u/fiddeldeedee

Thanks to this sub I came to the realisation that... I have a thing for someone with an avoidant attachment style...while mine is rather anxious.

What I read seems to confirm this. Now neither attachment style is superior or better or whatever. However I'm wondering... did any one of you experience, even from second hand, that such a relationship is even possible?

When I need closeness/signs that things are all good and well he needs his distance and vice versa. Feelings are there, but... would a relationship even make sense long term? Our feelings for each other exist since for ever but feelings alone aren't enough and I'm just wondering whether our attachment styles would make a relationship even possible?

would we become less anxious/avoidant if we were together and sure about our feelings for each other? would it get worse? would it just end in a huge exhausting disaster?

tl;dr: my friend didn't reply to.my last messages. should I ask him about our planned meeting this upcoming weekend or should I just make other plans anyway?

Hello there,

I (32f) have a friend (31m) from my youth. In fact early this year we texted and realised that we had feelings for each other for a long time and both wanted to be in a relationship with each other.

Again, this was about our past. We were close friends as teenagers and during our early twenties we made out a couple of times.

However we never became an item because whenever we got closer (physically, emotionally, you name it) he... somewhat disappeared a bit.

This confused me and made me doubt everything.

So after many, many years I finally got into a relationship with another man.

Anyhow, my friend and I met this year. He drove a long way although he only had little time for me.

We also talked on the phone a few times this year.

He wanted to see me again and when I asked when he had time he replied that the weekend after Easter (so the next one) would probably be okay for him. This was back in March.

He didn't reply to my last messages so I'm contemplating weather to ask him of he's still got time or weather I should just plan that weekend without him anyhow.

I don't want to appear needy on the one hand but on the other I also don't like planning something without having full clarity.

I should add that he is a very busy man who receives tons of calls and messages each day. He showed and told me as much when we met.

however whenever there was something important to me, he reacted immediately (for example when he realised I was feeling bad, when I had an accident, even when I had my child. And during our conversation early this year about our past and our past feelings he took time to reply all day long).

Anyhow, we are not dating, we are friends, but... I don't want to appear needy and I don't like planning something else if I'm not sure where we are actually standing with our plans.

what's your advice?

What I noticed is:

I went no contact with my mother and brother.

My mother's brother literally moved to the other end of the world and went very low contact.

One of my great uncles went no contact with most of our family and low contact with one member.

It seems to happen in each generation.

Now I'm rather sure my grandpa was a narc and I also see that my mother might either be a covert narc or at least carry lots of narc traits. So maybe it has to do with this.

Anyhow did you notice a similar pattern in your family?

When I was around 8 or 9 years old I (32f) told my mother that I had a crush on a female friend of mine. She told me I was wrong and that I just liked her a lot as a friend.

I didn't know that bisexuality existed and since I also had a "boyfriend" I thought, okay, then she must be right. However I told a neighbour, who was maybe 2 years older than me, that I was a lesbian.

Anyhow I suppressed whatever attraction I felt for girls/women.

When I was maybe 13 years old a friend of mine told me that she had seen me look at a woman as if I was in love. She didn't sound judgmental, I suspect she just wanted to give me a nice little hint but it just confused me.

Only when I was 21 years old did I realise that yep, I might actually really be bi (and I also had a huge crush on another woman).

The first person I confessed to that I was bi was the boy/man that was basically my love from younger days. He didn't judge me at all.

I then texted some friends that I felt attracted to women as well. And one female friend of mine told me that she already had suspected as much/already knew for years. It was clear to her based on the way I looked at some women/talked about them.

This baffles me to this very day.

However my own mother and brother believe that anything but heterosexuality must be a mental disease and disgusting so I never really came out as bi.

And for some odd reason I "forgot" that I was bi at all.

Until a few months ago when I cut ties with my mother and "remembered" that yep, wholy cow, I'm so very definitely bi.

And now, for the first time, I also start to feel free to feel attraction towards other people, women and men. I was suppressing this so hard.

Anyhow, did something similar happen to you?

I'm not out there still... and I don't really know who to talk to, plus I have a child and don't want to make life harder on my son... after all my own mother and brother wouldn't be able to accept me.