Is my professor attracted to me or am I over-analyzing things?

[Anonymous]

I'm going to try to make this as short as possible. I am a college student, and I am sexually-attracted to my college professor. I think the feeling may be mutual between us but I am still not sure because his behavior throws me off sometimes. He and I joke around and talk a lot in class and he likes to pick on me/tease me (I guess I am his favorite to pick on in class - even though he never picks on anyone else). I have caught him staring at my legs and breasts a few times - and he quickly looks away when I catch him staring. Every time I enter the class, he immediately stops what he is doing just to stare at me (almost as though he is waiting for something to happen or waiting for me to say something to him) and even once he interrupted a student that he was conversing with just to say "Good Morning" to me, and as I was saying "Good Morning" back he started staring at my body and he said "Mmmmmmm" to himself. Just recently, he spent about 2/3rds of the class time with me helping me figure out some problems with our work, and we spent some of that time joking around as well... and as we were debating some things, he called me "babe". He said "But babe, look...".

I am hoping he did not call me "babe" on accident or out of habit from being used to calling someone else "babe".

However, what throws me off about his behavior is that sometimes he doesn't notice me and sometimes can go an entire day or two without even looking or talking to me.

Am I over-analyzing his behavior? Or do I have enough evidence to allow myself to believe he is attracted to me as well?

Oh, and he isn't married or in a relationship.

[UnderDriven]

I would call it "hopeful thinking" rather than "over analyzing." Maybe it is even true, but there is some risk for him--it is considered unprofessional for a teacher to get involved with a student. Not that it doesn't happen, of course. You could go to any university and find several professors who married their students. But even though the initial attraction may have happened in the context of a teacher/student relationship, it would be very dangerous for a teacher to become involved with a student while she was taking his class. Also, a professor may be able to get away with it once if he ends up marrying the girl, but if it happens several times he might be disciplined (if he has tenure it is difficult to fire him, but it is easy to make his life so miserable he would go elsewhere). The point is that you don't know if he has done this sort of thing before, and how much trouble he might get in because of it if it became public knowledge. The fact that he actually called you "babe" in class is very hard to believe. It may have just been a slip of the tongue, but that is the sort of thing which starts rumors--and rumors are what gets professors in trouble. The last thing a college wants is to have a professor "preying" on his/her students. Parents send their children to college to get an education, not to get romanced by the professors...

[AmongTheApples]

He'll never go for it, at least, not while you're his student and maybe not until you graduate or transfer. I was a TA in college and had a hard enough time around students that liked me and hit on me, so I can't imagine how much worse it'd have been if I was an actual instructor.

[Anonymous]

i think he's attracted to you but he has an inner struggle not to let it show ut the he can't help it.

[Anonymous]

But he is your teacher and I believe having a relationship with him could potentially get him fired.

[HYPNOSEX]

If you get wet looking at him, stop fantasizing about him, leave him alone, he might be married.