2 weeks before lockdown, I started dating someone I met through work. We went on a handful of dates & there was a lot of chemistry. He made a point of messaging me after each one to tell me he'd had a great time & we seemed to be on the same page about wanting something real rather than a fling. I initially had some concerns as I knew through a friend that he had only very recently broken up with his ex & I was very upfront in saying that I wasn't interested in being a rebound. He (very emphatically) told me he was ready for a relationship & had wanted to leave his prior relationship for months before he actually broke up with her & I (perhaps naively) accepted this.
The day before lockdown, we went on a day trip together and had a lovely time, so I was upset when I didn't really hear from him the week after. Against my better judgement, I messaged him first to find out he was and how he was coping with isolation (he lives with a lodger who isn't very friendly) but I found his answers quite perfunctory & I assumed he wasn't interested. However, after I reached out again (again, not in line with how I'd usually play it but he'd mentioned feeling ill & I thought under current circumstances it would be quite unkind to check he was ok) he began to be quite chatty and flirty and over the last 8 weeks we were chatting every day and seemed to be building towards something.
Last week he told me he'd been thinking about me a lot & wanted to pick things up from where we'd left off. I was really happy to hear that and we agreed to meet up in a park (obvs social distancing being observed) and have a picnic. It was going really well & was actually quite romantic until he let slip that his lodger wasn't quarantining with him. I said how sad it was that he was going through lockdown alone and then he confessed that he had invited his ex to stay at his during lockdown. After I probed further, he admitted that they had been intimate a number of times but he had asked her to leave because it was a toxic situation and he wanted to focus on me. I was really upset as I thought it was dishonest that he hadn't mentioned it & it made me feel that the relationship we'd been building in lockdown was tainted. He seemed to see that it was a bit shitty of him on one hand but said that as we hadn't had an official chat about exclusivity that he didn't think it was a big deal & the sex was meaningless. I tried to move past it as I accepted that we were still quite early on in dating & I technically didn't have the right to ask or be upset but it was strained and the atmosphere was different after that. When we left eachother, he told me he knew it had been a bad decision & asked if we could start again & see eachother soon. I kind of agreed but I think it would have been obvious I was still hurt & probably didn't come across very enthusiastic.
That was 5 days ago & whilst that probably doesn't seem very long, it's felt awful not to be in touch with him. I live with my ex (not by choice & very much no chance of rekindling anything, which I've made very clear to this guy) but spend most of my time alone and feel really upset and anxious that things seem to have ground to a halt as it was the one positive thing I had to hold on to through this situation. My thinking is that the ball is in his court given that I already come out of my comfort zone quite a lot by double messaging him, generally being quite open & honest about wanting to pursue things with him plus the whole sex with th he ex thing but I'm not sure if I'm being too proud in expecting him to grovel and I should message him? I'm wondering if perhaps he feels bad and doesn't know whether or how to approach me because of how upset I obviously was & how awkward things were left.
Please be kind in your replies if you can, I am quite fragile at the moment.
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Relationships
Advice needed, unsure of what to do
Este67 · 28/05/2020 17:44
Oh OP,
I can hear your understandable disappointment.
It's a disappointing outcome for you.
Unfortunately I agree with above, he has said one thing but his behaviour has indicated he's a bit flakey.
I certainly wouldn't dream of contacting him.
If he contacts you....come back on here, but I would let it go.
Maintain your self worth
I really am sorry for your disappointment.
Sorry OP, but he’s a using bastard who moved his ex in (for meaningless sex
) and all the while he’s keeping you ticking over in the wings.
There’s zero point in analysing him. He’s a player and we all know it. Don’t let him play you!
he had no intention of rekindling things with her but just wanted some meaningless sex.
He sounds delightful.
Did she know it was meaningless sex and they weren't rekindling things?
It's pretty unusual for two people in a relationship to equally want to end it.
Aside from that, he should have told you she was living with him.
And as someone pointed out, he told you it was over months before yet he invited her to stay with him for lockdown and then shagged her several times, he's flaky and dishonest and doesn't sound like he has much integrity.
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