Has this date quietly fizzled out before we have even met?

[ForPlumQuail]

The date isn’t going ahead, is it?

On Tuesday I started chatting to this guy and, within a bit of back and forth he asked me out straight away. Asking when I was free. Asked him if Saturday was good, he had plans that afternoon but said he was reworking it to leave early so he can go out with me. And assured me it was perfect.

Next day, much less chatting but he did say that he had to catch up on work the other day as he had spent so much time distracted messaging me. Day after, even less chatty (again, working day). But, the context of the messages were never blunt and required an answer from me, if that makes sense. Never dry.

Yesterday hardly heard from him at all. Again, another working day and he had plans that evening.

Each day we’ve talked, the upcoming date has been mentioned by him at least once. He seemed genuinely excited. I’d say even more forward than me. I was genuinely flattered at how keen he seemed.

Please nobody tell me off but I was so, so looking forward to it and feel so deflated. I know advice will be to do something nice instead, I need to get a life, etc etc. First time someone has given me butterflies and the excitement was just so nice.

I am 29 and have been divorced for 2 years now. I got married very young and the dating scene now is so ‘new’. And my age group (not a negative thing, good on them), seem so much younger.

The girlies of my age group with advice are very much ‘nobody leaves their phone for more than an hour or two’. And ‘if he wanted to, he would’ - being married I think that one is true, I’ve seen how someone genuinely interested moves.

This guy was just so keen to ask for a date. And now it seems the attention has gone flat

He is like me and gets up for 6am… even on weekends

Date went very, very well 😃

Good, I think you are very nervous. Hope you can relax now it’s gone so well

Good, now please stop with the block after 48 hours malarkey. You’re being far too keen. Just because he can, it doesn’t mean he needs to be texting multiple times a day. Relationships grow organically, not by frantically messaging back and forth.

That’s great news. Try to relax about the messaging now you know he’s just a normal person.

Excellent news! So glad it went well for you. And I concur with what others have said — don’t muck it up by reading too much into things like how often he messages you or takes to reply, whether you were the last one to message, etc. Just communicate very directly and accept that some people are not able to message much while at work.

Op, I ask this kindness, but do you have self esteem issues?

This whole assuming the data is cancelled because he hasn't text in 12/24 hours, then contemplating blocking him, is not healthy behavior. I'm all for having standards but some very high maintenance/seemlying highly strung MN's replying here probably aren't leaving helping this mindset either.

Men typically have different mindsets to communication than women - which is neither a bad or a good thing inherently, but people need to be a certain degree of accommodating when entering new relationships.
I also think its a good thing to leave something for the date as well. OLD is all about talking for weeks and weeks on end before meeting, when the more natural process would be to spend some interaction deciding if you have enough in common to meet, then just have that conversation and 'getting to know you' phase in person.

It another example of how tech is harming social skills. Have these conversations IRL without the influence of a carefully curated messages (often by committee of whatapp'ed friends or Mumsnet forums) or AI analysed responses.

Hooray! 🥳

OP, I just came across this thread on Facebook. Can I ask roughly which area of the country you're in as he sounds very similar to the man I'm seeing (who cut our day together short yesterday)

@CucumberMelon London

Honestly some people are not that great at messaging and if anything, the more they message the more it fizzles out. I'm one of them. When I met my husband, I had a bit of back and forth with him after our first date (on a weds), and once it was clear we both wanted to see each other again, I literally told him "I'm not so great at text and I've got a busy weekend ahead, but I'll text around Tuesday so we can work out plans for Thursday (date 2)." It felt great! We both agreed that very early you might not know each other well enough for constant back and forth, and honestly it was a relief to not to have to overthink a text every few hours and just be clear and direct that we liked each other enough and we would pick up at a set time. Honestly just ask if that might be him? And yes people have phones on them all the time, but there are also loads of people who put off texting/ doing the banking errand they should/writing an email about x or y thing/ researching the thing they should on their phones- because it's not about proximity to the phone, it's having the energy and headspace to text constantly.

I'm glad your date went well. Just keep a mindset that you're not exclusive, and that this should be a marathon, not a sprint. Don't be so full on and be expecting that you're an insta-couple. That'll sabotage what might've been a good thing.

Have a wait-and-see attitude, ensuring that who he says he is matches his actions, and not just during the honeymoon period. Do respect differences. Just because you enjoy texting all day and night, doesn't mean others do. Stay in the present, not projecting to a future with him that might never happen. Of course, during each outing together, you'll gradually learn if you match in dating and life goals. That's the vetting period where you will find out if a person has all your must-haves and has any dealbreakers.

Anyway, however this turns out, you will have learned more about yourself with the experience. Have fun!

Could it not be that there was more chat to start as you are initially trying to understand if this is a person you want to meet and now you have both agreed a date then he is waiting to meet you rather than keep chatting online? That seems totally plausible to me.

Sorry just seen your update- I’m glad the date went well. Just try and relax and not get overly invested too early on. Not everyone can and wants to chat throughout the whole day and night. I know if it was me and a man was constantly texting me, it would put me off.

He told me to text that I got home safely afterwards and I did. He quickly replied to that with ‘Fantastic’

Silence from him the next day so at 2pm I sent ‘I had a really good time. Thank you for the lovely evening’

He replied later in the evening with ‘Had a fab time’ and ‘early night for me, shattered’

And that was that. Normal so far?

I was want to add some perspective to why I think it isn’t - every friend I have and my ‘gen’ seem to think it’s too slow and doesn’t seem keen or interested, and that if he wanted to see me again, he would’ve said that

Anyway, as lovely as he was, I am going to see other people at the same time. This seems to be good advice for not getting hung up on just one man

When I was married, it was so clear my ex husband was asking me on another date. The very next morning, he was asking about plans for the following weekend and putting things in place

Do you just trust your gut? Because my gut knew my ex was going to be very keen and consistent after 1 date

@ForPlumQuail how did you end the date? Did either of you say 'we must do this again?' or anything like that? No suggestions made for when that might happen?

Not to be rude, but you’re divorced, so your EXH texting all the time didn’t equate to the perfect relationship.

You really are reading way too much into the amount of texting he is/isn’t doing. I know I’m much older than you so can’t understand this constant need to text, but my advice would be to put your phone down. Stop over analysing it. Whatever will be will be!

Anyone texting me the amount you seem to expect would really put me off. You could ruin this if you don’t just leave him alone.

It was. Sadly we just couldn’t get past the grief of our DS passing/stress of childhood terminal illness. It really destroyed us

And nobody was to blame.

He’s probably messaging loads of other women

just meet, keep an open mind and tske it from there

Yes, trust your gut.

He is meh about you, a man into you will be texting and arranging the next date. Keep looking :)

Dating is tough, some people get lucky and find someone nice quickly but for most it is a lot of weeding people out.

I'm sorry for your loss.

The date went well and you enjoyed it.
You are fine to chat to other guys as there has been no expectation set of exclusivity.

Your expectations of messaging within the hour would be way too much for me. He has explained he is busy at work and the one day (1st day) he was in contact so much left him behind on his workload. If you need/want that much attention from him to be sure he is keen, then let him know and he can decide if he wants to pursue this. If you think you can be satisfied with less frequent messages (like 1 or 2 a day) then continue seeing him while not shutting down any other guys.

How much time do you have to be messaging throughout the day?