Dear Nurse Ansalong:
I know this is going to make me sound horribly slutty but here goes anyway. I'm good friends with this girl who's lately fallen into a depression because she's not in a relationship and all her other friends are. Without even meaning to, I found myself using her vulnerabilities, flirting with her, cuddling with her, kissing her etc. etc. etc. ...Essentially using her for some eventual chance of sex. I realized that I didn't like her "that way" though and vowed to stop. But now she's gotten the wrong idea (although I can't say I blame her) and is flirting back and stuff. However the more she flirts back the more I'm starting to get sick of her, to the point of not wanting to be her friend anymore. I don't know what to do, and I'm too shy to confront her and just say "Hey, I tried to use you for sex but had an attack of conscience, sorry." Wow, this sounds slutty AND juvenile. I'm 16, by the way.
-Caroline
Caroline, it's good to hear you say that you decided to stop what you were doing due to a crisis of conscience and not because you just got bored or something like that. What you did was very unfair to this person that was in a fragile emotional state to begin with and you used that state to try to get her into bed with you.
So, I do believe that it is time for you to suck it up and tell her the truth. For you to let this continue in any way is the same as if you were still openly flirting with her. She needs to know that you aren't interested in her in that way. Since you were the one that started this whole thing, you have to be the one to end it.
If it will make it easier on both of you, you can leave out the part about the fact that you were just using her for the possibility of sex. Just tell her that you don't feel the same way towards her anymore and talk with her about this. If she is still at a delicate emotional state, try to be as gentle as you can. It would not do any good for you to emotionally slap her around after what you've started.
You might think that you are too shy to do this but this is exactly what you need to do. This little charade has gone on for too long and you need to stop it before anyone else gets hurt.
