People Who Lost Friends Because Of Unrequited Love Are Sharing How Their Relationship Fell Apart

5.

“He and I (female) were really good friends as kids/preteens. We openly talked about our crushes on other people, hung out during and after school, and had a very sweet, innocent friendship. Those kinds of preteen boy/girl friendships often involve crushes or other types of drama, but we seemed exempt. Our relationship felt super sibling-like; I truly didn’t think he ever had a crush on me, and I never had a crush on him. We lost touch in high school when we ended up at different schools in different cities, and we definitely didn’t keep up with one another in college. We were connected on some social media platforms, but that was it. Well, imagine my surprise when he decided he wanted to start sending me lewd photos out of the blue in our mid-20s.”

“Essentially, we didn’t speak for over 10 years (other than occasional Instagram story likes or replies), and then he woke up one day and decided he wanted to start sending me suggestive photos of himself. There was no build-up, no reintroduction, nothing — just sudden bizarre Snapchat messages. He even added me to a private story that seemed to contain other partially nude (or worse) photos of himself…I didn’t open it. I could see the little thumbnail image, which was enough for me! 

I really didn’t want to confront him, so I just quietly removed him as a friend on Snap. A couple of months later, he tried the same thing on Instagram! At this point, I no longer followed him and didn’t even realize he still had an account/followed me. We hadn’t talked on Instagram since early high school. He sent multiple ‘hidden’ images to my DMs, and when I didn’t open them or respond, he’d unsend them and try again. He did that for a while before pretending his ‘app was glitching,’ and then he saw me open the thread and tried it all again. When I still didn’t reply, he sent, ‘Hello?’ and ‘Are you there?’ It made me feel so gross. I blocked him on everything.

So, maybe this doesn’t qualify as unrequited love so much as lust? And perhaps it didn’t ruin an active friendship, but it definitely tarnished the sweet memories I had of us as kids. The whole thing was cringey and dehumanizing.”

—Anonymous