I met a guy from an internet dating site in March. We went out from about April until August. I took my profile off almost immediately, but his profile was still on the site, I gave him the benefit of the doubt and I didn’t want to mention it initially, but finally he made his profile invisible after a few weeks. I must admit I did check the site on occasion to double check the profile was definitely not there. But after a few months into our relationship, I did a random check and his profile was visible again. But he seemed to be checking it only every few days.
I was very distressed and didn’t know how to approach him. As when he was with me everything seemed fine, he was also mentioning moving in together and buying a house down the track. So I was very confused. He did have issues, as his long-term partner had left him a year a go, and he had just finished the settlement and child support arrangements. His mother had died a year ago of Parkinson’s, he’d changed careers, and moved house all in the space of six months just before I met him. Things were slow between us initially, but suddenly they got really great, we had a lot in common and good bond and he seemed really happy, he called me his ‘resucer’. Everything seemed good, except he was back on the dating site.
I couldn’t take it any longer; I didn’t understand why he was looking for somebody else, when everything seemed fine. I emailed him and asked him why he was still on the site. I told him I was sad, hurt, disappointed, angry and taken for a ride. The next day he emailed me back and totally denied he’d been on the site since he’d met me. I was so annoyed as he’d now lied to me, so I didn’t speak to him for a week. He eventually emailed me, complaining that he’s been waiting for me to call him, and he didn’t understand why I had gone cold turkey on him. He was bewildered and disappointed. As I had not been in touch for over a week, he presumed it was over between us, and he would probably be better off on his own. He was thinking of moving interstate anyway.
I emailed him again to try and explain, and indicated I was probably being too sensitive for my own good. I didn’t want to totally loose him. I asked if we could talk, but he just texted me, and said he wasn’t ready to talk. That was 5 weeks ago. I did email him 2 weeks ago saying I missed him, but haven’t heard anything. I feel sad because it broke so suddenly and it was all done via email. I know I should have asked him face to face, but it is hard. He didn’t let us talk about it. Will I ever hear from him again? And what was going on with him?
NML says: This guy is screwing with your mind. You know that what he is doing is out of order yet you are buying into his crap and he has turned the tables on you where YOU’RE chasing him and YOU’RE feeling guilty when it should be him.
If he is not looking for a new partner or keeping himself open to the possibility of meeting someone new, why is his profile still active? The fact that he then lies about being on the site is ridiculous and this is where I feel that he is a bully and controlling. People like him challenge your truths and browbeat you into believing the falsehoods by making you feel bad about yourself. Technology means that these sites let other users know how active the person is on the dating site by letting you know how recently they have logged in. Is he saying that it’s not him and that he has a ‘site sitter’ that checks in for him and waters the plants? If you continue to keep your profile active, it means that you don’t have both feet in the relationship and are keeping your options open. These aren’t the hallmarks of a relationship that can progress!
This man has a lot of stuff going on and they all scream ‘red alert, abort mission’. We all have a bit of baggage but when we wheel them out as something to excuse our behaviour or to keep us at a distance, it means that we are not good for a relationship. I don’t deny that he’s had a difficult year but sometimes people try to do too much and it’s clear that he is not emotionally ready for a relationship. Rather than wait for him to tell you, you should take the signs and the hint and don’t try to make a silk purse from a pigs ear. You can’t fix this and he needs to deal with his own issues. The fact that he calls you his ‘rescuer’ is not a good sign. Being rescued feels good initially but he won’t want to feel rescued forever…It sounds like he could do with rescuing himself….
Let me spell something out for you. You have every right to be annoyed. You chose not to speak to him for a week where others would have dumped his ass. You told him how you felt about his actions and instead of owning up to it, he denies things and then demands to know why you haven’t been in contact as if your conversation didn’t happen. This is more bully and control tactics. Why was he waiting for you to call him? If he felt that bad he could have picked up the phone. On the flipside, you need to decide what you are doing with this guy because if you didn’t speak to him for a week, you had your reasons. If you wanted the relationship to continue, wouldn’t you say so? Wouldnt you say “Let’s talk in a week as I need to digest this and figure out things?” He probably was right to presume that it was over, not just because you weren’t in contact for a week though, but because of the conversation you both had, but most importantly his actions. He may sing a different tune but deep down he knows that he is in the wrong.
My biggest concerns though is that you don’t stand by how you feel and what you know. You are very quick to sell yourself down the river to a guy that can’t even commit enough to remove his dating profile from the website where you met him! Why do you feel you are being ‘too sensitive’? You’re not. If you’re in a relationship where there is talk of moving in together and buying a house, I think it’s safe to assume that you’re not just casually dating and keeping yourselves open to other prospects. You say you don’t want to “totally lose him” – well you can’t half lose him and you deserve better than to concede on the basic respect levels in your relationship and live the half life with him. He is playing silly buggers now by being the one in control of the contact and the best thing that you could do right now is sit on your hands and cease contact.
You may well hear from him again especially when he senses that you’ve started to forget about him. These guys are like boomerangs with a sixth sense for recognising when you’re starting to move on and get happy. He is trying to manipulate you and him doing his whole “better off on his own” and moving interstate thing is just emotional blackmail. If he wants to move, let him move. He can’t have been that serious about you if he was thinking of moving and you weren’t in those plans. You feel sad because there isn’t proper closure and he hasn’t allowed you to own how you feel. But you can get closure and own how you feel without him. Never let somebody, man or woman, tell you that black is white when you know the score. Always have boundaries and acknowledge when they have crossed and put yourself first instead of someone who doesn’t care enough about you.
Recommended reading: The 10 Commandments of Breaking Up and Why do men blow hot and cold?
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this is all woman’s rules and fuck the man thinking.
it’s very one sided and protects the interests of the female.
men get screwed over all the time by women, for money, for marriage, for kids, and then get screwed over in divorces, custody arrangements, etc.
you need to re think this article.
This site has been so valuable to me. Finally I am able to understand years and years of behavior. I recently fell for the worst Mr. Unavailable ever. He was the man who sounded too good to be true. I met him on a dating site. He was the ultimate “looks good on paper” man. Ivy league educated, Phd, works for hedge fund in New York, makes millions of dollars, sweet kind and sensitive..I thought I had met my Prince Charming! the 1st month I was swept off my feet. He pursued me intently, expensive dinners at restaurants, 3 weekends in a row at his house in the Hamptons, expensive gifts. I was flattered and felt lucky but at the back of my mind I kept thinking “this seems too good to be true”. After about a month I started to really fall for him emotionally. I didn’t care at all about his financial assets I just really felt that we had a connection. We had so many things in common. A love of art, music, travelling to exotic places in the world, languages..etc.. I thought it was a dream come true..i didn’t want to jinx it though, so I made sure to never ask him for anything or seem too needy in any way. I guess I tried my hardest. I began to let him know how much I liked him, by opening up to him saying things like “i’m so glad I met you” etc..showing my affection for him in every way. He went away on a business trip and when he came back the tables had turned. It was now no longer him chasing me, it was me trying to get him to spend more time with me. He worked long hours and his schedule was unpredictable. 12 + hour workdays, working on weekends..I began to feel that I never knew when I was going to see him next. I felt that I had 0 control in the relationship. We always met on his terms, often a weekday late in the evening. I was so flexible and accomodating to his work schedule. Soon I began to sense that something wasn’t quite right. We had been dating for about 6 weeks now, gotten tested together and presumed to be “exclusive”. then out of the blue he asks me (after being gone on a business trip for 5 days) if I had slept with anybody else during the time he was gone. I was taken back and offended, but i should have seen the RED FLAG. From then on there were so many other clues that something was wrong. He preferred to communicate by text message or email, rarely answered the phone, He was always in control of when we would meet, usually at his place on a weekday. I never met his friends and he didn’t care to meet my friends in the 4 months that we dated. he often seemed suspicious and guarded when I would ask him direct questions about his family/background etc..he had controlling ways. I remember one time I went to his house and and when I kissed him when he opened the door, some make up got on his shirt. his reaction was just not normal…he actually made a big deal about it and kept asking me if it would come out. RED FLAG..I, being to oblivious to the signs ignored these red flags, until one weekend after i didn’t hear from him all weekend. I had called on Saturday to invite him to a concert, but he never called back and I got Voice mail on Sunday night, after he knew very well that I was already asleep and my phone would be charging I get a blurry voicemail about some sort of “medical emergency”. The next day I try calling, no response. I text him, eventually he responds “thank u sweetheart 4 ur concern”I was in emotional turmoil. I felt this man was not being honest with me. it was just a gut feeling. I googled him and found out that he had lied about his age on the dating site (only by 3 years, you think what’s the big deal?) but a man who lies about small things usually lies about big ones too, right? then I checked the dating site and found out that he had been logging on all along! I was distraught, my self esteem has plummeted to the lowest of low, I feel lost and confused. It’s now been 2 weeks and I have the “no contact rule” in place. I WON”t CALL HIM! But I feel like he has just raped me emotionally. help, what should I do????
I would be slightly annoyed, but it doesn’t sound like the end of the world. It depends on the level of trust to me. And if you’re checking up on him to see if he’s deleted his profile… it doesn’t seem like there’s much there to begin with.
Figuring out what a guy is thinking or planning from her description is about as inaccurate as .. picking a date online.
But this really sounds like a ‘Cosmo’ moment – the time to figure out what you want, ask what he wants, and decide if you can live with his goals. *Assume* that you won’t change his goals.
You need to confront him. You are thinking that you are in an exclusive relationship, that you have begun to build the last relationship of your life. If he has a different agenda, then you have to ‘just be friends’. Some apparently mature people consider dating a recreation in their life, rather than a search for a life-mate. A successful series of dates should let you build respect, learn about each other, and build the bonds and involvement that make a date your ‘significant other’.
Hint; One opposite of ‘committed’ is ‘looking around’.
I had a similar situation occur with a man I began dating last fall. When I confronted him about it , he lied and lied and lied again. That was the beginning of one long year of hell, lies, cheating and abuse for me. I stayed with somone who continued to write to other women on line, even after he and I became exclusive. I caught him only because he was using my home computer to do it??? Why did I stay? Because I believed more of his crap and allowed him to push my boundaries to a point where it became absurd. I have been away from him for months and have found out about more cheating and lies that occured during our time together. If a man lies to you, its a red flag for sure. If he’s still cruising the on line dating sites ( mine was on one of the friend finder sites- the looking for sex variety site!!!!!!!!!) then its a sure sign that he’s not commited to working full time on establishing a relationship with you. IMO, if you’re dating someone exclusively, that omits the option of having cyber sex or otherwise with other women.
I say there is nothing wrong with checking to see how active someone you are dating is on the dating website. It may mean nothing. It may mean something. His response said a whole lot more! I think NML is totally on point! Preach on!
I am surprised you let this go on without saying anything for so long. Always trust your insincts.
@ Fran R. While I don’t advocate violence…I understand it. The nerve this foolio had to be trying to pick up other women from YOUR computer. (Throwing my hands in the air) I am not the one. I think some a z z kicking might have been in order
I miss the days when guys had to meet your father, brothers and cousins before taking you out on a date. Then they knew the faces attached to the a z z kicking they would get if they started acting foolish.
@Leo. I am sorry for your troubles. Anytime a man is too good, too soon, it sounds shady to me. Often they are trying to compensate for something incrediby jacked up. I know one too many women who have found themselves in abusive relationships from guys who were just a little bit too charming. Anyway I digress. A man should always know that you WILL leave him if he starts acting a fool. He should be pursuing YOU. If he is not RED FLAG (I recommend reading “he is just not that into you”). If you find that you are calling him all the time and constantly trying to chase him down. RED FLAG. If you really like yourself, you need to move on and leave him alone. If he wants to be with you, he will chase you down but you would need to let him know that he is going to have to put in some WORK to get back in your good graces. If he is not, you don’t want him anyway. Houses in the Hamptons are nice but happiness is better any day.
Hi your post is delightful.
I will definitely read your blog..
Thanks
Exactly! This was a similar situation that happened to me. This guy was claiming he was “so into me” asking me to be exclusive meanwhile he was active off the dating site we met on… I confronted him but then didn’t stand my ground and continued dating him while things went down-hill from there.
There are so many arguments about Dating Profiles still being active that if I was to date and become serious with a man who after we agreed to be exclusive was still active — no questions just dump his buttox. This guy in the paragraph above was totally turning the tables around on her while he was being the Jackarse. There are some people who don’t think it’s a big deal if they see someone is active on a dating site while they are dating someone — “trust” they say… well the writing is on the wall… but then again—it’s true it’s more about how someone reacts when you confront them about this—a normal healthy person would understand someone they are dating being concerned on whether they are dating other people if they are still active and will care about that other persons feelings—unless they truly dont care and will invalidate your feelings.
I was seeing an EUM and recently i stayed over at his house for a few days. I discovered that he was actively on a dating site while i was at his place. When i questioned him he said that he had not been on the site for months. When i pointed out that the site showed he had been online that day he didnt answer and still hasn’t. I have taken the “no contact” stance for the last 3 weeks while he has been emailing me with the usual general emails that we all send to each other. No personal emails, no explanations for being on the site, nothing. This of course isn’t the first sign of trouble there have been strange phone calls and secretive behaviour between him and others. Why do we otherwise intelligent women ignore these blatantly obvious signs of trouble? Now he has even stopped the general emails for the last 3 or 4 days. Maybe i will not hear from him again NML! Good interesting site NML. Thanks
I just went through the same thing. Instead of him being smart enough to say that he went on the sight because we haven’t been getting along lately..(because I started to set boundaries), he denied he was on there!! I found him advertising for sex on a site for “getting laid in 90 days!”)..he denied that too…I ended it immediately…haven’t contacted him. He texted me a week ago…saying he “knows who put the profile up there”…Does he think I’m THAT stupid?
The same story from the other side of the Atlantic , we had been dating for 9 months , and though we had not said explicitely (is it necessary? ) that we were exclusive, it was something understood by both of us .
I had seen over 2 months ago that his profile was still active , and decided to be cool about it and not say anything . He was also a kind of a ‘Too Good to be true’ guy (at least on paper) , but he acted funny , dissapeared for hours mainly on Sat Nights without any good excuse, I caught him lying a couple of times , he never had given me his key although he had mine , and panicked everytime I got close to his computer .
Lately we have been having more arguments because I am trying to get things on my terms and I found out that not only is his profile still on line but that he logs on every week . I hated to do so but I flashed him from a bogus profile, only a flash from an uncomplete photoless profile , and he sent me an e-mail with all his details .
I got on fire and the following day (two days ago) I dumped him , he said that he had unsuscribed from the site but that there have been an error with the subscription and they were charging him money without his authorization. When I asked him why he was still logging , he denied it , and when I asked him for the mail he had written to the bogus profile , he said it was automatic .
The amazing thing is that the guy is almost impotent and I was accompanying him every week for therapy (which I payed) . I feel so stupid now , Is there anything women wouldn’t do for a piece of love ??
I feel broken-hearted now but I think I have done the right thing I deserve better !!!!!
My boyfriend of a year and a half did the same thing to me. He was divorced twice (that should have been flag #1) and blamed both exes for the divorces. My boyfriend broke up with me first time after he took me ring shopping and kept stringing me along that he wanted to marry me. Took me away for my birthday, lavished and spoiled me rotten. I was smitten after a while but cautious. We broke up twice and he always turned it manipulated that it was my fault. I believed it and was sorry. For months he told me he was confused but wanted to make it work. We were trying to make it work, but he’d keep logging into the dating site. His line -oh i was just checking in for ^&*()( reason. He would go to business meetings (lies) actual dates. He actually went on several dates with one women. On my birthday this summer, he planned a date and told me it was a business meeting and that he would make it up that weekend. it was a work day so I was okay at first.
You know how I found out nabout all these lies. Intuition. We kept fighting about his confusion and bus. meetings and him logging onto jdate every few days.
Guess what. My intuion was right. I found on his computer an excel spreadsheet with over 600 profiles of women he e-mailed, ones he spoke to on the phone and the ones he actually dated (the past 6 months). One he took to a friends wedding (we had just broken up) and he took this girl he went on one prior date with.
The first time we got back together he drove all the way to come see me surprise me and take me out to dinner. At that point I was No contact. I refused to take his calls b/c he was hurting me by being so confused. He called me 5 times that day and when I didn’t pick up he surprised me at my door. When I looked at the excel sheet, i saw that he already had a date in my city earlier. hmmm. he really wasn’t going out of his way. he was right there and wanted a second date. He continued dating others while we were working on things.
Hmm.. after I confronted him about the excel sheet (he had a date only a week earlier), he was upset that I invaded his privacy. he swore he was done, and that he was confused and was gut checking. BUT NOW he is done and I AM HE ONE. He was ready to commit and ready to marry me. He told his family that I’m the one now and would get off of jdate. Yes, he did get off and turned the profile off. I still wasn;t convinced yet.
Well, trust had been broken and so I was a little mistrustful and hesitant. But, his family told me to move past it and move forward together. So i tried. But i kept checking things and found his other e-mail. Well, i found out instead of jdate, he was now on eharmony-much more difficult to track. He had just e-mailed a girl the day after he took me to the concert and told her about the concert!!! I was disgusted. completely horrified.
I confronted him again and broke up with him. I hope this is it. He turned it around and said i violated him and that he had only emailed these women and didn’t date them. hmmm. I don’t believe that. yeah maybe you hadn’t date yet, BUT you were planning to. Of course you wouldn’t go on a business mtg. yet. THis guy can and has lied to me with a straight face and he’s so convincing. my god. it’s so weird how safe i felt. It’s amazing how these guys can do it. B/c every weekend we were together. He never had weird things about answering the phone. I knew all his friends and family. They all thought we were getting married. I was there for him with his dad’s passing and with his family through everything. I really trusted this guy and he smashed that trust. I thought he was my best friend.
It;s so weird b/c other than that he treated me fairly well throughout-always took care of me, never let me pay, always picked up the phone, always made me coffee and cooked for me. from the outside he was so good. so convincing.
Kim,
You’ll never be able to trust a man than needs continuous validation from different women, I believe this man has serious self-esteem issues and needs regular ego stokes from many. This man will not change-like my ex- so I suggest you try and move on from this man and find someone who is capable of appreciating and loving you.