possible for a girl and a guy to be just friends? if so, under what circumstances?

so in responding to another thread, this question came to my mind and i didn't want to sabotage the other thread so i decided to open it up for discussion in a new post...

i've been friends with two guys since high school...about 10 years. i've never had any feelings of physical attraction towards either of them. if anything, i looked at them as family, brothers. one of my friends is married, and the other has been in a relationship for 5-6 years and will most likely get married.

in the other thread, i said that i think it's possible for a man and a woman to be friends without any physical attraction. no one really disagreed, but someone made a point that i thought was rather interesting and had me speculating my history with these friends.

someone mentioned that it was rather likely that my friends were attracted to me in the beginning and i just didn't notice. either that or i was just ugly. (now i don't think i'm ugly, and i definitely wasn't ugly in high school when i first met these guys. so in my own situation, ugliness was not the issue haha)

but what my ultimate question is, and wanted to open up for some discussion, is whether it is possible for a guy and a girl to become friends without that physical attraction, and if so, under what circumstances could that happen?

if what the other poster said is correct, and these friends of mine were attracted to me back in HS, how did they get over that attraction? what would have needed to happen in order for them to move on and be able to remain friends with me? (maybe the guys could help me out with these questions) like i said, the one friend that i see the most often is married. he is fully committed to his wife, so i know that he has no feelings for me in that regard. hypothetically, if he was attracted to me before, he was amazing at keeping it from me because i saw no signs.

but there is the possibility that they were NOT attracted to me, right? and if that's the case, under what circumstances could a guy and a girl become friends (when both are equally handsome) WITHOUT being physically attracted to each other? do they both have to be in relationships?

now i do remember a couple years ago, my friend who i don't see as often, had made a comment about how he thought i was cute in HS. i had never thought of him that way, and he's been with his girlfriend for almost 6 years, so i just shrugged it off as him being nice and didn't think twice about it. but now i'm sort of worried that my view of our relationship is completely different than his, and it worries me because i don't want to lose the image i have in my mind about us. i care about him like a brother and it would break my heart to think that he's had feelings for me and i've never even had a half a second thought of him like that.

i'm interested in hearing people's thoughts on this, experiences, etc. anyone?

You can't be friends with the opposite gender without offering free sex

Guys and girls can be friends if they both are not interested in ****ing each other or if one is not interested in ****ing each other and the other understands the picture. If one of them doesn't get it, then he is doomed in staying infatuated with someone who doesn't share the same feelings.

Friends are useful to have, and if a guy realizes he can't or doesn't want to **** you, then he may just accept friendship and move on. Either that, or they hang around until the girls desperation level falls below a certain threshold ;)

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Your friends may have been attracted to you in High School. They may have been too shy to ask you out, or they simply realized you were not interested back and moved on.

I have a friend I met at work. We both moved on to different jobs but kept in touch. Later I went through a divorce. Right about the same time her mom died. We helped each other through our respective situations and became very close. One night we got drunk and had sex. It was great, but I'm a lot older than her so we agreed that it was best to go back to being friends. Nearly 2 years later we still give each other dating advice and talk on a daily basis. We've even gone out many times and kept it platonic. I'd say we're best friends now. It's non-sexual now and we love each other as best friends. We tell each other everything. We kinda back off on going out when one or both of us are seeing someone, but when we're not, we go out all the time.

It's great to have a friend of the opposite sex if for nothing else their perspective and companionship when you are both not dating anyone, or down in the dumps. I'd say the only issue is if you text each other and you happen to be dating someone it can cause problems. It has for me.

If you weren't ugly I bet good money he was attracted. If one party is attracted and the other is definately not then yes, you can be friends- if the person who is attracted learns to get over it- it's that simple.

I have some very attractive male friends- and I'm attracted to most of them. But we remain friends- why? Because I have committed myself to my guy, and them their wives. You run into to trouble when BOTH parties are attracted to eachother (like in the other thread).

What makes you think they've completely gotten over it? Who's to say that, given the right circumstances, they wouldn't both bone your brains out? Say, for instance, your married friend gets divorced and you happen to be single at the time? You'd better believe it's likely he'd take a shot at getting into your pants.

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Originally Posted by Gigabitch [Dear Guest/Member you have to reply to see the link.click here to register]

What makes you think they've completely gotten over it? Who's to say that, given the right circumstances, they wouldn't both bone your brains out? Say, for instance, your married friend gets divorced and you happen to be single at the time? You'd better believe it's likely he'd take a shot at getting into your pants.

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ugh! the idea just gives me the irks...it's sooooo weird! i don't think my friend who is married would do that. my bf and i hang out with him and his wife all the time...they are pretty much our couple dating buddies. my bf and him are pretty cool too, they talk to each other about random stuff through e-mail without me even being involved and i do the same with his wife. and if for some reason i was to be single and he were to be single, i still don't think that there would be anything there.

my other male friend, who is in medical school, is a little different. he is the one that had mentioned he thought i was cute in HS and he's been dating his girl for a long time (longer than i've been with my current bf)...but after all those years, i've still never really gotten to know her. granted he went to UMD and she lives in MD so she is rarely in NJ. being in medical school prevents him from being able to really visit. we talk online every now and then to catch up and stuff, but yeah, never really got to know his gf. when we were all at the same wedding in the fall, i got this feeling that his gf didn't really want to converse with me. her and my friend were a part of the wedding party so they were busy doing that kind of stuff, but i really didn't get to catch up with him at all...it was very strange. i don't know if he has feelings and wants to keep his relationship with me completely separate from his gf or if she just doesn't feel comfortable with the idea of him having a female friend. either way, it seems that we've become more and more distant over the years. it's sorta depressing, but i understand that a male-female friendship isn't exactly very common or accepted and the last thing i'd want to do is create any trouble for him with his gf so i just keep my distance.

my situation is rather abnormal. i don't really have many gf's. my parents moved from my hometown when i was a freshman in HS so i was forced to start all over in a new town...and HS is pretty rough, especially as a freshman, so i didn't really connect with many girls at all. i tried maintaining friendships with my gf's back in my old town, but with the distance and the growing up we just went our separate ways. not only was the town we moved to completely different in regards to the way people acted, but i just felt like girls at that age weren't interested in letting another girl into their cliques. so i met and befriended some guys i shared classes with and that was that. they ended up being my REALLY good friends, and i don't regret it because they really are awesome guys. don't get me wrong, i wasn't the tomboy who hung out with the guys all the time. i did have some gf's, but i just didn't clique with them as well as with my guy friends. i was just not into the whole girl drama thing that went on in HS...it aggravated me, so i just stayed clear of all of that which meant hanging out with the guys more than with the girls i was friends with.

but yeah, if i were to find out that either of my guy friends have those kinds of feelings towards me, i would be so upset. it would totally ruin my view of our friendships. :(

I would say only if they are both unattracted to each other. Don't put this all on men. Women are just as likely to pursue sex if they find a man attractive.

LOL this is a bit of an attention whore thread, IMO. Sorry, Rd. :D

Noone is telling you any different than what I already posted in Survivors thread. Do you really need to hear this more than once? You need to believe your situation is somehow special. I'm telling you its not. It common as dirt and old as the hills. So is your rationalization of it, btw. Been there, done that.

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Originally Posted by IndiReloaded [Dear Guest/Member you have to reply to see the link.click here to register]

LOL this is a bit of an attention whore thread, IMO. Sorry, Rd. :D

Noone is telling you any different than what I already posted in Survivors thread. Do you really need to hear this more than once? You need to believe your situation is somehow special. I'm telling you its not. It common as dirt and old as the hills. So is your rationalization of it, btw. Been there, done that.

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i just won't accept the idea that it's impossible for a man and a woman (who are equally attractive) to be friends without there being any baggage. i know i am not attracted to my male friends and whether or not they are attracted to me, they are both in committed relationships and i don't believe that either of them would ever act on those feelings whether they remained in those committed relationships or not. i believe there is a point where friendship becomes way more important than fulfilling a physical/sexual desire. i do not do anything out of the ordinary with these men. i treat them as i'd treat any of my friends regardless of sex. my friend's wife is comfortable with me and my relationship with her husband, and my boyfriend is too. i try my best to keep everyone equally involved as to prevent any kind of misconceptions. i just don't like it when people stereotype certain situations into one type of ideology. i just don't believe it, i think that everyone is different and their relations with others are unique. i think that under certain circumstances (already being in relationships, knowing that the other person isn't interested and moving on, etc.) can create a relationship between a man and a woman without any sexual feelings.

i opened the thread to see if anyone had their own experiences that i could relate to, but only chill was able to post that type of input.

consider the thread closed!

I think it could work if one of the two people is both ugly and gay. That way, there will be no attraction going either way.

I think we are confusing "attraction" and "infatuation" here. It is certainly possible for two people to find each other attractive and still be just friends with no pain or complications. We meet and interact with attractive people every day without any problems. I have had lots of female friends that I found to be objectively attractive without any impulse to jump off a bridge because we weren't together romantically.

When attraction turns to infatuation/attachment, however, then trying to be "just friends" becomes impossible. If the infatuation is one-sided or if one or both of you are unavailable then all hell breaks loose. If the infatuation is mutual and you are both single then you start a romantic relationship.

Carl.

very good point!