mind menders

aw this is sweet! if you guys hang out and laugh and chat together at church then just ask him if he wants to hang out outside of church sometime :) I don’t know whether it’d be appropriate to start trying to flirt with him while you’re at church so I suppose just pay him lots of attention when you guys are in your group together and ask him questions about common interests e.g. school or whatever hobbies you guys are interested in. If he shows an interested in talking to you then just say “hey we should hang out sometime” or something like that :) you will do great, and I bet he likes you heaps. Good luck friend!

hi there :) where do you know him from? if it’s from school and he’s in any of your classes, message him on facebook and ask him a question about class! also it’s totally okay to message someone and just go “hey how’s it going? :)”. I’m sure you’re not too awkward!! If you’re struggling to hold a conversation with him ask him questions about himself and it’s also fine to say things about yourself as well! And just tell jokes and things and be funny!!

Ask/talk to him about whatever you have in common :) Good luck!

Hey! :) aw okay so your friend is flirting with another guy in the group while her boyfriend is away? That’s not okay. If you’re sure you’re not misconstruing her behaviour, that is. Cos these things can be pretty ambiguous. It sounds to me like the guy she is flirting (?) with might actually have a crush on her if he laughs/comments the most when she talks. And she might just subconsciously be enjoying the attention she gets from him and playing up to it? It can be a hard thing not to do sometimes (which doesn’t make it the right thing to do but still). As long as she isn’t taking the flirting too far or leading him on I wouldn’t be too worried. It’s understandable if you are jealous, it’s easy to be jealous when someone is getting more attention from certain people than you!

Do you have particular feelings for this guy? If you don’t, try not to let it affect you because it’s up to them how they behave with one another as long as she doesn’t begin acting with him like she shouldn’t while she’s still got a boyfriend. If you do have feelings for him then why don’t you try asking your friend about it? Or else pay him more attention than you do the others and see how he responds to you.

Good luck friend!!

oh dear :( friend this doesn’t sound good :( he is not being fair to you by stringing you along like this and I dunno he could just be really shy/anxious and that could explain his behaviour, or else he is just really unreliable/disorganised... but I dunno. If he is still being cagey with you about hanging out then I suggest you confront him. Not in a way that makes it sound like he owes you something, but to me that would be the right time to just come out with it and tell him that you like him and ask him how he feels about you. Just be like “look, if you hadn’t already realised I really like you but I’m getting mixed signals from you and I need to know how you feel about me”. That is the simplest way to find out what he’s thinking and it doesn’t sound at all desperate or anything other than slightly confrontational and frustrated (which is a good thing cos you don’t want him thinking you’d wait around forever), and if he tells you he doesn’t feel the same way then at least you will know for sure, and if he has just been being shy this whole time and he tells you he does feel the same way, then great!

aw good luck friend I hope things go your way x

Hey I’m so sorry I haven’t been active fsince like last week! From what you’ve said here things with him do still sound positive? I’d like to know how he has acted towards you since, whether he has texted you more since last time.

I still think there is no harm in texting him first and asking him if he wants to hang out however if he has given you no real acknowledgement since you sending this message then maybe not :/ but if he has acted better towards you since then, then by all means bring up hanging out with him!!

Good luck friend :)

Hi there, wow what an awful person. I think you should report him. You’re right, there isn’t any evidence but if he is sexually assaulting people then any complaint to the police will help to stop him doing this. However, I suggest that (if it’s possible) you get one/some of the other people he has assaulted and get them to go with you and report him for his assault on them at the same time. Unfortunately the way the legal system works with these things he is unlikely to encounter consequences with just you reporting that he touched you once where he shouldn’t have. But if the police hear lots of complaints about this guy then your incident will mean a lot more to them.

I hope he gets caught and locked up, ew. Good luck with reporting this and best wishes to you and all the other people he has assaulted.

If you’re being annoying/desperate his responses to you will be very concise and it won’t seem like he’s really getting involved in the conversation. He will reply with short messages and he won’t ask any questions etc. of his own. You should be able to tell if he’s enthusiastic about talking to you, for instance (if he’s a person who does this) he will send smiley faces, and the occasional x, whereas if he isn’t interested and you’re being annoying he will just keep his texts plain.

Think about how you would reply to someone who was texting you all the time and and annoying you and coming off as overly desperate. Would you reply every time or would you just prefer not to text them back? Would you come across as friendly to them or would you do your best to hint to them that they’re bugging you? Compare this to how his responses to you seem.

Some people just aren’t big texters so his not texting first often doesn’t necessarily mean much. It depends on the type of responses he gives you.

But just remember (!!!!!) just because someone might be giving off signals does not mean they have definitely lost interest. I mean if he is doing it all the time then maybe yes, but if you text him once and that one time he just doesn’t seem that keen, just be aware of the fact that people’s texting patterns when they’re really busy/their mind is on other things can be unintentionally very similar to what it looks like when they’re not interested. So if just once or twice he acts like this don’t be concerned. And people stopping replying halfway through a conversation doesn’t mean they’re not interested either, sometimes something comes up which prevents them from replying at the time etc.

Unless after reading this you think he’s giving off signals that he doesn’t like you, then don’t give up hope friend!! The next step is definitely trying to see him in person bc that way you will be able to tell for sure how he feels about you and progress things :)

good luck!

I really like him//but mixed signals

Female, 17. hello :) i really like this boy, and i thought maybe he was interested in me as well, but now i just don’t know. the other day i was talking to one of my friends (i needed to vent) and she screamed “well clearly hes not into you!” and it really really hurt.

He does give mixed signals, but for her to say that was painful. The whole situation with him started about a month ago, when I texted him cause i got his number from a friend and i wanted to get to know him. he said we should talk a lot more, and after that he texted me a few days later and we kinda took turns texting each other. he also asked for my snapchat, so we occasionally communicate by that. every time we try (or have tried in the past few weeks) to make plans, one of us can’t do something (usually him) and it’s frustrating. but he said its just been a bad couple of weeks for him, which is understandable. but i dont wanna keep believing excuses am i being naiive about this? oh but i must add, one time when we were going to hangout he suggested a movie or iceskating.. and why would he do that if he wasnt interested ya know?? he used to text me first sometimes like we would kinda alternate, but the past couple of times i’ve been the one reaching out, which makes me think hes losing interest. according to his friends, hes shy, and they told me if i like him i kinda have to just go for it. so thinking that maybe he is interested, but just shy, i have continued to reach out, just sending a snapchat every few days or starting the convo every few days (trying to give him space as well) but its hard for me to find that line between having to really further this, and just being plain annoying/pushy about getting to know him. ya know? although whenever i would say anything like “sorry to bother you” he responded “stop you never bother me dont say that!” and why would he say that and not mean it?? but that was like 2 weeks ago idk if thats true still?? cause i stopped saying it since he told me i dont bother him but what if thats not true anymore should i say that next time i text him? once, he also called me by the shortened part of my name like only friends and family call me that. for example (not my name!!) but it would be like him saying “goodnight em!” instead of “goodnight emily!” or something. im prob just overthinking idk.

also, hes going to the prom with someone else (i asked him about it) but apparently theyre just going as friends? idk i guess ive gotta trust that. but its been a while since he texted me first… like the past week or two ive texted him a few times and he responds and we talk for a little but he never initiates anymore which makes me very confused and sad. in our last convo (3 days ago) he randomly stopped replying and ive had nothing (but one snapchat from him) since. i know hes been away on vacation now which could be part of it? also, my one friend went up to him a week or two ago and just directly looked at him and was like “look are you interested in her or not?!” (‘her’ referring to me) and he was like hmm posssiiblyy. and shes like no seriously i need to know like dont play w me and he was like well why do you need to know?? like he kept telling her “i might be” but he wouldnt say anything about me and i have no clue what that means - i mean if he didnt like me wouldn’t he just tell her that he isnt interested??? so many mixed signals and im still mad that my friend said that hes clearly not into me because who knows. but what do you think? do i continue to start the convos? because i feel like hes never gonna initiate anymore/ever again and that makes me sad. hes still away on his trip, so maybe during the week i could simply ask how it went? im afraid to be annoying like urrggg why doesnt he ever initiate anymore :,( i dont wanna be too pushy by asking him about hanging out, but one time when he kinda cancelled plans i said “oh well let me know if you still wanna maybe do something sometime” and he was like “yes definitely! after my trip i would wanna hang out.” so idkkkkk so confused maybe he was just saying that.

Hey friend :) aw that was really mean of your friend to say and I don’t necessarily agree with them at all. I don’t think you’re being naive by believing his excuses at the moment but it’s good that you’re prepared for that possibility. And I agree, people wouldn’t usually suggest cute hangout ideas like iceskating if they really don’t care??

No, don’t tell him again that you’re sorry for bothering him. People don’t generally respond well to others constantly articulating their fear that they’re bothering them - I know this isn’t your aim but it can start to look as though you’re just saying it so that you can get them to deny it and tell you how great you are etc. and it wouldn’t do for him to think you were like that!! Even if what he said doesn’t still stand (though I’m sure it does), asking about it wouldn’t help because he can’t exactly just say “yeah actually you are bothering me I changed my mind”. On the whole I don’t think you need to worry :)

Do trust him about the prom thing! There’s no reason why he would tell you they were going as friends if it wasn’t true. And about the not texting first thing? Trust me friend, people don’t like to text a lot when they’re on vacation. Don’t worry too much about it bc honestly you go on vacation to get away from being at home and all the normal stuff that goes on right? And chances are he’s likely to be busy doing stuff that doesn’t involve using his phone all the time while he’s away so honestly I wouldn’t stress! Text him when he gets back and ask him how his trip was, you might find he’s a bit more responsive :)

Yeah okay so I agree with you about what he said to your friend, if he wasn’t at all interested there would be no reason for him to say he ‘might be’. It sounds like he didn’t take too kindly to your friend doing that and that’s why he reacted weirdly, he didn’t want to share his feelings with her. To me this says that he is interested in you but still deciding about whether he wants to take things further with you, which might be why he didn’t want to give a committed response either way. He is probably waiting until after you two have hung out in person before he gets your hopes up etc., and that definitely makes sense. You don’t want to commit to telling someone you like them (even if you do) before you’ve had a chance to get to know them in person and see if you’re compatible in person. Do chase him up about hanging out once he gets back, cos he sounded genuinely down for that! And that way you can both see how it goes and you might get a little bit more decisiveness out of him. If it goes well, then take the advice his friends have given you and go for it, there’s no reason not to :) and you might find that he does the same if he enjoys himself when you guys hang out.

Good luck with all this, and I hope everything becomes clearer for you!

Hey there :) if he texts you first sometimes then he won’t be replying out of politeness! And you can’t expect him to text you first all the time, those times he’s probably waiting for you to do it, which is fine! He was probably just busy and that’s why he stopped replying, or something came up. Maybe someone started talking to him and he felt it would be rude to keep texting in front of them. You gotta understand that people can’t always reply all of the time :) I’m sure there are times when you struggle to reply to people right away as well. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t like you, he’s probably just more relaxed about texting than you which is fine. Keep saying hi in the halls, he probably just has something on his mind! I think that you’re taking every little thing he does and taking it to mean he doesn’t like/care about you when that’s probably not true! People have hundreds or thousands of other little and big things going on in their lives which aren’t connected to you, so his behaviour could be due to anything. Keep texting him and see how it goes. Unless he really stops texting you first or doesn’t seem at all interested/invested in the conversation, I really wouldn’t worry.

It’ll be okay friend!

okay so. If the friend of this guy thinks you should go for it, then I think so too. If he’s someone you trust (which is important) then there must be a reason he’s encouraging you, so take his advice and do something :) it’s okay to be shy, just text this guy some more, ask him if he wants to hang out sometime. If you bump into him at school (if you go to school with him) ask him if he wants to do something later! It’s all about small steps. If he’s not someone who is likely to make the first move, then just show him that you like him. Laugh at his jokes and smile when he talks to you. Flirt with him a  little, if you like. There’s no way you could be annoying just by acting like this, and it’ll be a way for him to learn that you like him. Maybe he’ll act the same towards you. If you get the feeling from him that he likes you back but he doesn’t seem willing to do anything about it, then you will have to be a little forward. Consider talking to his friend again at this point and see what he thinks. It’ll be okay, with a little effort from you it will work itself out :)

good luck!

Of course it’s possible. If not love then crushes and infatuation, certainly. It sounds like there’s some sort of connection between you two? From what you’ve described of his behaviour he’s showing an interest in you but not an exclusive interest - and that isn’t a bad thing but you’d have to make sure if you took things further that he stopped flirting with other girls. Keep flirting with him like you are!! But you could take it further, do it more often etc? Ask him questions about how he feels about you, but sort of in a teasing way if you know what I mean? Like it’s all a part of the flirting game. He may be more serious about you than you think.

Let him know you like him. Make the things you say to him (when you’re flirting or otherwise) more meaningful, and keep the eye contact going like you have. Get closer physically. Just say stuff to him that might hint that you like him as more than a flirty sort of friend!! But you’d have to be careful bc you don’t necessarily know how he feels about you so try gauge his reaction to all this stuff! He has to know you like him if you want to take your relationship with him further :) cos being in love with a friend can be super frustrating right?

Good luck friend!

Aw it's okay to want to just get a boyfriend already!! A lot of people go with the whole "u don't need a boyfriend" or "ur time will come" mentality and I definitely agree 100% with all that and it definitely shouldn't affect your feeling of self worth bc different people are ready at different times but yes I get why you're feeling impatient. (that's not to say I think anyone should want a boyfriend just for the sake of having one but it's definitely understandable that you desire a relationship at this point in your life)

okay so my suggestion would be to take matters into your own hands! That doesn't mean you have to go ask someone out but just like?? make sure you let them know you like them. If you find someone attractive, smile at them, say hi. It's such a scary thing, to try and make people know that you're interested but honestly sometimes it's the only way and it definitely wouldn't be considered too forward! Things won't always work out but you gotta make sure they have a chance to start working out in the first place (if that makes sense). Just get things rolling with someone you like by talking to them and flirting a lil bit and see what happens? You just can't force it okay! Though I'm sure you know that. That's really all the advice I can give you. Flirt with people and if they reciprocate your interest then it's all up to you from there :) just keep showing your interest!

good luck friend, I hope this works out for you x

oh dear :( you poor thing, this is such a horrible situation to be in. I’m rly proud of you for knowing that you have to break up with your boyfriend because so many people would have chosen the easier option which is to lie about or go into denial about their feelings or pursue the relationship with the other person anyway. So well done for being so self-aware!

In terms of breaking up with him? There’s no easy way to do it unfortunately :( obviously you need to do it in person. An important thing would be not to do it in public. I’ve been dumped in public before and it made everything so much worse so don’t do that. Also make it clear what you’re saying!! Don’t be like “I don’t feel the same anymore, sorry” (but nicer obv) but actually say “I’m afraid I have to end our relationship” or you know, something of that sort. Because people will often seize the slightest bit of evidence that you’re not doing what they think you’re doing, you know?

To bring it up.. I think just do it. Not at a time when you and he are having a really happy moment or anything, you don’t want to ruin it like that. When you guys are having like, a serious moment or whatever. You can lead into it by saying something like “I need to tell you something”. Tell him you need to break up with him because unfortunately you no longer feel the same way for him romantically (don’t tell him you were wrong about your feelings all along). You can do your best to express how you still love him platonically if you want but don’t be surprised if he doesn’t react very well to that. You may be able to be friends with him but you need to give him (and yourself) time to heal and move on before you do anything like that. But feel free to reassure him that that’s what you want (if it is), at the time that you’re breaking up with him.

I suggest you don’t become anywhere near official with your friend who you like until you’re sure your boyfriend won’t be unnecessarily hurt by it. Give him enough time to get over you some. You can start flirting more with your friend as soon as you like because after all you won’t be committed to anyone anymore but do try and wait before you make it anything more serious. About two months would be a good minimum amount of time. It sounds like a long time but from personal experience, anything around one month is way too short and honestly it looks really bad, not that that should be your concern or motivation. Waiting this long also gives you a chance to evaluate your feelings more objectively, so keep that in mind :)

good luck friend!! and remember I’m proud of you for doing this!

Honesty I think you should stay up and do it :( it sounds awful I know, but at least that way you can get it in without disappointing your teacher and then you can catch up on your sleep after! I know in general you should put yourself and your mental/physical health first but if you think you can manage one night of hard work without it being too hard on your mind and body then I think that’s what you should do. If possible ask your parents to let you stay home but otherwise you might just have to miss out on a bit of sleep :/ it’ll be okay, I do it all the time for uni and I manage okay :)

If you absolutey can’t manage it, then talk to your teacher and explain to her that you just couldn’t do it in time but maybe offer to give her what you have done just so she knows you’ve been working hard on it?

good luck friend!!!

Hey :) aw I mean it’s nice of your friends to say that about you and I’m sure you’re absolutely gorgeous but just because they tell you you’re attractive and could get guys doesn’t mean you should feel obligated to date them or like them!! It’s okay to go on dates with people and not feel anything for them and just because you might get more attention from guys than some others that doesn’t mean you have to respond to that attention the way they think you should.

Next time you like someone, talk to them and make your feelings clear to them. Chances are they will show some interest back if you make the first move!!

If you’re trying to be confident with this guy then you’re already doing really well because you’re not letting your feelings for him get the better of you. He was probably distracted by something and didn’t even hear you! Just smile and say hi whenever you see him and don’t put any more pressure on him than that. If he keeps not responding then you’ll know how he feels, but maybe next time he will notice you :) you’ll do great.

good luck babe xx

hi there :) I don’t know why your friends are getting annoyed about this? It’s a totally normal thing to want to talk about the person you like! I mean unless he’s like, aaaaall you talk about? Don’t be too worried! I’m sure you’re not obsessing, everybody thinks about the person they like a lot. If it’s bothering them that much though, I guess just talk about it less in front of them, keep it in your own head.

Sucks how things are always coming up when you want to do something!! If you think it’s his turn bring things up with you, then just wait a little while, give him some time. Maybe he’s had a bunch of stuff going on this week which is stressing him out or upsetting him. Give him a week or so, then just try talking to him again, ask him how his day is going or something :) that way you’re giving any problems in his life a chance to pass before he has to turn his attention back to you and the rest of his life. Don’t blame yourself!! There are plenty of explanations for distant behaviour, including just needing some space from everyone! Just don’t stress and give him some time and then talk to him if he doesn’t talk to you first.

Good luck friend!!!

hi there :) you sound a lot like this question I just answered. If you are the same person and I just took too long to reply I’m so sorry!! I have been so busy with uni (I’m just starting the final year of my psychology degree) and I’m doing all I can to answer these on time but I’m so sorry if I didn’t.

If you’re someone different? Disregard all that :p