I don't know how helpful my story will be, but I hope it provides you with some comfort during this tough time: I was once in a situationship with my then-best friend. He was afraid of taking the next step to something more and needed some time to fully process his feelings. We then spent a period of time deepening our intimacy, but then I found out that he had been seeing another "friend" around the same time and I felt like I was the fallback girl. It seems that once I started communicating my boundaries and other-friend became available, he ultimately ended things with me via text and is now in a relationship with her.

To add to the confusion, he continued to deny his actions and has since reached out multiple times to try to keep our "friendship." Even after all of our talks, I still to this day have many unanswered questions, but I no longer expect him to provide any kind of closure. It's one thing to be used by a random man on Tinder, let's say, but feeling utterly betrayed by someone who was first and foremost my best friend damn near broke me.

I say "damn near" because he didn't break me. I was, and still am, hurt that my friend isn't in my life; Where did that friend go? But I know myself, in that I will continue to love just as much and just as passionately, and I won't let this experience taint my future relationship.