Estimated reading time: 18 minutes
Dear Dr. NerdLove:
I’ve read How To Have That Awkward Conversation, but I have further stuff on the topic. I had a crush on a friend and it seemed at least somewhat mutual since he seemed to have more affection for me than the usual. Asked him out, he said no but at the time seemed to imply that it was more about him having issues than it was an issue with me. Still hung out with him. Then almost a year ago we were out in public together and some people we knew thought we were together romantically…and out of nowhere he basically threw a little fit at the idea, with pointing and gestures, reminded me of “Yuck, yuck, dog germs, dog germs!” etc. It was totally out of character for him and people have told me it sounds like some kind of autism temper tantrum (disclaimer: as far as I know he is not diagnosed with such but people tell me they think he’s autistic all the time) that came on from shock, that maybe he didn’t mean to blow a gasket like that, etc.
However, I have Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria and that broke the friendship for me. I was mortified that he acted that way in front of me, in front of others. The horror in his voice is burned into my brain and I think of it every time I think of him. That moment seemed to reveal the truth about how he feels about me: that I’m horrifying and repulsive to him. I’m not 100% ready to end it officially and it would make things socially awkward if we had an open feud among mutual friends and activities, so I have basically “quiet quit” the friendship and have been working to stop caring about him like that. I no longer initiate contact and only reply to him if he does, and I have avoided him most of the time for the last year. This has been easy to do since we are no longer doing any activities together and I only run into him at shows and parties, though it got super awkward regarding the holidays when I could no longer bear to give him a thoughtful handmade gift like usual and instead mailed him a gift card. (I know, I know. I had to reciprocate something and he’s not into bought stuff.) I find it hard to pretend that I’m Cool and Okay around him and sometimes I say very little to him or nothing at all during these run-ins. It’s awkward as hell for me, but I’m not even sure if he’s noticed any difference other than the gift thing, as he’s having a very good year and our lives no longer overlap like they used to, and he’s very introvert-y/in his head a lot. He’s probably never thought of it again since then and probably(?) has no idea he hurt my feelings. (I note that there was one time in the past when I felt like he was blowing me off, I eventually spoke up and he said he didn’t mean to, he’s just in his head and didn’t get that he came off like that and I should not take that personally..) He’s mostly acting same as usual around me when I do see him, like he hasn’t noticed. He’s probably fine and dandy without me, and meanwhile I feel like shit about him. I hate it.
I still care about him, even if I’ve spent the last year trying not to. I feel like I’m being a shitty friend and I treat him now in cold ways I don’t treat other people, and whether or not he’s noticed it, it bothers me that I’m acting like this. But I don’t know how to be friends with someone if he feels like this about me and that’s his truth, and it triggers all my own shit about when guys had crushes on me and it wasn’t mutual and I didn’t like them *at all* and found *them* repulsive. Back then I wanted them to go away and to stop liking me like that, and ended up dropping them as friends entirely out of sheer uncomfortableness when they did not stop. It feels like karma finally got me for not liking them back, and I deserve this.
My therapist and various other people have told me I should really Say Something To Him about it, that presumably he was having a bad/shocked moment and maybe it’s not as bad as I think. But do I really want to make him feel bad and guilty and apologize when he presumably meant it, or discuss how much he doesn’t like me again? My stepfather (who thinks I should tell the guy to go blow forever, and he’s probably not wrong) said like you did, that I need to go into having this conversation knowing what I want. But I don’t know what that is. I just want things to go back to the way they were without my knowing that he finds the idea of being with me, or me in general, that traumatizing, but that’s not on the table. I don’t like being this level of asshole, but also doesn’t he kind of deserve it? And if he really doesn’t like me, shouldn’t I avoid him? I’m torn between “I miss my friend” and “but he finds me repulsive and I should go away.” Maybe I just want him to know: this is why I’m no longer such a good friend to you and I can’t be there like I was before now that I know his truth. But I suspect this isn’t something that can really “get better” if I do say something, and maybe the nicest thing to do is to let the friendship wither without saying anything, especially if he doesn’t seem to have noticed that I’m gone or that anything is wrong. Why make him feel shitty too on the way out? I haven’t the faintest how I’d even talk to him about this without feelingsbombing or feelingslettering either. I don’t know if I should say something or just let it slowly die, I don’t know how to talk to him about if I do, and I’m not at all sure what outcome I’m likely to get or what even I’d like to get under the circumstances.
I guess what I’m asking is the guy’s POV: if you really hurt a friend’s feelings (presuming that was not deliberate, which… maybe it was, subconsciously?), would you want to know that you hurt them, or is it better to let things politely die? I’m not even sure I’d want someone to bring it up to me, to be honest. What’s the best way to handle this situation?
–Karma Gave Me What I Deserved
This is one of those times when the question you’re asking isn’t the question you want answered, KGMWID.
I think you’re asking two questions here.
- Are you right for feeling the way you feel about this?
- Am I doing what’s right or am I trying to hurt someone who hurt me?
There’re a few things here that leap out at me that need to be considered. First there’s this:
“I have Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria”
and then there’s this:
“I don’t like being this level of asshole, but also doesn’t he kind of deserve it?”
Let’s start with the RSD. For those who don’t know or haven’t experienced it, Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria is the sort of thing that sounds like it may as well be called “over-reacting syndrome” or “lives-for-the-drama-itis”. For those who actually have it, it’s much closer to having very specific anxiety that is omnipresent and always active, like the world’s worst Spidey-sense. Except instead of warning you of danger, it’s more akin to telling you that the people who you care for and you think care for you are going to drop you like a bad habit any minute now. It takes the fear and pain of social rejection from everyone, dials it all up to 11 and then snaps the knob off. It tends to be co-morbid with conditions like ADHD, borderline personality disorder and others.
Here’s the important part though: RSD isn’t just “oh I am so sensitive, rejection hurts me more”, it’s your brain being on constant alert to the possibility that someone’s going to kick you out of their life, regardless of the facts. It’s like a particularly nasty version of confirmation bias. And like confirmation bias, it means you’re going to see evidence of this everywhere… even when it’s not actually there. And when you run into scenarios where someone does literally anything that could be interpreted as rejection, your brain will go out of its way to round even the mildest comment up to “I regret every moment of my life that I’ve spent with you”. Even if they said nothing of the sort.
Now I say this as someone who’s ADHD combo-platter came with a bonus side of RSD when I tell you this: RSD will just make shit up. The hyper-vigilance of RSD means that, absent anything else, it will quite cheerfully take anything and turn it into evidence that people hate you, no matter how banal or nonsensical it is.
So I think the odds are very good that your therapist is right: this is your brain taking an admittedly ill-thought-out comment and turning it Into A Thing.
Now this isn’t to say that how you feel isn’t real. You absolutely feel hurt, ashamed, betrayed even. Those are all real and valid. You are feeling them and you’re feeling those things for a reason. But I strongly suspect that you’re feeling them based on inaccurate information. I suspect that what happened with your friend is that someone made the usual cliché comment about two opposite sex friends clearly have to be into each other and he responded with the equally cliché “what? NOoooooooo” – an (occasionally playfully intended) response about a lack of romantic interest. But your RSD turned that into “Oh sweet Jesus I would never want anything to do with this person ever how could you ever even think that NOW I NEED A THOUSAND SHOWERS TO EVER FEEL CLEAN AGAIN” and that is what your RSD is reacting to.
And it hurt! It really really hurt! Even if that’s not what he intended, that’s how it hit and it legitimately hurt you. Which is why I think everything afterwards is you responding to that hurt. But I think there’s also a part of you that recognizes that. I strongly suspect that part of you knows this for what it is, but that part is in conflict with the part that reacted in that moment, which sees this as The Great Betrayal and has been behaving accordingly. But therein is the problem: you kinda committed in the moment to The Great Betrayal.
This is where the conflict between “trying to make yourself not care” and “wanting your friend back” comes in. The part of you that suspects that this was your RSD fucking with you came in after the anger and hurt and lashing out. But human nature is a motherfucker and when you’ve sunk a lot of time and energy into feeling or thinking a certain way… well, I think you ended up in a place where you don’t know if you can walk it back or not. It’s a form of the sunk cost fallacy, a sort of ego-protection against admitting that you’ve made a mistake and trying to walk it back will be embarrassing at best. Even if nobody else would think its embarrassing.
The “…but doesn’t he deserve it?” part of your question is the RSD and the pain lashing out like a wounded animal because you were hurt. It’s not justice, it’s not even karma, it’s just pure “he hurt me and now he must suffer for it.” But it’s also sort of you hurting yourself for “allowing” yourself to be hurt, on top of projecting how you felt about those guys crushing on you onto him for no real reason. Hence the “karma got me” feeling.
But that’s not all. This isn’t about what’s “deserved”, either by him or by you. It’s also you trying to figure out what’s real or not. Part of what’s bothering you is that you’re trying to gauge how much he actually does or doesn’t like you by seeing how he reacts to your having dialed things back. The fact that he doesn’t seem to be living in misery is making things worse. Does this mean he never cared about you and your exiting his life created no ripples at all? Does he think so little of you that he didn’t even notice you had pulled away? Doesn’t that mean that you’re right?
Or is this just a case where someone said something without thinking and now your RSD is using that to just make everything worse?
If I’m being honest, I suspect that the reason why things haven’t changed dramatically is because… well, you did the whole “quiet quitting” thing, which is to say, you didn’t really change your behavior much at all except now you don’t reach out first and gave him a gift card instead of a homemade gift which almost certainly got read as “well, probably didn’t have time this year”. Or he could be like me and be just fine with gift cards.
But here’s the thing. You’re having to fight to try to not care, which tells me that there’s a part of you that recognizes this for what it is. You’re feeling awful about it because, I suspect, you reacted to something due to your own baggage, rather than what he actually said or did. Trust me, I get it; been there, done that, had multiple long, dark, sleepless nights of the soul over it. But if you stop, do your best to strip the emotion out of it and look as objectively at his behavior as you possibly can… does any of it seem like the sort of behavior of someone who truly doesn’t like you? If you were to take yourself out of the equation, if this were two people you knew having this issue and the offender was acting just as your friend has been the entire time, would you say that he clearly hates his friend? Or would you say that the other friend misunderstood things and is reacting to that misunderstanding?
And, importantly: would you advise them to end that friendship – one that’s clearly still very important to them – over that misunderstanding?
Probably not. Which is why I think you should take a similar position for yourself.
I think you should have an Awkward Conversation with your friend about this. And I think what you should want out of it is very simple: you want to clear the air and know where you stand with him. So I think you should make time to talk it out with him and frame it this way: “Hey, when X asked about us, the way you responded sounded like ‘ew ew gross, dog germs, I don’t like her I hate her!’ to me and it really hurt me. I want to know if that’s how you actually feel, because I need to know if I need to exit this friendship. But if not, I need you to understand that I’m really prone to taking things like that very personally and very seriously and it hurts me a LOT, even if you don’t mean it.”
Leave the ‘did you even notice I pulled away’ part out unless he brings it up. Just focus on how that specific incident affected you and why. The point here is confirmation and affirmation: either you are right and he hates you or you misunderstood and you’re risking giving up a friendship that means a lot to you for no real reason.
Now, if he does dislike you… well, it’s going to hurt. A lot. But it’s a short, sharp pain, rather than the prolonged agony of dragging it all out. Like ripping a bandage off, it’ll hurt like crazy, but the pain will fade much faster than if you sloooooooowly peel it back, one centimeter at a time. The clean break heals fastest after all. And that is a pain that will cauterize the wound and you’ll be able to leave this friendship behind with the knowledge that you were right and justified to do so.
But if I’m right, what this will do is help him realize that he was careless around you, while you will realize that you’ve been putting yourself (and him) through hell for no reason. This will be the chance for you to put down the hurt you’ve been carrying around and rebuild your friendship with him. And, just as importantly, you’ll have new understanding of one another… and hopefully he’ll know not to be so careless with how he says things around you next time.
Good luck.
Dear Dr. NerdLove: I’m a gay man (26) dating another gay man (26). Or at least I’m beginning to wonder whether we’re dating or not. Or at least if he’s as into me as I am into him.
We’re open, which means that we’re both seeing other people casually. I’m more of a relationship hierarchy guy, so he’s my main focus. But my issue is that our relationship feels lopsided to me. I feel like I’m always the one having to propose dates or getting together and I’m almost always the one who makes the plans, decides where we’re going and all that. We also have to work around his schedule, which is legitimately tight, so we don’t see each other as often as I’d prefer.
When we get together, he’s fully present and we both have a good time. He’s warm, affectionate, playful and I don’t feel neglected or unwanted when he’s around. We message each other regularly and the blue ratio is pretty even and he’ll message me first to just talk about as often as I’ll message him. But it’s the getting together part that always makes me wonder if I’m more invested in this than he is. and if that’s the case, do I say something to him? Do I accept that I’m a lower priority as a boyfriend than some of the other folks he’s seeing? Do I break up and move on to find someone else who isn’t going to leave me feeling like a back-up option when nothing else is going on? Is that even what’s happening or am I just being a dramatic bitch about it? Help?
Lost In My Own Head
OK, so I’ll level with you, LIMOH: it’s very tempting to say that if someone sees you as a priority, they’ll treat you as a priority and declare that it’s time to ditch this guy. And maybe that’s what needs to happen.
But I’m at a point where that sort of black-and-white hardliner mentality seems to to be less beneficial. Yeah, it’s got some real “don’t let anyone treat you as second best” boss energy to it, but it also doesn’t allow much room for nuance, circumstance or understanding how other people work.
One of the things we often don’t talk about when we talk about relationships and relationship dynamics is that not everyone behaves the way we do or the way we expect them to, and we often end up in unnecessary conflicts because we’re angry about who we think they should be instead of meeting them where they are.
Some people, for examples, are just bad texters. They don’t like to text or it doesn’t hit the same parts of their brain and so they aren’t always on their phone or quick to reply; they just prefer talking in person instead of over the phone. That doesn’t mean that they don’t like you when they don’t text back immediately or are the exact same level of communicative when they do. It just means that they’re not a texter. You can be upset with them for not… or you can accept them for who they are and adjust your expectations.
The same goes with the dynamic of a relationship. It’s very easy to fall into roles where one of you is the planner and organizer and so that person is the one who does the lion’s share of proposing dates, inviting the other person on them and so on. That doesn’t mean the other person doesn’t care or is less invested; they’re just not a planner on the same level and their brain doesn’t work that way.
Now that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t get tiring to always be doing the planning and proposing. Sometimes a dude wants to be pampered and taken care of for once. God knows I love it when I’m taken on dates instead of planning them; it feels special and validating when it happens. But as someone who tends to make the first move and makes plans… I’m usually the initiator, rather than the recipient.
And that may well be how your boyfriend is with everyone, not just with you. Or he may be the planner with others, but appreciates how you are the one planning your dates with him.
You know who could answer that question for you? Your boyfriend. Because unless you’re secretly dating Professor X, your boyfriend’s not a mind-reader. If you haven’t told him that this is how you feel, then he almost certainly doesn’t know.
This is a time to use your words and talk about your feelings on this. You don’t necessarily need to tell him that you worry that he’s not as invested in this relationship as you, but that you feel like you don’t see him as often as you would prefer, that you feel like you’re always having to ask him out and plan the dates and it leaves you feeling like maybe you’re not as much of a priority for him. Let him know that you would like to be taken on dates too, that you’d like to be the seduced instead of the seducer on occasion and what it would mean to you.
Now I realize that this is the sort of thing that feels like “if I have to ask for it, it’s not real.” That’s not true. We all like to think that our partners would just know, because they know us that well and care that much. But I refer you back to the whole “not Professor X” issue. If your partner fills a need after you tell him that you have this need, that doesn’t mean that it means less. It just means that until that point, he may not have realized it was a need you had in the first place. Just as he may well have needs that you don’t know about.
But nobody can know about them until someone says something. So stop reading the tea leaves and stop expecting your boyfriend to finally come into his mutant powers. Talk this out with him so that he knows this is something that’s important to you.
And then? Well, talk a bit more, so you two can understand each other a bit better and then love each other for who you both are, instead of who you feel like the other should be.
Good luck.