He doesn’t look at his relationship with you as one that has the potential to lead to bona fide romance.

If you have been talking to this guy for a year and a half and you are still not together, he has a different perspective.

He has said a lot of sweet words to you in the last year and a half that has made you feel that he cares about you romantically.

He has flirted with you on occasion or quite frequently.

You have been intimate with him multiple times.

He has introduced you to his family and friends.

True, it is easy to look at all of these acts and assume that your relationship with him is moving towards romance.

That being said, there are guys who can do all of this and still not want to be in a romantic relationship.

It is a lot easier for them to do all these things knowing that they don’t have to commit to you, than to do it knowing that they do.

For them, they get to exercise their freedom when they don’t commit.

Furthermore, they know that they get to act like a boyfriend and live that life without having that official label.

They get to have the best of both worlds.

They get to do what a boyfriend does, but they know that they can easily retreat without having to deal with fulfilling your emotional needs if that time comes.

Guys who act like this has had past relationship that left them hurt or fearful.

He is worried that if he were to fully commit to a girl, he is making himself vulnerable to being hurt once again.

If he was in a previous relationship with someone that he cared about who didn’t return his affection, he questions his value and his self-worth.

This takes a big toll on him over time.

More of a toll than he has ever acknowledged.

When he meets you, he hides the fact that he is terrified of commitment.

He tells himself that he isn’t, and convinces himself that what is in the past is in the past, and he has moved on.

He socializes with you.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t take long before he realizes that he isn’t healed.

He is emotionally scarred from his previous relationship experiences.

His realization of this terrifies him, but he doesn’t tell you about it.

He keeps convincing himself that he is going to change, but unfortunately he doesn’t.

A guy who won’t be with you after a year and a half is grappling with the negative effects of a past relationship.

He can’t get over his past.

A past that has him believing that he is bound to fail again if he were to get into a committed relationship, makes him play it safe in avoiding commitment altogether.