Dating Thread 247

[SamW98]

Continued from 246

The Rules:

1.The first rule about the dating thread is don't talk about it with people you're dating.

1. Develop a thick skin.
2. Do not invest emotionally too soon.
3. It's all BS until it actually happens.
4. Trust your gut instinct.
5. People vanishing, lying & being generally weird is not your fault.
6. Know your worth.
7. If it's not fun, stop.
8. 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

@Mckittens Hey hey hey, I know what you mean by being burnt out by OLD. Taking MH breaks is a must.

Your academic sounds interesting and I'm like you more relaxed. But at least he is sorted and has things he is passionate about, no? But yeah constantly having same conversations and replying to same questions can get a tad 🥴

@2anddone Fab update! You go girl 😉 Are you sure about not catching feelings? If things are going well perhaps you two have a future together. Then you have to invite us all to your wedding 😅

Mr T is being nice and decent and wants to stay in touch but doesn't ask me many questions. So I suppose I the just...talk about myself then? Ah well can't spend my whole life asking for permission I suppose.

@cassiatwenty 😆 we definitely would need invited to any wedding, after all we've been invested from the very beginning; flops an all! Seriously though it does sound great @2anddone, long May it continue.

@cassiatwenty you are totally right, he does sound interesting and he has left his number so I might message him later today. It's the whole self doubt thing, rather than thinking about what I might want/like/need I'm automatically thinking I won't be good enough for the other person for whatever reason. Terrible really.

@Mckittens @cassiatwenty
At the minute I am not catching the feelings by reminding myself he is still in love with his ex wife and probably just with me for the rebound sex. We live on the same estate so all of our meet ups have been very snatched...we will text each other to let each other know our children have gone out and we have how ever much time before they come back! Because our meet ups are quite short we spend almost the whole time in bed...though last night we had a coffee together and a chat afterwards which I am trying to avoid as it will make it harder not to catch the feelings!! All of our texts are very sexual too no real day to day chit chat!

Think it helps that he doesn't want his children (they are in their 20's) finding out and telling their mum until the divorce is finalised and any pay offs have happened which means we don't go anywhere together or do anything which a couple might do...except the sex! He has started sneaking round on his way to work in the morning while my 2 are still in bed for a good morning kiss....trying to do that as limited as possible as am aware that if I let myself I could definitely catch the feels!

At what point do you think there should be any conversation about if we might become a couple in the future or do you think it's currently not necessary while neither of us have the feelings??

@2anddone I don’t think you need to have the conversation unless you do actually start to feel something, but maybe knock the sneaking for a kiss behaviour on the head because I would have thought that would make you feel all romantic and also if he doesn’t want people finding out he’s playing with fire

Thanks for the invite over form AIBU!!
I am struggling with getting used to differing text Nb styles which o know sounds ridiculous at fifty years of age but I'm new at this !
So I've been chatting to a man who seems lovely and we have a loose plan to meet next weekend .
I'm struggling with knowing whether he is actually interested or not .
He does initiate conversation but his responses are kind of flat but they are regular and appropriate.
Now he is in work at a conference so I hardly expect him to be full of text chat but I don't know... do I let this go?
He normally seems interested n my life , full of chat and interest, when not working .
I feel he is talking to others also so may be just getting bored with me ?
Overthinking much ?!!

@asabatt welcome! Just wanted to say i empathise. I guess people have different levels of busy so see how he is in person. Im the same with my partner, sometimes we could solidly text chat for 6hrs straight, sometimes nothing for a couple of days. Definitely makes me second guess myself and whether he's into me much. However most people are busy and i do find some people dont text much unless there is a reason to. See how he is in person.

Welcome over @asabatt
I agree people have different levels of busy...also if he is at a conference he may also have networking to do.
Do you message on WhatsApp or the dating app? Some of the men I have chatted to won't open the dating app while around people preferring it to stay private whereas WhatsApp is easier for messaging!

Thanks everyone.
We're on WhatsApp.

He did say to me at the beginning , before we exchanged our phone numbers , that he has been pulled up quite strongly on a number of occasions for not responding straight away to matches and to indeed his family and friends. That previous matches got really mad and blocked him as he didn't respond straight away even if he had been on line ( his words) . He says that he and his family and friends all have different comms style and this is his.
Training me to accept, perhaps?

He is physically more busy than I ,for sure.
I would be mentally more busy.

Anyway he is lovely, intelligent, quick witted and physically exactly my type.

Hope our exchanges don't die out before we meet which is possibly nine days time.

@asabatt who sent the last message?
If it was you when was it?
If you haven't sent one today maybe wait until this evening and send a hope your day wasn't too long at the conference type message.

@asabatt if you sent last message, I'd wait until his conference is over to double-message. I know at least for me work conferences are very full on, and based on his preference on communication that he's told you, I'd leave it until he's over it. Unless he's texted last.

One of the men that hasn't been asking many questions, apologised for not responding faster 🙄🤣 and wanted to have a call, and did ask me a question (how about you.. ) l. if he hadn't asked (a question) I wouldn't have bothered to continue, his replies are good, just lack of questions.

Thanks for your support. This is bloody awful being so ignorant in such uncharted waters !!
Basically he didn't read my
Message last night but had been on line and then responded first thing this morning . We've exchanged a bit t but it's a little flat . I've left it now as he's either distracted because of his conference or things are just dying a bit .
He's text me last in response to a comment .. it was light and funny( his) so I'll leave until later I think .

If he text last I would wait until later this evening and text with something along the lines of hope today's conference went well.

He has already prewarned you that he isn't good at text communication so I wouldn't read too much into it.

Where are you meeting when you meet up?

@asabatt I read the aibu thread, some good replies there as well about chilling out a bit (checking online status, expecting immediate reply etc). Do you have other people you're talking to?

We're meeting half way between my city and his. For lunch and maybe a walk .

Hi everyone,

I have come off the apps but have been chatting with 2 blokes for a few weeks. One of them asked if I was free to do something this Friday. I replied and said that I was working Friday and out with a friend Friday night but was free Thursday if he was free, he didn't reply.

My friend then messaged and said she had to cancel Friday night. I messaged him and explained that my friend had cancelled so I was free Friday night. This was yesterday lunch time and I haven't heard back from him. He is on nights this week but still I would of expected something back. I am so confused do I just write this one off and move on.

This is just so deflating all the time. I have read that some of us seem to be having better luck, hope this continues.

@Dottie4 i hear you I’m feeling like that too! Messaging is such an effort. I quite like bumble and try a few different first lines. But some unmatch straight away! Any one got any first message inspiration??
I have tried hinge in the past but it’s hit and miss with guys messaging first.
Tinder I seemed to get overloaded with likes but nobody seems to communicate well! Getting to the point of deleting them all.
I had a profile messaging me but he was super good looking and photos seemed a bit model pose unrealistic. Then I got a voice note from him and it sounded very computerised. (He wasn’t English) something seemed amiss so I’ve deleted and moved on again!

@2anddone that sounds great. Did you specifically say upfront that you were looking for FWB, or did it just work out that way naturally?

@asabatt I agree with @2anddone, I wouldn't read too much into it at this stage. If you haven't already I'd send one this evening saying hope you've had a good day type thing.

I think generally it's consistency over time that matters, so you now know he doesn't text much particularly if he is working/ at a conference so next time you'd not expect that to happen. But if someone does tend to text a lot through the day or evening and then that pattern changes it tends to indicate a shift. At least in my v limited experience of all of this malarkey it seems to anyway.

Having said that the whole OLd thing is a total minefield. Obviously these dating threads have been going for a very long time now and it would be impossible to read back over too many of them but even if you just have a look over the last couple there will be really good advice as we are all in the same boat. And it's very supportive over here 😊

@Starseeking no conversation has been had about what we are doing but it's very clear it's a FWB situation.
I know he still loves his ex-wife and we often talk about how it is too soon for anyone to find out especially his daughters.
In fact he was supposed to come round tonight while my dc were out but he messaged to say he couldn't make it as his daughter was questioning him last night so he better stay at home this evening.
I just keep reminding myself it's FWB/rebound sex so I don't catch feels...when we had sex I was his first person other than his exwife that he has slept with in 34 years!

Does anyone ever wonder if they're now dating your ex on here?! Saw my ex on bumble and thought I wonder if anyone in here has dated or will date him!

Oh I'm sorry this has happened to you!
I know it's a bit rubbish to have to say to someone you're no longer interested.... but just ignoring someone is so cruel!
So you've messaged twice about meeting up and no reply. I don't think you can message the third time so I think k you might have to write this one off :(
Just k ow that you have down NOTHING wrong. He may have been a nice guy/good chat, but leading you on and ignoring you is cruel :( hope you're ok and you can move on From this.

I'm still chatting to Mr last year. Part of me kind of wishes I hadn't started this chat because it's not going anywhere at all and that's abundantly clear... but it is nice to chat to him. He always sends chatty replies and doesn't take all day. It's easy! Maybe that's because I don't want it to go anywhere though 🙈

I have a new match in tinder who so great chat. Doesn't take days to reply, seem to have had a good convo over the past few days. Problem is that his pictures are obviously over a period of time and not all recent. I fancy the ones when he's younger but not the recent ones when he has a beard (not a massive one 😂). So I'm going to call him Mr beard! I do think attraction can come when you meet them though... will see!

I’m curious…Does anyone have any tips for figuring out if someone is secretly married or in a relationship?

One thing I’ve begun to wonder is if they only seem to be chatty during work hours but are silent after 6pm. Unless they have a time consuming daily hobby they’ve told me about, I begin to suspect it’s because their evenings aren’t free and they’re at dinner with their wife and kids 😮‍💨

There was research conducted a while back that showed well over half of tinder users were married or in a relationship.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna94163

edit to add: obviously there are some cheating men that may still chat in the evenings , but I just wonder if it makes it more suspicious if they’re quiet in the evenings. 🤔