Liking carrying on after rejection

Met a girl fortuitously at a lecture that I snuck into shortly after starting uni and I cannot get her out of my mind. We're great friends, which is threatened by the massive liking I've had pretty much since I met her. She's aware of this, because she read me like an open book and told me that, well, I'm a great guy but she's just not looking for anything but that she'd love to continue being friends. Me being me though, saw it fit to tell her a few weeks later how I felt because... I don't even know why. I felt like it was killing me not saying anything, even though I knew damn well she knew. She reiterated the fact that I'm a person she enjoys hanging out with but she wants to be friends with. Which is mostly fine and dandy by me, I think my life is better by having her as a friend because she's absolutely bananas, just like me, and I now have somebody I can invite to, and do invite to, a lot of the things I used to do by myself because there was no one else I knew who enjoyed them, but turns out she likes those things too...

Problem: I've never met anybody remotely like her and I don't think I ever will. I realise these are big, bold and cringy words for a young university student and I'd like for somebody to come over here and slap me in the face for being an idiot about this but that's just how I feel. I want to maintain our friendship and I want to respect her wish to just be friends but at the same time, I don't want to stop trying because... she's awesome! But I just feel like a horrible human being for it because it'd be basically not respecting her clearly stated wish, and of course jeopardising and dooming a great friendship.

Reply 1

Zarek

These situations have the potential to be very upsetting if you let them. Once a girl has delivered a rejection like this there is no possibility of a change of heart however much you want it to happen. So getting drawn in to ‘date like’ activities together while all the time you are hoping for more is at best hurtful and at worst leads to behaviour which destroys the friendship. I would make her an acquaintance level of friend and focus on finding someone else. Happily there is not just one adorable girl in the world, there are many. You cannot be happy with someone that doesn’t feel the same way.

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