Dear English Gentleman,

A couple of months ago I became friends with this Man. Immediately, we realised we shared a lot in common and our friendship grew quite quickly. Soon, I found myself day dreaming about romance with this Man. Little by little, the text messages we sent each other started becoming more and more ambiguous, such as him saying he was listening to a song we listened to together and was thinking about me. I felt like he was going to make a move ‘any time now’, but time went by (two months now) and nothing was happening- just those confusing texts. When we are face to face, there’s not even the most subtle hint of flirting. Not even a subtle hint of body language- you know, no accidental ‘brushing past’.

Because I had no clue how he felt, I didn’t want to make any ‘aggressive’ statements of my feelings, so I followed his lead with the ambiguous texts and perfectly casual face to face encounters. However, as time went by my feelings for him kept being fed by his ambiguous texts, until I found myself feeling quite miserable and prematurely heart-broken.

So, feeling like I had nothing to lose, a couple of weeks ago I started making more direct suggestions of my feelings for him being more than just friendly. Considering the fact that he is a very calm, mature man who seems to respect me and value our friendship, I was expecting one of the two outcomes.

Either he’d realise I was falling for him and if he didn’t feel the same way, readjust his tone and stop with the ambiguous texts to put me back on the friendship track.

OR, if what was stopping him was uncertainty of how I felt, that upon realising how I felt he’d get his act together and kiss me already!

What I didn’t expect was that neither of those would happen. He’s still continuing with the texts- saying that he’ll miss me when I move out (which might happen in the next month or so), or that the time we spend together never feels enough, and that what he’s feeling is new and very strange to him, or that he’s wishing I was there with him when he’s doing something… but when we see each other, we are really just friends sharing intellectual conversation. And he definitely doesn’t strike me as a shy man! He might be calm and quiet, but he definitely doesn’t lack confidence.

Can you explain to me what on Earth is going on?

Thank you very much.

Melissa.

Dear Melissa,

Goodness me. This is one of those difficult questions – in part because I don’t know some of the background detail. But I can still make a few educated guesses as to the underlying behaviour of your Man.

Let me start with what we do know. Your Man comes across as rather immovable: when you started making more direct suggestions as to your feelings towards him you rightly identified a couple of clear outcomes, yet neither occurred. It really seems that your Man is entirely happy with the way things stand and for some reason doesn’t want to move forwards (into a more romantic relationship), yet nor does he want to move backwards (as you say readjusting his tone and stopping with the ambiguous texts). This much appears to be the way things are, based on what you have written. Now of course the question you’d like an answer to is why? Why does your Man want to flirt with you via text messages, yet doesn’t appear to want to move things forward?

Firstly maybe your Man cannot move things forward because he’s committed elsewhere. Is there an ex (or perhaps not quite so ex) – girlfriend perhaps? Secondly, maybe it’s simply that he is afraid of commitment; perhaps he is rather attracted by the idea of moving things forward, but is afraid of losing his freedom in some way. Thirdly, perhaps he really is just a shy person, although you say that he doesn’t strike you as a shy man (but you do mention that he is quiet). Fourthly, perhaps there’s just a misunderstanding as to what each other wants in this relationship, your Man wanting to limit things to friendship, whilst you want more. But this last explanation doesn’t sit very well with the fact that you have made moves which seem to have had little or no effect on your Man’s approach towards you, nor does it explain the nature of those ambiguous text messages.

You are in a much better position than I to judge which – if any – of these possibilities might be nearest the mark. But, for what it’s worth, my gut reaction is that it’s an issue of commitment. I sense that your Man doesn’t want to make the commitment towards you which would be necessary to take the relationship to a deeper level. In a sense I suspect that he wants to have his cake and to eat it too. I think he finds it less committing and safer to flirt via ambiguous text messages than flirt in the real world.

A relationship doesn’t just need an arbitrary amount of commitment from both sides, it needs to be balanced. The deeper the relationship between you, the bigger the commitment you have towards each other. But importantly this commitment should be pretty much equal from either side. Now, from what you have written, there really does seem to be a lack of balance in this relationship. It sounds as if you are really full of commitment (after all you speak of being miserable and even heart broken), yet your Man appears to be lacking in this respect. If your Man is somewhat commitment phobic then I think that is something he has to sort out himself. You cannot do this for him. This is different to your Man being shy. You can help your man overcome shyness (a big kiss might help!), but you cannot sort out his issues with commitment.

At the end of the day you need to try and find out what your man wants from this relationship. And that will mean talking to him and asking him specifically. Equally, your Man should want to find out from you what it is you want from this relationship. If he says friendship is the way he wants to go then that’s the way it is and you need to decide if that’s for you. If he says he wants more than friendship then he needs to realise that that entails a deeper level of commitment, from both sides of the relationship. As I say he cannot have his cake and eat it too.

Good luck,

The English Gentleman