When love turns to misery

[Arqus_Zed]

Okay, so, I never thought I would be posting this on an internet forum, but I'm just... I'm done. I've had it. Fuck it.

So, there's this girl. Scratch that. There's this woman. She's 27, ergo, she's a woman. Now, I've known her for about 6 years and I've loved her for the last 5 of them. She's kind of introverted, I'm kind of introverted, you know how it goes. Or you don't, fair enough, not my business.

Anyway, we went through college together, we did our internship at the same studio, we've kept in contact after graduation. There've been some gaps, but lately, we've been talking a lot to each other. Hell, at a certain point, we were both following (different) evening classes, so we would meet up half an hour in advance for some good ol' fashioned conversing. Neither of us had time to eat beforehand, so I always stopped at that pasta placed she liked to get some Quatro Formaggi. That always put a smile on her face. I love the way she smiles. Clich?, sure, but that doesn't make it any less true.

Now, as far as I know, she hasn't had a real boyfriend, ever - never even went on an actual date.

Same here, by the way.

So we've been talking a lot lately. I've learned to listen, remember the personal things she tells me. Her likes, her dislikes, her allergies, stories from her past. It's fun. She always looks so wide-eyed when I bring up some trivial fact: "I can't believe you remembered that!" She asked me to her birthday dinners, I helped her out with her job that one day she got to work from home, we went on a trip to London with some other friends. Sometimes we meet up on friday evenings, never just us, always with another one of her friends - she's nice though, we get along well.

Or, to be more accurate, that was the situation about three weeks ago. "What happened three week ago?" I hear you ask. Well, based on various bits of information and dodgy signal interpretation, I told her my feelings for her in the most archaic manner possible: I wrote her a love letter.

Among said information and signal interpreting was the following: a colleague telling me a woman always likes to hear she's being loved. The notion of 'nothing ventured, nothing gained'. A direct quote from the woman I love: "If someone loves me, I'd rather he just comes out and says it. Maybe I'm lucky and the feeling is mutual. If not, at least I can put him out of his misery."

So, I bought myself a pen and some of that fancy paper to write 'real' letters. You know, the one with the extra page that has lines on it that you put below the letter - so you don't start writing in an arc like there's some gravity well at the bottom of your page. First, I spent like two weeks writing and rewriting a draft, just in Wordpad, trying to put everything I wanted to say in one, clean, clear, honest letter. Then I took to pen and paper. It was horrible. Not the content, but the way it looked. I have terrible handwriting and the letter was barely legible. So I wrote it again, actually writing each character individually. It took me somewhere between two and three hours, but I finally had what I wanted: three pages in which I confess my feelings to the woman I love. I write about why I never spoke up before, I write about the things I love about her, I let her know that I value what we have and I don't intend to throw it away if the feelings aren't mutual.

She would have gotten said letter three weeks ago.

I haven't heard anything back from her since then.

I've sent her a text: "Mornin' beautiful, how are you?" As I do regularly, except this time, I got no answer. I've sent her a message on steam: "Hey, how are you?" She was online, she didn't answer. I've sent her an Email saying: "If I said anything that offended you, my apologies. If you don't know how to react because you don't want to damage my frail, male ego: no worries, that's my problem. It was never my intention to put you in an awkward position." No. Answer.

I'm not even worth a simple text saying: "Sorry, not interested."

So, where do I go from here?

tl;dr: Can anyone recommend me a good book on 'How To Understand Women'?

 

[Phasmal]

Oh dear.

If you had asked for advice beforehand, I would have probably advised against the handwritten letter and suggested just asking her out on a date. As it is, I think the best thing you can do right now is give this woman some space. Maybe she'll get back to you once she's thought it out a bit more, but maybe not.

As for understanding women, just understand that they're people. A love letter out of the blue from someone you've long considered a friend could be considered quite the shock. And some women wouldn't like a handwritten love letter at all. It might be better to ask someone out for a date casually before dropping the L bomb on them.

Sorry things didn't work out, dude.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Just forget about relationships and remain single forever. Life is so much simpler and less stressful once you're free from all that crap.

 

[Saelune]

I cannot say it will go how you want, but as someone who has run from people who had strong feelings for me, it can be weirdly scary, especially if you dont think you can love them back the same.

Constantly pressuring her certainly wont help, and you just have to hope she eventually responds to you. I just recommend being open to it if/when it happens, and it could happen at any time really. And by that I mean like, days, weeks, or longer, and at any time of day. Basically dont hold your breath.

As for understanding women, well, it wont help you too much, since you want to understand a specific woman. There are generalities that can help you with many women, but women, like men, arent always stereotypical.

Really the best way to understand anyone is to understand they are not you, and may think very differently than you. Thats something everyone needs to know, men AND women.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well she did tell you how it will happen in advance, but you were thinking of the good part and forgetting the bad one. I.E. she is ending your misery flat out, we could have told you ahead of time that 99% of these fiend->relationship attempts go to shit.

And you did it in almost the worst way possible, sure it would make a great Hollywood rom-com, but in those everything has a magical fantasy ending, out in the real world it is blood sweat and tears the whole way through.
That letter was essentially a giant dumper truck full of your wants, wishes and feelings, then you sent it to an introverted friend who has never dated before... you essentially buried her under all your baggage of the past 5 years. The only thing you can expect her doing at the moment is staying the hell away so she doesn't get pinned down under yet more stuff you got on your mind.

I'm not being harsh on you man I very much know this scenario from of my own blunders, but it is important to understand that your side looks very different from theirs. Take this situation as a definitive No, I know you don't want to accept it unless she personally shoots you down but she probably very much wants to avoid that confrontation because it would get ugly.