I (mid 30 F) met this guy on OLD, almost 10 months ago. I lost a parent I deeply loved less than 2 years ago, very suddenly, due to untreatable cancer. Shortly after, my ex of 7 years left me (ofc he decided to shout at me a good amount of hurtful things before leaving, just to make sure I was left bleeding badly). Took 1 year for myself, stayed away from relationships, started therapy (much needed) cause well…I’m mid 30s and I need to work and function in everyday life.
Last summer, I felt I was ready to dip my toe into OLD (first experience for me). I set up my profile, making sure to show what my hobbies are, what I value, and specifically saying I was looking for something serious and LT. Matched with many people, but I decided to go on a first date only with one of those (I have ADHD and juggling multiple people is almost impossible for me). At first, he was SO great: full of jokes, very kind and respectful, very good looking. Was texting me consistently, future faking (I recognize that in hindsight, whether it was intentional or not, I’ll never know). I am very good looking as well (I admit and recognize I had the “pretty privilege” my whole life, since I can remember), but I have very low self esteem and my weakest spot is my empathy: give me a good story on how you’ve been treated poorly, and I’ll do my best to understand and console you. 8 months, and I can safely say it was the most abusive (mentally), toxic and manipulative experience I ever had. I don’t even want to consider it a relationship, cause it sure didn’t feel like one. My therapist suggested to reflect on this time, so here is a list of things I came up with and why, if I am where I am today, it is only my fault.
- Sexual jokes from the get go (not directly at me): I should have been more wary about his intentions.
- On our 3rd date (which took place at my house because it provides me a quieter setting to focus because hello ADHD), he kisses me. I tell him that I am looking for something serious, is he looking for the same thing? Answer: yes. Then he suddenly gets up and tells me he has to leave. My mistake: I should have taken this as a bad sign, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
- After that, he’s “sick” and for 2 weeks I don’t see him. My mistake: I should have left right there.
- Communication is great at first. But he never suggests dates, I always do. That’s not a problem for me, because I am used to lead and didn’t think much of it. My mistake: he was clearly “just going along” and not into me. Again, I should have left gracefully.
- I ask him if we are exclusive (1 month in), because if we are not fair, but that crosses a boundary of mine. Answer: yes we are but I need to go slow. Fair enough.
- I never met a friend of his. I think there is no need to comment on this one.
- He never wanted to meet a friend of mine. Again, see 6.
- “Women are scary” and all his exes were narcissists and crazy and treated him poorly. Not once did I hear some self reflection on his mistakes. Massive red flag.
- I was “dramatic” and “overthinking”. Please beware I was in therapy the whole time, and I can safely say not only was I not dramatic, but I was incredibly calm and quiet. Little jokes to put me down (“you’re not very educated”, “you’re boring”, “look at what you have done!”), always said laughing, so I would take them just as that: jokes. I should have left.
- Sudden drop in communication, he becomes flaky, cancel dates last minute, becomes vague, gives me many excuses: I think he genuinely thought he could manipulate me or that I was stupid, dunno. My mistake: I saw through all of this, but lacked the gut to confront him properly. I tried, but he always had a good excuse or explanation.
- Last straw: we talk about going to a concert on a Saturday (to which he agrees in person). I text him mid week to see if he’s still up for it. My text goes unread. On said Saturday, I decide to go to a park with a good book to relax and enjoy the sun. Lo and behold, he’s there with a woman. I (shocked and confused) decide to stop and say hi to him. He approaches me and proceeds to tell me she’s his friend from out of country visiting him for the week. Having never met his friends, God only knows who she was. Most likely, someone “new”. Never heard from him again, got ghosted and discarded brutally. He was wearing the same clothes and was on the same spot he brought me just one week before, lol.
It’s honestly embarassing that I was so stupid to arrive at this point, yet here I am, gathering the pieces of my broken heart. 100% my fault. Thank you for coming to my TEDTalk. Have you ever had similar experiences? Thought I’d never meet these people IRL…where did I go wrong? Take care y’all!
Tl;dr: got brutally discarded and ghosted after 8 months. List of self reflection on my faults. Support, insight, shared experiences are welcome!
Comments
Honestly it sounds like you need to get real about red flags and take ownership of this situation. You have to play smart out there
You try really hard and provide a lot of support. People are going to keep you around “just because” as it’s convenient to them.
I’d highly suggest you go work on your relationship with friends: meet people, say no to them, negociate, ask for favours, learn how it works. Watch how others act and try it out to see how it is.
> my weakest spot is my empathy
Your weakest spot is that you keep progressing intimacy instead of moving back when weird shit happens. Weird shit should be an immediate stop where you see what is happening, and you should be walking away from people and situations REGULARLY (as in: several times per months because I’m 100% you hang out around a lot of dysfunction).
So what if you go “aww”. You should then feel your intuition and discomfort, and move away.
I think that stories like this, which I can wholeheartedly relate to, kind have one running theme through them.
The woman in this type of partnership is always the one making CONCESSIONS. not only this, but the guy knows it.
The antidote: know what you want, and why you want it. If you aren’t convinced by your own standards… you will falter on them, and end up with trash.
It felt deeply relatable to read this sentence “Communication is great at first. But he never suggests dates, I always do. That’s not a problem for me, because I am used to lead and didn’t think much of it.”
When you think about what you’ve just said, you have to know now that you were most likely lying to yourself. If it truly doesn’t bother you to ‘lead’, you would not have bothered mentioning it… it wouldn’t be included in your post. But there is an element here that you fundamentally don’t enjoy. You don’t enjoy making all the effort, but you don’t want to be ‘disagreeable’ or ‘difficult’ by having higher expectations of him. So that actually IS a problem for you but you aren’t convinced its ok to have that standard yet.
Ultimately you were bullied for 8 months by a guy who saw he could get what he wanted from you without you putting up a fuss, and that’s going to do a number on anyones self esteem. You aren’t stupid and you aren’t foolish for being vulnerable, you just don’t have a clear mental picture of the kind of man you want…. because lets face it, if you sat down with yourself and said “this is what I need from a partner and its not up for debate” and THEN you met this guy, he’d already have broken numerous non-negotiables for you that would have resulted in the relationship ending within a month instead of 8.
Definitely not trying to lecture, because what i’ve said is the result of what I learned from being the quiet, amenable nice church girl who was told by her boyfriends parents “you’ll keep him in line, you are so good for him!” while he cheated on me repeatedly.
Any man who says something sexual to me that is not my boyfriend is just some cheap whore who is trying to get some from everyone. I do not entertain them at all.
Your point 3, very accurate. It’s all really sad but they are so charming only to pull such games. Just leaving is always the right answer to these kind of red flags. Leave first ask questions never lol. These guys honestly… I hate it
I’m happy that you can see all the redflags in hindsight. Buuuuut I agree with others, you gotta get smart here. You should have dropped this dude a looooong time ago.
I have not had these experiences online, but it seems a lot of people who are givers meet a lot of people who are takers, until you have a steel grip on your self-worth and boundaries.
While this could be taken as a gendered response, women are constantly told to give second, third and fourth chances, lest we “look like a bitch.” I personally have had my own friends tell me I was judging someone too harshly when I’ve walked away, but I was never proven wrong.
Now you know, next time you are confused, he is not your guy. Next time you feel uncomfortable, he is not your guy. Next time you feel like a joke was made at your expense or feel put down, that is not your guy.
Forgive yourself for knowing he was not your guy and hanging on for a while anyway. We don’t always know why we do it. But you’re in a better place for next time.
Yes had a similar situation with my ex who did many of the same things. #8 stands out the most to me — I will always pay attention to how someone speaks of their past relationships. It takes two to tango and reflection is critical for evolution. I missed many red flags in my relationship from five years ago but we are wiser and have learned from our experience, OP! You sound like a wonderful person who is committed to growth and development – and you deserve someone who will add value to your life. This guy was not it 😫
honestly the exact same thing happened to me after I got into my first serious relationship a year after a big painful breakup
I will say I did learn a lot and did not ever get myself back into that situation and feel a lot better about recognizing the signs of abuse
phew! you learned some valuable lessons here and thankfully nothing worse happened!!
it may haunt you for a bit, and that’s a good thing in many ways as long as you don’t get over-traumatized and keep thinking about
it’s now a few years later for me and thinking about it doesn’t bring up any emotions for me at all, I never wonder about him, and he’s been blocked for a very long time and I’m never curious about what he’s up to or how he’s thinking etc
you sound very reflective, intelligent, and empathic and when you find someone who matches that for you, your relationship will just feel stable and cozy 💙
A lot of people don’t learn from their experiences and get stuck in a cycle of abusive relationships. This becomes their normal, and they start to believe it’s all their fault.
It’s great that you’re analyzing your time with this person and identifying all the signs you overlooked, chose to overlook, or missed. You’re learning the lessons, and now you (hopefully) won’t repeat them.
Something I’ve noticed people do (and I’m guilty of this myself) is overlook red flags at the start because “he’s so smart/nice/otherwise treats me well/fun/blah blah,” and (this is crucial) “I may not find someone with these qualities again, so I’ll ignore this red flag.”
But here’s the thing, you absolutely will meet someone who has all of the above and is actually a decent person. But you’ll only find this person if you ruthlessly drop the red-flag ones.
If you ever see a single red flag in the future, my advice is not to even bring it up with the person (they will DARVO, manipulate, lie, grovel, then repeat). Just block, delete, and move on. This is the only thing that worked for me, and today I’m in the healthiest relationship of my life.
All the best.
Ended a year long relationship earlier this year, and I feel like my list is very similar to yours, OP. I am not beating myself up, but focusing on the lessons learned and moving on.
For me if a guy can’t plan dates or is inconsistent with communication I’m out.
Should look into the burn haystack method of dating where you cut men off as soon as they do something questionable like even make a sexual “joke”, don’t ask for an explanation, don’t scold, just delete and block and move on. Don’t waste time on men who aren’t putting in effort to you. I make 5x what my fiancé makes and he still plans and pays for all our dates. He knows I work a stressful job and does his best to make my life easy, and I of course love and support him emotionally, which is all he asks for. You’re in your mid 30s, like me, we are too old to play games.
If you’re wanting marriage and kids you need to find men who truly want the same and show you with action, not words. Allow men to speak and say what they want before you say what you want because predators will mirror you. Never stay with a man who says something negative about you, even if it’s true (like hairy upper lip or overweight), the man you want should treat you like he just won the lottery. If you’re conventionally attractive, shouldn’t be hard to find a man who truly likes and wants to do with you. I’m a fat mid 30s woman who grows a beard because of hormones and I found love in a man who treats me like a goddess.
TLDR: don’t put up with bullshit, as soon as they act up, block them and move on, you don’t have time to waste
I’m like you OP. We can have so much empathy that we even feel sorry for assholes.
I’m learning that instead of focusing on being liked, I want to shift the focus to myself and ask, “do I really like this guy? Or am I just trying to earn approval/love because that’s what my parents taught me?”
So much of the pain and abuse we tolerate is due to the fact that our caregivers set us up to think that’s what love is.
But it’s not.
Love starts with you. Love starts with loving yourself first.
I’m proud of you for recognizing the guy was no good. Trust your gut. I kept giving guys 2nd chances, wondering if I was just jumping the gun or being overly skeptical, every guy i gave a 2nd chance to ended up proving my initial gut reaction was right.
I just wanted to let you know I went through something very similar but in my opinion even worse.
It has been six months since he ghosted me and I am so embarrassed to admit I still wish he would come back.
I want to confront the situation but I also just wish he would want me like I wanted him.
I am so sorry this absolutely horrific and mentally abusive man found you. I am so angry with myself for allowing myself to get played in such a horrible way that I allowed.
> it is only my fault
Never, ever is this your fault.
People can be scummy and you’re now more aware of it.
Lots of love from me! Thank you for warning signs too. I’m very new to this myself and I have worried myself into a hole.
My two cents is that it would help you to focus on a guy’s character more. One good gauge is: If this guy was a woman, would you still be friends with this person? If the answer is no, even in the slightest bit, run away.
I heard this recently: “You have to value being respected more than you desire to be loved”
I found it really helpful.
Always trust your gut. You’re doing the right thing evaluating the situation and noticing the red flags you missed. It’s okay to mess up, it’s okay that you didn’t get it “right” with this guy, because you’re out of there now. Take stock and take care of yourself first moving forward. You got this.
I don’t know why these comments are unnecessarily harsh and victim blaming. They need to take a look at Dana Morningstars videos about narcissists, lovebombing, devaluing and disposal. All the victims of narcissistic people can’t all be “dumb”, they are just good actors. Once you see the common behaviours, you can tell much sooner. I’m really sorry this happened to you and I wish you the best with healing from it.
It’s so sad to me how many women end up is these types of situations and we choose to ignore our gut and don’t listen to our instincts, we chalk it up to “anxiety” and try to force ourselves to look past all the glaring red flags.
I, myself, was in an extremely similar situation. I had been in a 4 year relationship that ended suddenly and left me reeling, took time off from dating, started attending therapy regularly, and eventually met someone who seemed to be absolutely perfect. However, I knew from our 4th date that there was something not quite right, I actually seriously sat down and googled love-bombing and signs a man would be abusive (HELLO GLARING RED FLAG), but I ignored my gut instinct and kept dating him and I realized after 6 months of emotional abuse that I will never ever ever ignore my initial gut instincts ever again.
I am so glad you got out of this situation but I am so sorry you had to go through it in the first place. It’s not fair, it’s never fair to have to go through situations like this. Don’t let this stop you from being an empathetic person, just learn to listen to your instincts.
Girl, I dont think this is embarrassing. You are lucky to have gotten out after 8 months. So many women stay in marriages with men who do not like or respect them for YEARS! Their whole lives!!!!
Don’t confuse other peoples relationship longevity as a sign of them being good relationships. I’m 35 and a lot of my friends who have been married for 5+ years are finally putting together that relationships don’t have to be hard – their husbands just kinda suck as partners.
THAT SAID… you will keep spending time on crappy guys until you recognize these patterns you put up with and start questioning “why” you endure them. (Spoiler alert – probs has links back to childhood and attachment to your parents).
My friend is a couples therapist and the most helpful piece of advice, wisdom, knowledge, whatever she gave me recently is to think about whether I’m attached to the “story of the relationship” or if I’m attached to my actual partner. So many of us will attach ourselves to the story we tell about our relationship more than we are actually attached to the person we’re seeing.
I was deeply attached to the story of my relationship with my ex. And some of that story was real and was beautiful and amazing… but that’s the only part of story. The other 70% was that I was frequently emotionally deregulated because of that man and his inability to treat me with the respect and care I deserved and outright asked for. But I was holding onto that 30% real hard.
You list out a lot of red flags about this guy. I think you should write out a list of green flags you’ll be looking for in your next relationship too. Someone who wants to meet your friends, someone who suggests dates and plans, someone who listens and tries to understand your perspective and doesn’t call you crazy.
Keep those green flags in your head as much as the red ones. And don’t be shy to drop someone when the red flags come up. Maybe have a conversation about it if it’s something the person you’re dating would have no idea about… but any man in their 30’s worth dating does not need coaching on how to not drop off in communication or plan a date. They know how to. They just don’t want to.
Thank you for being so brave and sharing your story. Sadly, I relate so much. We deserve so much better. I’m sorry you went through that and sorry for the loss of your parent.