i’m exhausted man.
tired of getting told i’m the problem with no explanation
i’ve been having trouble with my bestfriend .
We’re both guys, and he’s a bit homophobic (like won’t even sit in the same bed as a guy because it’s “gay” homophobic) which is why i’m having a hard time processing this. (Only when he got a girlfriend was he semi-okay with sitting on a bed with me. His direct quote “it’s still pretty gay but i have a girlfriend now so i’ll allow it)
I do want to say that I am a big advocate for male friends to show eachother physical affection, and i’m no stranger to that at all.
We’ve had an extremely deep emotional bond. He was my very bestfriend in the world and I his. One night I had a mental breakdown of sorts, and his way of calming me down was repeatedly rubbing my back, pulling me down to cuddle (with him in his back and me on top of him with my head on his chest. which i rejected after a few seconds of shock) lots of hugging and pressing his fingers into the of my arms back of my arms repeatedly.
A few days before this I was having a hard time in school (which was the reason for the mental breakdown) and left our hangout early. he asked what was wrong and then proceeded to ask if i was into him to which i said no, and he responded that he was just joking to lighten the mood. Later on his reasoning was that he didn’t mean it, but he knew i had a hard time saying things important (which is true) so he was just guessing
Now usually I wouldn’t think twice about this. but it was around the same time that i found out that he sexts men online regularly and watches gay porn regularly. He admitted shame, depression and disappointment overt this. If a girl did this to me i’d most definitely take it as a sign, but I also was having a bit of a breakdown, so i’m not sure how to look at this? i’m genuinely lost and confused and more hurt than i like to admit.
(after the night he distanced from me and blamed it on my breakdown) :/ right after my breakdown he went to pursue a girl romantically who had a crush on him for a long time, but he had always refused to date her one of the reasons being her body proportions are off (among 20 other reasons he said some pretty gross things about her.)
i talked to him yesterday. Where he looked me in the eyes told me he isn’t gay and isn’t into me and that he loves his girlfriend. and no had no solid answer as to why he broke our friendship off. Just “i’m a horrible friend to you i’m so sorry”.
We got to talking a little less serious in between the serious conversations and i mentioned that im leaving for a week driving 11 hours to go see all my family. (sometimes i get bad anxiety driving home which is a 3 hour drive he’s offered multiple times to drive me home too. declined all of those)He asked me to my face if i wanted him to drive me there. He was being dead serious.
I don’t know what he wants from me and i’m exhausted.
At the end got Told it’s too much to hangout with me and made a bunch of other accusations and reasons


This has everything to do with your friend and your status as a gay person, nothing to do with who you are. You can’t fix your friend no matter how much you may want to. Only he can come to terms with his own issues. It’s not fair that you are collatoral damage in his identity crisis, but it’s his crisis that you didn’t cause. You are only guilty of being a good enough friend to him that he felt comfortable exploring intimacy with you. Please believe me when I tell you the biggest issue you have now is the sunk cost fallacy. Again, it’s extremely unfair to you and it’s a shitty situation. Now that you know you can’t get what you need from him, you can either waste more effort on him or save your effort for someone who can reciprocate.
Thanks for your comment. I want to say i’m definitely not taking any offense to this as I’m looking for advice and perspective, but are you saying i’m projecting and my friend isn’t into me? That’s how I took in what you wrote
No, it’s a lot worse than that . Your friend is into you at the same time as not being capable of being honest with himself. I’m not saying it’s necessarily the case here, but people get murdered in this situation even after being friends for years.
There is plenty of potential here for you to get hurt very badly if you pursue him, or worse out him, while he is trying to appear totally straight for his community. Once again, you did nothing wrong and the signals are pretty clear even to read, but this form of homophobia is very, very dangerous to both of you in every way.
Please don’t press him unless he comes out on his own, otherwise there is great potential for danger for both of you. It’s an awful situation and I hope you’re able to navigate it and go on to get everything you deserve from someone who’s available and safe.