Cuddling in the friendzone? (dating, wife, boyfriend, girlfriend)
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I met this girl on the Internet a few years ago. I had a crush on her almost right away, but chose to not act on it at all due to the large distance between us. I live in southeast Michigan, she was near Toronto. I didn't think I would ever see her in person, so I decided she'd just be a friend. Not long after this however, we met in real life on a road trip with a bunch of other friends. One of these mutual friends and this girl had already decided they were dating before meeting in person. The girl knew I had a crush on her at the time, but she was always super cool about it.
Some time after this, she and her boyfriend coincidentally both moved to the area where I lived. The boyfriend moved from Kansas to get near the border to have a relationship with her, while she moved to Windsor for university. So I hung out with them frequently. This girl was seriously devoted to this guy, and seeing this helped me get over the crush. I was able to honestly be just friends with her without any issue. In fact, she helped me a lot when I had another unrequited crush on her roommate, which I was eventually able to kick. I've never had a lot of friends, and she came to be my best friend.
After a while, I found myself a girlfriend in another social circle. I ended up spending all of my time with this girlfriend. I barely saw my Internet friends anymore. At some point, the girl and her boyfriend broke up. He had done some awful things. She moved back to her parents' house, far away.
However, this girl still loves this guy who cheated on her with her best friend and committed various unspeakable acts. Recently, she thought they might be able to get back together, but instead the guy dicked her around. He had gotten a new girlfriend, and he did it the same weekend when he knew she was planning on visiting to try to reconcile. But she still loves him, even if she's angry at him. I think that if he called her up, gave a lipservice apology, and asked to get back together, she'd love to do it.
So, I was with my girlfriend for some time and I basically lost touch with these people. I had no idea all of the terrible things had happened until very recently. Prior to learning what was going on with them, my own relationship had turned sour and I ended it just before this Internet girl was coming back to town for that visit. And spending time with her recently reminded me of how important she is to me, how stupid I was to ignore her all that time. My emotions are a little confusing, but I want to say that I have a strong platonic love for her. However, I also have been feeling attracted to her as well lately, something that hasn't really been a problem since I first got over the crush ages ago.
During her visit, she stayed at another mutual friend's house, and I crashed there as well a few nights. A lot of marijuana was involved. However, due to cramped sleeping arrangements, we ended up sleeping in the same bed together two times. The thing is: in my intoxicated state, I ended up spooning her, cuddling her all night as we slept.
Now, I loved it. I haven't felt so great cuddling someone in ages. Remember that my own relationship had turned bad before I recently ended it, so it's been a while since I felt so good spooning someone. She didn't say anything about it though, whether positive or negative. However, she did willingly get in bed with me the second night and didn't say anything when I cozied myself up against her as we were falling asleep. An implicit acknowledgment, I guess.
The thing is that I'm not looking to make her my girlfriend, she's already "seeing" someone anyway, and I don't really want to have sex with her either. I love her, I care about her a lot, but you could say that I'm not IN love with her. I'm physically attracted to her, and I think she knows that now. I'd really like to snuggle up with her some more too. I mentioned as such to her, asking that she doesn't share my cuddling indiscretion with the guy she's seeing because I wouldn't want my best friend's semi-boyfriend to hate me (even though she obviously doesn't consider it to be remotely serious with this guy), and she indicated she'd be keeping it a secret but didn't really say much else. She didn't say if she liked it or didn't like it, and although I said that I wanted to do it again, she didn't say whether or not she wanted to. Oh wait, she did say one thing: she thinks the guy she's seeing wouldn't even mind that her friend who is a male spooned her all night when she was out-of-town. She thinks that he wouldn't mind because she says he's open to polyamory, but yet she emphatically said she had already decided to keep the cuddling a secret. Incidentally, I am NOT on board with polyamory, and although I don't know EXACTLY what her stance on it is, she, like me, is apparently completely OK with what we've done so far.
The last few days, she keeps suggesting I go visit her at her parents' house since I've been talking a lot about how bored and lonely I am since my breakup. She's bored too, probably because her best friend back home is no longer a friend after having cheated with her boyfriend before. I get the feeling that her current somewhat-boyfriend is the only one she hangs out with over there. She says that she wants to drink with me since we didn't get the opportunity when she was in town recently. I want to go visit her, and I might be able to this weekend. I think that her implicitly allowing me to spoon her that second night before is a sign that she'd be OK with doing so again, but I was just looking for a little outside insight. I don't think she's ever expressed an attraction toward me at all, and this case of us cuddling together while sleeping is the closest thing to it. Her body language during also suggests that she definitely was a willing participant in both cases. However, when we met in person for the very first time before, she was willing to share a bed with me due to limited bedding, so although I never touched her that time, she might just be REALLY open about sleeping situations.
If I visit her and we do cuddle together, I also think there is a good chance that I might escalate once I get there in the moment. I'm not trying to have sex with her, become her boyfriend, or even ruin her semi-relationship with whoever it is she's "seeing", but I think it's pretty likely I might try to kiss her if I'm intoxicated and we cuddle. Now, I do want to get intoxicated with her (it's always been one of our shared interests!) and I want to cuddle her, but I think kissing might be too much. Not only do I think she wouldn't be OK with that due to her semi-relationship if nothing else, but I feel like it might open the emotional floodgates on me, and I don't want to open that whole can of worms while I'm still dealing with a little emotional fallout from my recently-ended relationship.
Sorry if my story/thoughts are a little rambly, so to wrap it up: I had a crush on this girl, got over my crush, she's never expressed any attraction toward me, she broke up with her boyfriend she still loves and I broke up with my girlfriend, we cuddled together and nothing else, I want to cuddle again but I am not really looking for anything else other than keeping her as my best friend. I guess ultimately my question is if this is all really weird, what she might be thinking but not voicing, and how should I handle this?
I have many close male friends. I have not ever cuddled with them. Nor have I cuddled with my close female friends.
In high school we would sometimes sleep in a big group on a big bed, but that was not really cuddling as we just mostly fell asleep. There was nothing remotely sexual about it and I don't think there was anything going on that could be considered active cuddling.
Never do anything you feel you have to keep secret from the bf.
Did you really need me to tell you that?
She's never used the word "boyfriend" to describe this guy. She is obviously VERY casual with him, but at the same time, I didn't want him to be jealous or weird around me since we already have plans where we'll be meeting soon. I asked her how long she had been "seeing him" (her words), and she seemed a little surprised when she realized it had been going on for about a year. I think in her mind, her ex who mistreated her is still her "boyfriend" and she's just using this other guy to not be lonely.
@JrzDefector, there was definitely full-on cuddling here with us. Very tight spooning, her half on top of me while I was on my back, me doing the same to her. This is not a case of friends who just happened to be sleeping the same bed. I have had that before, especially with male friends when I was younger, and this was entirely different.
Your female friend and her so called boyfriend need to figure out exactly what type of relationship they are in and what type of relationship they want.
She also needs to figure out exactly what she wants. Does she even know what she wants?
Is this how the younger generation acts regarding opposite sex friendships?
What the 2 of you are doing is blurring the lines between friendship and love.
Both of you need to figure out exactly what type of friendship the two of you want.
Both of you are playing with your emotions.
Are the two of you really ready to deal with this? The two of you need to think long and hard about this.
And please stop doing drugs.
This is a very strange situation that everyone is in. I would not want to be in this type of situation.
If she is using her so called boyfriend to not be lonely, is she even considering his feelings about that? Who wants to be used?
Your female friend and her so called boyfriend need to figure out exactly what type of relationship they are in and what type of relationship they want.
That's the thing. She's never used the word "boyfriend" to describe her relationship with this guy. According to her, she's "seeing" him. I think that in her mind, her awful ex is still her "boyfriend". As far as I can tell, however, it sounds like she does everything with this guy that a person might expect a young woman to do with her boyfriend.
Furthermore, I have a sneaking suspicion that the two of them might have a polyamory setup going on. No concrete evidence, it's just a hunch that would explain her behavior and her expectations and his feelings in this case. Even if not, they've been "seeing" each other for nearly a year apparently and they each apparently know exactly the sort of relationship they're sharing: a very, VERY casual one. She might be "using" this guy, but he knows the deal. Similarly, he could be using her. Hell, you could even say that I "used" her for comfort after my breakup. Or that she "used" me for comfort after realizing the situation with her ex wasn't going to work out.
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Both of you need to figure out exactly what type of friendship the two of you want.
I have a pretty good idea. I explained above. I care a lot about her and enjoyed sharing that non-sexual physical intimacy with her. I think that I'd like more of that, but I don't want to be her boyfriend, I'm not trying to have sex with her, I don't want to cause problems between her and this other guy, and I realize that even just kissing would be taking it too far for me. I have a handle on what I want.
The thing is that I don't know if she knows exactly what she wants out of this friendship, and I'm not sure how to broach the topic without being presumptive. If I get too heavy, talking about words like "love", even in a platonic sense, I might scare her, and I don't want that. I don't want her to think that I'm in love with her or that I'm trying to be something more than I already am toward her. I just want to be physically affectionate with my best friend. I tried talking about what happened a little bit and she managed to come out the other side of the conversation without saying anything about what SHE thought about it, and without saying anything about me admitting that I enjoyed it and wanted to do it again.
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Originally Posted by Time2Improve
Why are you cuddling in the first place? She's not your gf or wife!
Humans can show affection by touch. It's not uncommon for a person to crave this sort of non-sexual touch. This can be done between people who are not dating or married.
In my specific case, we were sharing a twin size bed originally. We were basically guaranteed to be touching in some way on those grounds alone. Combine this with the fact that I normally sleep with a body pillow and had gotten used to sleeping with a girlfriend who I had been living with, so my default sleeping mode is usually cuddling. Furthermore add the fact that when I initiated the cuddling, I wasn't even completely conscious and was still a little intoxicated from the night before.
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