Confused over a straight INFJ

[juju1]

I would never try to go beyond it. But I do sometimes consider confessing to her when I get overwhelmed. Like, some mornings if I'm expecting her to come into the shop and she doesn't, or is later than usual, then every time I see a person moving past the window in my peripheral vision, im flipping my head to see if its her. And getting disappointed every time it isn't. And then I think Jesus Christ I cant keep going on like this, its absolutely pathetic. So I have considered telling her in the hope it will scare her off and stop her coming in and talking to me and therefore resolve my problem.

QMTA what do you think her reaction would be if I admitted this to her but made it clear Im not trying to get with her? Would it completely scare her off or would she try to mediate it and salvage a friendship? I honestly think the former would be preferable atm because the 'friendship' is starting to drain me...

 

[thbxhs]

Thank you for responding. I appreciate your comment. What you said is very interesting because I made a female INTP friend (confirmed by test, as is the INFJ) when I started uni and your description rings really true. While our friendship was slower of a burn than with my INFJ friend, it was clear that once we became friends, my INTP friend had so much time for me and my interests. For example when she found out I speak another language she became really interested in listening to music and watching shows involving that language which I found really sweet. And she always has time for me and is always asking to hang out together, even early on in our friendship despite her being super shy. And yeah I never read anything into her behaviour more than friendship, at all.

I would say that the main difference between my friendship with my INTP friend and INFJ friend is that I have known the INTP for 2 years and the INFJ for just under 5 months and I already know a hell of a lot more about the INFJ than I do the INTP. My INFJ friend claims to be so private and introverted yet shes told me quite a lot of personal and sensitive things. Meanwhile, the INTP who I have spent a lot more 1 on 1 time with, is a lot more guarded and reserved. There is still so much about her past, her family etc that I do not know. I only get that kind of info out of her when shes drunk and even then its minimal. Really interesting to make the comparison actually but I suppose T are naturally more guarded than F?

I don’t know about being guarded as much with Ts in general, but most of the INTPs I know have all gone through many forms of rejection as our thought patterns throw people. Especially women INTPs. A lot of men do not like that kind of mind on a woman and it can make them really behave poorly. Not just boyfriends, bosses etc. The guys don’t have it easy either. For me I can give surface fly overs of part of my story but all of the meat is carved off. No just don’t want to be open until I feel safe with that person. Depending on the person, it can take a long time. If I go too fast I wobble in doubt and blow it up. Trust me, her even reaching out often to hang out was a big trust thing. She’s being vulnerable with you all over the place. But yeah we are puppies when excited about someone, all the more why it’s scary- lots of people will kick a puppy. (And then we morph into an indifferent dragon and burn your souls down, or shrug and walk away- hard to say).

I don’t understand INFJs. In real life their walls seem impossible. I’ve never made it past them. Ever.

 

[thbxhs]

QMTA what do you think her reaction would be if I admitted this to her but made it clear Im not trying to get with her? Would it completely scare her off or would she try to mediate it and salvage a friendship? I honestly think the former would be preferable atm because the 'friendship' is starting to drain me...

QMTA what do you think her reaction would be if I admitted this to her but made it clear Im not trying to get with her? Would it completely scare her off or would she try to mediate it and salvage a friendship? I honestly think the former would be preferable atm because the 'friendship' is starting to drain me...

She’s married. Don’t put that on her! You know damn well what it feels like when you have a good friend you really trust and they start creeping up to put their other feelings on you. It feels bad. No, do what you need to and handle how you feel.

unrequited crushes are excruciating. If you need to distance yourself for awhile you should. It hurts like a fire consuming you but there is no way this goes well. Love yourself pretty lady-dont put either of you through this-please hear me - find a distraction, heal. Come back to it when you feel differently.

 

[KimChiRx]

hi.

I need someone to help me with this, I am slowly driving myself insane over what is probably nothing, but I need someone to explain this INFJ behaviour to me.

I work at a coffee shop. In March a woman I had never seen before came in. I served her, it was a very brief interaction but I could not stop smiling after she left. I am a bi woman. She is gorgeous, so its no surprise I enjoyed serving her, but the interaction felt different somehow.

Anyway, after that she started coming into the shop almost every day (it is close to where she works). Our conversations became longer. If I was busy but other staff were available she would wait until I was free so she could speak to me. I started getting the feeling that maybe she was gay/bi and liked me. I think on the third or fourth day she came in she said she felt like she'd known me forever.

A few weeks later the government announced all cafes/bars had to close indefinitely on the upcoming Friday. Friday she came into the shop. I was sad and she was too. We exchanged numbers to keep in touch and she told me I better not forget about her.

From then we started texting daily, sometimes all day. This is when I started to learn a lot more about her and also learned she was married (and presumably straight) but I was like whatever, Im happy for us to have a friendship at least. I told her about my sexuality and she seemed fine about it but the convo changed quite quickly and she hasn't mentioned it since. She started opening up to me about all sorts of stuff like her childhood, some bad things that happened in her past, her family issues. We also got onto the topic of MBTI and she told me shes INFJ and basically that she is normally super private with stuff like that but feels comfortable telling me for some reason.

This is the point where I basically started to fall for her. Ive never met anyone quite like her, so mysterious and cryptic yet so warm, so confident in who she is and her values but so shy and sometimes insecure... I am just endlessly fascinated by her.

So anyway we stayed like that texting almost every day and calling sometimes until my place re opened around 3 weeks ago. This was mostly initiated by her but sometimes she would go quiet for a few days and I would leave her for a bit cause we have had discussions about her needing alone time which I can completely relate to. I would then send a check in text after a few days and she goes straight back to normal messaging me a few times a day.

First day of my place opening we agreed a specific time for her to come so we could see each other and talk for a while. I was quite nervous as it was my first time seeing her since realising I liked her. I kept the convo quite trivial which is unlike our usual conversations, mainly because I kind of forgot how to act around her and didn't want to say anything stupid or that would give away my feelings lmfao. Straight after she left, she texted me saying I seemed nervous... which, fair enough I was, but that's not the kind of thing I would say to a friend really? But don't know if Im reading into it too much. I changed the subject and she didn't push.

She seems quite protective of me. My sister is an INFJ so I have some experience with them, and they share some similar traits, like obsessing over solving my problems and finding ways to make my life better. INFJ coffee woman for example, when I tell her I like a specific genre of music she will bombard me with song recommendations she thinks I might like. I have anxiety problems and shes always sending me sh*t like what kinds of nuts I can eat to help my brain and stuff like that lol. I was having trouble starting my car one day and mentioned possibly wanting a new one and within half an hour she had found loads of possible replacements for me and was offering to drive me round to check them all out.

So on the one hand I think her behaviour can easily be explained by this, basically shes found a 'project' ie someone she can help, which could explain why she opened up to me so quickly and things like that. Shes a little older than me, she has a full time career whereas im still studying and have a part time cafe job... so she possibly sees herself as being my guide sort of thing. That fits in with what I've read about INFJs. She has also done things like pointing out 'cute' male coworkers to me and asking why I don't try it with them because Ive been single for a while which I don't think she would do if she liked me.

But on the other hand there's just a feeling I can't shake, Ive never had a friendship like this with any of my female friends, especially not so quickly. Our conversations are just... on a completely different level, I can't explain it. She is always saying how intelligent and unique she thinks I am.. which again I don't think anyone has ever said to me apart from ex partners. We talk about these things all the time like how lucky we were to have met and stuff. I really like her and its gotten to the point where I've stopped trying to hide my smile when I see her to be honest, cause I am just so happy to be seeing her again after being away for so long. The way she smiles at me too is just so intense, no one has ever looked at me like that but again I don't know If that's just an INFJ thing. The eye contact lasts so long too and I just melt. And I think, there is no way in hell shes seeing the way Im smiling/looking at her, and thinks it's completely normal. She is a really intelligent person. And she seems happy in her relationship from the limited info shes given me about it so surely if she thought I was getting the wrong idea she would say something. Or maybe she just enjoys the attention, I really don't know.

Can someone please make sense of this... I domnt know if Im just misreading the whole thing. Is there anything I can do to confirm her stance without directly asking? Also what should I do, is it immoral for me to continue the friendship knowing I like her? If she was single I would just bite the bullet and tell her but obviously can't do that. But think its gone too far now for me to just cut the friendship off, she knows where I work and we text every day. Sorry for erratic typing and formatting

This is more so of me thinking out loud and maybe not as helpful as you’d like because I’m sure you’ve settled into your sexuality, but I used to be bisexual or I guess what would be defined as a curiosity as I got older, but before getting married to my husband I did the same thing.. I had a good friend that I had an attraction towards. Now when I look back I see that I wasn’t fully into this person on a sexual level but more so in psychological terms that on a subconscious level I could see how my masculine energy would match their feminine energy and how a man could like them.

if we’re talking between conscious and subconscious decisions, possibly that could be you matching her energy as much as you matching yours but it’s totally in appropriate considering she’s married and it’s not something as a boundary either of you should be enmeshing yourselves with. She sounds like a good friend and you have to be able to decide to keep it as a friendship level of energy and deny those feelings and let her follow that example. No one can fully say who is sending that energy to eachother and honestly blame is out of the question anyway in order to remain respectful of eachother. I don’t classify my sexuality in any way but as an impulse and have happened to follow my way into the marriage that I’m in now. I wish I could goce you better reasoning and judgment on this, but I want to be respectful of your journey in life as well. If it becomes too difficult to remain friends for that reason it may be best to not be close friends and keep the boundary line respected and not be involved other than on a surface level.

teacher/therapist lines shouldn’t be crossed in that fashion. There’s laws revolving around it because it’s that confusing for individuals. You being the victim in that circumstance. Remove the blame from it in order to keep your head on straight and process those thoughts and emotions. That’s probably the best advice I can give you.

 

[KimChiRx]

I would never try to go beyond it. But I do sometimes consider confessing to her when I get overwhelmed. Like, some mornings if I'm expecting her to come into the shop and she doesn't, or is later than usual, then every time I see a person moving past the window in my peripheral vision, im flipping my head to see if its her. And getting disappointed every time it isn't. And then I think Jesus Christ I cant keep going on like this, its absolutely pathetic. So I have considered telling her in the hope it will scare her off and stop her coming in and talking to me and therefore resolve my problem.

The scary part is if it doesn’t. I think that’s my biggest concern for you and for her and her marriage.

 

[Matty]

Yes and that is exactly why I would never mention any of this directly to her or try anything, I hope that's not the impression I gave. If this happened to me a year ago I highly doubt I would even have the inclination to post about it. However, over the past 9 months Ive had 2 incidents of people saying they have feelings for me. Both of these people were 'straight' women in long term relationships with men. The first one I had an inkling about, but the second one took me completely by surprise as I never would have thought in a million years they would be remotely interested in any woman, let alone me. So admittedly these events may have impacted my perception of this situation and I suppose my perception of womens sexuality in general, which I previously believed to be very black and white. I am like 95% sure the person in question is not interested, but I just mean that my recent experiences probably made me have a different outlook on the situation and possible explanations, than what it would have been a year ago.

When I said, she's married, I wasn't making a comment about her probable sexual orientation. She's in a commited exclusive relationship. It's my attitude that if someone has made a commitment, it should be respected. That means no undermining it.

 

[thbxhs]

When I said, she's married, I wasn't making a comment about her probable sexual orientation. She's in a commited exclusive relationship. It's my attitude that if someone has made a commitment, it should be respected. That means no undermining it.

Ok, so when you are feeling that anxious longing feeling waiting for her to appear, I want you to try something. It isn’t going to make it go away completely, but it helps. Eat a banana With a sprinkling of brown dots on the peel, or drink/ingest Matcha tea. There is a substance in both that upregulates dopamine. The feeling of ache and craving you have is caused by dopamine fluctuations. It is why you have it, that sense of craving drives motivated behaviors. By supplementing your natural brain chemical you can mitigate the worst of the gut twisting ache. You may consider an L-Theanine supplement- that is one thing in Matcha that provides the feeling of “calm alert”. It does not erase the whole feeling but it fills the sharper edges to it.

Despite the advice and what we are all saying- I think we all know how difficult and painful it is to have the feelings you feel right now. It can be overwhelming to care and want so much. I hope you understand that at least some of us know where you are in this. It sucks. Try to help your brain ease down from the dopamine twist. It’s a bitch.

 

[yjn45]

QMTA what do you think her reaction would be if I admitted this to her but made it clear Im not trying to get with her? Would it completely scare her off or would she try to mediate it and salvage a friendship? I honestly think the former would be preferable atm because the 'friendship' is starting to drain me...

What do you mean it's draining you? Do you mean like what you're going through/feeling is draining you?