To think I put him off

[Backtolife14]

I was texting someone I was interested in, he's the one who wanted my number. We both took normal amounts of time to reply to each other, several hours kinda thing. He'd put a lot of emojis in his messages.
Then I started getting a less interested vibe. His msg was a bit colder, so I just sent a polite, short reply that didn't need a reply. Then I waited several days to see if he'd get in touch, he didn't.
Tried not to overthink so I sent a casual message asking how he was getting on. He started taking 24h for every single reply, cold, short messages.
I've just left it now.
Does it sound like I was too needy? Or it was just him?

It sounds like he’s met someone else.

To be fair I don't think I did anything that bad. Initially I matched his energy in terms of texting.
I once spoke to a guy years ago who said I was slow because I hadn't replied in 10 minutes, that was OTT.
It's the fact that he suddenly took a day per reply, stopped putting emojis on the messages, stopped asking questions etc.
I shouldn't blame myself, I don't think I did anything wrong, it was just his way of signalling he was no longer interested I guess?

Nope you didn't do anything wrong, he just wasn't interested anymore. Absolutely not "needy".

Thanks for reassuring me! My mistake was getting back in touch after several days, but in my mind I'd also sent him a short, unenthusiastic message and not continued the convo, so maybe he thought I wasn't interested!

No you didn't do anything wrong. Sometimes people are feeling it and sometimes not, sounds like this time maybe not. But you done nothing wrong.

Thank you. I'd honestly just prefer a quick text of 'hey I don't feel a spark, all the best' . Soo many people do the slow fade because they think it's 'kinder'. Like I'm not going to be absolutely heartbroken or something if someone's not into me, we didn't even date.
But when they do stuff like this it makes me second guess or wonder if something's happend to them, and I'm someone who's quite direct and tries to take people at face value.
But yes, this or just ghosting is soo common now.

It just sounds like he's no longer interested for whatever reason - maybe he's met someone, or maybe he's just not 'feeling it' and has decided to let things cool off.

I don't think there's anything wrong with sending a "how are you?" sort of text after a few days (unless you had a specific " never contact me again" message, but I assume in that case, they'd block. But some people are like this and just go silent.

Thank you, no nothing like that, and it was because my own text prior to that was very short and kinda ending the convo so he could've thought the same about me.
It's just when they go cold it honestly makes me wonder if I offended them or something.

It's fine he wasn't feeling, just worried I'd been needy for some reason. But looking back, I've met some men who like I say would blow up my phone if I hadn't replied in 30 minutes, getting quite passive aggressive :/

I've met some men who like I say would blow up my phone if I hadn't replied in 30 minutes, getting quite passive aggressive :/

Yeah, they're moving themselves onto the blocked list by doing that. They're also I capable of comprehension in my experience. My last text - "Got to go, busy day at work, lot of meetings."
Couple of texts during the day, just inconsequential chat. Then in the afternoon, demands to know why I haven't responded, why I'm ignoring him. Er, because, as I told you, I have a busy day at work with lots of meetings?

I made a rule when I started OLD that any existing activities (e.g. evening class,) friends and work came first - any dates have to fit round the rest of my life. They're there to enhance it, not take up time being needy. And if they get offended over nothing, that's their problem, not mine. Thry are not actually the centre of my universe when all we have done is exchanged a few messages.