# Marrying your best friend..



## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

Did any of you marry your best friend?

How did you transition from being friends to be becoming romantically involved? 

In theory, it seems like marrying your best friend would be the ideal choice in life. Someone you have same family values and morals, same goals in life and someone you can share anything and everything with. 

Do you believe that the opposite sex can be best friends? If you didn't marry your best friend who was the opposite sex, did the nature of your relationship change after marriage?


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## Entropy3000 (May 11, 2011)

I am my wife's best male friend.

My priorities are :

1) My wife's lover
2) Her best male friend
3) Her husband

What we see on this forum is wives leaving thier husbands left and right for lover's, friends and dare I say it ... soul mates.

I suggest you read the following blog / book :

Married Man Sex Life

Being best friend is great. But you better be her lover first and foremost. DO NOT fall into the Nice Guy syndrome. If being her best friend makes you a Nice Guy then you are in big trouble.

Be a good guy with an edge. A male freind can be delegated to the orbitor status.

My wife has a long term BFF girl friend she has known her whole life. She needs this. I want her to have this. I am not a woman so I cannot be her BFF girl friend. I don't want to be. I just need to be her only lover and best and only close male friend. We in general do not have close opposite sex friends.


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## YinPrincess (Jul 31, 2011)

My husband and I were best friends for almost 2 years before we got romantically involved. During our friendship I think we both knew we wanted more, but it was always a laid back friendship. 

Last year when I was in a motorcycle accident, he was the one who took me to the ER. He was the one who filled and paid for my perscriptions. He was the one who came over to cook for me and care for my three dogs. He became a very kind and gentle caretaker, a side of him I never knew existed. Now I have ALWAYS had a crush on my hubby, but the night he kissed me before leaving my house was when I realized how much I loved him. 

My husband IS Mr. Nice Guy. The dorky guy who gets stuck in the Friend Zone a lot... But to me he is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  For us, the switch between friendship to lovers to husband and wife, was a fast (41 days) evolution, but it never felt awkward or weird. My husband is still my best friend, and even tho he drives me insane sometimes, I wouldn't trade him for the world! 
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

Good to hear that both of you had positive results. 

It's kind of a weird situation for me. I've been friends with her for almost 7 years now. However, we have never lived in the same city. We were only able to see each other for 1-2 months at a time a year. When she was living a little closer at one point, we were pretty much unofficially going out, travelling back and forth to see each other for a few months. But it casually ended. Perhaps it was more of a fling given we were both lonely at the time. 

I know if circumstances were different, the nature of our relationship would have been different as well. I think we're somewhere in between the friend zone and the romantic zone...the nature of our relationship is very weird. It might even be harder to tell as our daily conversations are all done via the phone. I don't have many female friends, but none come anywhere close to what I have with her. I'd even go to the extent of saying that she's closer (knows more about me than anyone) than any of my guy friends who are living in the same city. We do plan on living in the same city in about 2 years, but until then we must continue our separate lives. I've had horrible experiences with long distance relationships so doing anything to even jeopardize what we have now is not really something I'd want to do. I'm just patiently waiting until the right time, but then again I'm afraid that another guy will swoop in.


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## Entropy3000 (May 11, 2011)

stevenham said:


> Good to hear that both of you had positive results.
> 
> It's kind of a weird situation for me. I've been friends with her for almost 7 years now. However, we have never lived in the same city. We were only able to see each other for 1-2 months at a time a year. When she was living a little closer at one point, we were pretty much unofficially going out, travelling back and forth to see each other for a few months. But it casually ended. Perhaps it was more of a fling given we were both lonely at the time.
> 
> I know if circumstances were different, the nature of our relationship would have been different as well. We do plan on living in the same city in about 2 years, but until then we must continue our separate lives. I've had horrible experiences with long distance relationships so doing anything to even jeopardize what we have now is not really something I'd want to do. * I'm just patiently waiting until the right time, but then again I'm afraid that another guy will swoop in.*


I my opinion oif there was a real passionate love, more than deep friendship, you could not resist living together. You could not wait. Keeping lovers apart is dealing with an irresistable force.


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## RandomDude (Dec 18, 2010)

We began as best friends, but she recently admitted that we were never just best friends, and she's right, the attraction was there but it was kept in check as I had a gf at that time. The more people got intimidated by our closeness however the more we defended our friendship, and the boundaries we put on each other got weaker and weaker, until it was obvious we can't stay just best friends.


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

Entropy3000 said:


> I my opinion oif there was a real passionate love, more than deep friendship, you could not resist living together. You could not wait. Keeping lovers apart is dealing with an irresistable force.


I guess my biggest problem is that I'm having a hard time distinguishing between a deep friendship and passionate love. It would definitely be a lot easier if I could see her more often. Perhaps being unable to clearly distinguish between the two is a clear cut sign that it's only a deep friendship. 

It's really confusing because it's starting to feel like a long distance relationship. We talk for hours everyday before going to bed, talk and give each other updates throughout the day...it's pretty much what I've done in my past long distance relationship except there's a more deeper and mature connection. She's been through some rough times this year and I guess I was the one she turned to for comfort. 

I honestly hate the fact that I'm not living in the same city as her. Honestly, the only thing that keeps me going these days is looking forward to when the time finally comes that we will be in the same city. I have always pictured that when the day finally came that we were in the same city, everything will work out naturally. There's nothing I can do before that given schools. She's in law school over there for the next two years, and I'm in business school over here for the next two years.


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## Entropy3000 (May 11, 2011)

stevenham said:


> I guess my biggest problem is that I'm having a hard time distinguishing between a deep friendship and passionate love. It would definitely be a lot easier if I could see her more often. Perhaps being unable to clearly distinguish between the two is a clear cut sign that it's only a deep friendship.
> 
> It's really confusing because it's starting to feel like a long distance relationship. We talk for hours everyday before going to bed, talk and give each other updates throughout the day...it's pretty much what I've done in my past long distance relationship except there's a more deeper and mature connection. She's been through some rough times this year and I guess I was the one she turned to for comfort.
> 
> I honestly hate the fact that I'm not living in the same city as her. Honestly, the only thing that keeps me going these days is looking forward to when the time finally comes that we will be in the same city. I have always pictured that when the day finally came that we were in the same city, everything will work out naturally. *There's nothing I can do before that given schools. She's in law school over there for the next two years, and I'm in business school over here for the next two years.*


I see. Good information. So it is not just one of you deciding to change jobs and move in with the other.

Yes, your friendship is morphing. Could you transfer to a program closer to her so you could at least have the weekends together? Have you asked her if this is what she would want.

The asking of this question may tell you something you need to know.


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

Entropy3000 said:


> I see. Good information. So it is not just one of you deciding to change jobs and move in with the other.
> 
> Yes, your friendship is morphing. Could you transfer to a program closer to her so you could at least have the weekends together? Have you asked her if this is what she would want.
> 
> The asking of this question may tell you something you need to know.


Unfortunately we aren't able to transfer. Otherwise I would have already done that in a heartbeat. 

I guess I should also mention that she has an ex that is trying to work things out with. He has full intention of marrying her. He seems like a great guy and perfect on paper; successful, kind and treats her very well. She did tell me that something feels missing and that she might regret her decision. As much as she wants to get married at an early age, she told me that she's worried that there might be something better out there. (She's kind of a perfectionist) My guess is that he wasn't always emotional support. She had complained about this a lot in the past. Fortunately for me, I was always there...anytime she needed me for 7 years. 

I visited her just last week, and she would constantly ask whether or not she should marry him. It was kind of to the point that it felt like she wanted me to tell her 'no'. As much as I wanted to tell her not to, I couldn't. Perhaps I should have just manned up and told her, but given the circumstances it didn't feel right.

This may seem childish, but we have always joked around about being each other's safety if we were still single at 35. This time around not only did she want to change that to 30, but it no longer felt like she was joking. It felt like she wanted to know that I'd be there if she decided to ditch this guy. She REALLY wants to get married in the next few years. 

We've always somewhat avoided the topic of our relationship over the years. I'm not sure about her, but for me, I don't want to risk the friendship we have for a long distance relationship that may rip us apart. My logic was to wait for the right time to do it right. I'd much rather have her around as a friend than to lose her completely. 

Being who she is, I have faith that she will decide not to marry him. The last thing I want to do interfere with what she's trying to work out with her ex, but at the same time it doesn't feel right to just sit around and wait for 2 years and hope for the best...


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## Deejo (May 20, 2008)

Quickest route to determining where her heart is at with you?

Start seeing another woman and tell her how exciting it is.

Or wait two years and keep trying to gauge what exactly your relationship is ...


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## Entropy3000 (May 11, 2011)

Deejo said:


> Quickest route to determining where her heart is at with you?
> 
> Start seeing another woman and tell her how exciting it is.
> 
> Or wait two years and keep trying to gauge what exactly your relationship is ...


:smthumbup:


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

I guess you guys are right. I've been told by a few friends to date someone else and tell her about how great it is. 
She was always bitter towards my ex's, if that's a start...

The sad thing is we always kind of grew apart for a while when either of us started a serious relationship. I guess that's something normal.


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## grendelsmom (Aug 1, 2011)

Maybe you should try another relationship to find where your heart is.


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

I have decided to let her know how I really feel. 
I can't just sit around at let her go. 
I've never really needed to confess my feelings like this to any of my exs, let alone to a friend I've known for 7 years. I'm kind of freaking out about what I will say.


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## rfAlaska (Jul 28, 2011)

From what I can tell you have a great friend that has been "with" you for awhile and has survived the test of some time. You are feeling it needs to be more than that .... which is fine. Three salient points/questions:

1) To what extent is your friendship impeding potential relationships in your life? If you have to run all of your potential dates through the filter of your best friend, it's possible that none of them will ever measure up. So in essence, your friendship with her is keeping you from finding a marriage partner. This is potentially affecting her as well.

2) What do you really lose by telling her how you feel? If you do and she looks at you like you're nuts, your heart is free to move on. If she says she feels the same way, winner, winner chicken dinner.

3) Peruse the Coping with Infidelity forums to find out how well close opposite sex friends work within the context of marriage. Simply put, they don't work. If you tell her how you feel (and she doesn't feel the same way) you may lose her as your best friend but you are free to pursue other relationships. Further, when you do find a marriage partner, assuming it isn't her, you better lose her as your best friend then as well or it will doom your marriage.

So the bottom line is that assuming you want to marry and not live in limbo the rest of your life you will either marry HER or lose her as your best friend. One or the other is inevitible; the only remaining question about that is the timing.

With regard to what to say, simply be honest with her, tell her how you feel. This isn't rocket-science, it's opening a door to something that can be truly wonderful in your life. If you can't tell her how you feel, rethink marrying her because I am learning a very hard lesson about being reluctant to tell people how I feel (with obvious discretion). Don't even consider marrying someone who you can't share your heart with.

Good luck and have fun


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## SimplyAmorous (Nov 25, 2009)

I agree with some others on here. If she gets JEALOUS over hearing you are interested in someone else or the potential of you wanting someone else, OR THEY WANTING YOU, this speaks- about how she feels for you.

I married my best friend. We were what I would consider best friends long before lovers. He was too much of a Nice Guy though. Too anxious to please me. It probably did play against Passion to some extent, I don't know, we had other issues like being too conservative minded that I think played more of a role to hinder us in passion, not that we were each others Best friends. 

At one point in our dating, I got a little bored (I was 15 when we got together), wasn't sure what I wanted, so I went & dated a guy a little wilder than him and seriously, he did NOTHING to make me jealous, just waited around for me -like a puppy dog . I am not trying to make him sound bad, I did go back to him because I wanted too but darn, thinking about this, I think he really screwed up -becaues had he showed some interest in some other girl at that time, or just let me know "Hey, if you can do this, so can I!" I just KNOW I would have ran back to him like lightening, had I felt his eyes were wondering somewhere else. He was like a "sure thing" to me. I took advantage of this. 

Yes, us woman can be nasty like that, not knowing what we have in front of us. Don't be afraid of a little Testing, don't put her on too much of a pedestal if she is not giving something back. You need to feel on equal footing in a healthy relationship. 

You may be her best friend now, but if she is not into you & finds another, this friendship will be TOAST anyway. NO boyfriend is going to want you around. So take a chance, all LOVE is about taking RISKS with our emotions, putting ourselves out there - being vulnerable. My husband asked me to "go with him" just days after I met him , he was expecting me to turn him down But told me later he thought someone else might snatch me up . To his surprise, I said "OK'" thinking, darn, I hardly know this guy but I guess he is cute enough. He took a risk, our friendship began there. 

Need an Ice Breaker - Rent this movie -- Amazon.com: Just Friends: Ryan Reynolds, Amy Smart, Anna Faris, Chris Klein, Chris Marquette, Giacomo Beltrami, Fred Ewanuick, Amy Matysio, Julie Hagerty, Wendy Anderson, Barry Flatman, Devyn Burant, Roger Kumble, Bill Johnson, Cale Boyter, Chris Ben



Absolutely TRUTH from rfALaska....


> Be honest with her, tell her how you feel. If you can't do that, rethink marrying her because I am learning a very hard lesson about being reluctant to tell people how I feel (with obvious discretion). Don't even consider marrying someone who you can't share your heart with.


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## stevenham (Aug 10, 2011)

I finally mustered up all my courage and told her how I truly felt last night. You all are right, i'd eventually lose her if she marries someone else anyway, so I didn't really have anything to lose. Unfortunately, she wasn't really on the same page. Perhaps we've been stuck in the friend zone for too long for her. She told me that the timing wasn't really right and that she had closed off all those feelings a while ago. She says we've come very far and that she doesn't want to lose what we have...and I don't blame her because that was the reason why I've been keeping my feelings to myself for so long. We have different lives; all her family and friends are in LA and all mine are back in Korea. She's just not the type of person to drop everything for love. I told her that my life in Korea is not set in stone and with her, I'd love nothing more than to start a family and do what we both always wanted to do. 

At this point, I think (I really hope) she's confused. She's got a guy that's potential marriage material who's financially stable and has a life in LA, and now there's me... I'd be a little more uncertainty for her, we'd most likely get married and have kids little later than what she had planned for. 

I told her everything, so I guess all I can really do is wait and hope for the best. It seems like she's trying to convince me that it won't work (or she's trying to convince herself). On the positive note, she didn't tell me that it will never work between us so I guess that's a good start. I wasn't expecting her to come flying towards anyway. 

At the end, I did tell her that I know what I want out of life and that I hope she figures out what she truly wants and if she decides that I am not the one, I will never think of her as I do now, but I promise to always be there as her best friend. (probably not a reality when either of us get married...)


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## rfAlaska (Jul 28, 2011)

Ouch .... sorry about that response. On the other hand, you laid it out there and so did she. You both know where you stand, no regrets.

You seem like a pretty decent sort - go find another lady and move on with your life.

Take care and heal up


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## popat08 (Aug 25, 2011)

ok - so i think this is the thread that suits my situation the most.. i should have looked up this forum years ago but i couldnt get out of my depression to even talk about whats happened to my marriage...

i did marry my best friend/my only guy friend/my first boyfriend.. too many firsts. our friendship bloomed over distance during the start of my undergrad years and lasted 6-7 years over distance.. instantly in the friendship, i felt a deep intuition that he was the "one" and i was committed to stay with him and marry him. he made me happy but i was also very naive and undeveloped in my career aspirations, etc. i poured all my hopes into him, didnt care to develop my own interests and pursuits that much. we both came from very traditional families that were too happy with the thought of us living together before marriage so we decided to take the plunge and do as tradition dictated. we both loved each other, that was no question but maybe had some hesitation that we both overlooked.

right into the start of the marriage, i felt something was off. our friendship was pretty much always solid, but as a couple, we started off rocky. our romance was dwindling from the beginning. it was near non-existent. we had very little physical chemistry and there was even an uncomfortableness sexually. there was some signs of this prior to the marriage but over distance it was always hard to gauge, especially with both of us lacking in experience in other relationships. he only had one other major relationship besides me. 

we both felt awkward about this issue. anytime it was brought up for discussion, we both knew it was a big problem, but did not know how to fix it or to really put action behind the desire to make it work. after a while, resentment built up and i had lost a lot of hope that things would get better. so much so that i stopped expecting satisfaction in this regard from the marriage. this was the worst period for me as i ended up in a very dark place. i ended up having a major affair which was later revealed, accidentally. now we're separated, even after attempting to reconcile, 6 months after learning of the affair, but to no avail. 

we really had a very solid working relationship, in terms of security, comfort, care, that was all there. we are very similar in so many ways and really got each other. we just have little to no sexual chemistry or romantic comfort. now after this affair, it almost seems impossible to heal this area of our relationship, b/c of what i have experienced and now what he experiences as a backlash of my actions. i have been in deep guilt over all this and do not want to push myself to go back into this relationship until i know i can really give myself and full effort. 

has anyone out there had any similar experience in marrying your best friend but not having the spark?


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## MEM2020 (Aug 23, 2009)

Steven,
Clearly you are a bright guy. So let me walk you down the path into the future. The ONLY way you will get to sustain a close friendship with her is to marry her. And here's why. You two dated/slept together. In some manner she loves you. 

If she marrys someone else, ANYONE else he is going to force you out of the picture. And frankly he should. Because at some level you desire her. And there is no way a husband is going to tolerate that level of potential open ended threat to the stability of the marriage. 

Like it or not you are playing a: "high stakes winner takes all game". 

Start dating and let her know about it casually "in conversation". Don't be heavy handed or obvious about how you convey that to her. Just mention it as it comes up. 

Be prepared. She is NOT going to like this. She wants you to stick around as her "plan B". I am NOT saying she doesn't love you. I AM saying that being any persons "plan B" is a train wreck. 

When she reacts badly to you dating "and she WILL", you need to act confused and ask her questions: 
1. "Do you really expect me to be your safety net, when you are seriously considering marrying someone else"? 
2. Why do you think that is fair TO ME?
3. If you want to try to make this work with ME, then make the effort, if not then accept that I am going to date. And if I meet someone and it gets serious, that may be the end of the road for us as much as I will miss you. 

And be HONEST. Because if you do meet someone else, she is not going to tolerate this "friendship+" you have with this woman. 




stevenham said:


> Unfortunately we aren't able to transfer. Otherwise I would have already done that in a heartbeat.
> 
> I guess I should also mention that she has an ex that is trying to work things out with. He has full intention of marrying her. He seems like a great guy and perfect on paper; successful, kind and treats her very well. She did tell me that something feels missing and that she might regret her decision. As much as she wants to get married at an early age, she told me that she's worried that there might be something better out there. (She's kind of a perfectionist) My guess is that he wasn't always emotional support. She had complained about this a lot in the past. Fortunately for me, I was always there...anytime she needed me for 7 years.
> 
> ...


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