BFF Male Coworker admits feelings for me & no longer wants to be friends

Hi Lafrance,

I appreciate your feedback. Unfortunately, I don’t think it will be easy for me to distance myself as we are forced to work in extremely close proximity of one another on a day to day basis.

I suppose I struggle with the notion of him not wanting to be friends at all. In fact, he never asked me if my feelings were similar and quite frankly, I doubt he wanted to feel this way himself at all. He repeatedly apologized for the situation and wished how things could be different, aka. staying friends. He strongly believes that he can’t be around me and it not hurt his marriage. I of course don’t know the extend of his feelings and how strong they are.. but it seems unnecessary to me that we can’t be friends at all. Perhaps, I am just not willing to lose him and trying to avoid that at all costs. :( Darn. This is so upsetting for me.

HE IS MARRIED! BIG RED FLAG!

NOT MEANT TO BE.

You might have look for a new job.

Think about it this way

You’re the married woman of this man. How ok would you be if you get dumped after making the promise to stay together forever?

Do not even consider sleeping with him and if your feelings are too strong, find a new job.

This is not a genuine friendship. Married men are excellent manipulators. Happened to me at work & I was single.

At work they can’t be sexual. Instead they are very cunning and appear to be very platonic for as long as you need it to be. They are patient.

They wait until you develop feelings & most women do as we enjoy the attention. That’s when the affairs start. He’s not your friend. It’s all part of the seduction.

He pulled away and they always will, leaving you devastated. It’s more horrible if you are co-workers. Take it from me, I had to get another job. Lesson learned the hard way!!..

“He strongly believes that he can’t be around me and it not hurt his marriage… but it seems unnecessary to me that we can’t be friends at all.”

It’s not up to you, it’s up to him. He’s telling you he can’t stay friends without it negatively affecting his marriage. If you are truly his friend, you should respect his wishes and back off.

I don’t mean any disrespect, but it’s strange to me that you seem more torn up about the loss of this friendship than the loss of your relationship. Are you sure you don’t have romantic feelings towards this friend? If you do, he might be picking up on that on some level, and for that reason he feels the need to back away from your friendship.

I think your view of not understanding why you can’t be friends is really selfish- sorry, but it is. It feels to me you expect special consideration from him above his wife. He is putting her first, and his life with her. He is saying he has recognised he has feelings of a romantic nature and he is doing what he needs to to stop these and subside these feelings, choosing his wife and life with her. Your attitude is all about you expecting him to chose you instead. Maybe romantically maybe just in some special way that’s not romantic, either way you have an expectation of where your place is in his life when he’s clearly told you you don’t have it.

You also make the oddest statement about being the same person as you’re so similar. The way you’ve written this- it’s just not normal. People don’t express themselves about a friend like this. They express about someone they feel romantically about.

It’s all odd

In an effort to be helpful, and not judgmental, I will still be very frank. You are in the wrong here. So is the guy. And so was poster Tammy and the co worker she described. It is wrong to become so emotionally close to another woman when you’re married because this is EXACTLY what can happen. An occasional lunch, or going out together in a big group of employees maybe – but spending regular time outside of work eating, laughing, drinking etc completely leads to emotional intimacy then physical attraction and temptation. So keep that in mind the next time you meet someone who’s married. Again — just be straight up — I don’t care how much you feel you are alike, have a connection, compatible, kind etc etc etc! They are MARRIED and have pledged themselves to someone else. IF the connection is so great the coworker wants to LEAVE or separate from their spouse then adults can make that choice and it would he honest and honorable. But having a work wife who holds NONE of the responsibilities of the household or children or just LIFE makes that friendship mostly a fantasy and most men will shag you, but they sure as hell don’t plan to properly date you or leave their families.

Also I am only guessing, but I wonder if you are so torn up about this because you either consciously or unconsciously knew your relationship with your boyfriend was nearing its end and you bought into the fantasy and saw this guy as a back up, ‘meant to be’ or whatever. Your relationship with your bf was long enough — that it’s ending is a loss, akin to a death, and you are in grieving and probably was wanting to quell your very intense grief in all the endorphins and fantasy love you had with this coworker. Which is all normal. It would be normal and human and a great temptation.

But to live an authentic life, with dignity, you need to practice always living in reality. This guy is not your true friend. He should not have been playing dice with his marriage by allowing such a close friendship and I don’t know if he’s being honorable now because he wised up, or just sees that you won’t ‘play’ and actually have feelings so he’s fleeing. Either way – get angry at his lack of boundaries. Then get sad! Meaning focus on grieving and processing the end of your relationship so you can begin to heal and move on.

Here’s a married man’s perspective.

Your friend is being manipulative because I question his timing. Why is being your platonic friend only becoming an issue when you need a friend the most? He could have told you this months ago. There feelings certainly didn’t develop over night not in the weeks since your breakup.