So I (24F) recently came across this sub a few months back and I wanted to say thank you to all of the amazing women on here for sharing your wisdom and experiences. It's made me realize how much of a pickmesha I have been for so long and how I deserve to raise my standards.

This is going to be super long, so I appreciate anyone who reads to the end. I should preface this by saying I've never really been in a relationship before, but I have developed feelings for close friends in the past (3 of which turned out to be gay by some funny twist of fate). So I'm quite familiar with the sting of rejection.

I'm very overweight and always have been, and because of this I've always felt very insecure and that I'm not really deserving of love. Because who could ever love someone disgusting like me, right? I realize how silly and wrong this way of thinking is, and I'm currently working on this by going to therapy. I'm also working on my diet and exercise because I want to feel healthier overall and finally feel comfortable in my own skin. I know I'm not ugly, I've always gotten those "you have a pretty/beautiful face" comments.

But I do have to say though, I'm really glad I've gone through most of my life being fat. It's amazing how you experience the world when you're less likely to be seen as a sex object because you don't fit the standard definition of beauty. I've seen the ugliest sides of the men I've come across, men who have zero respect for women they don't want to have sex with. In a way I feel like being fat has protected me from becoming a victim to a lot of LVM and has also allowed me to give insight to my "more attractive" friends who tend to fall for LVM and their manipulation tactics.

To get more to the point of my rant - Last year I went through quite a lot with a guy (let's call him Alex) who I considered to be my best friend for several years. I met Alex on a mission trip we both went on when we were in college, and we clicked right away as friends, same sense of humor, same ambitions to go to medical school, etc. It was the kind of friendship where we talked for several hours every day, met up for lunch several times a week, helped each other with our coursework, etc.

When I met him, he had a girlfriend though they broke up shortly after our trip. I talked him through getting over her - she was emotionally abusive and manipulative and kept trying to get back into his life. I pretty much acted as his therapist for the majority of our friendship because I have a terrible habit of slipping into that role for most people in my life. I was okay with it though because I felt emotionally fulfilled by him paying attention to me and doing the bare minimum.

I harbored feelings for him for YEARS despite him always talking to me about other girls and asking for advice for dates. He told me he was attracted to skinny Asian girls (and I'm neither of those things lmao). I guess I held out hope that he would grow attracted to me over time especially since our personalities clicked so much, plus he got bored of those girls so quickly while I always remained constant. We frequently talked about wanting to date someone who was already a friend and he even talked about us moving in together after graduating. But whenever I expressed insecurity about myself he would minimize it or joke that "I should go for black guys because they like fat girls." He always evened it out by giving me other compliments though and I kept falling for it.

Sadly my feelings held on because I was an idiot. Funnily enough he tried to set me up with his best friend, Jake, who was SUCH a LVM. Went on a few dates with the guy who was WAY too forward on all of the dates, but I felt bad and like I owed him something. He went down on me and it was just HORRIFIC, I didn't even finish but felt guilty so I reciprocated (poorly lol). Another time he jerked off into a cup while looking at my boobs because I didn't want to do anything, and it was so cringeworthy and awful.

I ended up confessing to Alex (via text because I'm a coward), basically saying I know he doesn't feel the same way but I just wanted to get it off my chest so we can be friends. Also told Jake out of respect and we got drinks to talk it out, and he still tried kissing me and the masturbation cup thing happened. 🤮

But Alex reacted pretty badly and said "Oh shit" and took like 12 hours to give me an actual response. We didn't talk for a while and ever since then he'll initiate a conversation once every month or two, keep it going for a little bit, and then just stop responding mid-conversation??? It very much felt like breadcrumbing, like he misses my attention or something. I feel like I was basically his girlfriend emotionally, just not in title or physically.

I'm so done with half-assed friendships/relationships and being made to feel like I'm not important enough. Thanks to you all, I've since deleted his number and blocked him and feel such an amazing sense of relief. I hope to continue learning from all of you so I can become the best version of myself.