Quotes in relation to ‘mayor of the friend zone’: feeling overlooked in romantic relationships
| Adolescence and young adulthood: aged 11–21 | |
| Mayor of the friend zone—male perspective/low self-esteem | I had pretty low sort of sexual self-esteem all the way through my teenage years. I was very definitely kind of mayor of the friend zone. I’d become very good friends with all of these very beautiful girls […] I sort of really struggled with forming relationships. (P02 male) |
| Mayor of the friend zone—female perspective | I was quite boy mad actually when I think back. I just didn’t have a lot of boyfriends. They all liked me, but just not that way. I was a bit of a clown really. I was one of the lads. (P14 female) |
| Lack of confidence | More lack of romantic relationships at the time. I mean when I was younger I probably had at school, I had one girlfriend and that was it. Maybe that was a consequence of it [SRS], potentially getting back to that confidence aspect as well probably did have an effect, no it definitely probably did have an effect at the time I would say, probably right up until or through till university. (P05 male) |
| Difficulties were over and above peer’s difficulties | I remember when I was 13 I liked someone at school, I asked her out every month for a year and she kept on turning me down. It was then I was aware that I was different ‘cause other people were in relationships and I wasn’t. It became quite an important thing […] I think I felt sorry for myself. Not having a relationship. I didn’t have many later on in life. (P08 male) |
| Lack of height and muscle/falling short of ‘masculine ideal’ | Even at that age [I felt] like the football players or the taller blokes or stronger perhaps did better with girls than those who were perhaps shorter or fatter. I didn’t actually have any relationships that I considered to be mature until I actually went to university anyway. (P07 male) |
| Adulthood: >21 | |
| Lack of height and muscle/falling short of ‘masculine ideal’ | Because of my height, I guess most girls are looking for guys who’re a bit taller. And my lack of muscle. Girls are looking for guys that have got a bit more muscle. Not every girl. But generally, if you take a hundred random women, how many of them, if you stick in a guy […] six feet tall with average build, and you take me, you’d be lucky if one of them picks me over the other […] and that’s just reality. (P03 male) |
| Feeling substandard—male perspective | The late 20s phase with the relationships I think I probably saw myself as being worse, as being sub-standard, being less of man in a traditional sense and also kind of being in an environment where the idea of what a man was was quite narrowly defined as being kind of you know big and muscular and sort of hairy. (P02 male) |
| Feeling substandard—female perspective/falling short of ‘feminine ideal’ | I think if I met someone, with me being my height and having my joint problems, it would take somebody special anyway, because I’m not the tall leggy blonde with blue eyes that a lot of men would want. So, it would take somebody with a special heart anyway to be with somebody who is physically unusual. (P12 female) |
SRS, Silver-Russell syndrome.