Too late?

My initial reaction was the same as Ss’s initial reaction. Wow. Reading that thread was painful. OP, I’m glad that you have realized this is a “you” problem and not a “him” problem. Yes, he love bombed and talked a lot of crap, but you absolutely went off the deep end. I really do hope you take some time to reflect and work on yourself. I would suggest taking a break from dating for a bit, even.

This is a guy you dated for one month! You pressured him to introduce you to his father, continued to push heavy conversations even when he made it clear he didn’t want to talk, you got passive-aggressive and pouty when he was not able to come fix your bike at the time you wanted him to come, you brought up his ex (!)….and this guy was not your boyfriend. Heck, even a committed boyfriend wouldn’t put up with that behavior for long. But to act this way to a guy you’ve been dating a month, who is not in a committed relationship with you…honestly if I were the guy, I would have bailed too. I don’t say that to be hurtful, just honest.

His “date” was with a woman that he knew a long time ago, who used to date his friend, and they used to hang out. He said it was more like a hangout than a date, and it might not even happen. But you got completely irrationally jealous. And you admit that he said he wouldn’t kiss any other women, much less sleep with them. That’s more than a lot of guys would promise a woman they’d been dating for one month.

As for your friend and her advice– of course, ultimately YOU are responsible for your actions, so you can’t blame your friend for how you handled this. Learn to take relationship advice with a grain of salt (including the advice on this board!) Someone I know gave me absolutely terrible dating advice when I was in the early days of dating my bf– but I recognized it for what it was, and did NOT take it, and am so grateful I didn’t. I think if you have a strong sense of self, and a strong sense of your own worth and boundaries, you will be less likely to take bad advice. So try to work on yourself, so that you don’t fall into that trap again.

I would also suggest NOT having heavy relationship conversations over text. It never works well. So much communication is lost when you can’t hear someone’s tone of voice or see their body language. And avoid cryptic comments over text about “needing to talk”. It just makes the guy anxious. That totally comes through in the thread you posted, you can see the guy’s discomfort ramping up. Texting for the most part should be informational (exchanging information), or else lighthearted/fun (funny videos, photos, links to interesting articles, fun chat/gossip). Texting is NOT a good format for heavy “talks”.

I’m not trying to pick on you, I’m just trying to point out specific examples of where I see you went wrong. You have to manage your expectations when dating, as in, there are certain things you can’t expect of a guy when you are so early in the dating process. And, you can’t be so possessive of a guy you’ve barely started dating; if a commitment to exclusivity has not been verbalized, you can’t expect him not to date other people. And finally you can’t manipulate a guy into commitment. The guy has to choose you as much as you choose him.

I’m glad you can come here and hash this out and reflect on what happened. I really hope you take it as a learning experience for the future. We’ve all been there and had bad & embarrassing moments in dating, so no one here is judging you!

Please, please, please let this go!

These things happen and no amount of self blaming is going to change that. I know how you are feeling as i felt the same after acting like an idiot with the guy i posted about above. Honestly, you will laugh about this soon.

What is meant for you will come to you. It isn’t just a platitude – a guy i was a bit gaga over and got it all wrong with is back in my life. 18 months later we are together and things are kind of good – I’m keeping my anxiety in check and it is just flowing naturally. What is meant for you will always come back around. Let go of this one as you are just torturing yourself x

Please don’t ever chase after a guy who does not want you. You need to write this on your bathroom mirror. You should walk away with dignity because I promise you that you will feel so much worse contacting him. It will not end with what you want, this is over. As others have said, if something is meant to be, it will return to you. Let it go.

My worry is that if he comes back (which it seems he will only do if he wants a relationship with me) I feel like I won’t be ready then. I was hoping he would come back and we would be able to things slow, just maybe trying to focus on each other and not others. Is this realistic in modern dating? Or is exclusivity directly equaling a relationship, I don’t even know anymore!

Laelithia

Please stop. Seriously. Everyone has been very kind in indulging you way way way over the top analysis of this. I am saying this to wake you up. It is not kind, but you need to hear it.

Please read your last post. He told you point blank there would be others. He said he wanted to keep dating. He only agreed to slow so he could keep dating. So your question about exclusivity is mute. He did not say let’s be exclusive and take things slow. He said I want to date other people and date you as well.

This relationship is now over. He no longer wants to see you. Some of that is on him, some on you.

Please get some therapy to learn about attachment styles.

“He could have saved me all of this over analysis is he just simply said it was over and goodbye.”

TOTAL BS. You did this to you. He didn’t. Stop talking and acting like a victim.

Leave this man alone. TOTALLY. Just give up the drama of this whole situation. He’s not over his last relationship and he’s dating around now. Stop fooling yourself that this has any potential to go anywhere. It’s not about him. It’s about you. You are not even close to relationship ready.

You need therapy before you get involved with another man to work through why you believe you need a man so badly that you’ll do this kind of behavior to hook one.

He is not responsible for you or your overanalysis. You need to watch men’s actions, not their words, his actions are telling you he is not interested anymore. He does not need to break up with someone who was not his girlfriend. And men would rather saw off an arm than hurt a woman by saying something painful.That is why you look at actions.

Hi everyone,

In reading some of these responses, I felt like I was having déjà vu. I searched up older threads of mine, and was saddened to see almost the identical post made by me, in 2015 and then 2017, with almost the identical responses. I’m disappointed that this patterned has repeated over the years, even with time and therapy interspersed between. I seem to be playing out some narrative from my past over and over, but I am not consciously aware of what exactly or why. I seem to have a love/hate relationship with romantic relationships. In fact, one thing I remember is before each of theses “relationships” went sour, I have doubts about the person as a partner. Then I seem to sabotage them unconsciously, and then pine for them after the fact. It’s madness really. My one friend thinks maybe deep down I don’t actually want a relationship. I don’t know if this is true or not. I find it very strange that I can maintain friendships and relationships with my family so easily, yet with dating I fail miserably each time. I seem to get “grass is greener” syndrome, and then once it ends, it’s more like “you only miss them when they’re gone” and I put them on this pedestal. Maybe all of this helps as a distraction from harder aspects of my life.

One thing that is common to these similar stories, is external stress. In 2015 I had a health scare, in 2017 my mother was fighting a terminal cancer diagnosis, and now my father is fighting cancer as well, as is my poor dog. I think I’m so busy unconsciously trying to distract myself from these awful realities, that maybe I drum up drama in my personal life to take the focus instead. Who knows. Either way, I have much bigger things to focus on rather than some man I barely had a relationship with. I just so desperately want to show my parents that I have finally found a partner and they don’t have to worry about me anymore, at least not in that department.

Good insight and yes, more self reflection. This must be a very intense week for you too, please look after yourself and when you have more sense of peace, more insight will come instead of overthinking. If you see fit, counselling or therapist always help, so as journaling or practicing mindfulness.

Yes, it is a very short time and infatuation may also block you from seeing the full perspective. Regardless of whether he will come back or not, probably not, focus on yourself and stop contacting him. We have all been there, and the world hasn’t end and hopefully, we will be a better person.

Thanks everyone, I’m trying to do better this time and show myself (and this forum!) that I can learn and move forward. Last time I messaged once more but then left it, and the guy actually did end up coming back a month or two later, but more in the hopes of friendship and he had just genuinely missed our talks. I think in the end I handled it okay.

As for this case, I’m wondering if I should send a final “thanks for everything. I’m leaving now, goodbye” text later this week and removing him from Facebook and deleting his number. I’m actually surprised I didn’t hear from him at all (even with a similar final text) but it doesn’t really matter. I just want to do now what is best for me now and to show myself I’ve made progress. I think that probably means not entertaining the possibility of reconciliation with him, even if he does come back, which is why maybe the final message is a good thing paired with deleting his number and removing him from Facebook. Or, just doing nothing at all and leaving it all as is. What do you think?

This post really hit home for me. I follow a lot of the same patterns as you do and am currently working with a therapist to get on a healthier path. It’s so easy (I guess at least for you and I) to focus on a guy when dealing with serious problems at home. And I think that’s the crux of your problem – this is just a way of you dealing and has little to do with the actual man. You were distancing yourself from him and then felt the need to become clingy to someone you didn’t even really want because he was serving an alternative purpose – distracting you from problems. And giving you a good healthy dose of feel-good hormones to boot.

As others have mentioned, there is no point in feeling guilty. We’ve all got our own problems and have made mistakes or done things we’ve regretted. The best course of action at this point is to focus on yourself and positive steps forward. I think unfriending him on social media and deleting his number is absolutely the right thing to do. In my personal situation, I originally tried unfollowing but that just didn’t suffice so I had to go all in on deleting him from my life. Trust me, you’ll feel much better without his digital presence in your life. You don’t need those reminders of his existence. I also would not reach out to him again. His silence speaks volumes. If he wanted to talk, you would be talking. But you’re not. Leave it be and focus all of your energy on moving forward and leaving this in the past. In the future, perhaps forego casual dating when you’re going through serious challenges. It’s completely understandable that you wouldn’t have the emotional capacity to date in a healthy way during those times.

Thanks everyone for your replies again. Especially Anon, it’s good to know I’m not completely alone in this. I think part of the reason I’ve had such a hard time letting this go (maybe most of it) is with him gone, I’ve had to face the harsh realities of my family’s health issues, work stress, the stress of the pandemic, etc. without the anesthetic his presence provided. Every text, call, hang out, sex gave me that high that made the other things easier to deal with. But that is in no way a good reason to maintain a relationship. It does make sense though why I panicked so much with the thought of him dating others and the potential to loss him, when I didn’t even know him that well. Maybe also why he doesn’t miss my presence as much as I miss his.

Anyway, I’ll think on if I’ll delete his info right away or not. On one hand, I want to delete everything (his thread, number, Facebook) but on the other that feels somewhat immature/petty/vindictive to me. But I’ll think on it.

The other issue I’m not totally sure how to deal with is the friend of mine that gave me the “bad” advice. It’s not so much the advice itself, but how she delivered it. She told me what to do, how to do it. Even now she is demanding that I report back to her everything that was last said between him and I, and I honestly just don’t feel like it. I feel like she is too involved in my life and too pushy. In fact when I told her earlier in the week things were going well with him, she insisted to know more and when I did admit I was a little nervous about him meeting my brother when he’s thinking of maybe still going on dates, she became like the dog with a bone and was enraged and demanded I say what she told me to. I think this speaks to my people pleasing nature… I should have been able to tell her no thank you, I will handle it. But I didn’t, and didn’t even give myself time to think for myself, just hurried and did what she said and sent the screenshots back to her. It seems very silly and juvenile now, and keep in mind I’m 31 and she’s 45.

I am not blaming this friend for what happened, I made the final call for adhering to what she asked. I just don’t know how to proceed now in this friendship when it’s put a bad taste in my mouth.

Hi Lane,

Thanks for your reply. I understand the removing of the messages and him off my social media, but why block him? I understand this when someone has misbehaved or mistreated you, but in this case, I feel unfortunately it was me that misbehaved and in all honestly, am probably the one that deserves to be blocked.

This is the same reason I feel bad to remove him from facebook without any explanation, as he didn’t do anything wrong. Well, he could have refrained from the future talk and all that, but other than that, he didn’t use me or mistreat me and I feel guilty to “punish” him over my bad behaviour. I don’t know, perhaps I am projecting how I would feel if someone deleted me off social media.

You are right, currently it is a very unrequited “crush” at the moment. Which is very sad because prior to my outburst, I would say it seemed that he was more interested than me. I really regret not focusing on how kind he was to always be checking up on me and being so positive when I was angry and hurt that one day. I can only imagine how ungrateful it made me seem, when in reality I do appreciate all the little things he tried to do for me. He even bought me little thoughtful gifts here and there, insisted on paying for most of our dates, picking me up, wanting to fix up my bike even when I was being bratty, etc. Now that he’s gone, it is so noticable how much effort he put in even though he wasn’t totally ready. I feel so badly about this, I hope it doesn’t make him wary to try again with someone else. It just really sucks to be faced head on with what I’ve done and what it’s cost me and maybe him as well. No wonder so many men have committment and trust issues… sigh.

I’d like to somehow make up for what I did, but don’t worry, I know I can’t. Maybe staying away and giving him peace is the only thing I can do.

You’re absolutely right, I shouldn’t have gotten all snippy and upset, I should have just listened to what he was saying and also continued to go on other dates. I could tell he didn’t want me to, but we both could have done this and just stuck with not sleeping with others as he had asked. Man, I really botched this one.

Due to my own family dynamics, I have always been terrified of space and what it means. My mother dealt with mental health issues while we were young, and was so hot and cold. Sometimes she would be the most loving and kind and sweet mother, and then for no apparent reason, cold as ice and cruel. I think this is where my overanalyzing/worrying/attempting to fix things came from but I am working on it. It hits home when you mention respect. I often do not see it at all in the moment as me having a lack of respect for others, but now that I look at it with some distance, that’s exactly what I did. I disrespected him and his feelings, and I feel awful about it. After he had been so kind and respectful of mine while I am dealing with all that’s on my plate. I could kick myself!

I have an appointment with my psychologist tomorrow morning, we will see how that goes. I’m going to be honest with her that I don’t think my progress has been going well, and see what she suggests in tersm of a concerete action plan to move forward and make permanent changes. I have to do something, because my disapointment in myself and regret is not helping me and today I feel emotionally I have regressed a little compared to yesterday. That being said, I will not allow these feelings to bleed into bad behaviour like reaching out.