was doing these things and he got sheepish and anxious when I found out. I reciprocated by taking care of him in many ways, being very kind to him and trying very hard to get to know him. We began to develop something of a a friendship, and he would sometimes confide in me about personal feelings. Over time he got stranger and stranger about it, getting increasingly hot and cold with me while behaving consistently towards others, but I kept checking in on his boundaries to make sure everything was okay. It was getting harder and harder for him to talk to me. He would just get too nervous and keep things short. So I decided to have a convo with him about it and he basically said something about how I was pushing him, and I decided to stop doing the things I was doing and taking a step back.

In this phase, he didn't really initiate conversation with me (although he would respond quickly and anxiously, while also not knowing how to proceed with our convos) and I noticed he didn't have that problem with other people, so I decided to stop investing my time and energy in someone who likely didn't want to be around me. He seemed uncomfortable and I was getting hurt, and I already tried to talk to him about it, so I thought it was for the best that we parted ways and kept it professional. He took this...very badly. Like, very badly. None of our mutual friends can bring me up without him getting upset. He’d watch me constantly and make excuses to be near me, but he’d refuse to talk to me. I've given him opportunities to clear the air and he won't do it. He'd even begun to dress in ways catered to my preferences in an attempt to get me to look at him. He kept this up until the last day - I once told him I liked a specific fictional character and that he should dress like him, and he did it until his last minute here.

He'd also begun to exhibit jealous behavior. I've had people tell me they could feel him seething near us when I've been affectionate towards them while he was around. He's even knocked away a chair near me and my friend once only to not do it again once we were no longer in that spot together.

Despite all of this, when he's told people about our conflict in the past, he's framed it as me lavishing him with attention and affection that he never wanted, which is exactly why I took a step back - that was how he made me feel. I have proof contradicting this as well, with him saying in text that he spent everyday looking forward to what I'd do with him next. For further context, he's in a committed and monogamous relationship, but he also really likes to string people along and is a huge flirt. But he's also never been normal about me. In team meetings, he used to stand near me and breathe very heavily to a point where I could hear it, even after we stopped speaking. He's made a point to stare me nearly everyday I've been here.

He’s no longer here. And I broke the silence between us before he left. But when I did, he acted like nothing bad had happened at all. He turned towards me, made eye contact and spoke warmly. However, this went nowhere. Our relationship reverted back to how it was silently. And he still couldn’t stop watching me, even with other people on his arms that he’d been flirting with. He was once sadly watching me have fun with someone else, so I tried to loop him in, but he resisted even then. The other person was just as confused as me. He has stickers on his water bottle that I gave him, and they‘re the only things on his bottle. And even until his last day he had those stickers facing him as he worked.

I guess I just want to understand. He doesn’t text me or talk to me the way he does other people, and he never has. I wish it was just a matter of him not liking me. But why do all of this? Why let other people, girls especially, in and flirt with them and have friendships that toe too many boundaries but put distance between us - just to spend all of your time staring at me anyways? Blatantly at that. I can’t talk to you but you don’t like when I don’t either. It doesn’t matter anymore but I suppose it hurts because I cared about him and know I’ll probably never get an answer.

Hi! I’d like to ask for a reading pertaining to a person in my life who is exiting it soon. We have a very tense, complicated and charged relationship where many feelings have gone unsaid and may never come to fruition at all. I was hoping for a reading pertaining to their place in my life and what will come from it. l

Please post my FREE Reading as a comment below and I will respond ASAP with a Review in the comments section.

Thank you!

It's a pretty long story but I'm gonna try to condense it. I have a coworker who flirted with me and went out of his way to do very laborious things for me from the moment I got hired at the place I'm at, to a point where he was reprimanded for how much he was doing for me. For the record, I wasn't supposed to know he was doing these things and he got sheepish and anxious when I found out. I reciprocated by taking care of him in many ways, being very kind to him and trying very hard to get to know him. We began to develop a friendship, and he would sometimes confide in me about deeply personal feelings. Over time he got stranger and stranger about it, but I kept checking in on his boundaries to make sure everything was okay. It was getting harder and harder for him to talk to me. He would just get too nervous and keep things short. So I decided to have a convo with him about it and he basically said something about how I was pushing him, and I decided to stop doing the things I was doing and taking a step back.

In this phase, he didn't really initiate conversation with me (although he would respond quickly and anxiously, while also not knowing how to proceed with our convos) and I noticed he didn't have that problem with other people, so I decided to stop investing my time and energy in someone who likely just didn't want to be around me. He seemed uncomfortable and I was feeling hurt as well, and I already tried to talk to him about it, so I thought it was for the best that we parted ways and kept it professional. He took this...very badly. Like, very badly. None of our mutual friends can bring me up without him getting visibly upset. He watches me constantly and makes excuses to be near me, but he refuses to talk to me. I've given him opportunities to clear the air and he won't do it. He's even begun to dress in ways catered to my preferences in an attempt to get me to look at him. And he refuses to be in social group settings with me.

He's also begun to exhibit jealous behavior. I've had people tell me they could feel him seething near us when I've been affectionate towards them while he was around. He's tried to sabotage my conversations with other coworkers I'm close to by being as loud as possible, and even knocked away a chair near us once only to not do it again once we were no longer in that spot together.

Despite all of this, when he's told people about our conflict in the past, he's framed it as me lavishing him with attention and affection that he never wanted, which is exactly why I took a step back - that was how he made me feel. I have proof contradicting this as well, with him saying in text that he spent everyday looking forward to what I'd do with him next. And he's only getting stranger and stranger the more distance I put. For further context, he's in a committed and monogamous relationship, but he also really likes to string people along and is a huge flirt. But he's also never been normal about me. In team meetings, he used to stand near me and breathe very heavily to a point where I could hear it, even after we stopped speaking. He's made a point to stare at me nearly everyday I've been here. Sometimes he glares, huffs, etc. but when he doesn’t think I’m looking he looks at me… with an expression I can only call pitiful.

I'm honestly just confused. I know I should have never responded to any of his gestures, but I was just excited to make a new connection and truly wanted to fix things. I can't really do anything about it at this point and don't intend to, but can anyone give me an idea as to why this person is acting like this? I don’t know what he wants. If it’s romantic attention, there are already people giving him that.

tl;dr: Coworker started flirting and being very generous towards me, I started reciprocating and being very kind to him, he got weirder and weirder about, I confronted him, he lied and tried to say I was giving him things he didn't want which I have proof against, he's developed a possessive obsession with me but also refuses to to actually talk with me while making it everyone else's problem.

This is a very long and convoluted story that I will not be getting into for a myriad of reasons, one of them being that I’m paranoid. But let’s just say I have a coworker (it’s always a coworker) who hit on me the moment I started working here. He is taken, for the record, and in what appears to be a monogamous relationship. I didn’t think much of it until I discovered he was manufacturing situations and technically bending rules to make sure I had to talk to him while covering up my mistakes behind my back.

I started liking him a lot more than I care to admit. I became very committed to trying to make his life better and getting to know him. He seemed receptive to it, if not outright happy, and I asked many times if I was overriding any boundaries of his. He did not ever say no and if anything responded positively.

He’s something of a huge flirt, but over time, as he was flirting with other people, he became less flirty and more vulnerable with me. More akin to a nervous and anxious kid. He would even confide in me sometimes. But it was as if the more we spoke, the less he knew how to talk to me. Any confidence he might have had ebbed away.

Things changed. I asked him if I was making him uncomfortable because I noticed he treats me differently and doesn‘t seem to enjoy being around me. He got incredibly nervous and gave me a pretty half assed responded, so I said alright and stopped bothering. I tried to find a good balance so every now and then I would reach out and try to strike up a conversation, but he would never hold it for long. Meanwhile, he engaged (and flirted with) other people with no problem, more than happy to give them his time.

I started reading the signs and began to put distance. It was to protect myself but also because I wanted to give him some reprieve if he just didn’t like me, so I stopped speaking to him altogether. When I did this, instead of initiating conversation with me, he would try to find small ways to goad me into talking to him. I didn’t bite because I didn’t see the point. Things continue to worsen. Now he is going dead silent at the mention of me, seething quietly when I flirt with other people in earshot or people mention banging out with me, and has gotten so strange about me that other people have noticed. He’s also actively avoiding being in the same settings as me.

But at the same time, he’ll keep finding ways to be physically close to me. And he keeps… watching me? Literally doing things he shouldn’t just to get the chance to watch me or gaze at me regularly. I’ve recently offered him a chance to talk and he didn’t take it, but he won’t stop doing things like this either. I’m just confused at this point. I’m assuming there’s an odd fixation here, but it’s just all so strange.