somewhere along the line, I fell in love with her

[N_divine]

Myself and a woman that I grew up with have been spending a lot of time together recently. She's been my best friend for 24 years. I'm 27, she's 31 and we've both been single for a while.

Here's a bit of a background story.

Our relationship has always been platonic. We played together as kids, cried together, drank together, complained about our lives together. But that was mostly it. 3 years ago, she asked me for advice for the first time in her life, which changed everything. She had never asked me for an opinion on her love life until then, and out of the array of advice that she received, she took mine.

12 months ago we both moved to the same city for work, by complete chance. Neither of us really have any friends in the area, besides the people that we work with. She has a family member that lives close by and my sister lives 4 hours away.. so, we've been spending most of our free time with each other, going to the theatre and enjoying the live music scene, and more recently we've been eating dinner at restaurants together, but we've never taken our friendship to the next level. Not physically, anyway.

Emotionally, though? It's as though we're deeply in love with each other, and we're both aware of it. I can see how much she cares about me when she looks into my eyes, or accidentally touches my hand. However, I do feel that we're both too afraid or too nervous to 'act' on our feelings, I just can't quite put my finger on it. Maybe we're both too afraid to mess with our friendship, or worry that we're too close. We've both been hurt by love in the past, that could also have something to do with it. At the same, though, all of those excuses sound ridiculous, because not doing something about this is killing me, and I can see that it's killing her.

About a month ago, we went out for dinner and a movie together, after not having seen each other for 3 weeks - she was away. When we caught up, the energy between was really intense. This is an energy that has been building up for a while. When she was away, we IM'd each other everyday, just like we used to, but there was something different there that hadn't been so evident in the past. We now hug each other differently, speak to each other differently. I know this will sound mushy and sentimental, but everything about our friendship is so innocent and sweet, and, when we do see each other, it feels as though we're the only two people on the planet. We've also playfully yet very truthfully said that we love each other a couple times over the past 12 months.

She now looks up to me, instead of taking a neutral best friend stance. There's something really special between us, we can be both shy and confident with each other at the same time. There are times where we'll be walking or sitting and our skin will meet, and neither of us will pull away. It's in those moments that I realize how energetically on-par we are.

I just know that I'll never love another woman as much as I love her, if that makes sense? I've known that my entire life. Believe me, tried and tested. I've had 3 girlfriends in my life and neither of them 'got' me. Each relationship was special, but I was never 'in love' with those relationships, never 100% comfortable with myself. I even changed huge parts of my personality for one of my exes, just to impress her. Stupid, I know. But my best friend has never had any expectations of me, she has always accepted and loved me for who I am. That aside, I could have been more of a friend to her growing up. I feel as though I didn't always appreciate our friendship as much as she did, but I've recently learned to stopped beating myself up over the past.

I knew when I hit 18 that I wouldn't go and marry the first woman that I dated, just for the sake of creating a nice family. My parents did that. I grew up in a very christian household, so until I realized that I needed to take control of my own future, I always felt as though they expected me to just find any old woman that's interested, and settle down with her.

I do see my best friend as 'the one'. Seriously, it's as if the universe brought us to the same city for a reason. I suppose I feel as though it was meant to be. I love her more than I ever thought possible, but I'm stuck on how I should go about telling her that. I've reached that stage now where I want ALL of her, and I've felt like this for a very long time. I want her to look at me as her boyfriend. Her boyfriend who loves her, and who will look out for her everyday for the rest of his life. I want exclusivity with her.

This isn't a random woman that I romanticize about, this is the woman that I want to spend the rest of my life with, hands down. But at the same time, I don't want to do anything stupid that will hinder our connection (ie. start kissing her passionately, if, for some totally unseen reason, she freaks out and runs away), nor have I ever been able to get her off my mind. Strange things have been happening to me, too. Yesterday, I heard her name 4 times in one day, and I rarely hear her name. It seems as though all signs are telling me to go for it, that now is my chance.

My question is, how do I tell her that I want to take our friendship to the next level? I'm seeing her tomorrow, and I want to know whether or not I should take the big leap and kiss her for the very first time in my life, tell her that I'm in love with her, or just hope that everything will work itself out.

Thanks in advance for the advice, guys. You must understand, I don't usually struggle like this with women, it's just that this particular woman means the world to me, and I just want to get it right.

[Yanky]

Yesterday, I heard her name 4 times in one day, I rarely hear her name. It seems as though all signs are telling me to go for it, that now is my chance.

My question is, how do I tell her that I want to take our friendship to the next level? I'm seeing her tomorrow, and I want to know whether or not I should take the big leap and kiss her for the very first time in my life, or just tell her that I'm in love with her.

You said it yourself, all signs are pointing towards the two of you being together.

And tbh, I think it very unlikely that she'll turn you down. From my perspective, I think that you're both ultimately being held back by the same silly fears. Lose the fear, you're both adults. True love is rare, dude, you know that. If you have it in the palm of your hand, don't let fear get in the way. Embrace it.

I'm sure others will have better advice to offer, but if I were in your shoes, I'd start off by kissing her forehead. But I wouldn't stop there. If she's comfortable with that, move down to her nose and kiss her nose, and if she's comfortable with that ---> KISS HER.

Good luck.

[N_divine]

Cheers Yanky.

I'll try that, but I feel as though I should also be planning for worst case scenario: what if she responds negatively to me kissing her forehead?

Also, if she does respond in a positive light, what would be my best move after that? I do consider myself to be very gentleman like at times. I've considered inviting her away to my Grandparent's beach house for a weekend, but, every time I got close to asking her, I panicked and just never brought it up. Maybe I've been waiting for the perfect time?

[Yanky]

If she responds negatively, be honest with her, but by the sounds of it you truly have nothing to worry about. Really, we can't help who we fall in love with. If you love someone that deeply, you'll always love them that deeply, trust me. Your best friend is a woman, too, so she's probably waiting for you to call the shots, but maybe a female can shed more light on that one.

If all goes well, invite her back to your place that night, experience a whole new level of intimacy with her, and if that's too much too soon, then invite her away to that beach house for a night or two. Be honest. Tell her what you want.

[HeartIsAching]

I'm married to my best friend. I highly recommend it.

When we die, we don't regret the mistakes we made, we regret the chances we didn't take.

Go for it.

[N_divine]

I'm married to my best friend. I highly recommend it.

When we die, we don't regret the mistakes we made, we regret the chances we didn't take.

Go for it.

This is true. Thanks heartisaching. We do regret the chances we didn't take. I don't want to be lying on my death bed one day knowing that I could have had an amazing life with her, or that I never gave us a chance.

I'm seeing her tonight, will let you all know how everything goes down.

[Yanky]

Don't need to be on a death bed to feel like that either. The woman I like to call the love of my life passed away before I got a chance to even kiss her. We'd already told one another how we felt, even planned to spend some time together, but she wound up in an accident. It hurts beyond belief, not knowing. But hey, I'll see her again soon.

Let us know how it goes! Good luck!

[N_divine]

Don't need to be on a death bed to feel like that either. The woman I like to call the love of my life passed away before I got a chance to even kiss her. We'd already told one another how we felt, even planned to spend some time together, but she wound up in an accident. It hurts beyond belief, not knowing. But hey, I'll see her again soon.

Let us know how it goes! Good luck!

Woah, sorry to hear that man. I can't imagine what it must feel like for you, I don't know what I'd do if I lost her like that. I'd be losing the best parts of myself. How are you getting on? So sorry and and cheers for the support.

[Yanky]

Lol it was like losing the best parts of myself. I kinda see her as my primary soulmate, with one another in every lifetime, that kind of thing? Definitely my strongest connection, I think we choose to challenge each other in every lifetime. I don't know, new ways of ending up with each other, shining our light on to others. We were always there for each other growing up, and supporting each other through all that life has to offer, finished each others sentences, laughed for hours on end, always knew what the other was feeling, and all that jazz. Female version of me.

I miss her like hell, but I kinda feel like we have new ways of communicating now, and like I said, I'm sure I'll see her again soon and we'll plan our next adventures. ^^)