Unrequited friendships or low self-esteem?

Rowen13

How do I know if a friendship is worth it? I told my online friend that I really loved and cared for him as a friend. He told me he liked and cared for me.

After knowing him and sharing my darkest moments and secrets, it hurts that the emotional/energy level is not reciprocated.

I know I have an anxious attachment style and my last girl friend never loved me back either. He knows about this and I have explained how much it hurts and how I worry that the same friendship dynamic is repeating.

l'm tired of always being the one that cares more? Should I try to care less or just cut ties with my friend and move on? I'm aware I can't control his feelings but I find because I am going through a difficult time in my life already..it's really affecting my self esteem and mental health.

He says he wants the friendship but I wonder if it's better to just cut ties and work on my anxious attachment style. So I can find a friend that I don't continually chase and the emotional investment is more equal.

He use to reply and text all the time and now everything I say seems to irritate him and he never initiates contact. I try to get him to see the friendship is already over but he always repeats that he is fighting to keep me in his life.

I know in every relationship that someone always feels more but after everything we have shared and the level of trust I put in to letting him see the "real" me...it just hurts that I know deep down that I am disposable to him and all the time spent and conversations meant nothing.

Opening your heart and being vulnerable and feeling undervalued just hurts.

I know I am the only one keeping the "friendship" alive because, that's not a friendship at all.

Eagle Ray

Hi Rowen13,

I just thought I’d mention that one thing that has come up on the balance menopause app I’m on, is women talking about developing anxious attachment styles in perimenopause that they didn’t have previously. So the fact things shifted for you in your 40s could have a hormonal basis to it. If there’s been early childhood neglect/abuse perhaps it’s more likely that this emotional dysregulation around attachment will happen when hormones become less stable in our 40s and 50s. It’s incredible how powerful hormones are.

I’ve definitely had really intense behaviours emerge in perimenopause that are like a massive intensification of childhood trauma patterns and issues. So in 2023 my avoidance became more extreme and I was literally frozen for hours unable to move in my home and stopped being able to answer the phone or the front door. This avoidance then turned into me getting into my car and driving to stay in remote locations, which was me trying to activate my flight response to get out of the freeze response. That actually really helped at the time, but it was clear there was an intensification of certain emotions and behaviours that felt uncontrollable.

So the fact you find yourself acting in certain ways in your 40s that feel less balanced and a bit out of control, could be hormonally driven. I’m hoping that post-menopause things settle a lot. But for some women this perimenopause phase is unbelievably rocky. So I think it’s more import than ever to be understanding and compassionate with yourself. I’m learning that everything starts with self-compassion in terms of managing what’s happening as best as we can.

I hope you have a beautiful day too 😊

Rowen13

Hi ER,

I have not been totally honest in my dilemma with my friend, anxious attachment style definitely affected the relationship but also the constant re-emerging of inappropriate feelings towards him. I somewhere along the lines fell in love with him. It was unrequited and impossible due to so many circumstances so I would try to continually kill the feelings. But unfortunately they kept springing right back up and affecting my mental and emotional health.

I expressed my feelings this morning to my friend, even though I knew my love was unrequited, impossible and unwanted.

I laid my heart bare to move on and show why I couldn't continue the friendship.

But I really regret it…because I not only don't have his love (which I knew he never felt) but now I feel completely exposed, vulnerable and really stupid.

I thought I was being brave but I just feel so heartbroken…I want to remove my heart from my chest because it's killing me. I thought some sort of closure, no matter how embarrassing and vulnerable it made me...would help me to finally shut the door and heal. But God the pain is unbelievable and I feel utterly worthless and beyond ashamed.

Additionally, I have lost all remnants of my self respect and I wish the ground would open up and swallow me whole.

Whilst I'm day dreaming, I wish I could erase him from my memory and stop the heart break...like in the movie, Eternal Sunshine on a Spotless Mind. Just to stop the pain, I feel like I can't breathe and even though I have been heartbroken before with a break up with a boyfriend. It's so much more degrading when it's unrequited feelings for a friend who repeatedly told you he just "cares and likes you".

I feel like utter sh*t!!! 💔💔💔

I know time supposedly heals everything but it literally took me 8 years to get over my ex-narcissistic boyfriend. So I have really strong emotions. I feel so angry at myself for developing these emotions and for not being mature enough to keep silent about them. Instead I have lost him totally and while it's probably a big boost to his ego...I feel so worthless and cringe with embarrassment and shame.

At 50...I feel even more ashamed of my lack of emotional immaturity in not being able to keep silent and deal with my emotions alone without heaping it on him. It was extremely disrespectful and only detrimental.

Whatever closure I thought baring my soul would get me...sadly has not come. I won't die but at 50, I really thought all this emotional drama and pain was behind me.

Thanks for listening ER,

Rowen13

Eagle Ray

Dear Rowen13,

I am so sorry you are going through this. Please do not feel bad for your feelings and emotions. Falling in love is not something we have control over - ever. It just happens and you can’t actually turn those emotions off. I think you have been brave in your honesty by telling him but of course it hurts like hell if you know it’s not reciprocated in the same way. I honestly think you have shown the courage to be vulnerable and open and that is something to be proud of. I feel in time you will be able to feel proud of yourself and look back and realise you showed courage and emotional honesty. It is not something to be ashamed of.

I can tell you a story that is quite exposing of me but maybe helps a little. When I was 18 I fell in love with someone I was studying with. In this case he also fell in love with me, but he was married. Both of us are honest and ethical to a T so neither of us was going to be involved in cheating. To make it worse we were duet partners (for music studies). We had regular rehearsals, just the two of us. We were like twin spirits and could talk for hours. We connected profoundly and I we could see and understand each other with the greatest of ease. We had similar prior trauma as well and were both highly sensitive individuals.

But, of course, we couldn’t be together. He was going to be moving interstate with his partner and I was only enrolled in a year long course there. We had to say goodbye and, honestly, there will never be words for the emotional pain. We were both in emotional agony the last day we were together. I lived with the situation alone for a long time as I didn’t feel I could tell others. When I did try to disclose to a couple of people there was more judgement than understanding because they assumed he’d taken advantage of me which he hadn’t.

Much more recently I discussed this with my psychologist. I initially wrote it out to her in an email because I couldn’t speak it at first. I then later spoke about it. It really helped having a witness for this experience which I realised decades later was like a broken part of myself that hadn’t been tended to or received support. So what I would say for you, Rowen13, is you need emotion support. That’s why it’s good you are sharing here. But I do feel, if there’s some way you can find a good bulk-billing or low cost counsellor/psych you really trust and feel safe with, it could be very supportive for you. What you will be experiencing now will be deep loss and grief. I have found myself that sharing grief with the right person helps. It alleviates some of the intensity and allows it to move through your system instead of being so stuck and heavy inside of you. It’s through that being seen compassionately by another that we begin to heal.

When I was about 32 I really liked this guy I was in a music group with. It’s hard to believe I did this now but I wrote him a song and went to his house and played it for him. That was my way of communicating my feelings. He immediately told me he didn’t feel the same way, but said let’s go out to lunch so we did. We actually managed to both keep going to the music group and although I felt a bit embarrassed I also felt brave and was glad I’d had the courage to communicate my feelings. I knew where I stood now. So try to see that you have been brave and honest. Yes, you will feel exposed now, but you are not stupid. Having been honest may close things down with him, or perhaps as in the example of the guy I wrote the song for, it clears the air with everything open and honest and you may even be able to maintain a friendship. Or, if you remain so intensely in love with him then, yes, it may be too hard to maintain as a friendship. But whatever the outcome, living honestly and true to your heart is a gift to yourself, even though it may not feel like it right now.

If you want someone to talk to, you could try Griefline 1300 845 745. The most important thing is to be tender and kind to yourself. And be proud of your courage to be vulnerable and honest 🌟 For those of us with emotionally traumatic childhoods we can experience attachments intensely and feel everything so much. But the capacity to feel is also a gift. See if you can turn that capacity to feel into compassion for yourself.

Take good care and happy to chat further if it helps,

ER

Rowen13

Hi ER,

You are just the sweetest!

Yes I feel intensely and deep. I just feel stupid because we met on a depression app, he's married with two children and I never, ever meant to feel anything for him. He also lives in a completely different country so you can see why I hate my heart atm. We didn't meet on a dating app, nor did I see him as anything but a fellow app member, then friend. We did move our friendship off the app, into another communication app and then we would talk weekly on the phone. We have only known each other for 15 months but the conversation content was of course deeper and more intense. You tend to I guess slip up and make yourself more vulnerable when you are merely texting and not looking in their eyes lol. Anyway I only saw him as a friend for ages and then I started to care and then I felt "love". I assumed at first it was a love I felt for some female/women friends.

I would describe it to him as such when I first felt it but the jealousy I feel towards his wife, makes me think it might not be purely friendly.

I have had guy friends irl and met their girlfriends and have never been jealous or possessive. But I was 39 at the time, so maybe perimenopausal is playing a part in it. Anyway of course he loves his wife, and he should since they have 2 children and I am not a homewrecker. Plus I am also a feminist, so I can't stand the fact that I am jealous of her. He belongs to her not me.

This illogical feeling has me thinking in such a "impossible" situation, I should just cut him out. I am Roman Catholic and married men to me, might as well be dead men. I would never go there.

My mum is sick and is constantly ringing me and of course I would love to text my best friend but I stupidly fell in love. So I have to learn to not have him for support.

Of course you are right...I could use a psychologist but even with subsidised therapists, my budget still can't afford it.

Thank you for telling me your romantic although unrequited stories of love. It does take bravery to make the declaration of one's feelings but when they are married...I can't help but feel rather stupid. I also told him because he always got so hurt when I tried to end our friendship and would become short and abrupt. But I thought if I told him that it was because communicating with someone who didn't feel the same way and was morally unable to, even if he did, would reassure him that I would only end it because I literally had no choice.

It's new and it really hurts...just miss him so much which is weird since we never met. I never believed that people could actually develop feelings for other people online. I guess it's karma slapping me in the face lol.

Bravo to you for being brave and talented enough to actually write a song about him. A female friend wrote a song about me and sang it too. We were best friends at 23 and I still love her and hope whatever she is, that she is having a happy life.

I definitely need someone to talk to and not judge me. I talk to my mum but it's like talking to the wall. I can talk about a topic and she reply about herself, the only subject that holds her interest. It's annoying and kind of funny too. I can't imagine being that self absorbed and sometimes envy her. My mum has never loved anyone more than herself and in fact proudly used people throughout her 82 years of life on this world. She thinks I am very weak but compared to her...I can see why she would think so. That's why we need professional unbiased, unrelated people to talk to.

Thank you for our chats. It's been awhile since I made an online female connection.

I have a few online acquaintances via my meditation app but they are male and the conversations are polite and light of course. Sometimes you need the female perspective.

Keeping being you're beautiful self 😊

Rowen13

Eagle Ray

Dear Rowen13,

I think it’s important not to view yourself as stupid. You are human and fell in love which is a very human thing to do. Yes, given his marital status, he is off-limits romantically. Whether you can find a balance again in a friendship sense I don’t know. But I think just keeping any communication straightforward and clear helps, whatever happens.

With your mum, I do relate to trying to do what you describe telling your mum things and her just turning it back to her. I had a similar experience where my mum would tell me all her problems for a long time and I would be supporting her and helping her out. The moment I tried to share something of my own feelings and how I was going, as I was a person who needed support too, she would turn the conversation back to her like I hadn’t expressed anything about myself at all. It’s like I was invisible other than to serve her. So with your friend it’s like you were seen and heard by him, and that can make it quite easy to fall in love where there is a feeling of connection and understanding that has otherwise been missing from your life.

I think the best thing we can do in such situations is learn about ourselves from them. So perhaps a theme is that you haven’t been seen in life and it is a need you have. Looking to find healthy reciprocal relationships where you are seen, as well as truly seeing and nurturing yourself, is likely the best way forward. As I mentioned I think in your other thread, a healthy relationship is not based on a co-dependency of thinking someone else has to meet our needs and clinging to that. It is more of a naturally occurring organic process where each person can support one another but has a healthy centre within themselves. So I think working on finding groundedness in yourself can really help, whether it is through meditation, yoga, a hobby you love doing that is part of your identity/sense of self etc - whatever it is it’s like coming back into your own body, connecting with your own soul and realising you are really ok in this moment in terms of who you are as a person. It is coming home to yourself.

It is very empowering to realise that you are ok as a person in this moment now. All the doubts and worries can fall away. People who have the idea you are weak, that’s rubbish and their construction and projection. My mum said things like I was “weak and pathetic”, even in front of others, like a form of humiliation. Looking back I should have told her exactly what I thought of that and the person I am today I would. I’d look straight at her and say “I’m not weak and pathetic”. You can often quite calmly refute rubbish. If you want to see a good example of this I suggest watching the Elton John biopic Rocket Man. In fact, if you google the YouTube clip of a scene from it entitled “When Are You Going to Hug Me?” it shows him confronting all the demons from the abuse he’s been through from others in a calm but firm way, before hugging his inner child. You can see he has become centred and at peace and the abusive ones no longer have power over him.

Take good care of yourself Rowen13,

ER

Rowen13

Hello ER,

Thank you for your continued support. You really are a wealth of information to me and I am extremely grateful.

I now see that I have to accept that my mother will always be a narcissist and stop wishing for the mum I deserved. I had no hatred in my heart since she was only repeating her childhood trauma.

She will always lie and manipulate me and put herself first. I have to accept that. Now I need time to soul search. She took 50 years of my life away from me, how much more of my life am I willing to sacrifice to her.

In regards to my friend, I have uninstalled the app we used to communicate. So I am trying to accept a life without him. It just hurts too much to text or talk to him. I don't want to keep wasting my life on people who don't love me. I actually accepted a long time ago that we couldn't be of course but I was never comfortable with the emotional imbalance. The energy dynamic...I felt once again like I was never enough. Expressing you love to a friend and having them view you as almost an acquaintance is extremely painful. So even though I miss him, I remind myself how painful contact with him would be so I choose my emotional and mental health.

I hope you are doing well and I want you to know you have really helped me continue with a difficult time in my life.

Look after yourself,

Rowen13 😊🪷😊🪷

Eagle Ray

Dear Rowen13,

It sounds like you are ready perhaps to prioritise yourself. I have found it interesting to see what happens when I do this. With my brother he has actually treated me better since I’ve been stronger with him and put up a boundary. But there’s a sense in which they try to pull you back into old patterns too and there’s a need to stay strong when manipulation is present. I find I am defending the vulnerable parts of myself first now just as I would defend a vulnerable person in the external world, such as a child. I think neither your inner child nor mine had anyone there for them growing up. So it’s like we have to have our own back if others don’t. I’m finding it actually becomes quite matter of fact and non-negotiable. You just start sticking up for yourself and identifying where your limits are.

In relation to your friend, it may help to view it in a less black and white way. For example, saying you don’t want to waste your life on people who don’t love you implies he didn’t care about you. But he may have cared but had certain boundaries in place and he couldn’t form a non-platonic relationship with you. I think it’s important to not put someone else too high in our hopes to meet our emotional needs, because it’s not their responsibility. It’s like placing a condition on a relationship from the start. We have to recognise we’re responsible for our own needs, and when we do it’s so empowering. We actually form healthier more grounded relationships that way that are mutually nourishing but without conditional expectations or projections. It’s like our relational needs get met when we’re not projecting but each have our own centre.

For me I’ve done quite a lot of pushing people away, convincing myself I’m not worthy and that they wouldn’t want me. Even when someone has reached out to me and made their feelings clear, it’s like I still haven’t believed deep down they will accept me. So in my case, my black and white thinking was no one could possibly love and accept me. We can hold core beliefs about ourselves that simply aren’t real. We can also project beliefs and expectations onto others. But we become at peace when we let go of all of that, be ourselves and let others be themselves.

I hope that doesn’t sound like a lecture, but I’m saying all this because I’m still in a learning process myself. Only yesterday I was talking with my psychologist about my past patterns of pushing people away and being afraid of intimacy, and the core negative beliefs I’ve long held about myself that are behind that. So we are always a work in progress and it’s so important for us to be kind to ourselves.

Take care 🤗☺️

ER

Rowen13

Hello ER,

Yeah the black and white thing struck me hard because he feels for me in grey. He said everything was not always in black and white and that there was also the middle, being grey of course. Where his feelings lie. I don't know it just gutted me.

Then I have read all these new terns like "limerance" and thought crap, I'm not experiencing limerance with this guy am I?

I don't why they have to keep putting new terms on things, sometimes constantly over analysing doesn’t help at all.

I miss him but I can't go back because I actually feel so jealous of his wife. That is not normal at all.

He did play with my feelings at the start and actually had me believing they were separated by ommission. He led me on at the start and first denied it and later on apologised for feeding my fantasy of a life together. I just don't know if I can fully trust him. He says he loves his wife but early on, he was obviously pursuing me. Maybe he was bored and when he did that I was repelled. The lines are too blurred and I have made myself way to vulnerable with him. A mistake I will never do again, partly my fault since I was emotionally easy I guess lol.

I continually have doubts about him...it's awful. Because of being brought up by a narcissist and surrounded by narcissistic siblings, I sometimes feel he is acting in manipulative ways or is it that I just honestly don't know who to trust anymore.

But I miss him and I hate myself for it. I really, really do. There's no point, I feel so embarrassed and I am not happy with what he has to offer me. A friendship where he likes to help me and trusts me to an extent but not fully. So he doesn't tell me any information about his past anymore because I gave repeatedly tried to break up the friendship and have hurt him too many times. I can understand it and accept it's my fault. But it's not a friendship dynamic I can be happy with. If I ruined the beautiful friendship we once had I can't pretend to be happy with a watered down version, all one sided. It's like playing tennis against the drapes, there's no effort on his side, he has cut me off emotionally about 6 months ago but won't leave me behind because of his military training..."no man left behind" crap.

Sorry really missing him today.

You are so smart and even though I don't want to hear it, you usually hit the nail on the head with me and my anxious attachment issues lol.

Take care,

Rowen13

Eagle Ray

Hi Rowen13,

From the further info you’ve provided about him it doesn’t sound like a healthy situation. At first I thought from what you were saying he’s a more benign character where he considered it a friendship but you developed feelings. But what you are now describing sounds manipulative and unbalanced. If he was leading you on regarding a possible life together, then denying it, that is a bit messed up given his marital status. That alone is a red flag. Often people who were raised by a narcissist can become the target of narcissists in other relationships later. Dr Ramani’s YouTube channel can be quite a useful resource for deciphering the behaviour of narcissists and these kinds of patterns. I’m not saying he is one. I can’t possibly know being outside the situation. But it sounds like a really problematic situation in terms of boundaries and very murky to navigate.

Once again, please don’t hate yourself. Having just discussed the topic of self-hatred with my psych yesterday, it’s so important to realise it’s an illusion and a reactive response that got embedded in us from a young age by our environment. It isn’t real and it’s another example of black and white thinking - e.g. I am all bad. When I was referring to black and white thinking I basically meant when we think in absolutes, such as viewing ourselves as totally bad or putting someone else on a pedestal.

My sense from what you’ve communicated is that it’s best to move on from this situation, which I know is very painful. It doesn’t sound resolvable and it seems like it will just be painfully drawn out. There will be grieving of course from having formed a strong attachment. I just think allowing yourself to let go and grieve and then open up a space for new possibilities is the best way to go. Just be tender with yourself right now. You don’t need to keep trying to go over it to resolve it, because it does sound like an unresolvable situation. I understand the feeling of loss is really difficult 😞

Take care and all the best,

ER

Rowen13

Hi ER,

I think you are right, the situation will always be murky and since this is someone whom I can never actually sit down with, I can never really know his true attentions. He displays many characteristics of covert narcissism a.k.a "the nice guy" narcissist, which is a lot harder to recognise early. And because I have been surrounded by narcissistic people my whole life I really have no healthy compass and double guess myself all the time. I will never know for sure if I was played (I probably was) or he is a nice guy. I talked to one of his girl friends who spoke highly of his character, so who knows?!?

But does it really matter in the grand scheme of things. He is not somebody I could meet irl for a cup of coffee. I did once have a male friend irl for years and do miss the company of the opposite sex in a platonic setting. I love women friend's but also loved having a male friend in my life. He moved to Canberra and the friendship ended so a part of me believes opposite platonic relationships can exist but this will not be the case with my online friend.

Thanks for listening to me. You told me what I was thinking inside, but didn't want to face and that in itself shows me what a wonderful person you are.

Back to the black and white thinking thing which is taught in CBT therapy, you're correct, in that regards I have slipped back in to that pattern a lot. Thank you for reminding me.

Another amazing person to watch on narcissists is Professor Sam Vaknin, whom is a self aware narcissist himself. I don't what it says about me, but I could watch him endlessly...he is so captivating and terrifying. Watching him has taught me so much about narcissists.

So it's day 3 of NC and I am of course suffering with withdrawals and self doubt. Over analysing if I am doing the right thing. I want him to be real so much and it's so torturous because I will never know for sure if he was narcissistic or a good guy.

I am aware I don't require him for closure but will be honest and admit I just came across that information yesterday on a YouTube video yesterday that taught me that lol. It was why I was endlessly chasing him down for answers, something to satisfy or ease my pain...to tie the loose ends, in the false belief something only he could give me would empower me to move on and make relinquishing him easier but nothing will and I can't skip the grieving process.

He definitely did things that just didn't morally align with my values. But he would say I was being judgey and assuming all the time. I guess none of it matters...I just miss my friend or atleast the "version" he once showed me. He is way more intelligent than me, so if he was a narcissist, I never stood a chance.

Thank you as always for your support 😊

take care of yourself,

Rowen13