Dating Thread 195 - Level Dean, home of serious women who actually talk

[Dancerinthemoonlight]

The Rules:

1. The first rule about the dating thread is 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. Know your worth.
8. If it's not fun, stop.
9. Loo update is mandatory.

10. No dating the thread. 11. Treat others as you'd like to be treated 12. Any relationship you have that could get ruined by having a conversation about your feelings, standards and/or expectations wasn't really stable enough to begin with 13. The things you choose to ignore/ tolerate now are the reasons you will break up in the future 14. OLD can get very time consuming. Keep doing other activities you enjoy.

Optional: Please give your irons (potential dates you are talking to) nicknames like Mr Scottish. Initials are allowed (Mr S) when you are an item

@freelancedolly
It is really difficult when you've come from dysfunctional relationships to accept calm and normal ones.

The highs and lows of dysfunctional ones have your adrenaline all over the place and the highs are so high but the lows are so low plus of course in time you forget the lows and embrace the highs and then you think thats what love is.

My 17 year marriage was so dysfunctional and i really struggled with Mr K that he has no drama, i initially thought it was because we were FWB as you dont share much but as the months went on i realised he is just a calm, normal person and this is what relationships are about.

Sometimes I'm still shocked at how quiet and calm it is but I'm embracing a whole new way of having a relationship and i like it.

@freelancedolly “ But also when given enough time to think about things start to try to find fault with him or reasons why we shouldn't be together, why it won't work, why he's not 'good enough' for me etc... FFS it's all so annoying... BE QUIET BRAIN!”. That’s really interesting. I think I’ve had these kind of negative thoughts before but have pretty much ignored them. Where do you think it comes from? It all sounds promising! (and @Ruralbliss).

LongtimeLurker @TheCatWithTheHat thanks - I’m really struggling with the fact my ex has a long term girlfriend despite being abusive and I’m single and can’t barely get a second date

Same .

I wish my ex would feck off and get a girlfriend and stop obsessing about me
Little update: had another message from Mr German where he explained thing better and it seems like he is genuinely stressed mainly with work which I knew but not how bad - he still wants to see me but just needs some time to get his head sorted. I left it pretty casual - give me a shout and we will go out on the town sometime- but I am both pleased and wary. I’ve been chatting to some others but he’s always in the back of my mind so I think I’m willing to wait a little - but not forever.
I’ve been enjoying flirty fun chats all weekend but I’m probably using them as a distraction rather than a serious prospect which is not good!

It’s good you’ve started the dialogue Mayzee - seems a strong position you’re in now, you’ve said your piece, keeping your options open and you’re open to MrG but not putting your life on hold for him?

Sent some random links of hotels to MrC to keep the whole weekend away dialogue going as I’m not sure what he expects

he seemed happy with this and to casually say he liked the look of one of them in particular so basically leaving it at that.

Definitely nodding along to some of the pps here

I’ve got to the emotional stage where little traumatic incidents/encounters with weird people have built up and I do feel I’m automatically being defensive and closing off to more nice/mainstream interactions?

I’m wary of engaging with someone at a “low-key friendly level” which is what this is really?

(that’s the trouble with early trauma/bullying - it’s easy to end up wired so I can only emotionally engage with weird overdramatic situations and close off from normal ones?)

MrC is a nice enough guy who wants to randomly think about some social stuff in advance whilst being away in a fairly tough work environment.

he’s not controlling and even if he was I’m not under his power - I can just take him at face value?

@cravingthelook just pm’d you

It’s quite interesting seeing how I was communicating with MrC (is that overthinking bench full now? )

I found I was trying to use jokes/humour to deflect from keeping things real and straight.

I was balking at actually saying “I like the look of this hotel” or worrying he would think I was asking him to take me to expensive places

but equally I was getting in my own way a bit, and not just taking a fun low commitment dialogue for what it was?

If we do get to this trip we can sit and talk about fairly splitting costs, and I’m guessing but if all his colleagues are talking about holidays with partners on their return then maybe he wants to join in,

I don’t have some massive phobia of going away with men btw.

I’ve had a couple of other guys suggest weekends away (definitely not instigated by me - plus I was physically intimate before so not just an exchange or convenient setting for sex), seem quite keen, then go all weird/vague when the arranging came up?

So I felt a right weirdo discussing it - but it wasn’t even my idea, I was just mirroring what they’d suggested back at them?

Like they’d set me up on some sort of ego/power game to go “oh look she’s desperate and needy” when if anything I’m at the opposite end of the communication spectrum.

So easy to overthink and get tied up in knots. I hope you find a way of just taking it for what it seems to be - a couple of people, who like each other, talking about maybe doing some stuff together. I hope you get your weekend away; what a great way to reconnect that would be.

@WeWantTheFinestWines that’s right, it is just friendly low key talk with someone who I feel has generally been reliable and positive about our interaction (or we wouldn’t still be in touch and I’d be swiping right now).

I’m mindful and wary of not falling into the social “set-up” or “trap” where someone suggests something, lets me run with it, then acts negative and suggests I’m being pushy when it wasn’t even my * idea in the first place people can be mean!

@Bunkbedpeople oh god yes, that is definitely a tactic isn’t it? I had that with my ex Tinder bloke - part of the whole future faking nonsense to get you to be into it and then they act all bewildered when you take them at their word.

I know @freelancedolly (and it really isn’t about them promising X to “get the sex” as that bridge tends to be crossed already!)

It’s like wanting to generate the emotion/need in me to feel wanted/as an ego or power boost then playing dumb.

It’s not just a dating thing I’ve found - an ex-colleague at my student job used to very charmingly and enthusiastically suggest people got together with her socially, wait till they contacted her to make the arrangement then flake or ignore them or treat them as if they were pushy weirdos (no children or big time commitments she was just controlling!)

You used to see people who’d known her for a while physically body swerve if she was trying to say hi as they were onto her

Yes @TheCatWithTheHat it is a terrible idea. She has so much to deal with and I'm sure you aren't at the forethought of her mind. Leave her be to cope with the difficult hand she has been dealt.

I find it a little bit upsetting you told her you loved her whilst she was reeling from such difficult news. And then say you don't think it will take you long to get over her. I'd find being told someone loved me quite a burden and it would make me very cautious about their feelings and what I could offer. It's not something I would say lightly.

I think they do it to get more approval in a people pleasing kind of way, and are so focused on the need for attention and approval that they are oblivious to the need for their words to actually have any meaning.

@NotCoolMum I didn't read it that @TheCatWithTheHat said ILY lightly or in the throes of his iron's horrible time with sick DC. I do think he sounds like he regrets it and doubts it in all sorts of confused ways, and that saying he'll get over it soon was a form of bravado (I do this, big time). Just shows how we can interpret the postings of strangers so differently I guess...

And yes, I totally agree @freelancedolly that both men and women of a certain type say all kinds of crap just as a form of noise without any thought about it being taken seriously by the recipient. Just not all men (or women).

I think one of the most valuable lessons I have learnt is not to chase. You can offer, you can support, you can make available but unless there is a willing recipient for your time and attention then your efforts and good intentions are wasted. And no doubt many of us will have been on both sides of this. If someone wants you in their life they let you know one way or another.

@Notcoolmum - @TiggerDatter is right, I do regret saying it in hindsight. I'm quite an emotional person, and it just came out.

I was feeling shocked (but not totally surprised) that she wanted to stop dating, upset at the thought of not seeing her again, sad for what she is going through, and I wanted her to know she meant something to me. I've thought about it more and it isn't love, but was more that feeling of connection you can get when being intimate with someone and spending a fair bit of time with them over the last 9 months.

Her DC has been ill all the time I've known her, and she's been open about the fact I've been a distraction to help take her mind off it. Over the last couple of months, I guess I started to think it was more than it was and I suspect she's backed off thinking I've grown more attached which was pressure she didn't need. However in hindsight, it was more like friendship with great sex (an ideal FWB I suppose?) - I never had any thoughts of us having a future together, and she never said anything to suggest we would. So that's why it's been easier for me to accept it's over, and also to think that I would be able to remain in touch as friends (or FWB if she is up for that at some point), which is not the case with any of my previous exes who I did see a future with.

During our time together, I have helped with stuff - I gave her a hand redecorating her DC's bedroom, and did shopping for her on occasion so I'd hope she didn't think I had an ulterior motive for offering to be there for her now.

I'm going to think about it for a bit longer - I won't get in touch for at least another couple of weeks, but I'd like to tell her my feelings were confused, apologise for throwing the L word at her without considering how it would make her feel, and that I would like to be there as a friend for her if she wants to stay in touch. She doesn't live far away, and we have a shared hobby which we both enjoyed doing together, so of all my previous relationships this is the first one where I genuinely think I could become a friend without there being any weirdness.

The thing is I know praise/emotional chat is often mainly BS to a certain extent

MrC says he thinks I’m 10/10 and the sexiest woman on earth relative to lots of men in boiler suits maybe and he’d literally be nowhere else but in my bed again, bunking up with men in boiler suits can make a guy keen

but yeh I’m not jacking in the career plans for a modelling jig just yet

It’s the ones who do just enough to get you to do something practical/waste your time then flake who really piss me off.

I’m not really a natural social organiser type (if left to organise a meet I pick something cheap and central and non pressurised) so it pisses me off even more?

The guy I had a fling with over the summer invited himself along on my staycation, then when I put the time in to see if we could coordinate schedules, went weird

I mean we’d been casually dating for a month, communication generally fine and balanced...but the way he went weird it was like he was pretending to himself I’d been begging/pressurising him to holiday with me.

(Of course I got the standard message trying to pick me up again a few weeks later which I ignored , probably upset that I hadn’t been begging for return of the D)

It annoys me as then it makes it harder to relax/I keep second guessing myself with the next person I date?

I really wish men would say what they mean and mean what they BLOODY say.

My FWB - saw him last the day before lockdown has been texting steadily saying he misses me, he's counting down to lockdown blah blah. In fact he sent a message at 6.21am saying he woke up thinking of me. He's respectful, he's polite, he says I'm his only FWB and I had no complaints until....

Today I say yes, I'm looking forward to meeting too, 2 weeks to go and when/where are we meeting? inserted something about not on the day it ends, because I'll have to wax.

Tell me why his response was - I don't know, I can't plan, what if lockdown is extended. I don't want us to get too excited, so let's wait and see

I suppose I'm also taking on board how you were with your ex @TheCatWithTheHat You were quite insistent she would change her mind and had feelings for you even though she was telling you otherwise. You have given me the impression of someone who gets caught up in his own feelings and not giving the same consideration to the feelings of the other party. I'm sorry if this isn't a fair assessment. And I totally accept we all do that on an extent on this thread. As we are talking about our own feelings.

You posted that there was a significant change in the outlook for Miss H's DC and so she decided she didn't have the headspace for a relationship with you. Which seems reasonable. I would honestly back off. No need to explain the ILY. If her child is as ill as you have said I imagine her bandwidth for things outside of that are limited. If she misses your companionship once she has more headspace then I'm sure she will get in touch.

I can see why you'd think that, but the previous ex was confusing and had been giving very mixed messages all the way through - even talking about what we'd name our kids, sending me reminders of things we'd done etc... Looking back at it, I was only 2 months out of an 8 year relationship when I first started talking to her, so don't think I was thinking too clearly - there was definitely some limerence going on there!

Plus sometimes when you're in the middle of something, you don't see the same things that someone else would, which is why I find it so helpful posting here. I tend to talk through things here (and with friends) instead of getting in touch with people who may not want me to, so I think that shows I am considerate to their feelings. You obviously don't know me at all, but I think I am a considerate person - in fact, Miss H told me that she liked that about me.

Yep, I accept she has very valid reasons for not wanting to have a relationship with me at the moment - especially if she thought I was wanting more. I can't even begin to imagine how hard it is for her.

But at some point she might want a distraction, even if it's just having a chat or meeting up for lunch, and I just want her to know I'm not going to get all clingy and expect to rekindle things, but am here if she wants to get in touch.

@TheCatWithTheHat

Break-ups are shite - whatever the technical classification of your interaction it must be a real emotional shock to you.

I kind of wonder (based on my experience here) if you’re not trying to “think” yourself out of feeling bad?

It seems like you’re using logic and rational thinking to come up with a solution to get back the old relationship, but this is blocking actual grief on your part. Which you’re allowed to have.

Nine months of what seems a genuinely close, loving and helpful relationship must have been nice, and if you were hoping things would progress and having a coupley Xmas it must be a massive blow. So I can definitely see why you’re struggling to detach a bit.

Modern adult life is lonely. Having one person who is close and accepts you socially and sexually and who makes regular time for you is going to be a big part of your life, and you’d have a big heart of stone NOT to be upset or off balance for the next couple months.

Wise words @Bunkbedpeople. @TheCatWithTheHat there’s definitely a danger with this kind of rationalisation that you’re putting off dealing with the situation. Also you’ll come unstuck with the emotional messiness of dealing with your ex, these things rarely align with your expectations. Such a crap feeling when it looked like you had at least a bit of a future together.

There’s a separate thread about Facebook dating but anyone tried it. Secret crush is a slightly tantalising twist.

@Bunkbedpeople and @DudefromThatLondon Thanks for your comments. It is pretty shite, and I am feeling bad, but I've had enough breakups to know how badly I usually take them, and this is no where near as bad as most.

If I'm honest I'd had thoughts over the last month or two that things weren't right, and I needed more from the relationship but I didn't say anything as I didn't want to pressure her knowing she was having a tough time. She'd even told me a few months ago that she wouldn't have as much time for me, and that maybe I should get back out there dating again, so I think the writing was on the wall at that point and it was only a matter of time.

I've also been reminded of comments I'd made to friends earlier in the year where I said I enjoyed spending time with her, but didn't think it had a long term future. It was clear that we wouldn't spend Christmas together - she was going to have relatives over to hers, and I'll be spending it with my family. I had suggested a few times over the summer that we might go away for a weekend, but that wasn't possible due to child care schedules, work schedules, and visits to her DC.

Over the last couple of months we only saw each other every 2/3 weeks, and she'd go for days before replying to messages so I felt quite frustrated for a lot of the time. Maybe I should have walked away earlier, but these are strange times, and I was enjoying our little Corona romance even though I think deep down I knew it wouldn't last that long. But I wasn't expecting it to end quite so soon, and it's still painful. But as much as it hurts, I realise it's for the best and it will give me a chance to meet someone who is more compatible.

Which brings me to Miss Walker - I'm starting to get RSI in my fingers from typing so much in my messages to her! We have so much in common it's scary - she is almost like a female, better looking version of me! We've pencilled in another attempt to meet this weekend, so my (aching) fingers are crossed we manage to meet. I'm a little concerned we won't like each other in the flesh after such a promising build up, but will try not to worry about it. So far there are lots of green flags, and absolutely no red flags at all.