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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

FWB is going on a date...

90 replies

BreadstickBev · 17/09/2015 13:53

I have a FWB... All started as a no strings just for fun agreement, and yes a lot of fun was had. I probably have fallen into the trap of being too dependant on him, physically and emotionally. He is very open / honest with me & told me last night he has a date planned for Saturday night. This has floored me & I'm a mess (and im usually not a cryer)

We were very emotionally close, shared interests, finished eachother sentences, basically he is the male version of me & vice versa re him. He has been texting his date for a week and has definitely cooled towards me, very noticeably in fact.

It is not possible for us to have a "normal" relationship due to various factors. I had never thought about him dating before but now it's an all consuming thought.

I don't know what I want from this thread but I just want to stamp my feet & cry & scream that he's my bit of fun I don't want him with anyone else.

Ive wished him well & he says it's only a date & he'll keep in contact with me. Has anyone ever came through the other side of this, because at the minute, I'm not sure I can see the light at the end of the tunnel...

OP posts:

Wewereneverbeingboring · 21/09/2015 10:07

Wished!! Not washed

NotTodaySatan · 21/09/2015 10:12

Do NOT send that message .

You will look bitter and jealous and needy and OTT.

Don't message him at all. Leave it in the past and try hard to move on. You have no obligation to even say hello at school. Head down and walk past.

Within the framework of a FWB relationship, he is perfectly entitled to date other people. As are you. But if you've realised that what you want is exclusivity and monogamy then you need to find someone else who wants that too. Good luck and take care.

OneBreathAfterAnother · 21/09/2015 10:13

It's done. You had your fun, and he's now dating other people.

He said he'd stay in contact because you see him at school and he wants it to end nicely, without any awkwardness or tension or bad feelings. For him, if he has no emotional involvement, that is completely rational and fine.

You need to treat this like a break-up now, and stop checking up on when he was last online, or hankering to text him. Get rid of his number. It'll hurt, but you have to do it or you're saving more hurt for down the line.

Texting him is a bad idea. You'll only alert him to the fact that you are emotionally involved. Don't ask how his date went - it's see-through. Don't pretend you have your own date. Don't ask any questions about what happens now. You know what happens now, you just don't want to see it.

Keep in mind that he may well text you when he's drunk or lonely, and see if you're up to meeting like you used too. You aren't. If you can bring yourself to block his number, you'll save yourself the temptation and the "what ifs".

This is the end of the line for you both - for him because he's dating other people and he's nicely ended things with you, and for you because you are emotionally involved and FWBs never works once that's happened.

I'm sorry. I know in your perfect world, he'd stay single and so would you, and you could "have" him even if it was only sex, but that's not a reasonable expectation and it can never happen.

PamDooveOrangeJoof · 21/09/2015 10:32

Why signs you want to contact him? I thought you wished him well and that was that?
Leave it now. No good will come of contacting him.
You obviously want more than FWB but he doesn't. At least he has been honest about dating others. He hasn't really done anything wrong if he thought you were just in a FWB situation.
You both just want different things so you should move on.

Original poster

BreadstickBev · 21/09/2015 10:59

To lay it bare, I want to contact him to hear the date was crap, she was not his thing & he wants to continue our arrangement

I need to remember all the buzz words yous have said I will look if I do contact him... Bitter, Jealous, needy, OTT... The thing is I miss him as a friend also which is just rubbish.

The proper relationship questions boring is a complicated one. Living with old fashioned parents, separated from a pscyo ex who would make my life living hell, knowing his ex wife and whole case of 'what other would think' stops me (us) wanting a proper relationship

Bitter... Jealous... Needy... Repeat

OP posts:

NotTodaySatan · 21/09/2015 11:06

I'm not trying to have a go OP.

The way things stand, he has distanced himself from you. That would be enough for me to adopt the 'Fine, fuck you. Your loss' mindset. If you initiate contact now he will know that you are still available/keen. Bluntly put, it means that he holds all the cards, knows he can have sex with you whenever he wants and he knows that you will still be on standby as he goes on dates with other women who he presumably might want to have a 'traditional' relationship with.

I'm far more pro-non monogamous relationships than most of MN but this one doesn't sound mutually respectful. I think there's a huge chance of you being used and getting hurt.

VeganCow · 21/09/2015 11:14

If you were up for a relationship with him, would you be together? I mean, is it just you preventing you being together or has he said he doesnt want a proper relationship with you as well?

TheMarxistMinx · 21/09/2015 11:18

None of those reasons are reasons enough to stop two people being together if that is what they really wanted.

He is going on dates because he can and does want to form a relationship, or wants to find others to fuck.

It seems from what you have said that it isn't just you who has prevented this from becoming a relationship. My bet is that he has accepted your reasons all too easily, perhaps even encouraged those reasons to be barriers.

Original poster

BreadstickBev · 21/09/2015 11:25

From the outset when it was just flirty msg and we hadn't got 'together ' we went through some details of what we expected from the arrangement. He told me & I agreed that he was not going to be my knight in shining armour whisking me away from the shit situation I'm in. It was sex, it was fun, it was spending time with a like minded person. He's just out of a long term marriage & living on his own & was explicit in saying he'd never get married again. All these things are agreeable to me ( or so I thought thought)
it's just the thought of him being physically with someone else is such a kick in the stomach to me. The sex was amazing, the best we have both ever had & I know this as he is (sometimes brutally!) honest when it comes to things like this. I can't understand why he'd want to go on a date...

I know I'm being blinded by everything and I really need to remember I don't want to be seen as needy, bitter, Jealous, all of which are scaring me as I'm starting to think they may be true...

OP posts:

ToGoBoldly · 21/09/2015 11:32

"I can't understand why he'd want to go on a date..."

As hard as it is to accept, when he said "I don't want a relationship" or whatever variation of that he gave you, he missed off the suffix "with you". He does not want a relationship with you. He was happy to have sex with you as you fulfilled his physical needs. He's not necessarily done anything wrong here. You said you were happy with the same, but it's clearly hurting you because you wanted more.

It's fine to have casual relationships but you have to accept that when someone is keeping it casual, it's because they don't want anything more than sex from you. They may eventually want a closer relationship, but will probably look elsewhere because you are a sex provider, and nothing more. It's hard to accept if you are kidding yourself, which is why it's crucial to not get involved in a FWB situation unless you are absolutely certain that you don't want a little bit more. No hugs, no chats, nothing like that if you are going to form some sort of attachment. It's easier to be FWB if you're not actually very friendly.

TheUrbaneFox · 21/09/2015 12:08

ToGoBoldly speaks the truth. A man once said to me "i'd never get married again" and I knew that he meant "to you" and that was OK because I didn't want to marry HIM. I'd get married again but I wouldn't have married HIM.

I think so far, so long as you don't text him, you've handled yourself with dignity And that mightn't be much of a comfort, yet, but it will be. if you text him ''how was the date?'' he'll know you are missing him and he'll feel awkward, and men nearly always deal with awkwardness by avoiding what's making them feel awkward.

bjrce · 21/09/2015 12:08

I know thus is the last thing you want to hear as you're obviously dying to contact him, in the hopw of hearing the date was just OK, please listen to everyone that's telling you not to contact him, you will just come across as desperate, hate to say this, but no contact from him is a bad sign, it sounds like his date may be home v well and he's just not into speaking to you at the moment, the fact that you didn't see him at the school, in my book would be he might just be avoiding you at the moment. Do not contact him.

Rockluvvindad · 21/09/2015 13:02

I'm going to go against the grain here, but with a caveat...

What would you have to lose by contacting him and asking something along the lines of "If you're going out on a date, then maybe that means you're interested in forming a relationship with someone. We seem to have had some great times, so I wanted to check in one last time to say that if you do, then I would like to try. If not, then good luck in your search, thanks for all the great times, but if you're dating then I need to move on like you are so we can't really go back to how we were..."

The caveat is that if he says no, then you do really go no contact and you accept it's over and move on.

Wish I'd done that. Would have saved me totally balls-ing things up with someone I really liked.

Good luck, and do what's right for you.

RLD.

brokenhearted55a · 21/09/2015 13:05

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ToGoBoldly · 21/09/2015 13:10

"What would you have to lose by contacting him and asking something along the lines of "If you're going out on a date, then maybe that means you're interested in forming a relationship with someone. We seem to have had some great times, so I wanted to check in one last time to say that if you do, then I would like to try. If not, then good luck in your search, thanks for all the great times, but if you're dating then I need to move on like you are so we can't really go back to how we were..."

Rockluvvindad, I think that is an ok option if you are sufficiently robust to take the likely outcome that they would say nah, no thanks.

The OP here is already in a mess because he went on a date with someone else, so I don't think she would take the extra rejection well.

It's also putting him in a position of having to be even more brutal to the OP by actually saying "I want a relationship, but not with you". If he was interested in going on being in a relationship with her, he would not have been going on a date with someone else. Unless he's a massive game player, but that's really tiresome and immature so you probably won't want to get involved in that kind of jazz.

TheMarxistMinx · 21/09/2015 13:13

we went through some details of what we expected from the arrangement. He told me & I agreed that he was not going to be my knight in shining armour whisking me away from the shit situation I'm in

So, he spelled it out to you. I agree with others, this is all a very clear sign. He's dating because he wants a relationship, he just doesn't want that with you. Don't take it all too personally. I think men often weigh up all available empirical data, and dismiss a relationship because of factors outside of just sex and personality. They often weigh up long term goals, attitudes to money, work, family, marriage. Like us they can make calculated decisions on whether to pursue a relationship based on more than just feelings, the difference is that men are perhaps more likely to do this.

TheUrbaneFox · 21/09/2015 13:19

I wouldn't take Rockluvindad's advice.

If you don't text him, and if his date doesn't work out, and if after a while he begins to miss YOU, (that's three IFs) then he will know that you're strong, you have self-respect, and have boundaries. That would be a better basis for re-drawing a new, different relationship if anything ever happened in the future. But to text that to him right now would be so needy. It'd repel him.

ToGoBoldly · 21/09/2015 13:24

But be aware that if his date didn't work out and he eventually texts you, it's probably because he is missing sex, not because he is missing you.

brokenhearted55a · 21/09/2015 13:26

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ToGoBoldly · 21/09/2015 13:30

It's foolish to go back to an old fuckbuddy. If you like them you may be inclined to subconsciously wait around in case they "may be back", which is shooting yourself in the foot.

If you hook up for a while, have fun. If they move on for someone else and then come back, it will probably screw you up if you let them come back.

Unless you are absolutely, 100% able to disconnect your yearning for sex from your fondness for someone. Which some people can happily do, but I'm not sensing that from this thread.

TeaAndNoSympathy · 21/09/2015 13:31

Please don't text him.

The boundaries of your arrangement with him were set out clearly early on. You agreed to them.

Sorry to be brutal but he isn't your boyfriend. He hasn't cheated on you and he hasn't done anything wrong within the parameters of your arrangement.

You want more from him but he made it clear from the outset that he didn't want a relationship with you.

If you send that message you will come across as bitter and needy. Delete his number and move on.

TheUrbaneFox · 21/09/2015 13:40

ToGoBoldly is right. I expressed that badly. I meant that even IF it could possibly work out, it would rely on so many IFs. I wasn't really suggesting that you hang on OP, in the hope. It is better to disconnect and accept.

ChickenTikkaMassala · 21/09/2015 13:52

He's a FWB, not your partner so surely he can do what he wants and go out on dates with other women? You're coming across as needy and possesive OP, as far as I can tell he hasn't done anything wrong so I don't understand why some posters are acting as though he has.

Do not text him.

TheUrbaneFox · 21/09/2015 13:54

Nobody's acting like he's done anything wrong, just acknowledging that it hurts the OP. Nothing ever hurt ya chicken!?

Jan45 · 21/09/2015 14:07

Leave him to it, you will look desperate, you should use this as a sign that he has NO intentions towards you other than a shag, use this to ask yourself is this really all you are worth, sloppy seconds now?

Sorry to be harsh but really, the guy is not interested in having a relationship with you, it's crystal clear.

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