h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Thanks madbeachcomber, for making me go ahaaa!!
Good luck to you both and heres hoping that you get to spend even more time together
Ain't love grand

Love is when you start an Internet conversation so that you can talk about the person you like rather than just sitting at home on your own thinking about them. *Sigh*.

Here's my current problem - imagine you fancy the pants off your colleague for a year, so much so that when you're talking to them about work, you only take in 50% of what they're saying at best because your heart is racing and all you can think about is how lovely they are.

Imagine you don't tell your colleague about this, knowing that you both have partners already and that he probably doesn't feel the same anyway.

Then imagine you go out with your workmate one evening, get a bit drunk, and he kisses you. It's the best kiss you've ever had, you definitely feel the fireworks, in fact your knees go weak and your head spins. You don't see him for three weeks, but you can't eat, sleep or think about anything else. You now fancy him ten times more than you did before, and it becomes overwhelming.

Then you see him at work, talk to him and he says something boringly logical about it 'all getting too complicated', so you'd best not pursue it. You still think about it all the time though.

Then - the worst thing - imagine that February 24th, just two or three weeks away, is the last time you're ever going to see him. You're both moving away and getting new jobs. He'll go off and lead his life, you'll lead yours. It makes you feel sick, but you can't tell him about it, because he's made it clear he doesn't feel the same. You don't want to make him feel awkward.

So - if you feel depressed after reading that, then welcome to my world. I think he uses this site sometimes, so - you know who you are, if you're reading this - I love you. I know you don't feel the same, but please just be flattered that someone feels this way about you. I'll miss you more than I can say.

aaaw! I feel so sorry for you! That must be the worst feeling in the world!

Well, I wouldn't have written this if I really thought he'd see it, but the chances are pretty low I think. The most important thing to me at the moment is that we don't part on bad terms. I don't want him to think I'm some weird obsessive stalky-type person, that wouldn't help! I just love him very much, and I wish more than anything that he felt the same. I'm sure if he knew how I felt, he wouldn't have kissed me - he would have realised that the kiss was going to mean way more to me than it did to him.

I can't remember who told me this, but apparently psychologists describe love as the all-consuming feeling you have when you can't think about anything else.

Van Halen sing: "How do I know when it's love? I can't tell you, but it lasts forever... it's just something you feel together." I don't think either of those things are necessarily true though - I don't think it has to last forever, even if yuo think it will at first, and I don't think it has to be requited - i.e. I think you can love someone, even if they don't love you. It just makes it a lot more difficult and painful!

Also, someone above was talking about stalking - I think/hope that's different from unrequited love. If you love someone but they don't feel the same, you can either respect their feelings, bite your tongue and back off, or you can hassle them about it. It's very hard to back off, but if you really love them, maybe that's what you have to do.

At the moment, I just have this huge knot in my stomach, knowing that I'm going to have to say goodbye soon.

I do sympathise with you.

It was me talking about stalking... there was a documentary on Channel 4 last night ("erotomania" on the evening of Weds 7th Feb 2007) about one of the clinical psychiatric conditions that can lead to stalking.

One of the case histories was this poor girl, psychologically normal, but romantically inexperienced and somewhat socially inept, who moved to a new job in London (social isolation and loneliness, disrupted personal life). She got infatuated on a guy in her office who was just being concerned for her, and went through feelings as described a couple of posts ago for a workmate. But being socially inept, she mistook friendly concern for romantic interest, jumped the gun a bit, thought she had a boyfriend, and told other people this. You can imagine the consternation this caused, (that this bloke’s intentions had been so badly mis-read by the poor girl) but I do feel she was harshly treated.

It was other people in that office who then labelled her a stalker and a flaky nut-job, so that she had to resign and leave... but she was a bit of an awkward "Ugly Betty" character with little social nous, poor girl, so in her circs, easy for her to mistake platonic concern for love?

Nobody was especially at fault here - it was just a set of catastrophic misunderstandings that nobody could have predicted or averted.

I think I'm on the other side of a situation similar to the workmate one described a while ago. I've just broken up with my girlfriend of a few weeks because I didn't feel 'that way' about her anymore and quite frankly I don't know if I ever did and staying with her isn't fair on anyone. She was understandably upset because she liked me a lot, but she's not the issue I'm talking about, her friend is. My ex is new to the school and I've only known her for about half a year but her friend I've known for almost 4 years and last night she was drunk and told me that she loves me and has done so for as long as she's known me. We talked for a long time about that and many other things and I walked her back to house and I hugged her and as we parted we kissed. It may have been me initiating it, I don't remember, but the next thing I knew her tongue was down my throat and I could hear someone behind us coming around the corner which isn't good considering I don't want this all over the school and I don't want to further hurt my ex. I broke off the kiss saying 'we can't do this', she agreed and we parted. She's been saying all night how bad she felt because she couldn't get with me because of her friend and I think the fact that we kissed might have messed her up a little emotionally. Anyway I don't know what to do now and this weekend me and her are going to be in Manchester on a school thing and we may be going out, as a group, and I don't know what she thinks is going to happen. I'm not adverse to getting with her but I fear that if I did the same thing would happen as it did with my current ex, that I would realise I didn't like her how she liked me and have to go through another break up like that one. Plus considering her 4 year infatuation it would be much worse for both of us if that did happen and my ex would probably kill herself.

So yeah, it's all fun and games going on here. I swear there must be something in the water, relationships are dying all over the place!

It sounds like she’s in the same situation as me, then!

I know everyone reacts differently, but if she thinks at all the same as I do, she may be hoping, or assuming, that your kiss meant something more than it really did. It depends what you said to her, I suppose – if you said anything that she could misinterpret or take too seriously, then she may be focusing on that.

For instance, from my own point of view, on the evening that my blokey kissed me, he said something like ‘why did you have to wait until you’re leaving [i.e. resigning from work] before you told me you fancied me?’ I read into this way too much, and assumed that this meant if I’d told him earlier, maybe something else could have happened between us. In actual fact, I think he was just drunk and not thinking about what he was saying! But I focused on this for three weeks over Christmas, and by the time I actually got to speak to him again, this was foremost in my mind - it had become this huge important thing and I hadn’t prepared myself for any other eventuality.

I would have preferred, when we first spoke after Christmas, that he had risked hurting my feelings and said ‘I don’t fancy you’, rather than saying ‘it could get complicated’. This to me didn’t feel like ‘closure’ so I carried on thinking something might happen.

My advice would be to be sensitive but honest – let her know that you still want to be friends, but that’s all. If you’re flattered that she likes you, tell her that, but don’t let her continue thinking you may have a future together if it’s not going to happen.

As I said, everyone thinks differently, but that’s my story, for what it’s worth.

Hearing all this makes me feel really sad for you and brings back memories of the past.
Its not just as easy as liking someone and them liking you , and its beginning to make this 42 year old single mum think twice before I could ever take such a leap of faith again.
I think you're very brave and I,m just not anymore,
Take care of yourselves

I haven't spoken to her since but I'm going to see her later in a choir practice. If she wants to talk I will but I don't know what I'm going to say. With all of this on my mind I've been having a very weirdly spaced out day. Sorry for your situation though FunkyP., I had something like that a few years ago with a girl, it's tough to get over but one day suddenly realised that I was over it and I think it's better that I am because she was never interested in me. Strange though, even though it was so painful I loved having that connection with her, but looking back I don't think the whole thing it did me any good apart from teaching me to be more cautious with love. Sadly I haven't felt that way about anyone since, at least that I can remember.

I think I know exactly how you feel, FunkyP. Although my circumstances are different, I'm in that 'having to say goodbye' situation. I know all about that knot and that psychologists' definition sounds spot on; she is in everything I see and hear (whether I like it or not.)

You're right about backing off, though it is so very hard, and you're right about honesty being the key. I can at least say that I have always been honest with her.

I expect this doesn't make much sense without having heard my 'story' but it is comforting for me that I'm not alone in feeling the way I do and I hope you can take some comfort from knowing the same.

I would say but I don't want to be a hypocrite!

I think it just sneaks up on you and then all of a sudden you realise you're smitten so to speak. All well and good of course but if it's not mutual then it can chuffin well be painful. You could end up 'ed before you know it.

I think that if it's not mutual you should try to busy yourself with other things, to help yourself to not think about it.

Good advice in general but...

I have tried that but it just doesn't work. I can be doing anything, no matter how 'non-her', and she appears in my head for no reason. My situation is complicated in that it isn't entirely non-mutual. We were together, she called it off and now we're 'friends'. We have daily contact and she's admitted that we are more than friends but she doesn't want a relationship. I don't really know what she wants but I can't cope with being just friends; it's too painful. I think I have to say goodbye but the thought of that is equally painful.

Pain or no pain, I still believe in love.

I believe in love. I believe in the pain of love, the loss of control due to love, the light headedness of love, the foolishness following love. I also believe in the beauty and freedom of love.

Hehe, reminds me of that Elton John song - "I believe in love, it's all we've got.. love has no boundaries, no borders to cross..." etc, etc!

I suppose the thing to remember with the 'unrequited' kind is that, no matter how absolutely awful you can feel at the time, things do get better. A few days ago, when I wrote the post above, I felt as if everyday life was of no importance any more, all I could think about was how I am never going to see my blokey again, and how awful it feels.

Today, I still feel pretty bad about it. If he hadn't kissed me, I most likely wouldn't have these feelings. But that evening is one I will never forget - a 'bittersweet' memory, I suppose! If I could go back in time, would I change it so that it didn't happen? No way. It left me messed up emotionally, but it still happened, yummy.

I still think about him all the time.. no, I tell a lie - there were five minutes yesterday when I set fire to the toast and had a mini-panic trying to find some water, I didn't think of him then.

So - I still think about him for at least 23 hours and 55 minutes of every day, and I'm still going to miss him soooo much, but wow - that kiss was so delicious, it was worth it.

Hello, FunkyP, galigan, van-smeiter and all... Just confessing in public too... The long of it is on my PS, but I am in a 'funny' situation too.

I am married, but since many years very attracted to a man on the other side of the atlantic. We have met for two work conferences, and twice on our own. Only the last time, we made it anywhere at all, sexually... even the first kiss was only one week ago. But of course, the attraction was there all the time.

I have no idea where it might be going... He is never going to move to this continent. I can't leave my children, or bring them with me across the ocean. And I doubt he would want it either.

But when we meet, (it was two years apart recently), sparks fly.

Idiotic. I know. But exciting nevertheless.


QN

I used to question what love was but the easiest thing I think to do is to just go with the flow and see what happens.

Me and my bf are like two pieces of a puzzle that only contains us two and we snuggly fit together like best friends but more. My mum says we are soul mates.

Is it in his kiss?

Isn't it scary how much love can affect you? One day you're going about your normal life, the next you've met someone, or your feelings for someone you know have changed, and suddenly everything you do and all your thoughts revolve around that one person.

The most powerful thing for me, with my recent experience, was the feeling I got when he put his arms around me, I was happy, sad, dizzy, faint, all at the same time - I can't explain it, but I wish he would do it again!