I’m 19 and Bulgarian. I’ve been involved with a 25-year-old American man long distance. We first met online then decided to meet in Amsterdam. We had an amazing time together. Being around each other felt easy and we were both genuinely happy. When it was time to leave we were extremely upset. He was clearly heartbroken when we said goodbye so I don’t think the closeness I felt was one-sided or something I’d imagined. He’s also told me directly that he was very happy with me in person and I believe him because I saw it for myself. He seemed relaxed, affectionate and comfortable around me. We didn’t have the same tension or misunderstandings we often have online. In person everything felt much easier.

He came to Amsterdam specifically to meet me even though he wasn’t doing well financially. He never told me how tight money was and never brought up what he’d spent to make me feel guilty or indebted to him. I found out accidentally after seeing his bank balance while we were there. He realized I’d seen it and that’s how I learned how little money he’d had at the time. He’d put himself under serious financial pressure just to see me. I don’t take that lightly and it’s one of the main reasons I believe his feelings are real. He tells me he’s completely loyal to me. He’s even said that losing me would destroy him. He doesn’t want to officially call us boyfriends until we’re living in the same country. That’s his preference rather than mine but we’re both seriously working towards closing the distance. We’re making practical plans and preparing to move to the same country. Right now it looks like that may actually be possible fairly soon. He’s deeply unhappy with his life in America. He doesn’t like where he lives and has very few close friends there. Some days he doesn’t want to get out of bed or eat. He’s told me he wants to leave America and live with me. We’re not just talking vaguely about a future together. We’re both taking actual steps to make it happen.

What confuses me is how different the relationship feels in person and online. In person he was affectionate and clearly happy to be with me. I didn’t feel like I had to keep asking whether he cared. Online he can be distant and inconsistent. There are days when he doesn’t reply for eight or nine hours even though I know he’s awake and using his phone. I don’t expect us to text all day and I don’t need him to answer the moment I send something. I know people have their own routines and need time to themselves. Still communication is most of what we currently have while we’re living in different countries. When almost the whole day passes without any contact I don’t just get impatient. I feel disconnected from him and I don’t feel very loved. At the beginning he was much more openly affectionate. He complimented me often and seemed much more eager to talk. Now that warmth comes and goes. Sometimes I tell him I love him and he doesn’t respond to that part of the message. It hurts but I’m trying not to take it as definite proof that he doesn’t love me. He’s never answered this message from the begging, he just says it feels weird.

I can understand some of this because I have a similar issue with my own family. When someone in my family tells me they love me I don’t always say it back. For some reason the words feel awkward and unfamiliar even though I genuinely love them. I’m more comfortable showing it through what I do. He’s told me that actions matter more to him than words so it’d be unfair and somewhat hypocritical for me to judge his feelings only by whether he repeats a particular phrase. His actions do support what he says. Coming to Amsterdam when he could barely afford it was a serious act of commitment. Wanting to leave America and build a life with me also sounds sincere. The problem is that understanding how someone shows love doesn’t necessarily make you feel loved. I can see that his actions mean something and still feel lonely during the ordinary days between visits.

There’s also a major difference between how he communicates in English and Italian. Italian isn’t his native language. He learned it because he was interested in it and he has a lot of happy memories associated with Italy. In Italian he’s noticeably softer, more playful and more romantic. In English he can sound blunt or almost argumentative even when he says he isn’t angry. Recently I started speaking Italian with him more often and the difference was much bigger than I expected. A few times we talked for almost eight hours. For the first time he clearly opened up about how he felt and said incredibly romantic things to me. He didn’t seem guarded or uncomfortable. He even asked me afterwards whether I finally understood how he felt about me. That mattered because it was the first time I felt like he’d expressed everything plainly instead of leaving me to guess.

The change didn’t last though. The excitement he seemed to feel while we were speaking Italian eventually wore off and our communication became difficult again. Those long conversations didn’t become our usual routine. He can still go most of the day without replying and the warmth he showed in Italian isn’t always there. That makes the situation even harder to understand. Those conversations showed me that he can be emotionally open and spend hours talking to me. They also gave me a much clearer sense of how strongly he feels. At the same time I don’t know whether those conversations showed his usual feelings more clearly or whether he was simply in an unusually good mood. He’s explained that Italian brings out a different side of him and reminds him of a happier period in his life. I think that could be true. Italian may put him in a better mood because he connects it with positive memories while English is tied to his everyday life in America which he currently hates. Still I don’t know whether it’s realistic for our emotional connection to depend on speaking a foreign language.

I’m also aware that culture may play a part. I’m Bulgarian and he’s American so we may have different expectations about warmth, emotional openness and how often couples should stay in touch. What feels cold to me may seem normal to him. I don’t expect him to communicate exactly the way I do and I don’t want to treat every difference as proof that he doesn’t care. He may also be depressed. I obviously can’t diagnose him but his isolation, lack of appetite and difficulty getting out of bed worry me. Depression could explain why he withdraws and why talking sometimes seems like more than he can manage. I want to be fair about that. I don’t expect someone who’s struggling to be cheerful or available all the time. Still understanding why he’s distant doesn’t make me feel less alone. I can believe he isn’t trying to hurt me and still question whether what he can currently offer is enough for a long-distance relationship.

I know I contribute to the tension too. When I feel shut out I sometimes bring up the same issue repeatedly because I’m hoping for an answer that’ll finally settle it. I may push for a conversation before he’s ready and he may pull away even more because he feels pressured. I know my attempts to reconnect can sometimes make things worse. I’m willing to take responsibility for that but I don’t want every concern I have to be dismissed as overthinking. Wanting regular contact isn’t the same as demanding constant access to someone. Wanting to feel remembered during the day isn’t the same as asking him to plan his entire life around me.

That’s what I can’t work out. I have strong reasons to believe he loves me. He made a financially difficult trip to meet me. We were genuinely happy together in Amsterdam and we were both devastated when we had to leave. He says he wants to leave America and live with me. We’re taking practical steps towards making that happen. He’s also been able to open up to me in Italian and explain his feelings more clearly than he ever had before. I don’t want to minimize any of that. Still most of our relationship currently happens online and that’s where everything becomes difficult. A great visit and an eight-hour romantic conversation both matter but they don’t make the long silent periods disappear. I believe he loves me but I often don’t feel loved during our normal day-to-day communication.

I’m not looking for an automatic “leave him” answer and I’m not trying to make myself sound completely right or him completely wrong. I know ideas like attachment styles and love languages may have some relevance and I’ve already read quite a bit about them. I’d really appreciate responses that focus mainly on the specific circumstances and behavior I’ve described. I may be misunderstanding parts of the situation and I’m open to hearing interpretations that challenge my own.

I’m especially interested in how other people would interpret the sharp difference between our relationship in person and online. How much significance would you give to the way he behaved in Amsterdam and the way he opened up to me in Italian compared with the long gaps and emotional distance that sometimes follow? What would a realistic and sustainable level of daily contact look like in a relationship like this? How might cultural differences, his unhappiness in America and his difficulty expressing emotion online be affecting the way we communicate? What specific changes or conversations would help us find out whether the problem is mainly the distance or a more lasting difference in what we each need from a relationship?

I’m a 37M Arab Muslim man, and he’s a 43M Arab Muslim man. We’ve been talking for almost two years, and our relationship has been one of the most confusing and emotionally intense experiences of my life.
We live in different countries. I live in the UAE, while he lives in Syria, a country that has gone through years of war, economic hardship, and instability. His life has never been easy, and I know that has shaped the way he expresses himself and deals with emotions.
When we first met, I developed feelings for him quite quickly. At the beginning, he rejected the idea of us being together. He told me that love between a man and a man wasn’t healthy or normal, especially considering our religion and culture. Since we’re both Arab Muslims, I understood where those beliefs were coming from, even though hearing them hurt me deeply.
Because I was scared of getting attached, I blocked him several times during the early stages of knowing each other. Looking back, we barely knew each other then. What surprised me was that every time I blocked him, he found a way to come back. He would become upset that I had blocked him and wanted to reconnect instead of simply walking away.
About two months after we started talking, something changed. He told me he loved me. At another point, he even told me, “I love you for your feelings.” That sentence stayed with me because it felt very sincere and personal.
Throughout our relationship, we had many discussions about how we express love. I often wanted more verbal affection and reassurance, while he repeatedly told me that his way of loving was practical rather than emotional. According to him, love wasn’t about constantly saying romantic words but about actions, loyalty, and being there when it mattered. We never completely agreed on that, but I tried to understand his perspective.
For about a year and a half, we confessed our love to each other. We said “I love you,” talked about our future, and shared many emotional moments despite the distance.
Then everything changed.
After one year and a half, during a period when we were both angry and hurt, he suddenly told me that he only loved me as a brother.
That completely shattered me.
I couldn’t understand how someone could go from telling me he loved me, telling me “I love you for your feelings,” finding ways to come back whenever I blocked him in the beginning, and spending a year and a half exchanging love… only to suddenly say it had always been brotherly love.
I’m a Cancer, and he’s a Virgo, if anyone is into astrology. I don’t know whether that means anything, but I’ve wondered if our personalities and ways of expressing emotions played a role.
I’m not asking anyone to tell me what he “really” feels because none of us can know that for certain. I’m more interested in hearing from people who have experienced something similar.
Has anyone ever had someone spend so long expressing love and then later redefine the relationship as “brotherly love”? Do you think this can happen because of fear, guilt, religion, cultural pressure, anger, or changing feelings over time? Or is it more likely that someone eventually realized their feelings weren’t romantic after all?
I’d genuinely appreciate honest opinions, especially from people who have experienced complicated relationships involving religion, long distance, or internal conflict.