I am confused about what men classify as 'love or 'being in love'.

I did write an article about this sort of thing a few years ago, it's still there in my old site archive: http://www.seducemen.co.uk/i%20love%20you.htm

I will tell you about a recent relationship to give you an idea what I mean.  I moved into a flatshare with a few people, including a guy I had known as an acquaintance for years and had always felt there was an attraction between us.  I will call him James.  After I moved in to the flat James and I really  clicked.  We seemed to have similar views and a similar sense of humour and we had fun together. We were always flirting with each other a great deal too.  He didn't make a move for a few months as I had a boyfriend who was his friend, but one night after a few too many drinks he told me that he liked me and kissed me.  After that he seemed to become obsessed with me, he would stare at me longingly across the room and as soon as we were alone together he would grab me and kiss me passionately.  He told me he couldn't sleep for thinking about me and wanting me so badly.  Whenever I left the flat he would follow me and come after me so that we could spend a few moments alone together.  Sometimes we ended up lying in bed together just kissing for ages and he didn't try to have sex with me.  After this kind of thing had gone on for a few weeks I took the initiative and we had sex.  This didn't seem to curb his passion and he was still eager to be alone with me at every opportunity. He told me that I was special and that he wanted me and missed me like crazy when we were apart.  I overheard him telling his friend about me over the phone and saying that I was so hot he couldn't keep his hands off me.  Well we continued to have sex and also had a great time together when we weren't having sex and I was really falling for him.   I continued to go out with my boyfriend as I really liked him too and was confused.  But after I had been sleeping with James for about 4 months I decided to break up with my boyfriend.  When I told James my decision I was absolutely gutted when he told me that I mustn't break up with my boyfriend on his account as he was not in love with me!

I really don't get it - if he loved having sex with me so much and enjoyed being with me when we weren't having sex and missed me when we were apart... why didn't he feel that he was in love with me?

It's not something I'm going to enjoy explaining to you but I think I'm probably right in my explanation.  From what you have said, he isn't using you just for sex, he is using you for much more than that.  If he really loved you and really fancied a long term relationship with you, he would want you to give up your partner.  In this case he doesn't, he wants you to stay with your partner.  

The thing that turns this away from using you for sex is the fact that he actually slept with you a few times without having sex and he seems very passionate towards you and really sounds as those he has some emotional attachment to you and wants to be with you.  There must be some reason for that. 

I believe the reason is, he's never had a woman or has had few women for sex or even companionship.  Laying in bed with a woman, when you haven't experienced that before gives a really good buzz to a bloke, it's just so intimate, it demonstrates a woman trusts you and demonstrates that a woman like you enough to trusts you.  You come along and you give him the chance to have that companionship and experience.  He absolutely loves the fact that he can intimately sleep in bed with you, kiss you, have fun with you and have sex with you.  Whilst you are with your partner, he is getting his buzz of doing all those things with you, without having to commit to you long term.  Now you have split with your partner, he is now worried because it threatens that status and you now might want to push your relationship with him further, maybe buying a house, getting engaged and sharing bills.

You make him feel overwhelmingly good, you have given him practise with women in bed, pratise of having a relationship and made him feel wanted.  It's hard to believe he hasn't fallen in love with you as a result of all this.  After all, it sounds as though you have made him very happy and boosted his self confidence. 

And that seems to be all he sees in your relationship, he is using you for that feel good factor, the experience and the sex.  He's enjoying life like that so why change it.  You sound like his ideal kind of woman, yet for some reason he still wants you to be with your partner, that completely says to me that he doesn't want a long term relationship yet, he is just in his experimental stage with women and you are one of those experiments.   He sees you as a very close friend, who he can have fun with and be intimate with and make him happy, but he doesn't want to push it into a long term relationship, which is hard to believe really.  I have known some of my male friends be like this, but I find it a very odd situation, because surely if you enjoy being with a woman so much, you would consider loving them and spending the rest of your life with them, 4 months is more than enough time to come to that conclusion.

If he stayed with you for a while then maybe he might be more convinced that you are a long term relationship prospect, but you may have frightened him now you have finished your partner.  He now needs to consider whether he takes his relationship with you into the more scarey stage of committment with you and because he's in the experimental stage in his life he might not be too keen on that.  

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