r/unrequited_love

So recently i met a boy at work that i thought was cute. We had one shift together and after that i just couldnt stop thinking about him. I’ve never been in a relationship before so usually i just start creating my own scenarios and probably fuck my self up there cuz then im either left avoidant or disappointed. This time around i kinda got to know him, i liked the way he opened up about himself and his past relationship to me and some small things he did. He probably doesn’t feel that way about me but ever since we “clicked” in my head i cant stop thinking about him.

Reasons being maybe family/social expectations, religion, or incompatibility etc

Wondering how often this happens

What if you’ve been friends for over a decade

Is it better to cut ties
What do men do about this

I really cared about this girl and tried my best, but she chose another guy over me. What I don't understand is that, in my opinion, he's less attractive than me and overweight, yet she still chose him.

I tried really hard, but eventually she got angry with me and told me to stop interfering.

I still care about her and don't want to give up. Is there any way I can convince her to give me a chance, or should I just let her go?

A couple of weeks ago, I liked my friend (let's call him Andy). We work at the same place, so we saw each other often.

Before this, we often hung out after work together. It wasn't overtly romantic, but some of my friends noticed we were quite close.

And then I had this idiotic idea to confess my feelings. Just so you understand, I wasn't making anything up; even though I like him, I don't fully believe he could feel the same way. And then, I was absolutely sure he felt the same way.

He asked me to go to a bar with him; we were supposed to go with a few other people, but they couldn't.

And then, stupidly, I decided to invite a girl (let's call her Anna), who had started working here a week ago, along with us.

The three of us went (this is starting to sound like a joke).

A couple of hours pass, and we're sitting at the bar. I go to the bathroom, come back five minutes later, and see Anna sitting on his lap, laughing flirtatiously at him.

Basically, I was successfully forgotten by the two of them and felt like dead weight. I drank a few more shots and completely fell into a zombie-like state.

After the bar, when I was already home, a colleague texted me and asked, "What happened there? My friend was at that bar and said Andy dumped you and picked up some whore."

Two days later, Andy told Anna he loved her. By a lucky chance, the three of us were alone on the street again. She turned him down, asking if they could just remain friends.

Did I feel humiliated? Yes. Did it bruise my ego? Yes.

On the other hand, it's good that everything turned out the way it did. But what happened is so sad and stupid at the same time that I don't know whether to laugh or cry over my idiotic behavior.

You can make a joke sometime, I'm really embarrassed.

So what's the problem? I'm angry at both of them. I understand that Anna and I have different worldviews and different senses of personal boundaries, but I still can't help but feel irritated when I see her, especially when Andy starts hanging around her like a dog.

And Andy also pisses me off for falling at her feet when she rubbed her "back" against him.

I'm jealous, and I have every right to be. At least it doesn't hurt anyone else.

I know there won't be anything more between us, but I'm hurt that it turned out this way.

All that flirting , sharing everything, prioritising each other, dreaming about eachother frequently, talking for long hours was platonic for him. Started talking to his ex just the day I confessed to him and they are almost back together. Changed too, no more of that platonic behaviour exists anymore.

It's been almost 2 weeks since we had our chat and I admitted to having a serious crush on you because people were running their mouths to you. You made your position very clear that rhere were no feelings on your end outside of genuine friendship and I honestly accept that. I know that no matter how much I wish these feelings coukd be returned that ultimately I cannot make you feel something that is t already there.

There was no written evidence of what I said in relation to it just my words to others so I should have just told you I had no idea what people are talking about. That they are just jealous of how close we have become over the course of the last 2 years and just wanted to drive a wedge between our ffriendship. Because now that my feelings for you are out there and you know I feel like I can no longer be myself and just say what comes to mind like before.

I have never been the kind of person to put thought into my words before saying them and I dont want to.have to start now.but I feel like if I dont start putting serious thoughts into everything I say going forward it could be misinterpreted and I coukd lose you from my life completely and I dont want that.

I would rather spend the rest of my life with my heart aching knowing ny feelings will never be returned than risk losing your friendship forever.

He’s been on site in Victoria since the 12th and won’t be back until the 24th. I’m feeling really lonely without my little routine of “neck-breaking” just to catch a glimpse of him when he passes by.

I keep thinking about the way he smells when I’m near him, and how he gets flustered when he catches me staring—still makes me laugh.

I’m not even mad that I miss him… I’m just sad because it’s so quiet here without him around.

Like say you’ve been crushing or in love with this guy/girl for months or YEARS. Or when they rejected you so many times and dated other people.

A couple months ago I (20M) got really close with a coworker “Jet” (25F) She started working here near the end of last year. I didn’t really see her much at first since our shifts were pretty far apart but during the holidays I (along with Jet and some others) were asked to come in for a overnight shift. We really hit it off that night and from then on our friendship blossomed. I changed my schedule to match hers since i was starting to develop a small crush. I used the pay increase as my main reason though. As time went on we started hanging out outside of work and would text a bit too. However most of our interactions were still at work. A friend of mine was having a performance for their college club and i decided to invite her to come along with. She agreed and we had a great time. At this point im head over heels. She says she has stuff to do and we part ways after the show. I tag along with my friend to a after party the club threw. I got pretty drunk and just gushed my feelings for jet to her through text. To my surprise she responded quickly. In summery she just didn’t see me like that. Shes still figuring stuff out with her ex and doesn’t want to see anyone new. And thats was that. Work went on the same and our friendship didn’t waver. We still talked and went back to normal except my feelings never did. I dont want to stop being friends with her but my feelings make me feel like such a creep. Im assuming she knows i still have feelings for her but is that ok? Any advice would be appreciated!

so you have been on my mind for a long time now, haven't had anyone for so long as you in my mind. initially i had thought of us being partners or so but things changed between us. I thought we had something between us, but I guess most of it was in my mind only. 

Now I think the time has come to let you go and make myself free from your thoughts, those expections of your messages or so... I tbh never really prioritised beauty over brain and I think it was one of the reasons why you never choose me in the first place, because person like you would choose someone who is very smart and talented and highly successful. I think I don't present my self in a way that makes me look flashy or very cool because my personal philosophy is that I don't want to attract the surface-level influenced people who are attracted to the limelight and all. and to some extent I even hate those people who try to snatch the limelight all the time.

I was very friendly and kind to you, which in general i'm not with most of the people. now I think I can close your chapter and move on, because there's nothing left between us, I feel like I have become your convinience person who will be available all the time for you. I genuenly feel happy for being that comfort person for you, but what hurts is that you not being available for me, or reciprocating that same energy. You want me when there is no one to entertain you, or when you don't have your friends but not when I need you. You are like a chalak person who know how to use people and then keep them at their disposal. you dragged me into things which i never wanted to do, now i'm just making things miserable for myself even there as well.

I though we were good friends and you a good friend but I guess that was not the case, you clearly were someone who was very chalak, who exactly knew what to do and when to leave....I was never that kind of person, all in the way I was trying to become that one person for you, with whom you could open up and tell your things...but I failed at that...I failed to understand you. or maybe I wanted to understand you more but you made your boundaries high enough for me so now I'm done with you. 

My biggest fear now is that I might become cold to you, like from couple of months I have been trying not to become so much cold and noticiable with my actions but now since this chapter is going to be closed I believe that I will have just maintain that distance a bit more with you, your thoughts and dreams. deep down I'm not someone who likes to play games or do stuff that makes other person feel like shit or something like that but I just wanted to become your goto home person.

I clearly wanted much more than you were ready to give, you had you boundaries...and maybe I am the stupid one who had forgot his boundaries and limits or maybe I was someone whose attention you enjoyed that made me look like a fool. maybe all this was for my character development to feel like stupid in infatuation about you. Thinking about you still my heart pound faster but now i have to let that go now, because if i don't let you go now then a day will come when all this will be over and I'd be still dreaming about you...even when everything would have changed completely between us. 

whenever I think of you I never really think about anything bad about you, you had that magic on me, I'm stupid sometimes. just know that I loved you, and adored you, but since we don't have a future, I'll have to let you go. 

I might have failed with you, but I will not become bad with others. I have other people as well, and for the fact, I will not treat you badly or anything like that, because that is not my nature, I might not talk on the surface much but i will never want something bad to happen to you, just be happy GOODBYE. today the date is 18Aug,2026 and timing is 1:39AM.

1. There's this guy I am trying to get over from , from the last 8 years .

2. I have tried to keep him blocked . It didn't worked.

3. I have tried to get blocked by him, still needed to reaching out somehow so this didn't worked either.

4. Tried to keep him as a normal contact so that I don't get the urge to reach out , still didn't work.

Since the day I have known him,I don't think there has been a single day when I haven't thought about him, even tho technically we never dated each other officially but that doesn't mean my feelings were not real .

I don't even know why I'm still hung up on him, I mean he's probably just a other guy but somehow I just can't get over the fact that there was a time when we used to talk all day and night everyday until we didn't anymore, why ? because he actually found someone he couldn't stop talking to .

Now when I think of all the interactions I ever had with him. He never seemed interested in me . Usually if a guy likes you , he approaches you first but that didn't happen in my case , I was the one who approached him first after he joined us one day with my other friends to just hang out . I mean if he had really noticed me and liked me he would have at least tried to reach out to me somehow but that didn't happen at all . In fact he once mentioned how he found my fb user sme so funny that he didn't accepted the friend request at all at first .

Maybe it was all my fault , Maybe I was so desperate and lonely that I just couldn't see how he was never into me in the first place . He probably used to hangout with me only coz he didn't had anyone that time and maybe he also saw this as a good opportunity to get laid . I was just another weird detour he took before he found the one he wanted to actually be with .

I tried to stay away from him and stay in contact with him and nothing gives me peace anymore . I don't know if I can heal anymore . Maybe this wound is too deep to be fixed .

I get mixed signals but it’s been over a year now.

TL;DR: she has always meant a lot to me and yesterday, 48-years after we first met, we spent a day together. And I realized that I should have tried more 35-years ago to see if there was a spark. Both married and not looking.

She (f60) and me (m60) were family friends as children. She was my first teenaged crush, but as a young boy and her as a more mature girl (yes, we are the same age), I didn’t have any clue or understanding of anything.

I moved away at 14 but we keep in contact through families. At age 18, we were again in the same city. And we didn’t go anywhere.

In our 20s, we went on what in retrospect were dates, but as a typical male, I probably didn’t understand that.

Four years ago, I was in that same small city where we were first friends. I was on a street where we would have been… and the silence and quiet of everything for a moment was mystical. (The only parallel I can describe is the scene in “Field of Dreams” where Kevin Costner meets “Doc” on the street). She was right there… with me… for a moment. And it was magical. And a flood of emotions overcame me.

And yesterday, I spent the day with her (and her parents and my wife) but those emotions flooded back. We laughed… we talked… and I told her of my “experience” and she didn’t laugh.

The missed soulmate was 35-years ago when we were in our 20s. And yesterday showed me just how much that is true.

I’ll always love her but nothing will come of it. And that’s ok. I’m not sad. I’m just regretful that I didn’t explore it more when I should have.

There’s a line in a movie: “all you need is 15-seconds of insane courage”. Wish I had that courage then.

Throwaway account for obvious reasons. And more for me than any of you!

I loved my best friend for years.
I was always there for her.
To listen. To act. To guide. To suggest. To help her through whatever she was dealing with.
I helped her get out of a difficult previous relationship. When she wanted to find a job, I pushed her to go for it. We did mock interviews. I referred her where I could.
But she earned what came after. Her grit and merit got her there. Three promotions. And I was always the guy cheering the loudest.

She used to send me these ridiculously long messages about how valuable I was to her. How important I was. How deep our connection was. How much of a priority I was in her life.

And I believed her.
Because we had so much together.
Breakfasts in the morning.
Unplanned outings.
Small treks.
Airport rides.
Taking her to places I knew she’d love rather than just doing the usual things.
Pictures. Memories. Years and years of them.

So when I fell in love with her, I thought maybe there was something underneath all of this that could eventually become more.
She knew I loved her. I expressed it right away. Within 2 years of knowing her.

She didn’t feel the same way.
And somehow, I still stayed. I Hoped. I have been hoping all the while. Maybe she’d feel how I feel for her. I never lost hope. Even for the next 3-4 years.

Recently, she asked me:
**“Why can’t I just be like a friend?”**
And now I understand why.

Because while I was experiencing all of this as someone who loved her, she was experiencing it as friendship. And there’s something else I didn’t know.
**She had fallen for someone else.**

While I was still standing there, hoping that maybe one day she’d choose me, she’d already found someone she could see differently.

I didn’t even know.
That’s the part that’s fucking destroying me.
All those years I thought I was beside her.

Now I’m wondering if I was just the sidekick.
The person who listened.
The person who helped.
The person who showed up.
The person who celebrated her.
The person who created memories with her.
Important enough to be deeply valued.
But never the person she wanted.

And I don’t know what hurts more;
losing the possibility of being with her, or realizing that **the same moments I thought were building our story were, for her, just a beautiful friendship.**

She didn’t owe me love.
I know that.

But I wish I’d known what role I was actually playing before I gave so much of my heart to it.
Because now I don’t know how to go from being someone who loved her so deeply to someone who can simply be her friend.
Maybe I can’t. I won’t.
Maybe that’s the thing I finally have to accept.

Four years ago, I went through a really bad breakup with an abusive, serial-cheating ex. After that, I told myself I would never get into another relationship again.

I stopped praying about relationships. I stopped looking for anyone. I stopped even thinking about it. I just poured all my energy into work and my family—my siblings and my parents—and honestly, I was pretty content with that life.

Then this guy came out of nowhere.

And somehow, he has all these qualities I never expected to find in one person.

He's incredibly considerate and gentle. He gets my humor. He prays for me and with me. When something difficult comes up between us, he actually talks about it. Even disagreements that could have turned into fights somehow don't, because he communicates instead of shutting down or becoming defensive.

We have an age gap that's actually within what I've always wanted (2–4 years). He's completely unafraid to be silly. He'll randomly sing songs. And, unlike people who leave you guessing about what they want, he literally told me clearly what his intentions were with me.

And the worst part?

I didn't even intend to fall for him.

But my heart apparently didn't get the memo.

I want this person so much. And yet, logically, I keep thinking that maybe I'm not the right person for him.

I've recently moved very far away from him, and I don't do long-distance relationships. I also don't think I'm ready for a relationship at all right now, especially with everything happening with my family and the recent hospitalizations we've had to deal with.

And there's this voice in my head telling me that he deserves someone better. Someone who is ready. Someone who can actually be there. Someone who doesn't come with all the complications I'm carrying right now.

So I made a decision.

I walked away.

I cut off communication because I thought maybe that's the kindest thing I could do for him. He's genuinely one of the sweetest people I've ever met, and I don't want to keep him emotionally attached to someone who can't give him what he deserves.

But now I'm sitting here wondering if I did the right thing.

Part of me thinks I protected him.

Another part of me wonders if I just pushed away someone who came into my life at exactly the moment I had stopped asking for anyone.

I didn't leave because I didn't want him.

I left because I wanted him too much, even if it meant becoming the villain in his story, and I was scared that wanting him wasn't enough to make a relationship possible.

Was I wrong for doing this? Is cutting someone off actually an act of love when you believe you aren't capable of giving them what they need, or am I just making the decision for him because I'm afraid?

How do you move forward when your heart wants someone but your circumstances—and your own head—are telling you to let them go?

I know this is common and happens to everyone, but my heart aches.

How do I grow taller?

I really, really like this girl.
Like, I’ve liked her for ages.
I genuinely cherish every moment I have with her, and I like her in every way. She talks to me like I’m someone and actually cares for me. But I can tell that the feelings aren’t mutual, and I don’t want to ruin the things we have together because I truly love her.
She’s the girl I’ve been longing endlessly for.
I get jealous whenever guys talk to her, which doesn’t happen too often, thankfully. But, I really, really like this girl.
I come see her whenever I can because spending time with her is by far my favorite thing ever. She’s gorgeous and just… wowww. She’s pretty much my type, but I’m not exactly hers.
I try. I try really hard. But there’s not much I can do. She sees me as her friend, and I dream of her as more.
Her type is quite literally the opposite of me. She’s into tall guys, and I’m not that. There’s nothing in my power that can change that.
But I love her.
I’ve felt sick thinking of her with someone else.
Am I obsessed? Maybe.
Love is to let go, but I don’t want her to be gone.
I don’t think she’s talking to anyone, hopefully. But… she’s just the best.
I was at this party a couple of days ago, and I was just alone in the corner. She came up and talked to me and treated me so well. She checked up on me and asked me how I was doing. And we just watched shows together.
I love her, man.
But does she love me?
I try to shower her with as many gifts as possible, and she even tries to do the same.
We were watching a show together, and I was just holding onto her arm. I wasn’t sure if I was making her uncomfortable or anything, so I let go. She grabbed onto mine so tightly.
It’s a feeling that I want to experience over and over, replaying in my mind forever.
I’m shorter than her.
If I was taller, maybe we could’ve been more.
My heart beats for her.
The gym is all I truly have. Maybe if I get stronger, she will see me as more. Maybe she’ll feel the same emotions I feel whenever I see her.

What do I do? I can’t tell her it’ll ruin what we have.

What can I do?