Problem With Best Friend :(

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Earlier this year my best friend got rather tragically dumped by his girlfriend of two years, and I think he rebounded with me or something along those lines. It was a really stupid mistake for both of us to make, especially since I've never had a relationship before, and so really don't know how the whole thing works, or how I work in those sort of things. Even the casual, non-emotional type relationships that, theoreticaly, I feel a lot more comfortable with.

It was a fairly unfair thing for him to do, but I understand that he was fragile and was probably very confused himself at the time. He probably feels really bad about the whole thing, especially since we've been best friends for five years now, and genuinely cares as a friend.

Needless to say, because I didn't know exactly what he wanted, I really freaked the f**k out. Crying, screaming, terror. Breaking down in front of other friends, etc etc. Eventually I cooled down a little, but because I thought something was wrong with the friendship, and things felt stunted and distance-y to me, I freaked out some more, and tried to reach out to him to reconnect as a friend. Which of course only had the opposite effect. Argh.

I actually brought up the courage yesterday to call him up and talk about the weirdness. It was good. This is how I learnt that he had actually been purposefully distant with me, because apparently I have been acting like I have a giant, flaming, teenage crush on him. I wasn't aware that my behaviour was coming across like that- I kind of wish someone had told me that a little earlier.

Apparently I need to just chill out- but this is a lot harder to do than it is to say. How does one uh, chill out?

What do you mean when you say he 'rebounded' to you?

It does sound a bit unfair that he avoided you without giving any explanation.

Okay...I think you're (unfortunately) overestimating the value of this friendship. This man used you as a "rebound" - knowing full well that you'd never been in a relationship before, and when problems arose, he chose to run rather than take the time to communicate. I'm not trying to advocate holding a grudge, but I think you're letting this guy off the hook far too easily. He behaved like an @sshole, and IMO, he doesn't deserve your concern, consideration, or any more of your time.

Enough of my comments - to your question about how to chill out....don't call him, don't text him, don't email him. Don't see him, don't talk to mutual friends about him. When you're ready to work out your feelings, try journaling, or a good therapist. Talk to friends who aren't his friends, try a little cognitive therapy technique - when you start obsessing over him, immediately start a new activity (doesn't matter what, just something to take your mind off of him). Good luck, hon.

Well, it wasn't entirely a rebound, but I'm not sure what else to call it. I think it was meant to be just a temporary extension of what the friendship meant. We were both feeling bad about ourselves at the time for our various reasons, and I thought that learning about sex from someone close to me who I really trusted sounded like a safe and fun idea.

Like, I knew I was second to the ex should she have wanted him back, and I was actually okay with that. There wasn't much pressure that way, aside from potentially having your first sexual encounter when intimacy kind of terrifies you. But then I started reading some signs that things were leaning to a less casual direction- unfortunately I got proven rather wrong. Potentially the ex said something that pulled on heartstrings and changed his mind. I was prepared for that- but that was before my emotions got confused. :/ But alas that is history now.

I was actually over things, or at least I thought I was, but then my other best friend slept with him and it ripped everything open for me again. Grah. Fate seems to have a sadistic sense of narrative drive with me that really cannot be matched.

The cognitive therapy technique sounds like a good, healthy idea. And some down time. A lot of down time.

He doesn't sound like a straight-up a*shole to me. The situation was both faults, and I would never personally have entered into anything like it. My first time was with a virginal friend and, although a mess, was meant to be 'friends with benefits' for me, anyway. When the sexuality ended, our friendship did not. I played that as carefully as I could.

I'm confused why you were having meltdowns in front of friends about this. Did you take it that seriously and not understand your emotions? Much of the other problems sound like they were caused or exacerbated by a potentially poor understanding of non-verbal cues. If that's an issue, I'd suggest taking it really slowly and as logically as possible.

Yeh, I'm pretty confused as to why the meltdowns were happening too. They weren't fun.

I know I got really really scared about interpretting something wrong or making the wrong gesture- like animal level, fight or flight kind of scared. I just didn't want to make some stupid mistake that would hurt him or something, even though, in hindsight, the only person really capable of that was the ex. Silly mistakes during your first time are kind of expected, but I didn't realize that at the time.

I think what caused this current mess is yeh, poor understanding of non-verbal cues on my part, and the fact that we never really sat down and said, "Okay, this isn't working out. Let's end this now before someone gets hurt." It just kind of faded off and left me again not knowing what was appropriate to do and when. So, I understand now that he doesn't want anything from me anymore, but there was a long period where I had no idea where we stood.