[INFJ] INFJ male doesn't want to be friends anymore and ignored messages. What should I do?

Hi all, I'll try to be as concise and unbiased as possible but there's a lot I'm a female ISFJ who really needs advice and has exhausted all other options of opinions from my closest friends and my mother.

This is about the same INFJ guy who is in the same university friendship group as I am that I posted a thread about 2 months ago. We had a very warm friendship that I considered very close especially in the last 3 months of last year, particularly as I did notice him sharing more things with me and another male friend who is an INFP (but more with me when we were alone). Around this time he would sometimes engage in behaviour most people would consider flirting and "boyfriend-like" but I always dismissed it as his quirky personality and due to him being younger (by 2.5 years) and went to an all boys' school (and thus not being as aware of boundaries between male and female friends).

I had feelings for him but wasn't sure if he did so I would be very indirect and would respond lukewarm or sarcastically when he was saying "flirtatious" things. I should mention that after everything that's happened, I have no intent on pursuing anything with him or being that close with him again, but I am hoping that we can be friends, which I think he no longer wants to be at the moment.


The trouble started when I casually mentioned a female coworker as "the coworker I like" in our group chat who I thought he would know I was talking about as I told him various times that she was the only coworker I liked working with. He messaged me privately and asked "he or she? the coworker?" and I said "she" and while I found it strange to ask me that question, I decided not to ask. He proceeded to be cold and distant towards me in the group chat for about a week.

This pattern of him asking about a male friend or coworker then being a little distant would continue for another few weeks until the end of last month. After that he was distant for a few weeks until we started talking again in our group chats before he went overseas last week. Some of the times he became distant would be when we had disagreements about small things in the smaller group chat with INFP male (who would agree with me most of the time). He would then suddenly initiate conversation with me whenever I told the group I was going out and things would be fine for a short time.

A few weeks ago, he started making sarcastic remarks in a different tone than he usually does with regards to things that I said or did that he didn't approve of (such as oversharing or extreme humour). I was hurt each time and responded with jokes or ignored the remarks because I didn't want to believe that was his intent.

Everyone so far has told me that even though I've made mistakes (I've apologised as sincerely as I could and I know that doesn't immediately absolve me of blame). I felt really hurt not because of what he said and did recently, but by what I so far interpret as his intentions were behind them.

I already asked two close INFJ females (to see their point of view on what I did - he doesn't approve of me sharing any inside jokes I've had with others to him or anyone which was his main point) and they agreed while it was something they consider quite hurtful, his response was extreme, particularly for someone who never voiced it directly to me as a serious concern to him.

I wanted to initially ignore him but felt it was unfair to say anything so I foolishly and impulsively messaged him several days after my apology which was a few days after our initial conversation instead of waiting until he came back from overseas as I initially intended.

He was very angry (understandably) and at the end of our conversation about what I had to say when I asked if he felt we could still be good friends and understood if he didn't, he said "I'm not the type to force friendships to work but we are not on bad terms and that is all that matters to me."

What we talked about was that I felt hurt by what I perceived to be his intentions in the words he said to me. After reacting to his message on facebook, 40 mins later I sent him "Thank you for listening to me. I am glad we are not on bad terms and I'll see you around ". But I noticed the icon saying it was sent but not delivered so I assume he has clicked "ignore messages" on Facebook.

Uni starts again in about 3 weeks. We have classes nearly everyday and our breaks together tend to be long so I'll feel very awkward and uncomfortable knowing if he has any resentment towards me. I'm wondering if anyone thinks it's possible for an INFJ male in this situation to be willing to be friends with me again, especially after he has chosen to ignore my messages. I know he has done it to avoid a situation where I might send more messages while he's overseas but I'm not sure if he's going to try to make that a permanent thing. How should I approach this other than my original approach to have given him distance?

Thanks in advance for your advice/opinions, I really appreciate them!

 

HAHAHA that's fair, thanks for taking the time to read all my rambling :'D My friends think it's because I liked him but I also generally care this much about a lot of people that I've been close to which I think is a flaw since it always hurts so much e.e

I talked to some of my close friends and I intend on not talking to him again other than greetings if I have to unless he does, but only out of politeness and because I don't want to sink to his level of pettiness. I made sure my last response to him showed that I want to be the bigger person and that he was not worth being angry at in return.

The last time he sent the same message again to our group chat a few hours after our discussion, he's now "un-ignored" messages from me (or at least temporarily) because I saw my message was delivered (he was also active in the group chat before when my message didn't get delivered which is how I knew). So would see a preview of my last response to him and I'm not sure whether his intent to unblock my messages was to see if I sent him anything or he wanted to make sure I could see the group messages he was sending again about "recruiting" more people into his tutorial rather than mine (in that case he is no longer worth even allowing him to reconnect).

I thought he could be petty towards others who have upset him greatly before but I didn't know he could be this petty, but at least I know now and have decided that's too much for me to accept. Even if he wants to reconnect later I'll keep it shallow for the sake of harmony.

I really wanted to be on good terms again because we have 2 more years of our degree left with almost daily classes and the same group of friends but I realise I just made things worse because I didn't want to live a lie which I still have to live now anyways. I also tried so hard because he also used to be a really good friend until he started acting strange (ie suddenly making comments about how I live my life) which made me alter my behaviour because I was trying to figure out why because his behaviour had changed.

I just don't know how to interact with him at uni around my group if he still harbors resentment since only male INFP knows and I'm not sure how petty he is in person where he would give me dirty looks or actively avoid me. I plan on staying away from the group for at least a few weeks since I have things to do before I can feel comfortable being in his presence.

 

Hi again Lady Jolanda! It's good to see you around again ^_^ I should have gone with my original plan to ignore him at uni after my apology until he approached me again like I did the first time (which worked). I think I expected too much where I hoped he would be mature if I was more upfront about a serious issue and thought he saw the friendship as importantly as I did, but I was wrong unfortunately

What I hoped was that we could just be friends as we were before because I appreciated his friendship and we were the closest to each other in the group since he told me things I don't think the others know about. I also wanted to clear up misunderstandings so that we could feel comfortable around each other again and that I wouldn't feel the need to restrain myself from being around my other friends when he's around.

However, I did make things worse and I'm not sure if they will resolve where he won't act strange (I've seen how he acts towards people he dislikes/feels uncomfortable around) and make me feel uncomfortable in front of the others. So that's basically my main concern now D:

 

He said "not bad terms" but I've seen how he acts or thinks about people who he doesn't think highly of and him clicking "ignore" on my messages then unignoring (my message wasn't delivered even though he was active until a few hours later) before sending more messages to the group chat that he was "recruiting" more of our group out from my tutorial that I can't move out of into his (I don't see why else he would do that other than to report to me for some unknown purpose I don't understand).

I'm overthinking because he made the conscious effort to go like quotes on instagram right after our conversation ended such as "sometimes removing some people from your life makes room for better people." and "energy is my first language. I understand it more than I do words. You might as well be who you really are because your vibe is going to tell me the truth anyways.". That was around the same time I sent a message thanking him for listening and that I still meant my apology even though I told him why I felt he hurt me with what I interpreted as his passive-aggressive sarcasm being used to bring up issues he had with me.

In that conversation, he said he was sorry if I felt that way and that he isn't perfect with how he deals with situations yet then went on to say my humour was still unacceptable in many situations (which I told him I agreed on).

I no longer expect us to be friends but his actions right after that conversation make me question whether he really believes we are "not on bad terms" is what I'm trying to say?

 

I'll try to, we used to greet each other and sit together a lot and I feel like he will try to avoid me so I will have to try to avoid him in a way without it becoming too obvious to our group. That's true, he will act how he wants to act and I'll just have to try to take cues from it. And I'll just accept his response as a sign of whatever he actually feels.

Thanks a lot for your input ^_^

 

Me too, I hope so ^_^

 

That's what I thought had happened which is why I posted here to see if I wasn't just being paranoid. I have a few things I was hurt by because of him but I decided to let them go after telling him because I wanted to cut him some slack since I'm older.

It's also because to me, I valued having him in my life more than continuing to be mad at him for that after I've told him. Both of us have never been in a relationship before and I'm completely clueless unless people are really obvious and outright tell me.

I've been thinking about why recently and I think it's because even when I suspect something, I don't trust my intuition and try go to by what I see as more "tangible" (obvious) signs. This is especially because for a long time, I believed that I wasn't really the type guys like him or even most guys would go for? He also referred to me as "friend" a lot as well, even in that initial message he sent me about our "compatibility".

In any case, I'm not sure if that's the sole reason someone would door slam another though so I hope that's not that case

 

Haha, I sort of agree, my self esteem/self worth was a little crushed from the experience, since I began to doubt everything about myself and wondered if it was solely my fault among other things. I think if I hadn't overestimated his level of maturity and had immediately confronted addressed his specific questions or statements as he made them (such as asking what he means rather than trying to interpret it in a more platonic way), perhaps it wouldn't have gotten this bad.

I think in this case he may have wanted me to chase him/initiate if I was to read his messages from that perspective. Not long before his strange behaviour started, we had a conversation about crushes and he said not all guys feel comfortable initiating and I wasn't sure if he was just talking about it as if we were two friends telling each other opinions or if he was trying to tell me.

Although maybe it was a good thing that I didn't, since it really does seem like we have some incompatibilities that wouldn't work in a relationship (I like to discuss (only if they're major or recurring) issues openly to solve them because I've learnt from past experiences it solves problems faster, while he prefers to not voice anything but expresses it in a very indirect way).

My friends have questioned why I would even want to accept him back into my circle after this and while it's mainly because we have to spend time with the same group nearly everyday for the next 2 years until we graduate, it's also because if he only tried to change me because he was considering me a potential partner (since he didn't expect the same from our other friend), then as long as he no longer does in future, we can be friends like before things became murky, since we had a really good friendship prior.