There’s a reason why heterosexual men and women cannot just be friends: sex. Even when sex is not involved, once the man realizes he’s not going to get anywhere with the woman sexually, he either ditches the friendship or remains very distant.
I met someone last summer that was a very good friend to me. He was there for me when no one else was when I had my surgery and helped me tremendously, more than anyone in my family or circle of friends. He fixed my car for free and refused to take payment. I felt comfortable enough with and trusted him enough to share things that I’d never told anyone else. We didn’t have much in common, but sometimes we’d have dinner or drinks together. Our communication was pretty much daily, and it was nice knowing someone cared. But I noticed something changed shortly after my surgery and then again recently.
Once I was on my way to recovering from surgery, I saw less and less of my male friend. I know he had a bunch of his own things going on; from a friendship standpoint, I was available for him emotionally if he needed me. But apparently, he didn’t need me. Each time I offered to make dinner for him in return of the favors he’d done for me, he declined. At some point, I told him I was going to stop asking, because I can’t keep setting myself up for rejection. His communication became less and less, and I let him know that I felt that he was avoiding me, and I wanted to know why. He gave excuses about working a lot, being busy, dealing with stuff. Okay, I get that, but I also felt it was just excuses and that he was blowing me off. After all, we went from hanging out 3-4x a week to maybe once a week or every other week. I figured maybe he’d started seeing someone, but he swore that wasn’t the case.
One of the things in the back of my mind is that he knew that due to the surgery, I was unable to have sex for a long period of time, so maybe that’s why he wasn’t pursuing the friendship. When I’d brought this up to him, he denied it and continued saying he was just busy. After healing from surgery and being medically cleared for normal activity, he found some time to hang out again, and he kept asking me when I was okay to go back to regular activity again. I knew he was referring to sexual activity, and medically, I was approved, but mentally and physically, I wasn’t ready.
When the holidays came around, my male friend was busy with family, so I barely heard from him and only saw him once – and it was the last time I saw him. This is about the time the friendship seemed to have completely changed. It was clear to me that he wanted to fuck, and even though my body wanted to, I physically could not due to other medical issues I was having. Mentally, I still couldn’t handle it at the time, and I didn’t want to get my feelings involved for the wrong reasons with someone that also isn’t emotionally available.
I told my male friend that I can only be friends with him, because I am going through my own shit, I knew he was going through his. I reminded him that he’s completely emotionally unavailable, and he treats me no different than he does his other friends, so I’m not about to have sex with someone that puts me on the same level as everyone else. This incident happened between Christmas and the new year. Since, I only hear from my friend when I initiate the conversation, and he hasn’t invited me to do anything at all. A week or so ago I was running errands near his house, so I asked what he was up to; he usually tells me to stop by and say hi. He didn’t. He hasn’t even initiated a hello or anything, which makes me feel like he only wanted to hang out thinking he was going to get laid, and that makes me feel like shit.
I sent my friend some messages about trying to arrange fixing my car again, because we’ve been discussing it for several months. He ignored my message and other regular ones I’d sent, but he had time to post shit on social media. When he eventually answered me, I felt he was being standoffish. So today, I finally sent him a message saying, “Look, I don’t know if you’re seeing somebody or something but you don’t even say hi to me anymore unless I initiate the conversation. I haven’t seen you literally since last year. I know you’re busy and all but I feel like something has changed between us. I almost feel like I’m bothering you by even asking you anything.” So far… crickets.
This is the type of behavior that men display that makes me not want to bother becoming friends with straight men anymore, because it’s a double edged sword. Just because I’m not going to have sex with someone doesn’t mean we can’t be friends and we can’t hang out, that we can’t eat meals together like normal friends. It’s really hurtful to gain trust in someone that was once so helpful, then just drops off the radar when he knows he can’t have sex with me. It’s really hurtful to continue being rejected by people that only want to be friends under certain conditions.
Free The Burden 