I've either made a terrible mistake or I'm insane. Help appreciated.

Warning: Long post ahead...

This is my first thread on this forum or any other forum relating to sexuality. I am not completely sure of my sexuality right now, and these feelings are causing me extreme anguish, confusion, and loneliness. I have had no one to talk to about my experiences over the past few months, and I'm finally at a breaking point. I'm posting this in the hope that some of you may have gone through similar things or have advice for me. Thank you for trying to understand.

So throughout my life, I've always developed crushes on girls (I'm a guy). Thinking about having a girlfriend or marrying/raising kids with a woman made me happy. However, I'm 20 and in college now and I've never had a girlfriend or really even come close. I've had strong feelings for some girls, and spending time with them made me happy on a level that seemed to be deeper than a simple friendship. However, every time there seemed to be something more developing, I'd always back out of it and cease communication (and hate myself for it, later..)

Now fast forward to about five months ago. I was in the first semester of my junior(3rd) year of college. My friend group consisted of several juniors, several sophomores, and several incoming freshman that lived near a lot of us. We would do a lot of things together on the weekends as a group of about 7-15 people. A few of the guys (mainly the freshman) in our group always acted gay to try to be funny. (ex: saying I love you, touching, "flirting", etc.) One of the freshmen started doing it with me. It started with him just saying "I love you" and looking at me occasionally at weird times. At this point, I barely even knew him. I would always just laugh and shrug it off, assuming it was a joke like everyone else. However, after a few weeks, things started escalating. He would specifically ask to always sit by me when we were doing things as a group, and he would barely act gay with anyone else. He would stare at me for long periods of time with an inquisitive look rather than a joking one, and I would always be the one that ended up breaking the eye contact. It was around this time that he gave me his cell phone number, skype information, and other ways of contacting him. He gave me this information over text on a video game, but it was at such random points in our conversation that I couldn't help but feel like there was something more than just a joke happening here. It was around this time that I realized a had developed a crush for him, which kind of freaked me out.

As the months went by, he became a better and better friend and I became increasingly okay with the idea of being in a relationship with him, although I was and still am not comfortable enough to tell anybody else if it were to become a relationship. Also, the signs that he liked me continued to pile up. Here is a list of the more striking ones in chronological order, although there were tooooons of little signs.

1) The friend group was going to do something over at my room which was a 5 minute walk from where we all were and I had to go early, and he volunteered to walk with me there. Nothing happened and we both acted "normal", but this was the first time we were ever alone together.

2) One friday night when everyone was going back to their rooms at the end of the night, he pulled out a golden dollar coin from his pocket and placed it on my thigh, saying nothing. I asked him what was up and he said he wanted me to have it.

3) We were all watching a movie and he was right next to me but it was pretty crowded and everyone was pretty close. He leaned his head on my shoulder for a good three seconds before I muttered "Hey ___..." because I was worried someone would see and think something. As soon as I said that he said "Sorry..that was weird" and took his head off my shoulder.

4) Many, many times while our friend group was doing things he would go out of his way to touch me in some sort of way, though never inappropriately. He would touch his foot to mine or put his hand on me, and whenever I made it obvious that I noticed, he would just smile. This could be him just joking around though.

5) One night with our friend group he quietly whispered to me so that nobody heard it. He flat out said "I have feelings for you. Do you have feelings for me?" Because people in our friend group are always so sarcastic and always act gay, I replied "Yes", but in a way that could be interpreted as a joke or serious. He then said "So we should change our statuses on Facebook to in a relationship?" and I again replied yes in the same way. He said it in a way that I honestly can't tell if he was joking or serious...Everything continued as normal after that.

6) I started playing a video game that he expressed interest in and one day over skype while we were talking about it he said "I need to come over some time to help you". I agreed and he asked if now would be a good time, and it was, so he walked 5 minutes over to my room. It was just me and him for about 3 hours and it was nice, but we both acted "normal". He didn't joke like he was gay at all..

7) We had many late night skype talks via text that sometimes went as late as 5am. Through these I learned that he may be dealing with depression and insomnia and has a tendency to overthink things. This just makes me feel like he's confused/repressing feelings...which makes the ending of this post so much harder..I'll get to that.

8) He came over for a few hours at a time several more times. Sometimes even without letting me know, he was just there when I got back from my class. We would just play video games, but there would be the occasional long stare followed by a smile and breaking of the eye contact from one of us. I felt like there was an elephant in the room between us at all times.

9) I needed to go to Wal-Mart and I asked him if he wanted to go. He doesn't have a car at college and he agreed to go. We went and I bought a bunch of things, but he never even bought anything. I asked him why he wanted to go if he didn't even need anything and he said "I needed my (my name) time"

10) Valentines Day. It was a Saturday and I was basically alone all day. I noticed he was on skype at 1am so I started a conversation. His roommate and his roommate's girlfriend were sleeping in the same room as him but he couldn't sleep because he has insomnia. I asked if he wanted to spend the night over at my place to give them space and so it wouldn't be so awkward for him. He agreed and I picked him up. I said I would stay up as late as he would and so we agreed to an allnighter, as long as that would last. At 3am we went to Walmart for a frozen pizza and I grabbed a movie. We played video games until maybe 8am and then started the movie. While watching the movie, the body language between us basically said that we were into each other. I noticed him attempting to hide a...physiological response... We were very close. He started drifting in and out of sleep and I fell asleep somewhat on him, with a pillow between us. When we woke up, I kind of jokingly acknowledged that I fell asleep on him and he just smiled and said nothing. He stayed until 7pm the next day.

11) He came over to my room one more time, about a week after Valentine's day. Everything was normal except he brought up the topic of girlfriends. He randomly asked if I had a girlfriend and I said no. I then asked him and he had never had one. When I asked if he wanted one, he simply shrugged and looked down.

Now since that week, things started to get much less eventful between us. I found that I needed to initiate nearly everything whereas before he would want me to hang out in his room or go with him to lunch. Nothing really happened between us that would cause him to back off, so I started to feel like he thought I had no interest in him and wasn't going to try any harder. To be fair, he showed way more signs of interest than I ever did....

Now I get to yesterday. I felt like I had to acknowledge whatever was happening between us or our friendship and whatever we had going was just going to slowly fade away into a lifelong "what-if?" question. I told him to come over at 3pm because I wanted to talk to him about something important. He was reluctant because he thought it was some sort of "psychologist trap", but I eventually convinced him. We played video games and before I knew it, it was 7:30 and we had to go eat with our friends. As he was getting up, I asked him if we could talk about something. I asked him if he ever feels like there is an elephant in the room between us, and he simply said no and that he doesn't know what I'm talking about. I said that I feel like he does know but just does not want to say it, but he insisted that he doesn't know. All he had to do was say yes and I would have spilled everything and revealed that I had feelings for him. However, he seemed genuine in not having any idea what I was talking about, and that got me concerned. I basically got scared and said "nevermind" and we went to go eat. He kept urging me to say what was on my mind, but I simply could not do it. It was impossible for me because I was second-guessing everything that had ever happened between us from his simple answer of "No."

The rest of that night I was extremely nervous and worried. At about 11pm I couldn't take it any more. He was on skype and after urging me to say it some more, I basically asked him if his acts of affection towards me are anything more than a joke. He replied that I'm reading things too deep, he is not gay, and he does not have feelings for me. He said that his friend in highschool was homophobic and he pretended to be gay to mess with him and that "it sort of stuck to his personality". He then said, word for word, "As far as I know, I've been straight since birth. I'm pretty sure nothing has changed since then."

So everything is fine between us now on the outside, but on the inside I'm breaking and I have no idea how he actually feels. I see two possibilities with this whole scenario.

1) I'm insane. I actually read all of the above signs (and the hundreds of other small signs) too deep. He is completely straight and just likes to act gay to mess with people.

2) I'm an asshole and screwed everything up by never revealing my feelings, but asking about his instead. He has either been repressing his feelings towards me over the past few weeks or is in denial, or he just simply couldn't tell me the truth when I straight up asked him if he was gay.

So which of these two possibilities do you think is the reality, and what can I do? I feel a huge need to tell him how I actually feel in the hopes that #2 is what's actually going on here. If I tell him how I feel, he might actually be truthful with me and we could actually have a relationship. However, I'm extremely reluctant because what if he is truly straight? It could possibly ruin our friendship, and I have a class with him and eat with him nearly every day. Things could get too awkward. This is honestly one of the lowest points in my life so far, so thank you for helping/trying to understand.

 

Thank you both so much for the responses. It's an amazing feeling finally getting what's been exclusively in my head for months onto paper and talking about it.

Now, I forgot to add 2 pretty big signs of his interest to my post and I cant for the life of me seem to find an edit button, so I'll post them here.

1) My phone broke about a month ago and I told him i needed to get it fixed. There is a phone place about a 3 minute car drive away and I said I was going to get it fixed the next day. He offered to tag along, so he came over and we went there. It turns out that phone place couldn't give me a phone and the nearest one that could was an hour away, which happened to be my home town. I basically decided to wait a few days for the weekend to drive there, but as we were getting in the car to go back to college, he insisted that we go there right that moment. I was very reluctant, but he really seemed to want to go. We ended up going and once we were at the store, the phone took over an hour to get. He didn't seem to mind at all, which was weird to me because he was spending his entire afternoon in a car and doing nothing at a store. I don't see someone that's simply a friend acting that way... Afterwards, we were hungry and discussing restaurants to go to and he offered to pay for me. I couldn't tell if he was joking or actually serious, but I refused and kind of laughed it off... At the restaurant, we were talking about facebook and somehow the topic of relationship status was brought up. He joked "(my name), engaged to (his name)" I kind of laughed and he then asked "How would your parents feel about that?" I just looked down and said I didn't know, then the topic changed...

2) He came over to my room about 3 weeks ago and was pretty tired so he wanted to get an energy drink. I drove him to a gas station about 2 minutes away and he got two, but he insisted that he get me something, too. I reluctantly picked something out and he paid for it. He ended up giving me the other energy as well later in the day when i mentioned I was tired. It just seemed to me like he really wanted to get me something as a sort of "gift".

Anyways, back to the present, now. I really feel like he is hiding something because he has not acted any different around me after we had the conversation about his sexuality. Wouldn't a straight person act somewhat differently if they just found out that their friend thought they were into them for months? I really, really feel like he was into me until about 2 weeks ago, then he maybe convinced himself that I was straight and is now in denial or just confused about himself. It doesn't help that the conversation 2 nights ago made it seem like I was straight and disapproved how he acted towards me.

I think he sees me as straight and just a friend and never anything more right now, which is why I want to tell him exactly how I feel about him within the next few days. If I tell him I have feelings for him, here are all the possibilities for what I see happening:

1) Best case scenario: He tells me that he reciprocates the feelings and was just lying earlier because he thought I was straight.

2) He tells me that he does not reciprocate the feelings, which could be because of two things
-He is confused and is not sure how he feels about me
-He is actually straight

Just knowing that he could possibly still be hiding feelings for me makes me feel like I need to tell him soon, otherwise the feelings could get repressed way too deep to ever reemerge. If he truly does not have any feelings for me, I don't know how he would react. He seems to be completely fine with me asking him if he is gay, so I feel like it would be alright..but you never know.

What do you think I should do right now? Right now I feel like I can't rest until I tell him how I feel, even if it somehow ends our friendship...

 

Update: So he was becoming more and more distant after I asked him whether or not he was gay. I don't know whether he just needed time to think or if he just felt uncomfortable around me. Either way, it was driving me insane. Ever since that conversation, he almost went out of his way to act straight around me. He brought up "hot" teachers he had in the past and how he hates the new changes to ****** (a very shallow, yes or no based on appearance, dating app). It just didn't seem natural at all. To me, it seems like he was overcompensating.

Anyways, I needed to tell him how I felt, knowing the answer I received would be probably be that the feelings weren't reciprocated since he had already told me he wasn't gay. So i did, and I got the answer I expected. He said he has never had feelings for guys in that way and does not reciprocate the feelings. I told him I was confused about everything because of the mixed signals he has been giving me and he insisted that the signals were false. He said he is perfectly fine staying friends with me even though it might be a little awkward at first. He then went on to say he did not think I was gay because I don't fit the obvious stereotypes...

Now, if I took everything he said as 100% truth it would suck, but I would deal with it and move on. However, so many things he has done and said in the past lead me to believe he is in some serious denial about all of this and honestly doesn't even realize it himself. Because there are still two possibilities with all of this, I can't bring myself to move on. Which sucks.

I would love to flat out tell him "I want you to deeply consider the possibility that you're in denial about your sexuality". However, if he is truly straight and is not in denial, that could seriously fuck with his mind and he'd maybe get anxious about being gay when he isn't. But if I say nothing and he is in denial, he's going to waste potentially years and years of his life and hurt people he tries to start relationships with. I can't just be passive in all of this, but how can I do anything about it?I want to somehow hint that he should consider taking a step back to analyze himself, but how do I hint at it?

A few striking things that make me think he is in denial are below. It's late and this is a quick list that I can come up with, but there are tons of things that I'm leaving out. Please let me know what you think about this.

-He legitimately offered to pay for my dinner when it was just us two. What straight guy does that?

-He texted one morning "Want to hold hands on our way to class?" since we have class together in the mornings. There was no smiley or anything indicating sarcasm. Would a straight person really feel comfortable saying this if they did not know the sexuality of the person they were talking to?

-There was a joke about him having a "girlfriend" among our friends and whenever they would mention it when I was around, he would quickly correct them, saying he did not have a girlfriend. One time he even said "I don't have a girlfriend, I have a boyfriend...and it's (my name)"

When talking about highschool, he would always bring up his two gay teachers that he had, emphasizing the fact that they were gay. One of the teachers was his french teacher, and someone made the comment: "Wow, so he's basically you!" and he quietly said "yeah...except I don't speak french.." He said it really quietly so I don't think anyone noticed besides me. In a skype conversation, he googled his teachers and sent me a picture of them as his way of starting the conversation. He then explained that they were his teachers, they were gay, and they adopted some children. To me it seems like he wanted to see my reaction to them being gay and it honestly seems like he sees himself in them, and thats the reason he likes to talk about them.

Somehow the conversation was brought up among friends about his future kids. He was really quiet and seemed depressed about it all. When someone finally asked if he wanted kids, he replied "I dont know....no".

In our conversation about him not being gay, he claimed that he "wants a girlfriend, but some things are just not meant to be." It kind of seems to me like he doesn't see a future with a girlfriend ever. I know that he has no problem with kids, and if he saw a future with a girlfriend/wife, wouldn't he see a future with kids?

It just doesn't add up. I feel like he can't see himself as gay because he thinks all gay people act feminine and only hang out with girls. Since he doesnt, I feel like he concludes that he is not and could never be gay. I can't just sit here watching him go through anxiety/depression/insomnia, though, when I feel like I know what is causing it. But what can I do.....?

 

Thank you all for the responses. When looking at my situation objectively, I realize that me ceasing communication or giving up hope would probably be the best course of action for myself. However, I generally don't make decisions based on objective reasons, and I can't bring myself to do it here, either. You guys can tell me I need to let go all you want, but as long as that uncertainty remains, I don't think I can...

Right now, my situation feels like the following scenario. He is in a car that has stalled right on the edge of some train tracks. He has his headphones on and is completely unaware of the predicament he is in. I think that I feel the tracks start to vibrate and hear what sounds to me like the faint sound of a train in the distance. So what do I do?

I could just leave and forget about his whole situation like some of you are suggesting. He might eventually get his car to work on his own and safely cross the tracks. There might not even be a train coming and I just made up the signs in my head. But I can't bring myself to simply walk away like that. What if there was a train coming? What if it eventually hits him and I knew about it the entire time but did nothing to help?

The only other option would be for me to intervene. I could tow his car off the tracks. I could push him so that he is no longer in danger. Hell, I could just knock on his window and let him know what kind of predicament he is in. But I don't feel the need to do any of this. All I want to do is take the headphones off of his head so he can figure everything out himself and find his own solution. I don't want to control his life. I don't want to force him into thinking he is gay. All I want is to get him to stop for a minute to think about the reasons behind his actions. But I simply do not know how.. Maybe time will help me find an answer to that, but boy does time move slowly and painfully lately.

 

Runner5, I wouldn't say that I am more confident in my sexuality. I am still beyond confused with it. At the moment, this guy is the only male on campus I even consider attractive in any sense of the word. I know I would enjoy it if things went further with him, but I can't say the same for any other male I know. I also don't have any urge to go out and find a guy to date. I still feel romantically attracted to many women on campus...I guess I want this to all work out with this guy because not only do I know I like him, but it would help clear up some of the confusion I've been having with my sexuality lately. If things end up not working, the only other reality I envision is one in which I get a girlfriend and discover myself that way. I dont know...this is the only guy I've ever felt this way about and I just feel like if it doesn't work out, I may spend years and years in this identical state of confusion.

Anyways, I do have an update. I did something similar to what you suggested, Runner5. I talked to him on skype because in person he is acting very distant to me. I basically told him that he can always talk to me about problems and that his depression could be because he keeps nearly all of his emotions to himself. He has even told me in the past that he has been bottling up his emotions since he was a kid and he can handle it himself. This just makes me want him to open up more because he thinks what he's doing is fine. I'm telling you..one of these days, whether it's a week from now or a year from now, he's going to burst and it's not going to be pretty. Hopefully I poked a hole in that balloon with our conversation today so that some of it can leak out every once in awhile and never burst. I'm not sure how much attention he paid to my words since he kept his responses brief, but I finally feel like I've done all I can with this situation. I feel like I can finally relax for the first time in a week because there is literally nothing I can do at this point to help matters. For now, I just want to work on building back our friendship to the point it was at before. I'd say I'm fine being friends and nothing more with him for right now. I just don't want this friendship to slowly slip away. Luckily, he said that he thinks things will be back to normal in a week or two. Who knows, maybe eventually he will open up to me, but I'm not counting on it and I'm happy leaving it at that. So I'm doing better, now. Thanks so much for all of the thoughtful responses everyone. Things could have been much worse without your input.