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Why Did He Bring His Girlfriend On a Date With Me?

aabbbiee — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:37:59 -0800

Online-dating filter: Should I confront him about bringing his girlfriend on what I thought was a date, or just let it all go? I am female, 31, and I've just started dating again after my shitty marriage ended. I've had a few dates in the past few weeks, and I'm getting more confident and laid-back about the whole thing. I'm not looking for anything really serious.

About 3-4 weeks ago, a guy emailed me on a popular online dating website. We chatted for a couple of weeks in email. He seemed nice. He asked me to dinner, and that went well. At the end, I said, "This was fun. Do you want to do it again?" He said, "Sure, yes," and sounded like he meant it. Then he followed up by saying that he had been kind of seeing another person for a week and a half.
By my calculations, he'd asked me to dinner since he'd started seeing this other person, which said to me that they weren't serious. I said, "Well, whatever, we can be casual. Honesty is good." Blah blah blah. I might have said something about being friends, but really I totally got the impression that he liked me and I liked him, and maybe he wanted to just date around a little, be casual, and that was all fine with me. We are both slightly nerdy, with reserved, quiet dispositions, and we were having a great conversation with a lot of laughing.
He emailed me immediately the next day and talked about getting lunch again the next week (which was last week). We exchanged numbers, real email addresses, etc. Funny, flirty emails ensued over the next few days. In addition to lunch, we talked about going to an afternoon event on the weekend (this past weekend). He said that there are other people at his work that were interested in that event, and maybe there'd be a group or something. We met up for lunch on Thursday as we had planned, and that went well. He talked generally about the weekend event and that one of his coworkers in particular would probably attend with us. I thought that was fine, no big deal, sounds like fun. On Friday afternoon, he emailed me to ask if I want to see a movie that same afternoon and said this same coworker might want to see it too. He namechecked her for the first time. I said, yes, great.

I met up with him and this coworker for the movie and then we ate a very casual dinner afterwards. I thought they were just friends and coworkers, but it dawned on me that this is the girl he'd been seeing for the past few weeks. She referred to him in a very familiar way, and she put her hand on his thigh. After dinner, we headed back to the cars and they were obviously leaving together. He mentioned the weekend event plans, and she was the only other person coming to it with him (and me). I was more than a little crushed because I like him.
When we met to go to the event on Sunday, they arrived together. She obviously thought that she's dating this guy. She was touching him, using the word "we", commenting on what they did together the previous day. It sounded like they have been dating for months, but she was still in the touchy-feely honeymoony phase. He was hard to read and did not touch her like she touched him. I was friendly and acted normally, but I was totally uncomfortable and felt like a third wheel.

For no good reason, I like him. He doesn't seem to be as cruel or manipulative as it sounds on paper, just probably oblivious. He is late 30s. (She is probably early 20s, but I don't think that's a factor.) To be clear, he and I were just flirting with some extended eye contact, etc., but we never actually touched. But I know flirting and I know chemistry and I know what a fucking date is.
Meanwhile, he is still on the dating site. His profile is active. He is listed as single. He instigated the conversation and dates, though I was an active part of the planning and conversation- I'm just saying, he was proactive with me and not just reactive.

So. Should I just walk away without explanation, or should I confront him about this and ask him what the hell he was thinking by inviting me to events with someone who clearly considers herself his girlfriend? I can't think of any logical explanation for his behavior, but I'm (for no good reason) willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Please remember, none of us are confrontational people, so demanding an explanation would be a big deal for me. I don't want to confront him by email, and I really hate talking on the phone. He mentioned seeing me again when we left after the event, so if that did transpire, I could potentially agree and then use that to confront him, but it would totally stress me out.

God, I feel like a moron, but I don't know what lesson to learn here. WTF?

Dating for widows. Not the spider kind. Not the text layout kind.

Anonymous — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 21:03:17 -0800

Widow in her mid-thirties would like some dating tips... I'm in my mid thirties and my husband passed away about 7 years ago. (and no, this isn't the way I usually start conversations) I've tried to date on and off, but have not yet found anyone where there is any mutual desire to be "in a relationship". Some might say I haven't "dated" anyone, but I find that to be an ambiguous term. I date. I go on dates. I just don't sequentially date one individual.

I'm unclear on when or how to bring up my marital status. I don't generally mention it on the first date. I have mentioned it on the first date in response to questions like "So, have you ever been married?". Men usually seem shocked and distressed whether I simply state that I am a widow, or explain that I was married but my husband died. Then they usually start asking how he died, if it was expected, etc -- if I found out a man was divorced, I wouldn't start asking if it was expected, the details of the settlement, etc. on the first or second date. I usually try to steer the conversation back to getting to know each other a little better.

Friends have reassured me that men wouldn't particularly care that I'm widowed as far as making a decision to date me. I've noticed that some personals sites ask if you are interested in meeting people who are single, divorced, separated, or widowed. Many men seem to check off everything but widowed.

I think I've got a fairly positive attitude overall, and sometimes acquaintances comment on how happy I look, or that I'm always in a good mood. I'm reasonably outgoing, and don't feel that I need more men approaching me in public than currently do. I have tried to approach men once in a while, but find that their not approaching is usually a sign that they are just not that into me. I've been dipping my toe into online dating on okcupid, mainly because I felt discouraged by yahoo personals showing me profiles of men who don't want to date widows when I've checked off the box that says that's what my status is.

I've tried asking friends to introduce me to people, but I don't think this is common in my social circles, as I only met one man that way. I do a lot of activities I enjoy, and I do meet men this way, so I don't need to be told to join a club or take a class.

I make the effort to go on dates, but more often than not I don't find it to be a very enjoyable experience overall. Usually, I either don't enjoy the date itself, or I enjoy the date and wonder why I never hear from the guy again. I do pay attention to having a good balance of conversation, and even if I'm not having a great time I figure I can use the practice and might learn something.

Are men interested in attractive women in their mid thirties who happen to be widows? What and when is the best way to reveal this information?

Bonus question: Do most people enjoy going on first dates? I see that some people doing online dating want to date for "fun", and I'm not sure if that means "sex is fun" or "first dates are fun". BTW, I have no trouble at all meeting men for sex, this question is specifically about dating, as in meeting someone in a public place which would involve some sort of refreshment, conversation, and possibly some sort of activity done with clothes on.

Yes, I know there are online dating sites for widows/widowers, and they have very small memberships. Yes, I know there are support groups for "young" widows/widowers, and from my perspective these are groups of "older" widows/widowers. I've been to some, and have not found much in common with people there. Yes, I know there are online groups for widows, etc. And yes, I've already done counseling.

Why is he still going to Match.com?

terra — Fri, 19 May 2006 04:30:30 -0800

If a guy is not a player why would he continue to frequent a dating site a month into what seems to be a pretty good relationship for both of us? First off let me say I AM going to have a talk with said gentleman once I get some feedback from everyone here, but right now I'm confused and afraid of getting hurt and need input on the situation. I've been single for many years but am NOT a serial dater - 90% of those years have been spent as a single, working mom, dating very little. So I probably don't have the street smarts I need for this kind of thing. Yikes.

A little over a month ago and six months after the end of a 1.5 year relationship with Mr. Wrong, my only truly *bad* choice in years of dating, I jumped back into the online dating thing. I met this Mr. Wrong on Yahoo!, which for me was bad because there's no real matching involved - anyone can and does e-mail you - and in my area the caliber of man on Yahoo! was pretty bad.

I went to Match.com and soon realized that, while the guys seemed to be better people, anyone can pester me via e-mail even though reading my profile would tell them explicitly what I'm looking for or what I'm about and that we'd be an obvious mismatch. Also, I recognized several faces that were STILL around from when I was on Yahoo! a couple of years ago. Guess the serial daters had just moved up a notch. Was about to cancel my membership and go to eHarmony, when Match offered a subscription to their similar new venture, Chemistry. So I signed up.

Chemistry promotes the kind of LTR I'm looking for. You have to answer a lot of questions and they send you a few matches rather than letting everyone search their database and mail anyone they like. For me, this works. I hoped to find the man I would eventually marry.

So I get a few matches who seem far and away above the guys whose profiles are on other sites, but for one reason or another they're just not quite "it." And then I got the e-mail about Mr. Right. So many of the things about him just clicked with me. We went through all their guided communication stuff and it just kept clicking, as did our in-person meeting. Lest you think it's simply that he's a hottie I must say he's just an average guy in the looks department.

So Mr. Right has been divorced for six years and hasn't had a steady relationship in two years. He is also a single parent. Match offered him the same deal on Chemistry as they did me. I never saw his profile on Match during the short time I was on it, but after he told me that was how he'd come to Chemistry I found it and checked it out. That's when I saw that it said "Active within 24 hours." Well, okay - I've only been seeing him for a couple of weeks...maybe he's still shopping. I, on the other hand, pulled my Match profile after going over to Chemistry, not wanting to be spammed by Mr. Wrongs any longer. And I've since cancelled my Chemistry membership as well, though I paid for a period that will not end for another month and a half.

When I had been with Mr. Wrong for a couple of months I found that he was still corresponding with women on Yahoo!, a fact that upset me to no end, though he dismissed it as just harmless flirting and said he just really got an ego boost out of it. Based on the fact that he was at my house practically all the time I'd say he probably didn't actually meet any of these women. But even if he didn't, what about the woman on the other end he is stringing along? What a jerk thing to do.

My relationship with Mr. Right has become physical. We see one another a lot. When we're not together he calls me and we usually have pretty lengthy phone conversations. So if he was seeing anyone else it'd have to be that he was getting two hours of sleep a night or something ridiculous like that. Because of my bad experience with Mr. Wrong I didn't want to do anything stupid when I should have known better, so last night I went to Match and found Mr. Right's profile again and, as it was a few weeks ago the "Active within 24 hours" was noted. If you are a Match member other members can see who's looked at their profile, so I went in anonymously with a different browser. I don't think my profile is accessible to anyone at all because I deactivated it but I didn't want to take any chances that he'd think I was still trolling around on Match - I'm not.

So, guys in particular, what's the deal? Is it a harmless ego boost? Is he trying to get something going with someone else? Even if it is just flirting it is not acceptable to me if our relationship is going to progress, and I will tell him that. But right now I just need to hear some outside opinions on the situation. I am in my early (gasp!) 40's and he is in his late 40's.

Online Dating

slipperywhenwet — Sat, 12 Feb 2005 00:40:45 -0800

What are your experiences with online dating? [+]

On dating sites, should my profile be long or short?

Anonymous — Mon, 07 Feb 2005 08:55:40 -0800

DatingSiteFilter: One thing that annoys me on dating sites is profiles that are very short - just 2-3 lines or so. I'd like to know a bit about potential matches (yes, I'm picky!) But I'm wondering if having too long a profile is a turn-off to women. I'm a guy in his late twenties who totally believes in honesty, and my profile on a couple of sites is about 600 words long. This is so I don't accidentally end up with people who won't fit (I'm an atheist libertarian among other things). Is my profile too long? Should I keep some "mystery" back? Am I not getting any contacts because women might be falling asleep by the time they finish reading? Please share your thoughts and experiences.

Online dating diplomacy.

scarabic — Mon, 31 Jan 2005 23:04:41 -0800

Online dating diplomacy. If you decide after an email or two that you are not interested in the other person, either because the conversation is uninspiring or the pictures they send are unappealing, should you actually write to tell them "sorry, but I'm not interested?" Or is that worse than falling silent and letting the correspondence die? Some people persist if you don't respond, and ask "what's the deal? you didn't like my pic?" I honestly don't know what's the best thing to say, if anything. Honesty is not the same as full disclosure, and I just feel that random people really don't need to hear that I find them undesireable / uninteresting. I figure if I just stop writing, most people will simply write me off and move on. What do you think?