Wouldn't you rather have a nice cup of tea?
Let's say you have a friend (coworker, acquaintance, etc.) who misreads your signals, and confesses or otherwise signals their attraction to you, but you don't find them attractive, and let them know their feelings aren't reciprocated. Can things go back to normal friendship afterwards, or will it be awkward between you?
The question was inspired by a thread in the guys' forum on mixed signals.
Don't believe everything that you read.
It depends on how mature you both are.
Two grown-ups? Sure. It might take a day or two to get back on track, but I absolutely think you can get the friendship back.
Not grown-ups? The butt-hurt would probably be too much to save the friendship. JMO
Never been in the situation. The only time a friend was attracted to me, I was also attracted to her and a wedding and child resulted.
I don't see how it could not affect the friendship, though. The attracted friend's feelings for the unattracted one would colour things for a while at least until they got over the rejection. Maybe some time apart would even be needed. Hard to say without being there.
Wouldn't you rather have a nice cup of tea?
Sure I guess it could go the other way, if you were the one making the moves with one of your friends. I did once, and was rejected. It was a little awkward between us for awhile. Now, it's fine. We've both moved on with our lives and are way past it.
Don't believe everything that you read.
anything could happen. It might induce the other person to give some thought about the other in a romantic light, if they hadn't done so before. Regardless of the outcome, kudos to the initiator. You'll never know if you never ask. If rejected, I think the initiator needs to respect that answer and not pressure the other person for more if they want to stay Friends.
no, one of us would have to quit. i kid, i kid! seriously, things might be awkward for a little while, but presuming that we were friends before, i'd get over it.
Being rejected with one's romantic advances will absolutely affect the friendship negatively but not permanently. I think hoping to see things return back to normal in a few days is rather wishful but given time on the scale of weeks or months I imagine that any damage done will become repaired, assuming both people are mature enough to allow it to happen. Though, In the unlikely yet possible event that the friendship is permanently damaged it is a much better result than the fallout that would come from not being honest and either stringing the person along or forcing a romantic relationship to develop and having it crash and burn. Sometimes the happiest ending is just the one that is the least bad.
I can’t think of a good tagline so this will have to do. Suggest a better one for me?
Some time ago a female I worked with wanted to go out, but I told her she didn't want to go out with me. It wasn't that I didn't find her attractive I was only interested in having sex and didn't want to ruin the friendship. Long story short we had sex and she had regrets and quit our work place.
Could happen and next time it could be different. But , we all know it is hard to unsee something or unfeeling that old feeling.
I told my husband NO at least 50 times and then it clicked. Knew I was not the kind of girl you take home to Mama.
Usually awkward unless he is one of those guys that just trys it on everyone
This happens to me a LOT, and it has turned out various different ways, from butt-hurt and awkward, to going right back to normal friend-zone. The more ego a guy has, the worse it turns out.
As long as you let the person down gently and tell them that you where flattered that they felt that way about you. You may well get back to normal a normal work place friendship
