Let's Get Ready! It's Dating Thread 103

[DrFoxtrot]

The Rules:

1. The first rule about the dating thread is you don't talk about it with people you're dating.
2. Develop a thick skin.
3. Do not invest emotionally too soon.
4. It's all BS until it actually happens.
5. Trust your gut instinct.
6. People vanishing, lying & being generally weird is not your fault.
7. You are the prize-they should be trying to impress you.
8. If it's not fun, stop.
9. Loo update is mandatory.

10. No dating the thread. 11. Read Why Men Love Bitches (aka WMLB), and take from it what you will. 12. Don't serve up moose burgers on the first date (although this is still in debate right now) 13. Matthew Hussey also very useful. And very easy on the eye even if you don't find him any good. 14. IF THEY SAY THEY DON'T WANT A RELATIONSHIP, THEY DON'T WANT A RELATIONSHIP.

I've been staying away from the thread licking my wounds but this talk of emotional investment has brought me back...

I am just the same but I want to remind you all - esp Freaky & Handy - the need to rein it in somehow & protect yourselves...Invest equally in the fantastic life aside from the man... I was just the same with M I was very careless with my heart & look where it has got me?! Please don't be me...

Sorry Freaky I wasn't thinking - obv did not mean to suggest you dump DS fr Bacon

I know you weren't Ocelot! It was only a half thought about meeting up on Monday but it wouldn't be a good idea to suggest now for lots of reasons. Perhaps would have been if I had suggested it last week when we were discussing when to next meet but I kind of forgot it was a bank holiday...

Just listening to a couple of really good ted talks ocelot where they analysed the different messaging styles of people who 'd been un succesful and 'successful' (ie, met somebody) on line.

They expect them to be younger, better looking, richer, taller, with better jobs. But NO, what separated the couples from the singles was the length of their profiles (tick, we have that right) but also the number of messages they sent.

I said I was going to take April off and I sort of did and I didn't, in various ways. I'm going out with the boy :-P on Sunday. Then come Monday 2nd May (?) I am going to trawl through my favourites and message ten men of an appropriate age who do not want children. Yes it will be hard to find ten I feel inclined to message and it could take about 2 hours but I'm going to do it.

I can handle the rejection.

ok, ECHT43 has come back to me. I ignored his last message which was a request for a picture of my belly. I have replied, but what's the protocol here. Can you train a man to be more respectful?

In a grump again, MrIT has definitely tailed off the messages in the past couple of days, and he's now online on POF. I just feel he's going to cancel, but I'm going to channel my inner bitch if he does. To be honest I've been wondering about it all, I really like him as a person, but I don't phwoar fancy him, and the sex wasn't great, but he's one of the few people to genuinely make me laugh. Going to concentrate on cultivating a few more irons, it could be that that's all he's doing, after all we both discussed dating other people.

Just chatting normally now. But I clarified with him that it was not an ''excuse'' that I stopped chatting with him because he asked for a picture of my belly, it was The Reason.

Not sure he gets that.

Right, I have decided I am going to fire a warning shot across Bacon's bows tomorrow...just let him know that I have noticed the change in messaging. I'm going to send something like "It's Friday! Hope you have something good planned for the weekend as you seem to have had a very busy week"
Too passive aggressive? Or just nice? Practically every single message I've had this week has been about how busy he is at work so mentioning it is not unreasonable but I want him to know that I know what's going on.
I was reading back his messages from last week and I honestly want to cry. It's such a change and does make me wonder/worry if there's something more going on with him and maybe he's just waiting for me to ask him?

GOd NO.

I would go more for ''if I'm off grid for a while don't worry, I'm going to my school friend's and he mentioned a mini reunion"

That's exactly how I feel Freaky but I'm not going to ask. I think I'm too scared of the answer.

Truth is.......... you may or may not recover from this post-sex lack of sexual tension. It's gone straight from LOADS of frisson to a heavy dose of reality. Bad sex + opening up. I would be independent, make no demands, present an image of somebody with loads of OTHER friends.

I know that's a crock of shit FREAKY but if you want to rescue the situation, and I think it's kind of 50:50 here tbh, it seems like the 2 week gap straight on the heels of the bad sex, well, that might not end well. I think he's dialled back so mirror that

Matthew Hussey would tell you to mirror that. So would Amy. So would Matthew Boggs.

Mirror back what he's giving you. Go off grid for two days. Enjoy your School Reunion. Were there boys at your school? if not, go for a venture scouts reunion, lol

All this thread makes me realise is that we all work far too hard behind the scenes of these men casually responding after a few hours when everybody knows it takes minutes to fire off a text!

I almost feel like dating is too hard. :(

Tell him you need to get well for a last minute mini reunion. Be jokey, nothing a lemsip and a gin and tonic won't cure.

I know it's easy when you're not in the middle of it but tomorrow, I'd send a good humoured text to let him know that you won't be checking your phone all weekend becauuse................ george clooney and amal invited you over to meet brad and angie. I don't know! something that is within the realms of plausibility :-p

then you have the weekend off. No checking the phone. No agonising. HIS turn to wonder if you are meeting up with old friends or having second thoughts.

Then text him monday at 11 to tell him you feel so re-charged after a great weekend.

HOnestly when I have doubts about people it's usually becuase the idea of being responsible for their happiness makes me panic. Don't give him any tiny clue that you CARE that he's backed off.

Freaky (and gast) there's no warning shot here that won't come across as needy, I don't think.

My best guess is he's in maintenance mode +/- become paranoid about the dtd thing.

314 which one is ECHT43? Sorry I find your naming system hard to recall iron names from.

waving that's appalling of your sister, how awful. My family was, on the surface, happy, functional, drama-free on the surface. It's amazing the negative dynamics that lie beneath, though.

Traffic, I know, right!

If and when I give up, I know I'll be enveloped by such a feeling of peace and acceptance. I'm not quite ready to give up yet though. when I do though i'll have the comfort oof knowinng i tried god dammit

i'll be in the nursing home, sea view, yes please, telling anybody who'll listen that I dated 47 losers before I gave up. H was not a loser. he ended up being the minister for finance but i wasn't mentioned in his biography

Handy ECHT43 was fat sex questions guy who was very funny but just now, he made it like, i had to explain why i stopped chatting to him. I told him why and he said ''that's a poor excuse'' I said it wasn't an excuse, it was The Reason. I don't think he's that bright. Terrible thing to say about somebody but .......... nope, pass.

Freaky listen to the wonderfully wise words of 314

She is (as usual) spot on

Handy, is my new system too dewey decimal, shall i go back to calling him fat sex questions guy?

I'm mirroring, I'm mirroring! Honestly I am! I am only replying to his messages and mirroring his style (well, maybe with a little more affection than he's giving out) OK, so I'm replying quicker but it's taking him hours to read the bloody things anyway so it makes no difference when I respond! The crazy is coming out on here but with him I am honestly being very breezy.

He knows I'm off for a family weekend, so can't fib about that but could definitely be more off grid. But couldn't I do a "have a good weekend after your busy week (so busy you couldn't muster up a bit of affection, MoFo!) I'm off to spend a lovely weekend in the bosom of my lovely family doing lovely things?"

I'm not sure it'll recover either. Either his messages will pick up next week in which case I'll be like "well, you're just faking it now" or they won't and I won't particularly feel like seeing him anyway. I'm not going to let him bloody ghost me though, I deserve some answers!

And ........... anna was brutally frank with me back thread but I appreciated it because I trust you all not to plamás me

I've had two peronis. I didn't mean ''plamás'' scrap that from the record your honour. I meant '''tell me soothing lies.''

Oh god, sorry for putting you off Traffic!

My best guess is he's in maintenance mode +/- become paranoid about the dtd thing.

Yes, you're right. It's weird, as soon as we DTD, he changed into a different person...OMG, my vagina has magical powers!

And I appreciate it brutal honestly 314, I really, really do. I need to hear this stuff to stop be doing something stupid and risking whatever chance we have.

Freaky, I don't think he's faking anything.

I think you two were running on pre-sex energy and that's normal enough. But, combination of bad timing (the two week break) + the bad sex, plus his opening up = awkwardness.

I don't think he's being fake, or faking anything. I think he just feels ............ like it's gone at sixty miles an hour from flirty frisson to slightly awkward.

But it might recover. Take yourself off grid this weekend. Don't check your phone every ten minutes. If he looks at whatsapp, let him see that you were last on line ten hours ago.

I know, I know. I appreciate it too!

God, I would still be taking crumbs of ''friendship'' from Bear if it weren't for this thread, thinking that no other iron could ever compare.. I'm over that.

You know what, I actually remembered earlier this evening the first time he sat down in front of me, at the table of a pub in town, outside, I thought, meh, he's ok.

Obviously the fekker grew on me like an infestation of barnacles but my FIRST impression was that he was 'ok'.

I laughed to myself remembering that. What happened!? HOW did I build him up? I king konged him and became the pinocchio of my own life.