I like two guys...and I don't know what to do!

[kekep]

I'll try to make this long story short. There's this guy who I was seeing last summer, who doesn't live in the same city as me. My two good friends know him well, and always told me, "he's young and likes to have fun, and isn't interested in settling down...don't get too attached." But whenever he came in town, we would hang out, have a great time and hook up. I liked him but I took what my friends told me to heart, and still dated other guys. Well...his good friend who DOES live in this city asked me out, and we started to date pretty seriously. We would talk every single day and went out on dates. i felt guilty when the original guy came back in town, b/c he was pretty taken aback by what was going on since it was his good friend and i who were dating, but he never really said anything to either me or the new guy about it and played it cool. since he'd never expressed much interest in me beyond just having fun i didn't think it mattered to him. so for about 3 months i was dating the new guy, and things were going well (or so i thought) but one weekend i didn't hear from him at all, and when i confronted him about it, it turned out he had hooked up with his ex. needless to say, i was floored and dumped him on the spot. i pretty much vowed at that point to never speak to him again.

 

so here's where things started to get complicated. me and the first guy started talking again about 2 months ago when we randomly saw each other at a beach weekend. we had an awesome time together and there was a lot of texting, phone calls and facebooking back and forth after the weekend. a few weeks later, he ended up coming in town for our mutual friends wedding, and again, we hooked up and even went out on a date! the problem is, everything was going pretty well with that, but now the other guy (the one i seriously dated who ended up cheating on me) is texting and calling me again, and for SOME REASON, i'm still interested in him as well!! we met up for drinks "as friends" but totally made out all night i feel like such a skank!! i don't know what's going on with me, i've never been in this type of situation before...and i don't know if i'm just getting played by both guys here or if i'm the one who's confused. all i know is i'm starting to feel in over my head with the whole situation. can anyone relate to this and give me some good advice?

[keenan]

phew. i can--unfortunately--sort of relate.

 

if these guys weren't friends with each other, i would say that there's nothing wrong with casually seeing both of them and doing whatever feels right in the moment. but they ARE friends, so it becomes this weird thing where you feel like (or makes you worried that they THINK that you are) the skanky girl who is giving it to the whole team, or the whole band, or whatever (a very overly-exaggerated metaphor--but you know what i mean). you don't think of yourself that way, but you see how it looks to them and to others, so it's awkward.

 

it actually makes sense that you would be attracted to both of them ~ they're friends and have things in common, and you're probably attracted to these personality qualities. plus there's the comfort level--you know them both, you have a shared history, and you can easily strike things up without too much effort or anxiety.

 

it's easy to feel that you're the one in control of these situations, and then to look back a little later and say, "what was i THINKING? i was either being played, or i was playing...but not any game that i was going to win." then you feel like crap ~ slightly skeezy but not really, because you didn't really do anything wrong...but just a little ick.

 

at this point it will be weird to have a serious relationship with EITHER of them because the ghost of the other will always kind of be there...but if it's just casual, do you really want to keep bouncing back and forth between them?

 

my most honest advice is to cut it off with both of them and just start over. i know that's tough, but i think it's what you'll need to feel better in the long run...and that's really what it's about.