at least he didn't give me a pen

October 11, 2009 3:54 PM

"I love you" "(blank stare)" Now what?

I've been dating this wonderful man for about six months, and last night when I told him for the first time that I love him, he just looked at me. I was shocked. I love him very deeply and had assumed it was mutual.

I said that if it was too overwhelming he could just think of it as that I care a lot about him and want him to be happy, and that seemed to be better. I don't know, though! I'm in my early twenties, he's a little older but this is his first relationship. So maybe he's just scared? He's very shy. But this has made me feel a little bit as though he likes having a girlfriend as opposed to having me as his girlfriend. Which, ouch.

I left sort of quickly after that because I felt very uncomfortable (and I expect he probably did too).

I am hoping the hive mind here will be able to tell me what I can expect now, or at least help me feel better about putting my heart out there and having it, well, just stared at.

Email [e-mail] if you need more information

posted by anonymous to Human Relations (33 answers total)

You and your time are worth someone who loves you enthusiastically.
posted by littlegreenlights at 4:01 PM on October 11, 2009 [17 favorites]

The first time my girlfriend told me that she loved me, I was shocked too. It was possibly the best moment of my life, but it was unexpected. It was just one of those "whoa!" moments, like the earth had fallen from beneath my feet.

I'm shy too. I think it took me a good 24 hours to reply with those immaculate words, "I love you too." Just give it some time, and don't freak out about it. You don't spend six months with someone if you don't feel the same way.
posted by hnnrs at 4:02 PM on October 11, 2009 [14 favorites]

You should talk to him about it. Otherwise you're left speculating from an absence of information, which IME never leads to anything productive.

That said, based on my own first relationship, if he says anything like "well, I don't think I've ever been 'in love' with anybody," believe him and don't make the mistake of wasting your time and emotional energy hoping you'll be the one to change that.

My mother used to say, "You deserve somebody who makes your heart sing when you look at them. And you deserve to know that their heart sings when they look at you."
posted by Lexica at 4:06 PM on October 11, 2009 [15 favorites]

You should absolutely just give it some time.

It could be: Oh god I wasn't prepared for that and it's not what I'm feeling right now and what the hell do I do.

Or it could be: Oh god I can't believe she loves me. ME. This is the most shatteringly amazing thing that's ever happened to me and what the hell do I do.

A little bit of time will sort it out, and if he's as awkward and shy as you've described, I'd bet it's the second reaction.
posted by meerkatty at 4:06 PM on October 11, 2009 [2 favorites]

This is a tricky one, I think . . . if he had returned your sentiments without pause, would you be thinking that he was merely replying to your "I love you" because that's what he was supposed to say? Maybe that's why he didn't say anything . . . because he, at some point, wants to tell you - unsolicited - that he feels the same way. Give him that chance.

I agree with hnnrs - that you give it some time (how much, however, I do not know).
posted by Sassyfras at 4:08 PM on October 11, 2009

Ask him, not us.
posted by fire&wings at 4:10 PM on October 11, 2009 [2 favorites]

It sounds from your description like you are basically assuming what his feelings are for him, which is not the way to know what his actual feelings are (so talk to him about it). He may just want to tell you on his own clock, without feeling like he has to say it back just because you said it. Be patient and let him tell you what/when he wants to tell you--this "omg he doesn't love me and he just likes having a girlfriend and he will never love me and this is a waste of 6 months I'm going to die alone with cats" is, very likely, all in your head. Just take a breath and let things happen the way they are going to naturally happen. You were honest about your feelings, which is exactly what people ought to do in relationships, and now you just need to give him the chance to be able to be honest about his too, when he is ready.
posted by so_gracefully at 4:14 PM on October 11, 2009 [2 favorites]

My current boyfriend told me he loved me over two months before I felt that I could honestly return the sentiment. People fall in love in their own ways, on their own schedules. I don't blame you for feeling awkward, uncomfortable, and disappointed, but if you have an honest heart-to-heart with him, and he feels that he could love you - he's just not there yet - it's entirely possible you could end up happy together. But you should have that heart to heart, to see where you stand, and so he knows that his non-reaction reaction has made you feel worried and uncared for, and so that you can know whatever worries and hopes are going through his head and help him through them.
posted by shaun uh at 4:21 PM on October 11, 2009 [5 favorites]

Definitely talk to him. He's potentially very overwhelmed. Now, you don't have to have a giant "Where is our relationship headed?" talk because that's a surefire way to scare someone off in this particular scenario ( good communication in relationships is vital, but you don't want to make him feel smothered right at this moment).

It may have just been unexpected. My boyfriend said it to me first, in Japanese of all things (I'd already displayed my interest in the culture and language) and so he figured out how to say it and it was super sweet - but it was surprising too. It took me a good few minutes to sort through the swirls in my head.

Now, given that this is his first relationship and you're both pretty young, there's not a lot of stuff to fall back for a frame of reference, and he may not even know how he feels for certain or may want to take things more slowly. Because when someone tells you they love you, it's serious and it can either trigger the most wonderful bells or be extremely scary. He may need time in his own head to figure it all out. That's okay.

If you feel like you can be okay giving him time, let him know that. Use humor. Communicate somehow that you're still having fun and into him. But don't pressure him or voice assumptions about what you think happened. Maybe he'll come around, (or he won't), but let him have that.
posted by cmgonzalez at 4:36 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

I dated this guy five or six years ago. I told him I loved him so long before he told me that I eventually had to say "Look, if you get to the point where you know this isn't going to happen for you, do the right thing and tell me so I can move on." We've been married five years and three weeks and since the day he finally told me, I have never, ever doubted that he does.

Some people just take longer to be sure. There is no reason except your own personal insecurity for a lag to derail your relationship. Just tell him it's a fact and that's the way it is, but it's not a problem for him to roll along at his own pace. Then grab his hand, give him a kiss, and go to the movies.
posted by DarlingBri at 4:40 PM on October 11, 2009 [4 favorites]

Ask him, not us.

Don't make this into a bigger deal just yet. As many are saying, just give him time. I'm sure he's doing a LOT of thinking right now, and if you ask him before he's reached a conclusion, you may not get the answer you would have if you'd been more patient.
posted by hermitosis at 4:45 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

I've accidentally blurted that out too early when what I meant was "I like how I feel around you" blah blah blah. Maybe it's not too early for you and you know for sure, but if your SO is willing to talk about it maybe reframe it for him by talking about what led you to believe that. Does not apply in all cases, but sometimes the gravitas of those words overshadows the personal meanings behind them.
posted by ShadePlant at 4:46 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

It's just words. Relax and enjoy how your relationship actually is, and don't worry about what it's called yet.

The worst thing you could do is pressure him (explicitly or implicitly) into saying something he isn't comfortable thinking yet. That'll have serious blowback later.
posted by rokusan at 4:50 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

Those are words I just don't take lightly. With one boyfriend, he let me know 3 months in....and I just couldn't respond. I think I said 'Thank you.' We were almost to a year before I said it back. Of course we talked it over, and he was hurt...but I got across that I express love differently. He was very verbal and huggy. I spend time and do things for people that I love.

Don't think he doesn't have equal feelings. 'Love' is expressed many different ways. You express with words, maybe his way is different.

(I also felt like I had been hit with a ton of bricks, and I needed time to process. I understood he was serious, and I didn't want to disregard that with a fake response. I knew I liked the guy enough to make sure that I gave a true answer on my end.)
posted by shinyshiny at 4:59 PM on October 11, 2009 [2 favorites]

I told my boyfriend that I loved him pretty early on in the relationship -- maybe around the 3 or 4 month mark. I got the blank stare, too. When I pressed him about it, he admitted that he'd never said "I love you" to a girlfriend before (he was in his early 40s at this point). He said he didn't quite know how to compute what he felt for me. He said he wasn't sure if and when he could.

I freaked. Seriously, quietly, silently FREAKED OUT. I was positive this meant that he was too emotionally stunted to ever make a commitment. I was prepared to see this as the reddest of all red flags. I was getting ready to bail.

But then, I realized: hey, he's being honest. And everything else about our relationship was spectacular -- warm, honest, trusting, passionate, fun, and totally without drama. It occurred to me that he was actually showing me great respect and trust by confiding all this in me. I realized that, at that stage in the relationship and with all the other good stuff in place, it was too early to judge whether or not this was a deal-breaker. I also realized that I tend to fall in love quite quickly -- and sometimes had felt I was falling in love early on when, in fact, I was merely infatuated -- and so that his more measured, thoughtful approach might actually be the more healthy or appropriate one.

So instead of running out the door, I made a mental note to myself that I could place my running shoes near the door, as it were. I decided that I would bear the anxiety of not knowing for awhile. I would keep in touch with how he continued to treat me, and how I continued to feel about myself when I was around him.

So I bided my time. I took the pressure of the both of us. Several months later, we were having some pissy little fight about something inconsequential, and he just blurted out "but sweetie, I love you!"

And there it was. It wasn't a romantic declaration while watching the sun set over the ocean. It wasn't the obligatory "I love you too" the first time I said it. But it was the purely honest expression of the thing he had only gradually come to realize himself. That he loved me, too.

That was about four years ago. We say "I love you" a dozen times a day to each other. But I had to give him the chance to get to where he needed to be, so that we could have a chance to get to where we are now.
posted by scody at 5:08 PM on October 11, 2009 [43 favorites]

Yeah, just relax. It could be anything from him having major commitment issues to him just not being there emotionally yet, to him actually loving you but being embarassed to say it out loud. If he's a late bloomer, I wouldn't be surprised if he's afraid of rejection -- even after you said you loved him.
posted by empath at 5:31 PM on October 11, 2009

"Love" is a difficult commitment for many guys. Don't be freaked just because he might have been freaked at your declaration. He may very well be flattered, happy to hear this and thinking the same thing himself yet still be freaked to have to address this major issue. Give him some time. Some guys are funny this way. If he is still freaked in a few months then that might be a problem.
posted by caddis at 5:40 PM on October 11, 2009

Just how many women had their boyfriends drop the "I love you"s here and there multiple times a day, just to find out, three months in, or three years in, that they never meant "I am devoted to you", "I put your needs above everything else", "I want you in my future". It's the meaning that people attach to the phrase that matters most.
posted by Jurate at 5:47 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

As usual, scody said what I was going to say, except better. This happened to me, except I was the doofus with the blank look. In fact, I replied "Oh dear" (as in "oh lord what am I supposed to do now?") - and to his everlasting credit, Future Hubby didn't bail on me right then and there. Your boyfriend may be as dense as I am and never noticed that you had fallen in love. Or he may be as slow to make friends and form deep attachments.

But even us doofi are capable of loving someone back, so just give him some time and space and let him wrap his head around the whole thing. It may work out for the best, and at worst it will have been an honorable relationship where everyone acted in good faith but it simply didn't work out.

What's with the giving of pens?
posted by Quietgal at 6:04 PM on October 11, 2009

You said this is his first relationship, I'm guessing he's not one-hundred percent up to date on all of the relationship stuff that other people take for granted. Talk to him.
posted by kylej at 7:34 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

Quietgal: I Gave Her My Heart and She Gave Me a Pen. (from the movie, Say Anything)
posted by Sassyfras at 7:36 PM on October 11, 2009

I have been on both ends of this, I think.

It does not by itself mean very much. People have somewhat different senses of what the "love" in "I love you" means, especially with regard to how certain and permanent it is. Etc. Etc. Don't freak out.

I'm not sure you should immediately bring it up as a relationship "issue," either, as the "talk to him" crowd seems to think. Give the thing some space and time. I wouldn't be surprised if you hear it from him in a little while.
posted by grobstein at 8:11 PM on October 11, 2009

To expand briefly -- perhaps you shouldn't "talk about it." It is uncomfortable on both sides to ask someone if they love you, and may look like (or be) a power move. You don't need to do that. The words given after discussion or prompting will mean less. Let him come to them if he will.
posted by grobstein at 8:15 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

my girlfriend fell in love with me before i fell in love with her. she told me she loved me, and i was kind of nonplussed and kissed her a few times but didn't tell her i loved her. she didn't talk about it more than that, and neither did i.

a couple of months later, when i saw her again (we were a LDR at the time), i was ready to tell her i loved her, too.

it's been something like 8 years and we're still together.
posted by rmd1023 at 8:30 PM on October 11, 2009 [1 favorite]

Other side of the coin here. My ex never told me he loved me. Turned out over a year after we started going out that he didn't say it because he didn't. Whilst time can help, in that instance, it really really didn't. So give it some time, but not too much.
posted by nunoidia at 10:51 PM on October 11, 2009

Well, you don't know, and we can't know how Boyfriend (hereafter known as "B") feels about you, Anonymous (hereafter known as "A"), but let's make this a numbers game by looking at all the obvious reasons that B would or would not say that he loves you, too...

B says he loves A because:

he already knows that he feels the same way, but has been afraid/waiting for A to declare first

he examines his feelings in that instant, and in that instant feels that he loves A, too

thinks he might feel the same way, isn't sure, but says he loves A too, because maybe he does or will eventually

knows that he doesn't love A, but says he does to make things easier

B doesn't say he loves A because:

he has examined his feelings and knows he doesn't love A

he has examined his feelings and just doesn't know yet if this is "Love" or not

he hasn't examined his feelings, and is just very confused about the whole thing

he knows he loves A, but it scares the hell out of him to say the words

Okay, now parsing all those possibilities, it seems that there are three either Bad or Not Great reasons out of four "I love you, too" responses, while there is one Bad (from your point of view), one Good, and two Neutral reasons for him not to say "I love you."

It seems to me that outside of the one ideal response (you both feel the same way at the same time, realize how you feel, and both feel ready to declare those feelings simultaneously), there are a lot more potentially positive outcomes in the "He Didn't Say It" list, so I wouldn't imagine the worst just yet. You don't want to invest in false or manufactured hope, of course, but it's a bit early to despair.

and to add to the anecdata, I also didn't say it when my now-husband first said it... it was a few months later. I was gobsmacked and happy and amazed, but I was in such a swirl of emotion and infatuation, I needed to wait a bit to be sure it wasn't all a mirage.
posted by taz at 11:52 PM on October 11, 2009 [4 favorites]

I've been married for almost 5 years and in a relationship with my wife for 14 in total. I rarely say "I love you" because I believe the overuse of those words makes them cheap.

Instead of saying it, I live it.

You love this man so he must be doing something right.

Don't turn your life into an episode of Friends or Three's Company unless he likes watching those shows as well.
posted by srboisvert at 8:13 AM on October 12, 2009 [2 favorites]

I was told "I love you" before I could say it back. Afterwards, I was asked, "Do you think you will love me?." I told him, "yes but I need more time." Later, I said the words back to him, and it was wonderful.

Take away: I think it is totally fair for you to ask him where his feelings are. Although, do think about srboisvert's point - does he live it?
posted by soupy at 12:49 PM on October 12, 2009

After five months of dating, I said "I love you" to my husband first. I was 20, he was 19. I had had a few long term relationships, he'd had none. He did not return the sentiment. I waited and did not discuss it with him. I think he said it a few months later. To be honest, what seemed like such a huge deal at the time was pretty inconsequential historically (I can't even remember when he finally told me!) We got married 5 years later and have been together over 13 years. I have been amazed by his love for me, but never doubted it. Many have expressed similar scenarios. The bottom line is this does not need to be a deal breaker, not at this point. I knew that if I pushed him into saying it back to me, or asked too many questions, it could have made our relationship too complicated for the time being.

I think you need to decide if you believe that he is worth giving some time to without having a response. If you really love him, then I think your answer would be yes. (this is, of course, barring other issues like he's abusive, has a wandering eye or worse, etc).
posted by fyrebelley at 3:10 PM on October 12, 2009

It would have been nice if he'd said SOMETHING. I'm sorry, that situation totally sucks. :(

I'd definitely ask him about it if you have questions. If you don't, then wait and see if he really was just in shock, and is waiting to respond in kind.
posted by timoni at 4:15 PM on October 12, 2009

Me: I love you!

Her: That just makes me feel weird.

Me: NEXT.

...if only it wasn't true.

You should at least have gotten SOME reaction.
posted by flutable at 3:35 AM on October 13, 2009

My boyfriend told me "I think I love you..." after our third date. Poor boy, so confused! But after 17 years and 11 years of marriage, I think I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.

Everyone works differently. Give him the benefit of the doubt -- if you think he's worth it.
posted by pointless_incessant_barking at 11:51 AM on October 13, 2009

I agree with giving it a bit of time, but I think hnnrs is a bit naive to think that "You don't spend six months with someone if you don't feel the same way.

Millions of jilted lovers disagree.
posted by IAmBroom at 1:25 PM on October 13, 2009