I appreciate all of your insight. Thank you very much for taking the time to answer this for me.
I also thought I might go into some detail about the situation.
I am asking for advice before I give advice to my best friend. She is very much in love with this man. I do believe that he genuinely is also in love with her. There is a twist however that was unexpected and has changed the natural course of their relationship.
He is in his late 30's, very career oriented and has not been successful in a prior marriage. He was dating an (ESFJ?) prior to dating my friend. That relationship ended very badly as she was very manipulative and threatening. I was told they dated for a couple of years and it was a rollercoaster ride. As it was ending he met my friend.
My friend is very similar to him. She is an INTP. She is career oriented, a good mother and had been married previously.
They seemed a perfect match. They both felt they found their soulmate in life. Not rushing into anything...though marriage was brought up in future plans.
The twist- his ex calls to tell him she is pregnant.
Long story short. Painstakingly he returned to the ex to do the right thing by his child.
My friend was heartbroken, though she supported his decision. They have remained in touch though for the first year she pulled away to give him time to focus and see if that was what he truly wanted.
FAST FORWARD TO TODAY:
They have been in touch now again for about 6 months.
When he left my friend to return to the ex, he had drawn a very deep line in the sand. That all they could ever be is friends and he was 'in love' with the mother of his child.
Not only was his action so brisk and his words so cutting and just truly unbelievable, she was left wounded and befuddled. Though, to my friends credit she was so classy and told him that even if she didnt understand how his feelings could change so quickly that she admired and understood his commitment to his child and told him that her feelings went beyond the situation and though she walked away at the time (he has always been open to 'friendship' during this) she couldnt imagine her life without him in it.
BTW, they have not seen each other during all of this, all contact has been via email.
So, here is where we enter with the questions I first came to you regarding. The reason being that although she has attempted to move on, she is still very much in love with this man. She dates etc, though her mind is trying to move past him her heart will not let her. This is a very healthy individual and she is handling it very well. The problem is now their contact has changed and I see her struggling and regressing from where she had healed some.
From when she first had contact with him again it was again restated by him, almost defensively that although they had what they had reality had changed. He made sure to redefine that boundary. She agreed, as she is also a very correct person with conviction to God knowing that this relationship was a very fine line and that in loving him she had to respect his marriage. Also in respecting herself not becoming his emotional pacificer.
For several months their contact was all discussing mutual friends/news/politics etc. They share a lot of interests...so having enjoyed a lot of their relationship in doing those things it seems that is the course they took.
She has shown me the correspondence, I saw where there was a sudden change in him about two months ago.
It went from a very non-emotional (though there were times they touched on some personal issues and both telling each other how important the others happiness is to them etc) to a complete stop for a month. He had a family emergency come up and took leave from work to address it. He told her it involved his wife's parent passing away.
Upon return from that month it was like an entirely different person was on the other end of those emails.
This is where I am so afraid to tell her anything without being very sure of what I may think is going on. He has already hurt her so much, and honestly now I am looking at the situation and thinking he is very hurt also. At one time I was very, very angry with him. Now I am putting the entire picture together and thinking something completely different may have transpired.
Since his return, his email contact is more brief. No more politics/news and chit chat. It is very revealing. In these ways.
*He is referencing past emotional situations between the two of them.
*He is bringing up (though in a round about manner) intimate things that transpired
between them.
*He is referring to things as 'we'. For example; when we do this or that.....with future tense.
*He is asking her to do things on his behalf within the group they used to hang around with. Such as...tell so and so I said this.
*Suddenly he was challenging her and trying to play with her like the used to do (they played a lot) and he was pushing her to move in that direction.
*Telling her places he could be found, where he is at any given time and things he was doing (which all of that had been COMPLETELY shut off)
So, it all boils down to this. If he was with her, and open to her in the beginning and then the sudden change with the pregnancy shutting all of it down. I can't help but think something has had to change on his end to being opening in up again the way he is.
What I am so afraid of is giving her my opinion on this and being wrong. I do not want to encourge her opening herself back up to him. At this point she is very skeptical and still staying in the 'friend' mode with him.
I am to the point I think he did solely return to the ex out of duty to the situation and his accountablity to it. I think my friend is the love of his life. I just dont think he knew how to handle it. He reacted the way he thought was correctly.
So, that is the story. That is why I am asking for help. I do not want to hurt my friend. I do not want to encourage her to do anything that will damage her.
I am asking your advice and opinions. Thank you all again.