Excuse me while I burst into flames

I made a mistake by dating David. I made a mistake by having a physical and romantic relationship with him. Not because I regret it (I don't regret it)... But because I miss the friendship more.

Well, I was always able to separate my emotions from my friendships. Like genuine friendships. If there was romantic interest but maintaining the status quo of platonic friendship seemed more logical, I've always been good at not giving into my feels.

I know I say it a lot, and it may be hard to see when I'm living up an SO's butt, but I value friendship so much more than romance or being physical.

It's why I sorta try to maintain friendship with most my exes. But I can always see that they struggle with it. They can't separate their emotions. I don't blame them... I'm usually the one that hurts them by leaving and then my selfish ass tries to waltz back in to their lives but only at arm's length.

And I find myself often wanting to talk to David because I always liked his insight and logic. But what little I talk to him usually results with him holding back for to ~feels~. And that is why I miss what we had before we dated. The feels were there back then, but I suppressed them and it was fine. For me, anyway. Perhaps he was never fine and felt friendzoned. I don't know.

By dating him, I raised him to my unrealistic level of expectations. And he, like everyone else, did not meet them. And it made me unhappy, so I left. As usual. As always. That's how my story cycles again and again and again.

So now we're stuck history. Complications. But I'm not the one with the feels. Not those kind of feels. I don't have the heart to tell him that I'm not physically pining for him. Maybe not emotionally either. I don't want what we had when we dated. I want what we had before that. I really miss what I perceived as a good, honest friendship. I'm not naive enough to think he wasn't ready to get with me at any moment in those days. But he didn't treat me like prey.

I just miss friendship. I miss connection. I miss having someone to talk to. Someone to vent to. I miss not getting upset when my boyfriend wasn't giving me attention because he's all I've got. I miss not feeling so lonely and sad all the time.