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age
26-29,
anonymous
writes: Sorry in advance or the long post. :) This has been going on all school year, and I just don't know what to do. Here's the story:After summer I got a new English teacher because my old one retired. He's fresh out of teacher's university, and he is a really good teacher. He's fun and teaches us in various ways so we don't get bored. English isn't my native language, but I've been learning it for almost six years so I should be pretty fluent. I've been the top of my class in English for last three years, (I don't mean to brag, but I know this for a fact) but recently I've been going through a rough time, so my grades are lowering, and he's noticed.I'll keep that part short because the question isn't about that, but here's why I was feeling bad. I've been bullied quite a lot, but not so much anymore, but it has caused me to have a pretty broken self-image. My dad just didn't want any contact with me and my sister whatsoever, but was always on the edges. A few months ago he was diagnosed with lung-cancer and is now squeezing himself back into our lifes. I was almost raped over a year ago and even though that guy didn't practically rape me, it was really hard on me. I've been cutting myself for almost a year, and the addiction has become so bad I do it almost every day, and since this is a small school, and apparently I can't trust some of my friends, almost everyone in 8th through 10th grade knows this, including some of the staff.So this teacher noticed my cuts and decided to ask me to stay behind after class and ask me about it. I just told him the truth, and it felt so relieving because I know I can trust this guy. We talked for more than an hour (his class was the last one that day), and I felt great afterwards. We kept talking a lot. Not just about my life, but about his, and our hobbies and just everything. I knew we were way past being a teacher/student, because we were telling each other dirty jokes and bitching about other school-staff and students. We even got coffee together once when we met randomly in town, and we had a great chat. It was like that until Christmas. We gave each other presents; I gave him a black tie with the Rolling Stones-tongue on the end,because he loves that band, and he gave me beautiful earrings and a deck of Pokemon cards (sort of an inside joke).After Christmas it has been fun, even better, but I'm developing a crush on him. We've been having these moments, like in the movies, the drum-role right before a kiss. We haven't kissed, but we have been flirting a little and we have stolen glances here and there.He really is a great guy and I like him so much. But even though I have feelings for him, and it's tearing me up inside, I can't act on them. Not only because I'm sixteen and he's 25, but because I can't risk him losing his job because I couldn't hold it together. I just like him so much, and he as helped me more than any psychologist has, and I trust him more than all of my friends my age. I have much higher self-esteem, but I'm afraid that if I try and keep away from him, he'll stop wanting to talk to me.What should I do?
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female
reader, Storm the Vampire  +, writes (20 February 2012):
Hey!
I think that you should continue to see him-but don't take it too far. Wait until you are 18 if you want to establish a romantic relationship with him. But don't ask him about it until then, you don't want to put him in an uncomfortable situation. While you are still a minor, don't try anything, just continue doing what you're doing.
I wish u luck. Hope it all works out.
Xx Storm the Vampire
A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (5 February 2012): I know this is a late reply to the question and all, but hunnie please stay away from this man. I had the same story as you exactly the same right down to the cutting thing and the bullying and close friends telling people. It hurts, he's there I get it, but my teacher groomed me and I've ended up more F**ked now then I was then. I still haven't really moved on BUT I've grown the hell up since then and realized what it was, he was doing and it makes me now feel sick. I want to march back up to school and point blank tell him, HEC tell everybody and make sure he never does it again. to anybody else.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (25 January 2012): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you so much for your responses and I thing you are right. I won't cross that line, but I can't avoid him! I care about him, and if friends are all we're ever gonna be,then so be it. I will just see where it goes and how he sees things. But again, thank you! :D
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A
female
reader, this_years_love +, writes (25 January 2012):
 DO NOT TELL HIM ABOUT THIS POST!
he will start to think if you're telling strangers on the internet about this crush and how you percieve the relationship, he'll think you've told others and he'll get freaked out and back away out of fear for losing his job.
Trust me, I had MANY high school teacher crushes that resulted from really friendly relationships like this, and all of those guys backed away as soon as I made my feelings obvious, even if I didn't straight up tell them!
I think it's important you have this guy in your life if you feel he's trustworthy and you can be open with him about yourself and your cutting. But as a friend, and as a mentor, not as a romantic interest. Trust me, I know you don't think you would now, but if he stepped over the line you'd lose respect for him. He'd seem like a different person and you'd question his character once it happened. I've been through that too, and it wasn't pretty.
When I was 15, 16, 17, and 18 I had crushes on teachers. When I was 15, I wrote one a letter telling him I trusted him which he took to my guidance counsellor who told me I was lucky it didn't end up in the principle's office or else my parents would've been called, and I never trusted him again. When I was 16, I had a teacher I was close with and who I'd talk to any moment I could at school and also online in the evenings and he was one of the few people in my life at that time I felt I could trust and who I felt cared about me for who I was. As soon as we flirted even just a little bit, it wasn't long before he was gone for good too and avoiding speaking to me completely. You'd think I'd have learnt by then, but no.
When I was 17 one of my teachers came over to my house and sat in the backyard all night with me talking. He had his arm around me but nothing more happened, thank God. The next week he pulled me aside and suggested I take a different class so 'we could be friends'. So I switched classes which meant he had absolutely no need to talk to me anymore and I was out of his life, no friendship to be found. This is when it gets REALLY important.
Then the next year, I had a close friendship with another of my teachers which lasted and remained within the boundaries all year--I knew not to push it now and although I had a crush on the guy we kept it at an appropriate friendship and he still managed to be there for me whenever I needed him. We'd buy eachother coffees and such too, but it was always at school and over lunch or something. Then on my graduation night, he told me he wasn't happy with his wife and child and wanted me. At 18 years old I had to tell a man almost 20 years my senior that he loved his family and only lusted after me, and he needed them more than me anyway.
We talked about it for a long time and I lost A LOT of respect for him and we don't speak anymore either. I went back to visit my high school to visit a couple years after graduating and he told me he was divorced and gave me his number and said we should hangout. We never did, infact now he avoids me completely. He's actually the only teacher who I don't make an effort to visit because I know he doesn't want to see me. The rest greet me with open arms and instead of having somebody who was a really great mentor and friend to me during a difficult time in my life there with a smile on his face too, he's nowhere to be seen.
It took me A LONG time to learn that these things just don't work out. Hopefully you can get out of this with a friend and somebody who you trust, but I assure you if you take it past a friendship, you will lose him, be it right off the bat or as soon as he realizes what's going on.
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A
male
reader, Hugh.J  +, writes (24 January 2012):
 I WOULD agree with every word, "AmHereToHelpYou", in normal circumstances, but this young lady is in need of help which is apparently unavailable anywhere else.
OP, I would recommend that you be totally open and honest with this teacher, maybe to the extent of showing him your post on here and any responses that you feel appropriate, and discuss how you could keep a professional relationship and still be friends.
But, as has already been said, DO NOT cross the line.
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