A little context… I am a 36-year-old quadriplegic who relies on 24-hour care, And I live in the US. My friend who lives in Ireland is 29 years old and able-bodied.

My friend and I have been talking for three years (Long distance texting and video chat). About a year ago, I admitted that I was getting strong feelings for him, And after he told me he only cared for me as a friend, I never brought it back up.

We have been planning to meet in person this whole last year, And finally have put together solid plans to meet in Paris in January (neutral ground, and someplace we both want to visit) (I will be traveling with my mother since she is my caregiver and my little sister who has down syndrome). Since our friends and family found out about our plans to meet up, They have teased us that it is meeting up for something "more", And he flat out asked me if I still have romantic feelings for him. And me, being me I can't lie so I admitted that I still had feelings for him, around the time of our first discussion of this type last year he got into a relationship shortly after and I admitted I was jealous but I was also dealing with the hurt of being rejected so my mind wasn't exactly clear. But those feelings only lasted for a month or so, and since then I've had no jealousy. I keep reiterating that our friendship is the most important thing to me because I'm never going to act on any other feelings because I already know how he feels. Since then he has been repeating that he doesn't feel comfortable having a friend having those feelings for him, And he feels like I lied to him this whole time.

I have been trying to explain my feelings are not sexual, And that I do not want that type of relationship with him (even though early this year/Late last year I had a couple of fleeting thoughts), And I honestly don't know how to explain my feelings. I spent the last week in the deepest depression of my life, Hardly eating and feeling completely numb to the thought of losing my friend.

My counselor said it may be a good idea to go ahead and meet in person and use that as a measuring stick of our friendship and comfort levels etc. But, my friend is still unsure.

I honestly wish I could go back and just lie and say no that I don't have feelings. All I want is for our friendship to move forward and put all of this in the past because none of these feelings mean anything to me besides our friendship.

Has anyone else been in anything similar? And if so, how did you go about it and how did it turn out?