Unwelcome advances..

[Kalima]

Okay I don’t know what I’m doing or thinking. I’m 25yo female and my best friend is a 41yo man. He’s married with 4 children. I love him as a friend, I talk to him daily and that’s all fine. However recently we’ve been talking on Skype (he works away from home a lot of the time and is stuck staying in hotels all over the world) and since we’ve been using Skype rather than a text based program we’ve also been using video and his comments have become more and more suggestive. Well more than that.

I’ve known him 2 years and we have been good friends for all of that time, there was a period of time when I first knew him when I reciprocated his feelings and we were a bit more than friends, but our relationship at that time was all via phone or computer. I met him on the internet (I know that sounds crazy, but I know him well and he works locally to me so we have met). About 18 months back our relationship became wholly platonic and I think that was a good thing.

I’m not sure how to handle him now he’s making advances because although he’s my friend I don’t want that kind of relationship with him. I don’t think it’s fair to his family or to me. How can I explain this to him without loosing his friendship? He has been there for me through thick and thin and I have a very small circle of friends.

[Mark]

I appreciate that you don't want to risk alienating one of your few close friends, but I do think that it is the right thing to do to make it clear and explicit to this guy that you do not want to have a sexual relationship with him, virtually or otherwise. to not do this is to basically be not defending yourself and to allow him to lead you down the path towards something you are uncomfortable with. Which will lower your self-esteem, yes? To not say something is being passive. To set the boundary with him while still saying how much he means to you and how much you value his platonic friendship is assertive. To yell at him and call him a jerk would be aggressive. There is a difference, and it is the assertive path that has the best likelihood (in my opinion) of preserving both your self-esteem and your friendship.