NC for my sanity...

[surrender]

I didn't want NC but I was losing my mind... I'll make this as short as possible so hang in there and read it. I need the feedback and the truth. We met a year ago through a mutual group of friends. We started going out "as friends"...never with other people, just the two of us. After no more than a month he was calling daily, sometimes two or three times and texting consistently. Heavy flirting, wanted me to meet his family, his child (divorced for over 10 years), spend every weekend together. We talked about everything...very open and honest with each other. After about three months we had the "what are we, what are we doing" conversation to which he said we could only be friends. I made it clear that I wanted more than that. He said he had put me in the friend zone and wanted things EXACTLY the way they were. He said it would "bother" him to see me with someone else but that if that's what ended up happening then it was meant to be. Mean while...all behavior stayed the same. Every weekend together...just the two of us...talked even more on the phone...texted constantly. I was thinking all the while that he would eventually realize what he had in me. Well...I realized by month 12 that the realization of what he had in me wasn't dawning on him. He honestly liked things exactly the way they were. Said I was his best friend in the world. We never had ANY kind of physical relationship beyond a hug...literally never. I protested this as well. After talking about it again I told him I just couldn't handle a friendship with him. That I wanted more and was unable to deal emotionally with the way he wanted things to stay. I have stuck with it. He has broken contact once saying that he "thought we could be friends" and I said we could not...that I basically felt that I was going through a breakup and needed to heal. To which he said he loved me and would be there for me if I ever needed him. I would be lying if I didn't hope that no contact would cause him to notice what he's lost but typically no contact is started by the dumpee not the dumper. I am the one that ended the relationship and told him to please not contact me again. Part of me desperately wants to heal and move ON. Part of me is sick to my stomach that he is seemingly just fine without me in his life. My question is this...is no contact effective in taking your dignity back after you've made yourself so vulnerable? I put it all on the line months ago in the hopes he would wake up and it just didn't happen. I truly can't handle just being his "friend"...it hurts too much. Its a daily reminder of all that he doesn't want with me. Thoughts?