Throughout the entirety of the date, everything was reciprocated. There was, uncommon for me, even unprompted active flirtation from the person in question when the present conversation was not necessarily flirtatious - random sweet things.
It lasted over four hours. We talked about our intentions, our interests, our passions, our traumas. There were two hour+ phone calls prior to the date that contained much of the same personal conversation.
They asked me to kiss them, prompted only by the vibe of sitting on a park bench by a river surrounded by geese enveloped in the reflections of the sun on the ripples of said river. This has never happened to me before, I have always been the instigator - always the asker, never the asked - it was not considered a masculine or attractive trait during my childhood to be asked. I obliged. We kissed quite a few more times the rest of the night, by my initiative and theirs.
They complimented parts of myself that I hate, or at least find hard to love - my nose, my freckles, my hair. They made me feel both seen and beautiful and I did my best to reciprocate. I have not felt this way in years, I can’t remember the last time I felt this way. It is only a first date, I know this. I know this. For like 50% of the date we were laughing and planning our second date, a potential third. We had talked about how things may change the more comfortable we became with one another, like hanging out at each others’ houses. They talked about getting me a birthday present.
Date ends. Get home. We text about how wonderful the date was, when our schedules would align well next - the sooner the better. Two hours since the last message was sent, I see:
!
Hey I’m so sorry but I’ve been thinking and I’m just not interested. Good luck tho!
I am taken aback but I think, ok, sometimes these things happen. Rejection would be one thing. I wrote a message saying it was totally ok but I just wanted to know if it was possible to remain friends, and if they were comfortable telling me if I did anything wrong or could have done something better, but they had already blocked me on everything. I just don’t understand. I’m starting to feel like something is seriously fucking wrong with me.
We had shows we agreed to watch together, games we agreed to play, and music we agreed to share. All gone in an instant without any recourse or explanation.
Am I acting entitled? Is this an extreme reaction to something trivial? I’ve been crying for a while. I’ve always considered myself an open book but I shared deeply personal things with this person. The connection was instant and nigh tangible.
I just wanted someone or some people to talk to. Most of my friends won’t care. I’m living out of a hotel for now. I returned to this horrible, disgusting room with a smile on my face. I was ready to get some rest and do what needed to be done tomorrow with that same smile. Now it’s 2am and I just lie here staring at the ceiling through soaked eyes tuning out the hotel cable until infomercials become little more than meaningless gibberish.
I’m trying to get better. I feel so fucking alone. They probably had a good reason for ending it so abruptly. Maybe they were scared of retaliation because I’m a man. I just wish I could know why. Is this type of hurt so fucking typical for “casual” dating? I am so drained, it’s a fucked up thing to say but I wonder about chemical castration sometimes. Is there something similar for “romantic attraction”, too? Because if this is at all typical, I’m ok. Count me out. I’m an adult and I still feel like a scared little kid.
Update: I slept. I’m over it. New day, new experiences. It was a great date if anything and reminded me that I am attractive and capable of being confident, capable of being a good listener, capable of being radically honest. I’ll remember this person for at least a long while and I’m at least grateful for our experience together IRL. I hope if they’re going through their own shit things get better.
Apologies again if this seemed like an extreme or silly reaction - I feel very intensely. I appreciate everyone who gave input and will find time myself to respond more in depth.
Also I was high and tipsy when I made this post. Ironically not to forget the date or whatever, I got high to sleep and tipsy to celebrate before the message came lol. Just a happy little accident that I saw it when I was crossed and ready for an excuse to freak out and cry lol.
You can rack your brain for days over this question and never come close to the real reason.
My advice in these cases is always the same: you’ve survived this long, you’ll survive longer. Take what you learned from this interaction to get something positive out of it and keep living your life.
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While it very normal and human for you to feel like, completely self hating and worthless after such a crazy Charlie Brown football moment, and I know this is not what you want to hear right now, you absolutely can’t be walking away from this scenario thinking “I must be horrible or why did this happen.”
You seem like a nice, cool, and self aware guy. I don’t know you, who knows, maybe you’re a monster. But just judging at face value, I think most people would agree it is very strange for someone to reciprocate and initiate such strong feelings so intensely only to completely 180 and say/do that.
I don’t know the person in question but as someone who has a really complicated relationship with dating right now I can empathize with some states of mind and behaviors that could be really damaging to others that would totally just be my internal BS. I am talking to one girl and I like her, but I also have some negative reactions to her affections and catching myself having feelings for her, so I go cold and firm a little bit. That’s not at all her fault, that’s entirely a byproduct of my own shit. I don’t know the person you talked to, but it would not at all be weird for you to wonder what THEIR issues are, because frankly that level is a little bizarre.
You’re not entitled, you just had by all accounts a mutual human connection and it got destroyed with no explanation. I wouldn’t be surprised if this made it really difficult for you to accept affections. You have been kicked while you are down, nothing stings quite like getting your hopes up in a chronically shitty scenario only to be left probably feeling like a loser and a fool.
You are neither of those things. You’re a person and responded to strong affections how any of us do. I know that connection felt like a diamond in a sea of shit, and diamonds are indeed depressingly rare sometimes, but there IS plenty of other diamonds out there. I know it’s cliche but you will find someone special again, and again. Please don’t let this push you into a pit of hopelessness. What you desire and what you deserve may be behind 1000 more bitter battles, but it is there, and it won’t always be a complete hell marching towards it either. Have some hope. 💜 I’m sorry you are going through this my friend, that is truly terrible.
Thank you comrade. You have been in my thoughts as of recent, too - I hope things are looking up. I do see a light at the end of this tunnel of filth, the hard part is crawling my way to it.
it’s a fucked up thing to say but I wonder about chemical castration sometimes.
The other day I was wishing that I could undergo shock therapy or lobotomy just so that I might stop obsessing over unpleasant memories. I made the mistake of bringing up one of them to my best friend a few days ago and (long story short) he actually made me end up feeling worse. Now I’m hardly talking to anybody and I feel like I don’t want friends anymore.
I understand entirely. How many sleepless nights can a mind spend wasted thinking about the ways we fucked up or about the fucked up things that happened to us?
I think there has to be a healthy way to just forget, right? Not like bottling up or repressing trauma, just a way to integrate those experiences into our being, our pasts without letting them overwhelm us.
I remember when I was 20 feeling like my head was going to overfill and explode from memories good, bad, and neutral - a mind must be a finite space! A few years later and my head feels empty as shit a lot of the time… which is… better? But it can also lend one to making similar mistakes over and over again without even realizing it, as I have.
This shit sucks, I’m sorry comrade.
After I wrote that, I learned about forced laughter and that became my coping mechanism.
I’m serious. Your body can’t tell if you are laughing intentionally or naturally, and if you prolong your fake laughter it soon evolves to become natural and almost uncontrollable. Even if you force yourself to laugh it still releases dopamine and after a while it can diminish the effects of an unpleasant memory.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11898980
I wish that somebody had told me this earlier, because it’s relatively easy and it makes more sense than useless advice like ‘just get over it’.
Be kind to yourself. Late stage capitalism makes things awful. I’m a demiromantic demisexual and dating apps are no help at all. You might find someone later, maybe she was testing the waters and decided that she was not ready. Maybe she’ll text you later because she needs to get over her old boyfriend for a while first. If she thinks you are a good guy she might recommend a friend. Many things are possible. Maybe she went too deep too fast and you reciprocated but that embarrassed her.
I appreciate the insight and empathy comrade. Should this be a wakeup call that I’m not ready to date? I don’t know. I feel like this just has to be a rather extreme example, right? For things to become as intense as they did so quickly (we have only talked for about a week) to collapse in an instant.
It’s so hard to make meaningful connections on dating apps that go beyond even a few words, let alone to this point, it all feels so frantic. I was in a relationship for 4 years and every time I think about a new one it feels so tiring to “redo” everything as it were - to make myself truly vulnerable again, to discuss everything that needs to be known about me for love to work. To have it flow like water from me like it did, and how the night wound up, ugh. It hurts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AHDACDch_w
IDK if this video is appropriate for you now, but look at the atomization that this video refers to within capitalist society. It will hurt for now, but you’ll get over it.
Find other people to meet your needs instead of seeking everything in one person. If you are out and meeting random people you’ll meet other people.
Find things you can do for cheap and fun and maybe you’ll find someone that way.
Damn. I found the video incredibly helpful, thank you. Did not expect a jreg video to hit quite like that, but I also only rly know jreg as le polcomp guy.
Yeah. I gotta find ways to meet people naturally in actual social environments. Easier said than done but I have to socialize on my own terms and not at the whims of strangers who I think I know. I especially felt the bit about superimposing the benefits of community, close friends and intimate partners onto a single person… of course there’s no way anyone could fulfill that role, but dating apps make it all feel so natural to expect someone to.
How did something as innately human as meaningful relationships get so twisted amd fucked up? Rhetorical question, I know how and why and most importantly who and I hope no mercy is spared on the facilitators of this complete social degeneration and atomization, from those behind the car lobby keeping neighborhoods unwalkable to the CEOs of Tinder and Hinge. Jreg is absolutely right, this is a fucking catastrophe.
A YouTube link was detected in your comment. Here are links to the same video on Invidious, which is a YouTube frontend that protects your privacy:
That’s unfortunate but these things happen in dating. And there’s nothing you can do about it really. If one person doesn’t feel like going on, you have to respect that. It hurts and you can be sad about it. Though it must be said that the other person, based on what you describe, was a bit rude ending it this way.
The important thing is, you put yourself out there in a vulnerable position and that’s a good thing. You put yourself open for other people to get involved with but unfortunately it didn’t end on a positive note. But what you did takes courage to do, and you did it. Feel sad about it but also keep in mind that there are lots of other people out there doing the same thing, getting hurt, falling in love, not matching, whatever and eventually they find the right person. It took my god knows how many people before I ended up with my current partner. I was ghosted, I fell in love, I had casual encounters, I made friends instead of partners etc. and if I stopped moving forward after every set back I wouldn’t be where I am now.
i’m sorry that this happened to you, it certainly must feel very shitty. however, this likely has nothing to do with you and more to do with the other person. they may have their own issues with self-sabotage in relationships, which made them cut you off like this, you can’t really know either way. don’t bottle up your feelings, but also don’t blame yourself for their actions. nothing of what you described here sounds like it was something you did that would lead to this, you seem like a pretty nice and cool person. i hope you have better luck with someone else ❤️
Wow I really empathize bro this must be harsh… I’m bad at comforting people, I can just give you my best hypothesis.
The most probable thing that happened given the info I currently have is that she wasn’t over her ex. Sometimes people use dating apps as a way lf coping with their breakup, I know people who do that irl. The thing is, if it went so well, she might have thought that you were too sweet to be used as a “bandaid relationship” (translated french expression idk if English speaking people use it) because those usually make people suffer.
Abruptly after the night she might have realised she was totally always thinking about that ex and felt extremely wrong and conflicted because she couldn’t just be that sweet to you with him at the back of her mind. She might have already done something like this with a pretty laid back and fuckboy-ish dude who still ended up in pain or something like that. So she thought she needed to cut it clean to not waste your time and hurt your feelings.
This kind of reason is pretty shameful and most importantly even good persons can insist on pursuing the relationship in that case because all they want is to try even if she is not over her ex. So she blocked you, just to be sure, and so you don’t suffer too much, like a clean amputation.
Hope that might help explain the situation, you can decide to make it your head canon if that’s probable to you
This also struck me as a potential explanation. I can confirm as someone “going through a lot of shit” that girls who are sweet and want a good, simple, happy, stable relationship, and who have eaten their share of shit and deserve kindness and happiness, these girls make me want to push them away for their own sake.
Idk, just move on
They’re probably a coward anyways, in which case not a negative
$100 says they were on the rebound and got a call from the ex.
You know, you’re almost right, but the situation wound up being much, much stranger. Let me say I am glad I did not allow my emotional vulnerability to persuade me to become too invested in this person… I dodged a lot of insufferable drama, at the very least. Still hope they’re getting better, though.
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Women like mysteriousness and a lot of interrogation games.
I want to counter this on behalf of the women in my life who absolutely hate this with a burning passion. It would be the nth time they meet a man who is unable to communicate their feelings, needs and wants in an adult manner.
What is important is that you feel at ease with yourself, that you know who you are, what you like, where your boundaries are, respecting other people’s needs and boundaries etc. Be yourself. And for the love of God, don’t follow conservatives advice on dating and masculinity lol.
It was the first date for OP. There can be women you mention, and they are the ones that do not want to play around. But a lot of women in the dating space do like to play around, either for night outs, free meals, socialising, or whatever reason.
You need not follow the word of nutjobs and cultists to follow conservative/moderate advice on masculinity. Kevin Samuels is a good one, he died recently. I just think they have a good hold of traditionalism, and a lot of those elements hold a lot of value that allows countering a lot of “Western feminism” elements I do not agree with.
But a lot of women in the dating space do like to play around, either for night outs, free meals, socialising, or whatever reason.
Sounds like they are not there with the goal of getting into a relationship, but rather to freeload on whatever man they take out for diner. Why would you want to join their game if a relationship is what you are seeking? Sounds to me like you would just play a game just to play the game, and then you should evaluate your own goals. If the person you are on a date with is only playing games with you, you should keep the respect to yourself and not continue dating. Someone who can’t treat you as an equal with the respect you both deserve is not worth having a relationship with, nor should you disrespect someone just because you heard some masculinity guru say it.
If a traditional relationship is what you want, by all means do that, and fit in that role. But it does not sound like OP wants that kind of relationship, nor is he needy for expressing his feelings towards a potential partner.
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>using 'male' and 'female' to refer to men and women as if they're animals>also, because every single men and women behave the same wayI used it because a radical feminist used those words against me, making me think it was suitable to use “male” and “female”. Nobody is talking about animals here, so stop misinterpreting.
Real fucking shame that one of the few comrades from the subcontinent we have on here is a misogynistic weirdo. I hope you either change your ways before you end up ruining a poor girl’s life.
Whose life am I ruining exactly? My views are not even strong enough, what is this reactionary lib behaviour?
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Its reactionary and lib to think you shouldn’t judge all women as being the same?? You will ruin the lives of any woman you enter a relationship with if you treat her with the mindset that she’s incapable of having her own preferences and ideas, instead of as a human being you see them as prizes to be won over.
I do not have such a narrow tunnel vision mindset. I have healthier and diverse ideas than that. I made a thread putting myself out there, check it out.
what the hell? this is disappointing to see, as i respect your efforts in countering western tech bro bullshit on reddit, and and was surprised to see you here and find out you’re a comrade.
and a lot of those elements hold a lot of value that allows countering a lot of “Western feminism” elements I do not agree with.
what elements exactly? there’s definitely lots of criticisms to be said of liberal feminism, but it sounds like you have other things in mind.
I agree there are definitely women who are very turned off by such things. But I also know women who are very turned on by such things.
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I myself am interested in the human race investigating more into how typical vs deviant relationships might have hard-to-see (and certainly hard-to-acknowledge) long term consequences of some sort. I am currently agnostic and I think that both extreme ends of relationships can be both healthy and cool as well as incredibly poisonous. I respect your views though I understand your hesitancy in a communist community.
That being said, I think that it can be much more complicated than that. I’m seeing one girl who really likes my closely guarded feminine side, but in our dynamic I am still by far the traditional masculine role. We take turns depending on the context in who is “dominating” although I would say there is little of that in either direction.
I also see other people where I am much more clearly filling a stereotypical male role, and others where it is more akin to “role reversal”. So far I think they all have their merit, and the most severe potential issues will be the result not of which roles we are filling but other internal issues.
I certainly think there are people who enter non-traditional setups acting out their traumas, unhealthy thinking, and other bullshit. But I see plenty of people doing the exact same thing in traditional setups. I think our society is just deeply fucked and right now there is no easy fix for that for many people.
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