A frequent question I’m asked is a variation of ‘Why doesn’t he envision a committed relationship with me?’ .There are all sorts of factors that can cause someone to be afraid of commitment but if you want to tackle the part of the situation that you can control, you need to realise how people see commitment.
As I’ve explained before when talking about values, people work out who you are and who you are likely to be, based on who you consistently are now, hence if you want to come across in a particular way, it’s important to live it now as opposed to bargaining and saying stuff like ‘Well I will be more relaxed and secure when he does X,Y, Z’.
When people make a positive decision to commit, it’s because based on what they see in front of them and what they are experiencing, they can correlate that to future experiences, feel good about it, and feel positive about the idea of being committed.
I make a point of saying a positive decision to commit, because a decision to commit based on illusions, coercion etc is not a positive one – it’s a one way ticket to Doomsville.
A positive decision to commit originates in a relationship with mutual love, care, trust, and respect that feels good to both parties and is based in reality. A committed relationship requires two people with both sets of feet in with both parties actually being in and working at the same relationship.
When your partner looks at you and the relationship without illusions, if the messages that they get convey that this is a relationship that is emotionally demanding, high drama, and basically more than they’re willing to be expected, wanted, or needed from, on some level they receive a signal that you are not the one that they are going to commit to.
This is why it is important to have an honest conversation with yourself, discover your boundaries and values and live authentically because if you do and you start engaging in healthy relationships, who you are now will make a very attractive prospect for a committed future with someone who wants to commit and shares similar values. Note that I say someone who wants to commit because this is very different to someone who has no genuine desire to commit – you could be The Most Perfect Person on Earth and it won’t make a difference.
Aside from having the basics like boundaries, an awareness of your values, and seeking mutual love, care, trust, and respect in your relationships, personal security is what conveys a message about the confidence you have in yourself and also what you are likely to need emotionally out of the relationship.
Personal security means having a reasonable level of self-esteem and your own life, desires, and interests – being your authentic self.
People who lack personal security are (often inadvertently) emotionally demanding because they derive their sense of security from the comfort of having a relationship and a significant other and the level of validation that they are experiencing in the relationship.
The more validation they seek, the more emotionally demanding they’ll be, but also the more insecure they’ll be because as you’ll already know, if you are always seeking validation from others rather than doing a lot of validation yourself, it snowballs and you are never happy.
What conveys that you are not personally secure?
Frequently seeking validation from your partner. This is looking for confirmation that something is true, even when you can confirm it for yourself.
A lack of boundaries. These are your personal electric fence. Life being full of the double standards that it is, even when someone relies on busting your boundaries, the fact that they can will be used to penalise you and determine that you are not commitment worthy.
Being a human transformer. Shape-shifting, morphing, adapting, twisting, turning, and contorting to suit your partners says ‘I am not secure in who I am and I will be whoever you want me to be’.
Basing your existence around them. If you sack off your friends, family, career, interests for the sake of your relationship, aside from being emotionally demanding for the object of your focus, it’s also a dangerous sign of co-dependency. You will smother your partner. Nobody, unless they have control and co-dependency issues themselves wants to commit to you making them your focal point or smothering them forever more.
Unrealistic expectations. If you have expectations from them that would be more appropriately directed at one of your parents, this is emotionally demanding. Pushing for a relationship before you both really know each other and it’s early days or making girlfriend demands when you’re not the girlfriend will cause discomfort. Being emotionally demanding because you have unrealistic ideas about what the relationship should be and what they should be being, doing, and saying, and how you think you should feel, is just bloody exhausting.
Drama seeking. As someone who has had her fair share of drama and created much, I had to give myself a kick up the bum early in my relationship with the boyf because I was catering to my old pattern. Drama is only attractive to people who have no intentions of being committed with you anyway. Other people will tolerate it to a degree but if all you want to do is argue, accuse them of cheating, question the relationship etc, there will come a point where when they envision they future and they correlate you and the current relationship into it, they will just see more of the same and not want to commit to that.
I appreciate that there may be factors in your relationship that are not helping you to feel more secure, but the truth is, commitment really has to come out of a positive place and if you practically have to put the screws in to someone and beg, plead, cajole, coerce, pitch yourself, and essentially run rings around yourself, it becomes a negative experience.
If you are insecure, trying to be whoever you think they want you to be, making them the focal point of your existence, having unrealistic expectations and finding that drama is common place in your relationships, commitment will elude you. Pretending that you don’t have needs to fit around them – commitment will elude you. Trying to get them to commit before there is a relationship to commit to, they’ll back off.
If you feel that you are personally secure but you’re involved with someone who habitually seeks to avoid commitment, you have to ask why you are seeking commitment from an unlikely source?
I hear from women all the time who didn’t realise that they have their own issues with emotional unavailability and commitment because they consistently seek relationships and commitment from men who offer the least likely opportunity for commitment – they’re called Fallback Girls. Make sure this is not you!
If you are looking for commitment but struggling to get it, make sure that you assess your own contribution into the situation and also examine the ‘source’ that you’re looking for commitment from.
If you feel you have a pretty healthy partnering, focus on being personally secure and giving off genuine confidence about yourself and the relationship so that when they do envision the possibility of commitment, they don’t come up with a negativity road block. This means doing your own thing as well as doing things with them, and making sure that any conversations that you do have about commitment are positive conversations as opposed to originating out of tension.
But overall, remember: for any relationship, whatever it is that you think that you should be seen as, make sure that you are being those things now and don’t put off being the best that you can be in the relationship to some arbitrary point where you think you’ll be X,Y,Z in the future based on a whole load of if’s, but’s and maybe’s. Likewise don’t determine that you can become more secure based on them being or doing certain things. You need to be personally secure anyway.
Your thoughts?
Editors Note: In the interests of clarification, this is a post about commitment. It is not a post about getting commitment from emotionally unavailable men, as this would be an entirely different post which you can read here. There are people reading this blog who want to understand commitment in the wider sense. That, and I don’t have to write about Mr Unavailables and assclowns every day! – thank you
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I would agree with this statement “If you feel that you are personally secure but you’re involved with someone who habitually seeks to avoid commitment, you have to ask why you are seeking commitment from an unlikely source?” BUT some of these guys are exceeding slick and know all the right moves, words and have great timing. You cannot see a red flag for months until their mask starts to crack – of course after they have worked their magic on you and you are star struck. I would say there are exceptions. There you are both feet in mud while they are living a double life you knew nothing of. Taking future faking to an art form. It can shake the strongest person and drop them to their knees. Even if you have personal security – sometimes its not enough. This post seems harsh almost blamming -I am quite surprised. Accept your part yes but be real about your part. I don’t blame myself for falling for the BS I didn’t see right off the bat or even months down the road – it took a year before any of it started to show its ugly head and another year to come to the surface. When you see it – RUN – but don’t blame yourself for not seeing in the first place – hindsight is 20/20.
Hi Movedup. Part of the reason why I started the post with “if you want to tackle the part of the situation that you can control” is because I’m not here to slag off men and say that everything is someone else’s fault. This is what assclowns and Mr Unavailables do. If we want to take control of our experience and live consciously, it is accepting that we’re not just someone who is an unwilling passenger in their own life. Whether you choose to acknowledge it or not, you’re 100% accountable for you as the other party is for themselves. We can blame others but just like blaming ourselves is futile so is blaming them. For everything that they have done, we have to look and ask what did we contribute. That doesn’t make you responsible for what they’ve done, it doesn’t change who they are, but it does let you address your own contribution and there is one. If you’ve been with exceedingly slick guys who hid red flags from you for a year – that’s an entirely different situation and you are in the minority to the audience of people that read this blog. Then you’ve been with a con artist because you’re essentially telling me that you are personally secure, have boundaries, values etc and that they played a game for a year as a confidence trickster giving off zero outward signs and clues.
At no point in this post did I tell you not to be real about yourself or to take the blame for their behaviour.
Got ya on that one. I liked your next post – cleared things up for me considerably. Ya he was a slick one – no doubt. The worst I have been up against then again hindsight is 20/20. I take responsibility for my part but not his. I have better relationship skills thanx to reading this site – cause now I know what to call them! Funny when you label something and give it definitition it gives it more power. My Boundaries – mine, mine, mine – don’t step on them or else. Give it a name and it becomes more real.
Con artist – most excellent term because that is exactually what he was. Thankfully I never lent him money lol! He would have taken it but I do know better on that one. Unfortunately I got dickmotized before it became apparent. Love that term.
Hi Movedup!
How’s marital bliss?? Sadly, I wasn’t even “dickmotised” as he ended up to be a terrible lover….I guess I just wanted to be part of a “plus one” in my life and picked the WRONG guy.
Great post Natalie! This is a question that I’ve asked myself, but I FINALLY woke up and realize that I was asking this question in regards to the WRONG man, a MM that I was involved with for four long and tumultous years. I finally implemented NC and although I have fell off the wagon a few times, I’ve gotten back on and am at day 7 of NC. It has gotten easier, probably because I realized what an assclown he was a while back but fear kept me in the “relationship”. This is my first comment, but I have been an avid reader of your site for the past few months and I want to thank you for providing me with such insight on being a better person whereas relationships are concerned. Your site has helped me not only in the former relationship with the mm, but also my mother. I’ve shared your site with her as well. Thank you for empowering us!
Oh thank you Lynn! It is wonderful to be able to make a positive difference to your lives and help you make sense of the difficulties. It is recognising that you’re asking for things that under other circumstances would be totally normal from the wrong person. Keep the faith – there is better out there for you than a man who is married to someone else. (((hugs)))
NML…..Love love love it! I have been on here for close to 3 years and i can say that it’s finally sinking in =).
Re; the quote “When people make a positive decision to commit, it’s because based on what they see in front of them and what they are experiencing, they can correlate that to future experiences…..”.
The above quote is ironic to me. The flipside applies because if I’m not seeing what I like and the experience is continuously painful then why in the he** would I want the bastard to commit? And yet I did.
I have my sanity back. Thanks and much love to you
Hi Metsgirl. You are very welcome! We all get there in our way on our own time. You’re finding your way to your peace. Sometimes we want commitment, not because it’s on offer but for validation of ourselves, not stopping to ask if this person is someone even worth giving the time of day to. You’ve saved yourself from committing to more pain. (((hugs)))
Well said NML. As always you have to look at what you’re doing, portraying and conveying because you yourself is the only person you can do anything about.
Amen! I hope you’re keeping well! x
What if your partner sends mixed signals the entire time you’re involved?
Mixed signals is a red flag which suggests flip flapping which suggests hot and cold, which suggests don’t know what they want. If he can’t even commit to what signal he’s giving out, he’s unlikely to be able to commit to a relationship.
Thanks so much for your explanation. I really appreciate it. Hope the weather is OK in the UK!
Love your site! Posted about it today on my blog – please visit when you have time.
I think all too often we women imagine a commitment when there’s not even been a discussion of it! Rori Raye calls it the “girlfriend trap.”
For me, I have a simple list of deal breakers that have to be met – and I mean really simple, like job, car, home, literate, neat(ish)……..to even date. Somehow in keeping boundaries being completely clear about what I will NOT allow allows me to be very flexible in other areas – like looks, height, opinions….whatever. Being flexible led to me finding someone who is very easy to live with after about 100 on line meet and greets. I totally agree with the Mr. Good Enough concept, have never made a list for myself or the Universe of what I required in a man….and therefore, the universe is free to surprise me!
The key is in knowing what I won’t even deal with – ergo, drama, lies, etc. And then it’s a rule that falls into place and NEVER changes – it’s my gravity.
Best,
Jacqueline
I’m the “lucky” one who has had a number of a$$clowns commit to me – I even married one. And then I realised I didn’t actually love them, I was addicted to the chase and to proving to myself that I could win them over.
Ask yourself the question, why do you want a commitment from this guy. Is it possible that it’s only because he doesn’t want to give it? How worthwhile is he? Is he a decent person? Would you trust him with your children? Do you respect him? Is he morally sound? Is he faithful? Is he trustworthy? Is his word golden? Is he reliable?
I’m guessing the answer is no.
Excellent comment. It’s not a prize when you get an assclown to commit. Those questions are great! Thank you! 🙂
Amen, amen, amen! I keep saying 4 words to women I’ve been talking to recently “You’re going too fast!”. They want commitment straight out the gate when they’ve been on a handful of dates or where there has been no discussion of where they are at. They don’t know about values or even the real person but are looking to clamp down! I agree you can be very flexible about appearance and basically secondary values – love the ‘the universe is free to surprise me!’
This is the best post I have read yet, and that is saying something – I have so many favorites. This post is NOT harsh. It is the basic truth, or at least I see it as such.
“Drama is only attractive to people who have no intentions of being committed with you anyway.” I would say that drama is only attractive to someone who is incapable of commiting to you anyway and needs something else to imitate feelings of healthy intensity and depth. This applies to both parties of the relationship.
I am in a wonderful relationship that is evolving and loving and kind. We are talking about marriage, clearly discussing values and expectations and beliefs. He is supportive and kind. But I truly believe that if I had not found BR and some great books and found my own inner security, I would have blown this relationship within 6 months. I deeply believe that I had to be ready.
I was so desperate to marry that I never considered whether the man I was with was ACTUALLY WORTH MARRYING. I just wanted the fantasy that I created (often before the first date with him!) would come true. It was not until I accepted that I could be alone and at peace that I could be with another.
My man treats me very well for two reasons: one, because he knows I would put up with nothing less and two, because of the type of man he chooses to be.
Thanks, Natalie. Your words are priceless.
Thank you Blaise and it still pleases me no end to hear how happy you are in your relationship. It reminds me of myself and the boyf. If I had met him before I got wise about myself, I would have blown it, big time. I met him off the back of being alone and making myself 100% responsible for myself and my experiences. When I initially created some drama in the early months of our relationship, I had to give myself a serious talking to. “I just wanted the fantasy that I created (often before the first date with him!) would come true.” – were we the same person? 😉 x
Another thought provoking post. It is a bit of a slap in the face, somewhat like the first comment suggests. I guess we like the posts that say its the assclown’s fault, not ours, but it does make me think about what messages I was sending out. He seemed very interested in the beginning and I would never describe myself as needy or insecure but I definitely started to feel that way as things progressed. He went from attentive and seeming committed to distant and indifferent. I tried backing off and never called him – he always initiated the contact- but I suspect these guys have a very sensitive radar and can smell insecurity easily. I do realize now that I was seeking validation and maybe I was unable to see how “desperate” I read but I don’t suspect it was enough to send him running. I think, based on his history of never being in any relationship for any length of time, that it was bound to happen no matter what. I am all for accepting my responsibility in a relationship – it does sort of feel in this post like you might be assigning too much blame to the women, when there are some men who just won’t step up to the plate no matter what. Perhaps the best way to look at it is to concede that both sides need to really be in it to make it work. Its almost a catch 22 – maybe the one girl these assclowns finally pick is the one with the self-esteem to hang in there, but that girl would never tolerate his crap. That’s why these relationships cause such heart ache and grief – they can never be figured out.
Indeed Tina, it’s like trying to rationalise the irrational. I should add that this is a post about commitment and that while it mentions Mr Unavailables and assclowns, it’s a post about commitment in general. The latter two guys are not suitable for commitment hence pursuing them for it is a futile and painful exercise especially if your self-esteem is low and you have little or no boundaries. If a guy chooses to commit after being habitually resistant, it’s because something within him whether it’s temporary or permanent has changed.
I have written over a 1000 posts on this blog and I am consistent with the same messages – you are 100% responsible for yourself, you have to look at your own contribution because it is the one thing you can control, and that you can focus on blaming them but after a while, if you genuinely want to be honest with yourself and move forward, you’ll take the focus off them and bring it back to you. I specifically said at the start of the post that it was about dealing with what you can control and what you convey is exactly that. If a man will not step up to the plate, and has consistently shown he won’t step up to the plate, and gives off signals that he is not going to step up to the plate, it means that he’s not going to step up to the plate which means any woman who gets involved with him and sees him doing this, must recognise that pursuing him to step up to a plate that he has consistently shown he is not going to step up to, is a waste of time. The question is, is it all the fault of the guy that the woman wastes her time trying to force him on to the plate? At what point does she recognise that she is contributing to the situation and responsible for creating her pain?
I would also look at https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/new-video-when-you-try-to-demonstrate-your-love-but-they-interpret-a-lack-of-self-love/
Tina
I am not sure that these men do deliberately target insecure women, I think it’s more a case of insecure women being what they end up with. Someone who is secure will expect regular phone calls, proper dates, chats about the future, and when they don’t get it they will walk away. Or the man can’t take the pressure of her reasonable expectations and walks away. So he moves onto the next woman, and maybe this one is too insecure and accommodating to rock the boat or to leave, so he sticks around in a halfhearted relationship.
As I read the title of this piece I strongly came into the awareness that a far more pertinent question for me was ‘Why aren’t I ready for a committed relationship?’ That is to say that on some level I have been attracting in unavailble men and pursuing real or fantasy relationships with them and continually creating disappointment and suffering for myself. The fact of them showing up in my life is merely a reflection of what I believe I deserve ie a limited and unfulfilling experience. This sense of self-responsibility feels empowering; and maybe the altered perspective means that I have somehow shifted, changed, transformed my beliefs and therefore may now MYSELF be ready to accept a loving committed relationship. If this is so then there is nothing more I need to do ‘cept sit back, relax and let the good times roll… Wow feels good! Thanks Natalie
WIth peaceful blessings to all
Hi Jennifer. I experienced exactly the same feeling five years ago. I blamed all the Mr Unavailables and assclowns and then had this acute awareness that I was the only common denominator. Was I really a backseat driver in my own life? Was I that unconscious? Not at all. The realisation that I could make a massive difference in my own life was immensely empowering and freeing. Keep shifting your perspective and altering your beliefs about what you think is possible – but believe a relationship is possible with better people. Blessings to you also x
“When people make a positive decision to commit, it’s because based on what they see in front of them and what they are experiencing, they can correlate that to future experiences, feel good about it, and feel positive about the idea of being committed.”
God knows I love your blog Natalie and your advice has propelled me to operate from a position of strength, but this post seems to run counter to your previous posts along the “why will he commit to her but not to me” vein.
Here you say that EUM and the like (I assume we’re talking about EUM and Mr. Unavailable here) won’t commit due to women telegraphing desperation or drama, but previously you said these type of men primarily don’t commit because they see they can’t get away with their BS on us and rather commit with the next woman who they feel will put up with their shenanigans.
I’ve known so many men who have either refused to commit to or have left healthy women, only to end up and gladly committing to women who reeked of the desperation you mentioned above because the new women offered some combination of colossal ego stroking, waiting on them hand and foot, living their life like a damsel in distress thus requiring daily rescuing from the man, or financially upgrading them. You also pointed this out in your other posts.
Everything you mentioned in the above post is true and we should all work on becoming more self-assured and secure for our own well being, but we should also keep in mind that many men operate with an agenda and if we are not offered a commitment despite demonstrating few or none of the negative traits, we should realize that an agenda may in play rather than to automatically find more fault with ourselves.
Lindsey, I’ll say the same to you as I did others – this is a post about commitment. I didn’t title it Why won’t my emotionally unavailable guy commit to me otherwise it would be an entirely different post.
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/reader-advice-if-he-doesnt-want-a-relationship-why-is-he-with-her-when-he-could-be-mistreating-me-instead/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/is-he-different-with-her-why-did-he-choose-her-instead-of-me-when-youre-not-the-one-or-they-move-on-to-a-fresh-victim/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/knowing-when-to-work-at-your-relationship-part-one/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/reader-advice-is-my-ex-boyfriend-emotionally-unavailable-weird-or-scared/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/coulda-woulda-shoulda-could-my-relationship-have-been-different/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/do-emotionally-unavailable-men-change/
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/how-to-spot-emotionally-unavailable-men/
Hi NML,
I do agree with taking responsibility for accepting certain things that should not be accepted with these men. I do think that Lindsay and Movedup have a point. Believe me, no one is better at blaming themselves than me. This guy said he wanted to marry me, moved in with me and 8 months later said his fear of commitment was not fixed and he left. He is with someone else now and I masochistically believe that she is getting the commitment that I thought I had with him. It’s hard to accept all the blame and the post made me do that even more than usual which is a lot. Is she getting what he couldn’t give me? Who knows. It’s very painful to think about. Thanks for your blog. It has helped me a lot. Ramona
Thanks for clarifying Natalie. Since we primarily discuss involvement with EUMs here, I thought this post was for dealing with that type of man by default.
First off, NML I love everything you post! It is always dead on and helps keep me focused when I start to slip back into old bad habits 🙂 I especially like how you use humor to get your point across – I think it is important to remember that if wondering about why some guy isn’t acting how you would like is your biggest problem, life cannot be all that bad! I decided to post because from the comments I think people aren’t quite getting the point, which as I see it is to always take responsibility for you own actions, not “blame” yourself when something goes wrong with a person who is screwed up in relationships anyway. As has been said countless times before on this site, if you are with someone who has never really committed to anyone and acts inconsistent with you, there isn’t anything you can do to change it. Your only option is to leave and move on. It follows it is impossible for me (or anyone else) to be the reason a real relationship isn’t happening with this kind of person.
However, if you get into a relationship with someone normal and healthy, it is possible to be the reason it doesn’t work out, i.e. acting crazy, creating drama, not trusting, etc. So I think that is what is important to keep in mind – with a good guy who can have a healthy relationship, your actions certainly do matter and they are evaluating you to see if you are someone they want to commit to. With a guy who can’t have a relationship anyway, not so much!
Wise words and it’s good to read posts directed at healthy relationships for a change. This one is important to me, as I begin to think about having a healthy relationship for a change. Am I being auhentic? Am I acting and saying the same things? Am I creating drama where none need exist? Would I even know if I were? I hope so. I hope I have become more self aware, accountable for my share of what goes right and wrong in a relationship and far more willing to live without the fantasy, but old habits are hard to break and I suspect it may take a few tries before I get it right. I guess the point is to keep trying, pay attention and slow down!!!! If I had gone slower in the last one, I likely wouldn’t have ended up in as much pain as I did. Fast does not equal love, it means someone is trying to hide something.
Thanks for always being the voice of reason.
Thank-you Natalie,for one more insightful post. Your blog has helped me give a name to my patterns of behaviour in relationships. It has been so empowering to bring the focus back on myself. I love your FB onepagers too with explanations on what grieving a relationship looks like, along suggestions on how to manage the No Contact Rule when it’s all over. I would still be thinking that I was a magnet for EUMs were it not for Baggage reclaim to point the way out of the fog of relationship insanity.
Hey, Natalie, here’s an idea for a post – the difference between accepting responsibility and blaming oneself. They are very different things in my mind. One heals self-esteem, one kills it.
Deep. Thanks for the reminder.
This is great stuff. Really insightful.
Wise words in a great article.. So insightful that I had to go away for a while and reflect. The journey to authenticity for me has been paved with good intentions but I fell off the wagon some time ago,suffered for it and caused suffering and am now back on track…. I will not be other than I am for a guy. This can be so difficult particularly when you can see how it might ease conversation for a few minutes to comply or agree or when it might up the ‘temporary’ sexual charge to act in a particular way… Problem is your left with a feeling of deception.
But now I ask myself if I behave unauthentically what is there left four months or six years down the line. Answer: pacing the floor,the peaks of the himalayas versus seabed, its so so exhausting….
I actually have friends who live their lives like this with their men, never actually being themselves and are slowly being destroyed by it. Having read this great article I think now think to myself, whats it doing to the men in these relationships,do they know their wives/girlfriends are emotionally elsewhere? I actually think its possible for a man/woman to get to middle life without ever having felt real emotional commitment. It brings up the whole definition of what is meant by commited relationship…
The part of ‘living your own life as distinct and as fufilling away from your man’ is my credo now. Never used to be. The part which resonates for me is when NML points out be personally secure in your self. My only problem here is, I ‘m in a very new situation, extremely early days and am certainly interested in pursuing more info,more time getting to know the person. I feel already that I ‘m not getting enough information about what’s happening next weekend… I need to make plans too! I want to know whats happening so I can live an enjoyable life too!This is frustrating on a micro level and may, (I’m not making assumptions) point to problems on a deeper level…its about the process of communication that indicates whether if it stays consistent and honest, commitment can be possible… hurrah!
I can’t do rollercoasting anymore not without a sickbag. I thankfully recognise the signs fairly early on though and generally get out of the situation pronto. The problem here is that certain guys, particularly the game-players may be used to being cajoled into commitment. They know the score and use it for their own highs. I hope that this new situation of mine can be cleansed of artifice. I can only control my own behaviour and my own behavour is great just now. I ‘m damn proud of myself…… thanks for the insightful posts on this site. L
I believe being “dickmotised” is where I fail. I am no longer willing to be intimate with a man while I’m dating him
Several men in my life “enjoyed” being with me until I wanted more out of the relationship. I know now they just wanted sex and someone to spend time with. They were not interested in a “future”. I failed to see the red flags.
If a man wants to be with me in that way…he’s going to have to marry me. I’m not giving the goods away anymore…I believe women do themselves a diservice by being intimate with a man before marriage.