Making sense of being dumped
June 1, 2021 2:35 PM   Subscribe

I just got dumped out of the blue by someone who very consistently acted like he liked me, and said he really liked me, who I also really liked. I’m completely devastated. I’m having a really hard time making sense of what happened and am questioning my gut, and I could use an outside perspective.

We’d been dating for over 3 months. I expressed at the beginning that I wanted to take things slowly and intentionally, and that’s what we did. In a pace appropriate way, we both clearly, consistently, and increasingly expressed interest, appreciation, and affection for each other. We had not yet made a commitment to each other, although we had talked about that being on the table. When we hung out, we’d always spend the entire time laughing, being affectionate, telling each other stories, extending the hang longer and longer, and just having a great time. It felt totally balanced in terms of who was initiating dates, sex, affection, etc. I worked hard to express my needs and set boundaries and he was totally on board with that. It seemed like we were a great match in terms of interests, values, and sense of humor. We had fun pretty much no matter what we did, even if it was just lying around the house. He frequently talked about things he wanted to do together months from now, had bought me a toothbrush for his house, and told his family and friends about me. He literally never expressed anything but positive regard for me- if there were things he didn’t like, I have absolutely no idea what they were. There was no lull in new relationship energy that I could see, no red flags, and no mixed signals, which has been very rare for me in my dating experiences in these past few years. It just felt reliably and increasingly good, without being anywhere close to a love bomb on either side. I tend to be an anxious dater and hypersensitive to signs that someone is losing interest, and I felt secure with him and didn’t see any of those signs. I was thrilled to find a romantic relationship that felt so simple and easy.

On Sunday morning, after another great overnight date, he was showing me something on his phone and I saw he had reinstalled Bumble. I asked him about it, as he had told me he had deleted it. He said that he hadn’t used it, but he’s been ambivalent about us moving forward as a couple for several weeks, and even though he likes me a lot, always has a great time with me, and feels like he could talk to me about anything, his heart’s not in it. He said that when we were apart, he would get in his head and feel scared of moving forward with me. I told him I wasn’t interested in dating someone who felt ambivalent about being with me. So we broke up.

This came as a total shock to me and I’m completely crushed. This feels like the worst case scenario given how hard I’ve worked in the past year, in therapy and on my own, on trusting my gut and not being paranoid about someone secretly not wanting to be with me even though they act like they do. I’m trying to make sense of this on my own and with my therapist so I can move forward in a healthy way.

As I process this, the biggest thing that’s coming up for me is whether I need to recalibrate my sense of whether people are into me. I feel very misled by his enthusiasm and consistent affection in the past few weeks- it feels like none of that was real, and it’s really confusing in retrospect because it seemed totally authentic at the time and hard to fake. If he wasn’t that into me, it seems like it would have been more honest for him to pull away a bit or tell me that he needed to think some things through. I want to believe that he was telling the truth when he said he really liked me (because this would mean my instincts aren’t way off), but I also feel like if that was true, he’d want to be with me. It just seems like he didn’t really like me and was letting me down easy. If it’s true that he didn’t really like me, though, it makes me feel like I can’t trust my instincts.

Of course, neither I nor random internet strangers can know what was truly going on for this person. But I feel like it would help me to have an understanding of what most likely happened that I can accept and move forward from, rather than spinning my wheels trying to make sense of things that don’t add up like I am now. Any perspective on this front would be much appreciated.
posted by deus ex machina to Human Relations (33 answers total) 8 users marked this as a favorite
 
Given that you hadn't talked about exclusivity yet, and you turned him down due to his ambivalence, it may be that he was thinking of this in a more casual way than you were.

I don't think there's a contradiction between his behaviour in the relationship and his ambivalence; it seems perfectly possible that he was swept up in the moment when he was with you, and the feelings that he described when he was apart from you gave him reason not to embrace that as fully as you did.
posted by sagc at 2:44 PM on June 1, 2021 [16 favorites]


I think you should assume anyone you meet on a dating app is not serious until you have a direct conversation about being exclusive.
posted by bradbane at 2:47 PM on June 1, 2021 [6 favorites]


Since you weren't exclusive, and he was ambivalent about your relationship, it seems to me he didn't want anything serious.

"I told him I wasn’t interested in dating someone who felt ambivalent about being with me."

You did the right thing here since it seems you want a serious relationship. He didn't, so you guys weren't compatible and broke up.
posted by GiveUpNed at 2:49 PM on June 1, 2021 [30 favorites]


He said that when we were apart, he would get in his head and feel scared of moving forward with me.

Echoing a tried and true bit of advice from here irt relationship things: when someone tells you who they are, believe them. He told you that he liked you but that he didn't see a future with you. It's totally okay for you to find that unacceptable and for it to be a deal breaker.

Sometimes just being into someone isn't enough. It sounds as though he was into you, but he wasn't necessarily into the idea of what he pictured for your future (or whatever his brain was spinning up as that future).

If he wasn’t that into me, it seems like it would have been more honest for him to pull away a bit or tell me that he needed to think some things through.

I totally get this feeling (you're hurt, you cared about him, it's totally understandable to want things to be different) but: he was honest, and he did tell you. Would you rather he had pretended for a while longer while his heart wasn't in it? It sounds as though he communicated his feelings and you communicated yours and they turned out to be incompatible. This happens. It's shitty and it hurts, but it happens.

Personally, and I may be a hopeless romantic so take this with a grain of salt, but I think the fact that he was honest with you and treated you kindly and with respect suggests he was genuinely into you, but just not as much as you might have been into him.

Be kind to yourself for a while. Don't make any big decisions now or try to judge yourself in a time of grief. In a few months, when you've been apart for a while, go back and reassess with a clear head. For now: treat yourself to something indulgent, feel your feelings, and know that it was good while it lasted.
posted by fight or flight at 2:49 PM on June 1, 2021 [21 favorites]


I just got dumped out of the blue

He said that when we were apart, he would get in his head and feel scared of moving forward with me. I told him I wasn’t interested in dating someone who felt ambivalent about being with me. So we broke up.

Well so, here's the thing, though: you didn't get dumped. You dumped HIM because he no longer met your standard. You're completely entitled to have that standard, of course, but it doesn't sound like he would have wanted to initiate a breakup if you hadn't requested it. 3 months is super early in a relationship and definitely a point at which people can be very authentically having a fantastic time with a person while still not being ready to go "all-in."

On the other hand some people are just fantastic liars. (Doesn't sound like him, though, or he'd have come up with some comforting and plausible lie about Bumble!)

On the gripping hand, some people are actually just not great at sending the signals they want to send--or about NOT sending signals they DON'T want to send. I thought I was sending an ex very clear signals about my unhappiness, but he was reading other signals and interpreting them in the opposite way, and it definitely (in hindsight) made sense that he would.

There's probably nothing wrong with your judgment at all. This person liked you, but not enough for your taste. It's not a mindfuck, just a bummer.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 2:50 PM on June 1, 2021 [71 favorites]


It's a cliche that you never know what's going on in someone else's head.

The real thing is, most people take some time to figure out what's going on in their own head.

It sounds like ... you read the signals that he liked and enjoyed you correctly, and he confirmed that. I'd take that on its face: I don't see any reason it's not true.

But also he had his own internal reasons for feeling "scared of moving forward with you" that he has just been catching up to and working through, without sharing yet (and you have no way of knowing how big those feelings were, or where they came from in his life or head). The good news is: he did tell you. And the good news is: you can be clear about what conditions you are and aren't willing to accept.
posted by Dashy at 2:55 PM on June 1, 2021 [6 favorites]


I would add that rather than being a sign of poor judgment on your part, I feel like the whole thing is a sign that you have excellent judgment. You ended up allowing yourself to get attached to someone who was too honest and innocent to hide his phone OR make up excuses about it, who was open about his conflicted feelings and gave you the info you needed to make a decision. That's a super-like-worthy person!

Sadly, just because two good people like each other doesn't mean a romantic permanent relationship will always pan out. It is hard when you feel like you've done the work and nobody's in the wrong but you still don't get what you were looking for, but them's the breaks.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 2:59 PM on June 1, 2021 [54 favorites]


3-ish months is about the point where casual dating turns into official dating. I am a person who has always had a fight or flight response about commitment, and so this is about the time in a relationship when I start getting antsy. Any sign that the other person wants more than casual dating and I'm going to suggest we break up, because I'm not here to hurt anyone's feelings. I just want to have a good time.

I dumped a guy once like literally seconds before he told me he loved me. We had been dating 3 months almost to the day. I could feel it coming on and I knew it was going to ruin the fun time we'd been having, so I cut it fast. And of course I didn't say so because it would be wildly inappropriate and it sounds sociopath, but on my own I was mad, because here we were having a fantastic time together, and he had to go and ruin it by wanting more than I was able to give.

Just a perspective from the other side of the table here. Someone can be 100% into the relationship you have as-is and still have zero interest in committing to a long term contract. Not everyone is built for the relationship escalator. As I've gotten older these feelings have solidified for me, so I know and am able to articulate it honestly right from the start.
posted by phunniemee at 3:03 PM on June 1, 2021 [24 favorites]


As I process this, the biggest thing that’s coming up for me is whether I need to recalibrate my sense of whether people are into me

I don't think there's anything wrong with your sense of this. It's completely possible for someone to genuinely be into you but not be ready or able to commit. There's no magic signal that you can look for. Any relationship involves risk, because you're letting go of control...the other person will always have their own emotions and choices. The best you can do is be open with your own feelings and let things unfold (totally fine to have your own boundaries about needing a commitment, of course).
posted by pinochiette at 3:08 PM on June 1, 2021 [3 favorites]


I don't mean to diminish how absolutely crappy this situation feels for you right now, but how about trying on the following idea: What if nothing went wrong here?

That is, what if you did everything exactly right? … from taking it slow, communicating your needs, trusting your date's words and affections, not lowering your standards, and even cutting it off when he stated he can't reciprocate the love you want.

Maybe there's nothing to recalibrate.

How might it be true that you did everything right and yet it still didn't work out?

I know it does not seem like it right now, but I wonder if in the future there's room to see this as a success in being exactly who you want to be - someone who is trusting, open, communicative and not willing to settle for anything less than a loving relationship with someone who is unequivocally ready and available for you.
posted by iamkimiam at 3:10 PM on June 1, 2021 [71 favorites]


He said that when we were apart, he would get in his head and feel scared of moving forward with me.
He sounds like an idiot who's not ready for an adult relationship. All that stuff that you experienced together WAS real and he DID feel that way. People just let every random stray thought push them around. He just talked himself out of a good thing. That's on him. You'll find someone who isn't an idiot.
posted by bleep at 3:30 PM on June 1, 2021 [5 favorites]


...but he’s been ambivalent about us moving forward as a couple for several weeks...

Several weeks!?

I'm so sorry this has happened to you. I may have an "old fashioned view", and despite all the dating rhetoric that floats around, I actually find this deceitful.

Even if you weren't "committed", I take it he knew you were only seeing him, you had a view towards a longer commitment, you were having sex...

I think this is an awful way to treat someone, and it most certainly is misleading. And to find Bumble on his phone! Just no!

I'm not sure if my response will help you, but I think you can do better than someone like this, even though you won't feel it right now. To me, his behavior speaks of his character, which is severely wanting, in my opinion.
posted by NatalieWood at 3:33 PM on June 1, 2021 [6 favorites]


Response by poster: Thank you all so much for all of the very helpful feedback and perspective.

Two minor points of clarification- we previously had an explicit conversation that we were not looking to date each other casually and weren’t dating other people, and I’m positive that he went into the conversation wanting to break up. I shortened the breakup part of the story to keep it anonymous, but this was a sit-down conversation we had where he said he’d been meaning to tell me all this but kept putting it off, he started crying while he told me everything, and then said “my heart’s just not in it” very much in an “I don’t want this” context.
posted by deus ex machina at 3:35 PM on June 1, 2021 [3 favorites]


It just felt reliably and increasingly good, without being anywhere close to a love bomb on either side.

he’s been ambivalent about us moving forward as a couple for several weeks, and even though he likes me a lot, always has a great time with me, and feels like he could talk to me about anything, his heart’s not in it.

This is just speculation from an Internet stranger of course, but I wonder if it's possible he went along with your (very reasonable) pacing because he was into you, but ultimately he is someone who equates love with love bombing and so began to have doubts in light of this not happening.

Anyhow, I agree with the consensus that you didn't do anything wrong. There is no way to date without occasionally getting hurt, and the first 3 months are usually a time of figuring out if a relationship has legs or not. Nobody can really know another person in just 3 months - so, there's nothing wrong with your "gut" per se, it's just how dating goes unfortunately. And it sounds like you did an excellent job of advocating for your emotional needs, so I'd try to feel good about that - that's a skill that will serve you well on future dates.
posted by coffeecat at 3:45 PM on June 1, 2021 [6 favorites]


I had just written a whole answer about how you shouldn't "have to" but realistically probably have to...do everything you did, based on your update. You didn't do anything wrong. You did a ton of things right.

It is possible that it just wasn't clicking for him in the way that should kick in around the three-month mark and he legitimately felt bad about that and didn't know how to end a relationship that didn't suck but wasn't the definite right thing. I have been on both sides of that equation and it was never a perfectly-executed dismount, people said and did awkard-to-ungreat things in the process and the timing was always a little awful, in part because there wasn't exactly anything wrong, there was no big event, it was just a failure to thrive.

I am inclined to view him more sympathetically after your update than before, but it's definitely still feasible that he's a fuckboy or a babyman or both or just a mediocre product of toxic masculinity in that he can't handle having feelings or communicate properly about them.

My only (horribly old-fashioned-feeling) advice for your next attempts is that negotiating "going slow" with "having sex" is pretty fraught. If you're not built for (or currently in a mode for) casual fucking, sex creates connection, and there are also some playing-house-type intimacies (including sleepovers, or couple-y things like throwing parties together or going on holiday or other things that hit the romance button too hard) that maybe you need to be a little more discretionary about if you know it's going to over-bond you too soon to someone. Obviously it's possible to go too far in the other direction and be so cold it's off-putting, but there's something to be said for letting a bit of mystery and anticipation flavor the very early weeks and maybe months, and focus on experiential, more public-friendly dating at first.
posted by Lyn Never at 4:00 PM on June 1, 2021 [9 favorites]


If the question you're asking is "why didn't I spot him as a non-starter earlier?" it's two reasons.
1. You're not psychic. Other people's heads are black boxes, god only knows what's in there.
2. He was hoping it would click because you were a good match on paper, but it didn't.

Neither of these means you are a clueless baby deer in the forest of romance. It was just a thing that didn't work out.
posted by emjaybee at 4:22 PM on June 1, 2021 [16 favorites]


I think to get to the gut question instead of the boy question...learning to trust your gut does not, ever, make you a mind reader. It doesn't save you from hurt.

Learning to trust your gut may save you from harm and from people who are presenting radically differently in order to manipulate you. But it won't save you from someone who is dating you, likes you, and then decides it's not the relationship for him right now. It doesn't make your work less!
posted by warriorqueen at 4:23 PM on June 1, 2021 [8 favorites]


I think, as a very commitment-phobic person, that there are a lot of people out there who are in fact scared of commitment and will balk at it when the possibility arises. Someone can be 90% present and emotionally available, etc, and then the 10% comes around and all bets are off. Someone can be, 90% of the time, very sincerely happy....but that 10% is a powerful 10%. To an internet stranger, this sounds like a guy who thought he wanted to pursue a committed relationship and who thought he liked you enough to go ahead but then the repressed returned and he wanted to get out.

It's grim timing for you, but I don't think it means that your approach is wrong.
posted by Frowner at 4:31 PM on June 1, 2021 [7 favorites]


I want to believe that he was telling the truth when he said he really liked me (because this would mean my instincts aren’t way off), but I also feel like if that was true, he’d want to be with me.

OPE on a re-read I think I found yer problem there. This seems like a super reasonable logic chain, I know, but it's a fool who looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart.

People can really like someone, even actually-factually LOVE someone, and also not want to be with them. People love the abusive spouses they have fled, and they still don't go back. People like their best friend's partners and suffer about it but still choose not to be with them, and even recognize that they don't want to be with them. Most people who end a marriage or a long-term relationship still very much love or at least like their exes on some level. Those are some extreme examples but this is all a difference of degree and not kind.

So of course, on a casual-dating level, someone can really like someone else but still have reasons to not want to be with them. Sometimes if someone is very extremely self-aware they'll be able to articulate those reasons. (And sometimes they're easy to pinpoint like, for example, a fundamental mismatch on kids vs no kids.) But mostly it's just a difficult fog of "almost...but not quite."

But yeah, if there's anything in your mindset to work on I'd say it's not your gut, but rather the black and white thinking on what it means to "like" someone vs what it means to be in a relationship with that person.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 4:35 PM on June 1, 2021 [12 favorites]


Are you familiar with attachment theory? It sounds like this person has some strong avoidant tendencies. People with an avoidant attachment style find emotional safety by carefully controlling the amount of distance in their relationships. To them, closeness and connection feel scary, so they pull away after connecting to regain control, even if they enjoy connecting in the moment. Depending on the person, this might manifest after every date, after a new milestone like having sex, or after a certain time period has gone by that rings the alarm bells of "uh-oh, things are getting serious." Most of the time, they don't consciously realize that this is happening or why. It just feels like suddenly they need to move away from the connection.

This website has helped me a lot in understanding the avoidant attachment style: https://www.freetoattach.com/

Good for you for standing up for your needs. Of course you don't want to be with someone who is ambivalent about you! It still sucks and is sad and disappointing.

In terms of making sure it doesn't happen again, I don't know if there's a sure-fire way. Sometimes there are warning signs, but sometimes they don't show up until the pull away has already happened. Did your guy feel comfortable being part of a team with you? Did he ever ask you for small favors? Did he feel good receiving help and support from you? Did he talk about his past relationships in healthy ways? If any of these are nos, they can be some of the warning signs.

The website above recommends talking to people directly about it. "How have your past experiences with relationships shaped your worldview?" can be a useful question to ask, but it takes a ton of emotional intelligence to answer meaningfully and even then you may have to read between the lines.
posted by danceswithlight at 4:51 PM on June 1, 2021 [4 favorites]


Someone upthread suggested this guy might be a cad, but to me it sounds more like he has some attachment stuff that he has not worked through, and that he does not know how to be in the kind of relationship that he thinks he wants to be in. This sucks, but it happens. And really it's of no never mind what was going on with him, because what matters is how it makes you feel. It sounds like you handled both of the relationship in general and that conversation with him really well, and I'm really sorry this happened to you. I hope you can do something nice and get yourself some ice cream or watch a comfort movie, because this just sucks.

The breakups I had with people who were like this were harder than the breakups that I had with people who ran hot and cold on me. I really took them to heart, because I wanted to be able to find something that I had done wrong. With the hot and cold people, what I had done "wrong" was obvious: I stuck around even though they were inconsistent. But the breakups with people who were consistent until they weren't? I couldn't blame myself. I tried, but this did not serve me. Trying to overcorrect made it harder for me to be intimate and vulnerable with people, and I don't recommend this.

From your question, it kind of sounds like you're more used to dating people who run hot and cold, and that you've been working on this and trying to recalibrate so that doesn't keep happening. If what happened with this guy is not a pattern for you, I wouldn't worry about recalibrating more yet. Instead I would probably focus in therapy on how to not take responsibility for problems that aren't mine. Because you did everything right here, at least from my limited vantage point. Take care and I'm sorry.
posted by twelve cent archie at 5:00 PM on June 1, 2021 [4 favorites]


I should add that there is also a possibility that he wasn't avoidant at all, he just didn't click with you as much as he initially thought he did, or maybe only intermittently. When the click was there, it was strong! So he kept waiting to see if the feeling would go away, but it didn't, so eventually he talked to you about it and broke up. That would be a very honest and honorable thing to do, even though it still sucks and is sad and disappointing.
posted by danceswithlight at 5:01 PM on June 1, 2021 [3 favorites]


I was once similarly dumped, but way LATER in the proceedings - we loved each other and said so, I caught myself daydreaming about having his kid once (and when I told him he was all twitterpated about that), we were INTO IT. And - he dumped me kind of out of the blue as well. He had his reasons (that he just didn't see us ultimately lasting long-term) and I have my interpretation of those reasons (he had MASSIVE, MASSIVE issues with commitment because he hadn't gotten over an ex-wife); but ultimately, the theory that felt the most "true" about what happened was when I was discussing the whole situation with a friend of mine who has the knack for getting to the heart of things. And my friend's theory was "I think he did love you, but he just couldn't handle it."

Everyone in a relationship, if they want to stay in a relationship, has to dig down into themselves and really do some self-reflection and self-examination at certain points; it's part of how intimacy grows and part of how you work out what kind of relationship you want to have. You have to really deep-down know who you are to be able to figure out if it fits with this other person, and periodically as a relationship progresses you have to re-evaluate yourself a little and open up more. And sometimes that self-reflection and self-exploration scares the shit out of people because it's big and serious and messy and "aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh i wanna go back to where we were just goofing around and not talk about all this heavy shit". They may tell themselves that the other person got too serious, but it may be more a case of them not being able to get that serious, or being too afraid to get that serious about themselves.

I have the feeling that it's not you; it's him getting scared of the prospect of "holy shit this is getting real, I don't know if I wanna do that." Giving him more time or space wouldn't have helped - he wasn't going to be able to really open up, and you deserve someone who is strong enough to do that looking within themselves.

I'm sorry. Good luck.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:47 PM on June 1, 2021 [5 favorites]


A lot* of dudes are deeply, deeply, deeply messed up by masculinity, patriarchy, pornography, etc. One of the ways this can manifest is that real genuine love felt for a woman and/or received from a woman generates crazy intense feelings of guilt and shame, because that's contrary to what patriarchy says men should be feeling and doing. It's hard to overstate how much of a headfuck this stuff is from the inside, but just try to imagine the kind of weird compartmentalization a man would have to go through to both derive sexual pleasure from dehumanizing and objectifying women, as men are heavily heavily conditioned to do since childhood, and to also love a woman as a human being. You kind of... can't. Genuine love sets off a civil war in a man's mind and forces him to reckon with what may be a lifetime of sins. In the end it may prompt a complete destruction and reassembly of who he thinks he is. But it's so hard to recognize and understand this when it happens to you and we write it off as "cold feet", "not a good match", "just not feeling it", "my heart's not in it". Personally I think he loves you and he freaked out at the daunting task of leaving masculinity behind to be with you.

* I have yet to meet a dude who is untouched by this. Most men I know are almost completely subsumed by it.
posted by PercussivePaul at 6:24 PM on June 1, 2021 [15 favorites]


I just want to add to the chorus that is saying that you did very well with your approach to dating and were very healthy and conscious about it, but it sounds like there's something going on with him that he wasn't sharing with you (or even himself). There's no way to inoculate a relationship against things not working out. I think your approach was a very good one and your decision to end things swiftly when he finally was open about his feelings is also excellent. Your practices are good, but there's no way to be assured that people you date will have done the level of work on themselves that you've done on yourself. There's no magical way of knowing what's really in someone's mental landscapes.

I'd also add that a lot of people I know are really going through it right now. It seems like people are trying to simultaneously process what they went through during this last year (a lot of trauma) and it's often coupled with an almost manic drive to go out and be social to the max. It's like spring fever on steroids out there. Whatever the case may be with him, I think it's very much his reaction to his own stuff rather than a flaw in you or your perception. I'd guess spending time with you and genuinely having a good time was like an oasis for him, but that it wasn't enough to stave off whatever else is happening with him. People can like you and be attracted to you and enthusiastic about you in a very honest way and also be really hung up on other stuff in their lives in a way that fundamentally interferes with their ability to connect in a more long-term manner. Dating is often a gamble and while it pays to be open and vulnerable, it also increases the risk of pain if things don't work out. I don't think you missed signals, I think there was a lot in him that he wasn't sharing. Hopefully you can brush yourself off and get back out there and meet someone who is in the same place as you are.
posted by quince at 6:33 PM on June 1, 2021 [6 favorites]


I feel very misled by his enthusiasm and consistent affection in the past few weeks- it feels like none of that was real, and it’s really confusing in retrospect because it seemed totally authentic at the time and hard to fake.

I'd like to offer up an alternative viewpoint: relationships and love are performative, and some people just "do" relationships well. Depending on the moral framework they grew up in, they "perform" care for their elderly relatives or kids, just the same as they "perform" relationships with potential romantic interests, and it may not be meaningful to try tease apart what is authentic and what is not. Like many other things in life, you have to do something before it becomes real, not wait until it feels real before you do it. I don't think he was trying to deceive you, he was just doing his best.
posted by xdvesper at 9:08 PM on June 1, 2021 [5 favorites]


I know you are disappointed but think of all the time you just saved yourself!
You could have easily drained over a year or more and dragged out the heartache.

Instead you were clear and decisive. I stand in awe.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 10:33 PM on June 1, 2021 [2 favorites]


So many of these “we just started dating and it was going great and then they weren’t into it” questions on AskMe lately.

Have you weighed the pandemic context? Millions of people spent a year with little or no human contact of the “dating” sort. They also spent the year evaluating what they want from life. Or in some cases stuck in pre-pandemic relationships that didn’t stand the test of isolation and exclusivity. I would expect an absolute epidemic of commitment-phobia and intensive “playing the field” dating to follow. I’d expect less interest in settling down or monogamy for a while.
posted by spitbull at 4:08 AM on June 2, 2021 [2 favorites]


Genuine love sets off a civil war in a man's mind and forces him to reckon with what may be a lifetime of sins.

I beg you not to be swayed by grandiose fanfiction about what might be wrong with a guy you have told us nothing wrong about. A breakup hurts more when it's only wanted on one side, because you can't console yourself by pretending you're happier without him (although since it had only been a few months, there could certainly have been aspects to him you didn't know yet and wouldn't have liked as well. but there's no point in fantasizing about potential Mind Wars this guy might have been waging unless it really honestly does make you feel better. and if you liked him this well, why would it make you feel better to dream up a scenario like this?)

he sounds weepy, but not creepy. he didn't fake the relationship, he was happy enough in it that he waited until the very last minute he could back out honorably, and he might have delayed a little longer if you hadn't fully cooperated in understanding his implications. but you did, which was honorable of you.
posted by queenofbithynia at 6:42 AM on June 2, 2021 [5 favorites]


I wanted to write a very similar question about 3 years ago. I’d been dating someone I just *knew* was right for me, I thought it was going so well, then he broke it off out of the blue. The most distressing part, even more distressing that I couldn’t be with this amazing person, was the dissonance between that feeling of absolute certainty, and the reality that I must be wrong- if he was in fact right for me, at the very least he’d have to agree.

The reason I didn’t ask the question was because I suspected I would get similar answers to the ones you’ve got here- he’s just not that into you, it sucks but that’s the way it goes, you’re incompatible and want different things etc etc. Of course I knew that these things were wise and almost certainly true, it was what I’d tell a friend, it was what I was telling myself. But knowing all that didn’t change the feeling in my bones that he was the one for me. It was almost like discovering I was allergic to all the foods I craved the most. A fundamental survival instinct had failed me, and I felt unsafe and uncertain in the world. I’d done so much therapy and self help and my instincts still appeared to be terrible.

I tried to get over it and date other people, but I always found myself comparing them unfavourably to him. I kept thinking he’d get in touch and ask to see me, but although we kept in contact occasionally by text, no invitation arrived.

What could I do with this feeling (that felt like love) I had for someone who didn’t want me in their life? As much as I tried, it wasn’t going anywhere. So I tried to channel it in positive directions. I did this self compassion meditation, breathing in strength for myself and love for him. I tried to hold on to the motivation he gave me to be the best version of myself. I did things he had inspired me to do, I read more, took up volunteering. I was generous when I thought and talked about him. I didn’t blame him for the hurt I felt or console myself by finding fault with him. I stayed in touch with him, even though it was painful, because I wanted him in my life in some small way. Not long after we fizzled out, I discovered the book Hold Me Tight by Susan Johnson, which completely reframed attachment for me and taught be that having emotional needs and feeling vulnerable are a feature, not a bug, of relationships. Looking back, I think the experience taught me how to love.

About a year into this strange period of unrequited love, he asked to see me. About 2 years after that (last month in fact) we got married. The feeling of certainty has never wavered.

Of course we’ve talked about what went wrong the first time around. I was amazed when he told me he broke it off because he thought I wasn’t into him. Yep, the guy I’d lovingly meditated for with no hope of anything in return for a year thought I was ambivalent about him.

Obviously that wasn’t the case, but I can understand why he thought that in retrospect. When we met I was in a pretty bad place. I’d been in a lot of abusive relationships, and I really didn’t trust myself. So I tried to be mature, measured, not let myself get swept up by someone else’s feelings and pace, and be vigilant for signs of abuse. I wondered if that powerful feeling I had was a sign that something was wrong (abusive people can be super charming, and narcissists can make a great first impression). So I took it slow. I didn’t sleep with him (although I desperately wanted to), I didn’t text him as often as I wanted to, I waited for him to contact me (although I was receptive to his contact), and I was careful not to let on how crazy about him I was, in case he thought I was, you know, crazy.

I don’t think I did anything wrong. I’d been through the mill and it was sensible to protect myself. But most of my previous boyfriends had pursued me relentlessly when I showed much more ambivalence/resistance, so my expectation of how much chasing an emotionally healthy man would do was very skewed. Abusive people don’t take no for an answer, and non-abusive people do.

You mentioned lovebombing in your question so I wondered if you’ve been in abusive relationships and had a quick look at your history. Your last couple of questions really resonated- you asked a few months ago about intentionally growing intimacy, and last year about pushing people who seemed keen away. Is it possible that your (very sensible) attempt to control the pace came across as indifferent, or that you were pushing this guy away? You might have felt like you weren’t, but by my standards I was basically throwing myself at my now husband, and he thought I was just passing time. When we have extreme tendencies, even a big leap towards the middle can still be far out to the majority.

I often wonder now if this sort of miscommunication happens a lot in online dating- it’s so vulnerable and risky, I think we all hedge our bets, and could interpret each other’s caution as indifference, and attempts to control the pace as lack of passion. These things protect us from the wrong people, but maybe they sometimes stop us from diving in with the right people. After a lifetime of ignoring my instincts to get away from people who were bad for me, I fought my instincts to go all in with the one who was right for me.

I know my response is pretty weird and contains terrible advice for 99.9% of people who’ve been dumped (if you feel like this guy did you wrong it might be actively harmful to do some of the things I did), but I just wanted to share because I believe in your instincts. Even if this guy isn’t the one for you, he showed you that a wonderful relationship is possible, and your hard work is starting to pay off.
posted by Dwardles at 10:40 AM on June 2, 2021 [17 favorites]


I share this story with friends a lot as an example that we can never know exactly what is going on inside other people and that rejection doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you or that you were wrong when you sensed compatibility.

I have a friend since high school. He is extremely handsome. We get along exceedingly well. Over the course of several years in our early twenties we flirted and tried to date a bit on and off. I felt hugely compatible with him and found him objectively handsome but there was something in the way. That something is that he not only looks an awful lot like my brother, they also have similar voices and speaking styles. Every time we would kiss I would feel like I was kissing my brother. I unfortunately did not have the self awareness and maturity to tell him this at the time so all I said was that “something just wasn’t quite clicking.” I’m sure on his end this was very confusing since we seemed to click so well. And we did! I can also easily imagine that someone might have a similar experience and not even realize that you remind them of a sibling, or an ex, or a teacher they didn’t like or whatever in order to express this to you.
posted by Waiting for Pierce Inverarity at 11:55 AM on June 2, 2021


Nthing that you did nothing wrong. You did everything right! And he's just not the right person for you, because the right person for you is a person that wants a future with you, and sometimes it takes people time to work that out for themselves.

I have been on the other side of the equation. My guy on paper was great. We had a great time. We had lots in common and were comfortable with each other. I enjoyed his company. He literally did nothing wrong. We were even friends a while before we dated and I trusted him and everything. But I just could. not. get. the feels. There was nothing in my body or heart that made me excited about a future with him. I couldn't feel what he wanted me to feel. So when I was able to articulate that to myself (and yes, sometimes it can take weeks to work out what's going on internally), I told him and we ended things. And we are still friends!
posted by greta simone at 12:59 PM on June 2, 2021


I bet it is serious relationships he is ambivalent about vs being ambivalent about you; I think he just didn't want the same level/type of relationship that you wanted. Sometimes people think, "If his feelings were strong enough for me, he would want a closer, more committed relationship." But that's not necessarily true. Also, sounds kinda like when he got busted for still being on Bumble, the jig was up and he jetted. You can do better (and you deserve better). You did nothing wrong - not so sure he did, though.
posted by SageTrail at 5:06 PM on June 2, 2021


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