friend vs. potential partner

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At work, I have a lot of time to think. I just realized something last night. I have a hard time distinguishing between friendship and a romantic relationship because basically I just want the friendship and sex. For me, the ideal relationship would be to have my best friend who is female and we have sex on a regular basis.

Anyway, I am bisexual, so most of my friendships (male and female) have had some element of liking, sexual attraction, maybe some sexual activity. I realize that I have been in love with male and female friends before.

Maybe the difference between a friend and a partner is that you have 'a crush' on the partner, whereas with a friend you don't. There is a certain spark that makes you fantasize about the potential partner. Whereas with a friend, you might be attracted to them, might even do some sexual stuff, but don't see them as a potential partner, don't have 'a crush' on them. I don't know if I am using the right words to describe the phenomenon I'm talking about.

Once you develop 'a crush' on a friend and try to turn it into something more than friendship, things get dangerous because you don't go back to being just friends if things don't work out. You always have that romantic history as well and somebody usually has hurt feelings.

What do you guys think? Is the thing that separates a friend from a romantic partner having that spark, that chemistry (basically having a crush on the person)?

Last edited by em_tsuj on 01 Jan 2014, 8:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Most of the married ppeople I know we're friends for a while before they started dating.

What made it turn from a friendship to a romance? What are the differences in the way you view the person or feel about the person?

Also, what makes a romance turn into a friendship? I've had that experience as well (after all the emotions had died down from the breakup).

It's something like that, but you're right.. it's difficult to describe something you can't quite put your finger on.

I've had a crush on my closest friend ever since I met him a few years ago. we remain close friends. He's the only gay guy I've ever thought about as a potential partner. Any others have pretty much just been about sex, although some are friends + sex, but there's no "spark," as you put it. I don't have crushes on them. I can't see myself dating them or being with them long term. But the friend I have a crush on, that's an entirely different story & I've never felt like that about anyone else. I guess you just kinda know it when you experience it, kind of thing. It's really difficult to try to qualify & quantify and put into words.. which is why most just call it Love.

If I knew the answers to those questions I wouldn't be the only one of my old group of friends to be unmarried.

I guess nobody knows, or it wouldn't be so hard to find a good match.

way too hard question

Some girls are nice they smile and talk to me but I find out they all have husbands or boyfriends. It seems like single women don't talk to me.

Last edited by jerry00 on 02 Jan 2014, 3:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.

They wouldn't tell you everything.

They were friends, yes, but what they wouldn't tell you that there was flirting, attraction and lenghty conversations between them in private way before they annouce anything.

Obviously, but they were friends first. Do you think attraction is immediate all the time? Sometimes people grow on each slowly over time. Then they start flirting and getting to know each other better and so it begins to get serious.

Here's a man with aspergers who was friends with someone and eventually realized she was "the one" and married her.

Love story click here.

Don't judge him on what he does. People are people with emotions no matter what they do for a living.

I love the way he describes her:

Last edited by hurtloam on 03 Jan 2014, 5:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I have that problem with men. I get the most interest from married men. It's so annoying!

In my last relationship (which was the best ever for me), we were friends first. We spent the first 50 or so communications (emails and phone calls) talking about nothing but science, motorcycles, and V8 engines in pickup trucks. After we met and spent a few times together in person, we started getting kind of flirty.

But I don't know if it's something you can set out to do - convert a friendship into a relationship. If the "chemistry" isn't there, I don't think it would happen for me. In my case, the chemistry was definitely there.

OTOH, in the second best relationship I've ever had, we were definitely strictly friends first. For a long time. In fact, I was married to someone else when we met. We all saw each other a lot (all three of us were in college together). Eventually, due to completely unrelated circumstances, my marriage ended. I had not seen my friend in quite awhile by that time, but I ran into him 6 months or so after the divorce, and we started hanging out together again as friends. One weekend we went to the beach. I don't know if it was the combination of sun, sand, and alcohol, or what, but it sparked something, we ended up in a relationship, lived together for several years, got married and were married for 8 years. Things didn't work out in the long run (he considered himself bisexual when we first met, but ultimately came to the realization that he was really only sexually interested in men), but since our relationship had always been about being friends, and the sex was secondary, we split amicably and are are still friends.