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Several times now, I've had text conversations with women where they seem to scare themselves off.
One kept pushing me to ask her sexual compatibility questions, which I answered as delicately and dryly as I could. She'd rave excessively about how attractive I was and how she's looking forward to seeing me again (we met once, briefly, and she tracked me down on social). Since I know it's a bad idea to build up a date this much and set sexual implications, I complemented her back but kept it light and fun.
Then the day of the date, suddenly a co-worker got fired and she has to work a double. Also "You're not expecting sex for this meeting, are you?" Well no, I was not, despite everything you've said being suggestive of that, because I was going to take it slow. I reply "Light canoodling at most." There's mutual availability tuesday, and thursday, but she suggests thursday, mentioning "she'd like more planning, usually." Now I haven't heard anything from her since.
Before this, the shape of the exact same thing happened. She started talking as though she was already assuming we'd be in a relationship with her "adding spice to my life and shaking things up." This is way, WAY more than I'd typically send when I haven't even met someone in person, it assumes too much. Then suddenly she was astronomically ill from "allergies," which continued for several days, her apparently being home from work, yet replying less than when she was at work, until I stopped texting.
I want people to turn up for an in-person date. I very carefully don't say things that create too much pressure or assume things about compatibility, because it comes off as pressuring and dishonest ("OMG I'm so into you" ...we haven't actually met yet, miss, maybe save that for after the first date). But then they themselves do that exact thing, bail the day before.
Fucking everything I do is tiptoeing around not triggering anyone's anxiety so as not to be treated as a threat, then they trigger their OWN anxieties, treat me like a threat, and presumably pat themselves on the back for having spotted a manipulative predator who was Only After One Thing.
What the fuck is going on here?
When I interact with someone in real life, I get really confused and anxious whenever they start praising me. Then they get confused as to why. This is why. Because whenever someone gives me unprompted compliments or raves about me, they swiftly ditch me, which is why I don't believe what anyone says anymore.
Everything I've heard of dating apps lately sounds awful, I'm hoping my kids will be able to find someone in some sort of organization like I did and my parents did and their parents also did -- college, church, volunteer work, whatever.
Not sure what's going on with the woman in question, though, or the in person compliments.
They aren't awful at all if you think of them as a way to meet people you wouldn't otherwise meet. They come with a whole different set of incentives in that the sheer amount of availability leads to an expectation of instant chemistry, but I don't know that that's necessarily a bad thing. You can go on a date with someone and think it went well, only to find that the person isn't interested in going out again. A lot of people complain about that, but the complaint is entirely one-sided in that these people almost never talk about how they didn't feel anything special about someone but decided to give a second or third chance in hopes their opinion would change. People are more likely to stick it out for a few dates in a market where potential partners are scarce, but that comes at the expense of a greater emotional toll. Imagine a situation where two people go out a few times. A is genuinely excited and views B's willingness to go on additional dates as evidence that the feeling is mutual, while B isn't that excited and is only going on additional dates because they think they should give things some time. When the truth inevitably comes out, it's going to be much harder on A than if B never let things get past date number one. And it's much harder if A doesn't have scores of potential matches just waiting in an app on their phone.
All that being said, if a woman was being as aggressive to me as in the OP's example, I probably wouldn't let it get that far. I've used the apps and everyone I've met has been normal, or at least seemed normal.
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