Tornado Dating Continues With A super Scary Date Story

It’s been a while since my last post and I haven’t really gone on many dates since.  I’m a bit burnt out and this next story was a big reason I took a break.

I haven’t had much success in online dating.  I’ve found that while profiles and emails may help you filter incompatibilities, you still can’t decipher how much of what the person is telling you is based on what they think you want to hear.

Once again, I meet a man I met through an online dating site for dinner.  My first mistake was that I should have stuck to my rule of coffee and can’t remember why I agreed to dinner.

Anyway, I arrive at a local Mexican restaurant and find my date sitting at the bar two-drinks into his evening.  We ask for a table and he orders another drink for himself and one for me as we start the “get-to-know-you” conversation.  Over the course of about two hours, he ordered at least four more drinks and things began to deteriorate more with each drink.

About an hour into the date, my date was drunk.  He began talking about his ex-wife and described her as psychopathic liar.  You
would think people would realize trashing an ex isn’t attractive.  I realize alcohol reduces inhibitions, but that is no excuse.

As he wrapped up his tirade about his ex-wife, he began to focus his attention back on me.  He said that we exchanged a few emails several months ago, but that our conversation fizzled.  I indicated that I didn’t recall us exchanging emails and apologized for my memory gap.  From here he told me how he was prepared to not like me, but was pleasantly surprised.

At this time, I am a bit stunned.  I should have excused myself at this time.  (My second mistake was staying as long as I did.)

Next thing I knew, he takes my hand in his hand, caresses it and tells me how he “gets me” and that “he so gets me it’s like he is inside me”!  I’m not a touchy-feely person – especially with someone I don’t know, so I am uncomfortable with him holding my hand and his comment was unsettling too.

I tell him I am not a touchy-feely person and pull my hand back as he progresses on to his next rant.  He then goes on to tell me how much he likes me and how he is surprised we are here having dinner together because “there are so many forces conspiring
against us and trying to keep us apart.”  I have no idea what these forces are and decide it is best not to ask.  (Again, I should have left at this point.)

He grabs my hand once again and this time he starts to kiss it as well.  He then tells me that he loves me and would throw his body on a grenade for me.  (What???!!!???  Remember, this is a first meeting.)  Once again, I pull my hand back and thank him for his courage to express his emotions, but that it takes me more time to care about a person.

He ignores what I have said and continues to tell me how he loves me and feels this deep connection.  At this point, I am feeling very anxious and don’t want to make him angry because he is not sober and potentially not sane.

I again thank him for his courage in expressing his emotions, start to stand up and tell him I need to head home.  He surprises me by asking if he can come with me and says that he never wants to be without me.  I tell him that he can’t come with me and that I am indeed heading home – that’s when I realize my car is parked behind the restaurant in a dark parking lot where I have to walk out and around the building.

I walk hurriedly, but with confidence back to my car – hoping the whole time that he isn’t following me.  (My third mistake was not bringing mace with me or asking the restaurant for an escort to my car.)  I make it to my car and book it out of the parking lot as quickly as I could!

The next day I send an email saying that I wasn’t comfortable with his level of drinking.  I also say that he scared me and that I couldn’t move forward or go back.  He tells me there was a good reason he was drinking that evening and then asks if we can still be friends.  (Hell no!!!!  I might end up dead or beat up.)

So, my dating sabbatical continues.  I don’t have the energy to invest in crazy dates.

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Ready To Commit???

I’ve been emotionally unavailable. I thought I was in a position where I could open up and love a potential life partner, but I wasn’t. I was able to develop deep feelings and perhaps love that person, but I wasn’t able to open up and let go of my defenses. I think I just might be ready now.

I can’t blame the guys I was dating for the relationships not working out – many shouldn’t have worked out! Some were amazing experiences I think I was supposed to have in life. Others were a testament to what I have learned since my divorce about myself … how early experiences shaped my thinking and behaviors; how family dynamics created learned dysfunction; how I created barriers that led to repeated experiences and how I have to take chances in order to live a fulfilling life.

I have the power in my life to create a healthy life with a healthy relationship. The first step is knowing I deserve it! The second step is allowing myself to take chances – emotional chances where I open up and don’t create an invisible safety net. I won’t lose myself in the people I date and I know I can survive if the relationship doesn’t work.

Now I need to make a decision; do I stay in the city I live in now or do I move elsewhere. I can’t open myself up to a relationship before I answer this question. I have a small network of incredible people I call friends and that will be difficult, not impossible, to recreate elsewhere.

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Feeling Lost

I’m finding myself in a sad place right now. As I have worked to learn new coping skills, I have also worked to purge negative relationships from my life. I haven’t let down my defenses, so I haven’t developed new healthier relationships. This leaves me in a state of loneliness.

I realize that my previous relationships were based upon being needed rather than wanted. This is the enabler role I learned as a child. Now that I don’t want to start a relationship off with a “need”, I am finding that I feel neither needed nor wanted. That’s a pretty lonely place to be in. Ironically, I rediscovered the tidbits below.

• If there is one thing about which you are not in control, it’s who loves you, stays with you, gets ill, or leaves you.
• When a heart is doing what it’s supposed to be doing, it holds nothing back. And sometimes it gets broken.
• If our hearts are closed because we don’t want to suffer, they won’t be open enough to recognize the joy as it flies by.

My heart is broken, for a number of reasons, and I don’t quite know how to put it back together.

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Taking Your Own Advice

I’m not sure why this thought hit me today, but I am glad it did. I realized that I would tell a friend to move on and end whatever relationship she was in if he/she were experiencing the same “dating woes” I am.

I’m a firm believer that if someone is interested in you they will make the time to see you. Lately, this belief has been over-shadowed by phone calls and text messages. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to see someone investing an effort to connect, but there should be a warning bell if that’s all there is. You have to spend time with a person to really get to know them and figure out if you are compatible.

If the person you are getting to know or seeing doesn’t value your time and doesn’t make opportunities to see you, he/she won’t in the future either. The getting-to-know-you phase and honeymoon phases are when people are on their best behaviors, so if your needs are met now they probably never will be.

It’s great to give people the benefit of doubt, but there is a cut-off point where you have to be real with yourself and realize hope is not going to turn into reality.

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Something’s Sinking In

I still have a long way to go in terms of dating, but I am seeing progress and the application of lessons learned!!!

Remember Guy #4 from one of my earlier posts this month?  Yeah, well he is still a flake.

I don’t think a guy has to call, text or IM a girl every day.  In all honesty, while flattering, it’s a bit too much –but that’s a new and separate lessoned learned.  I do think that when you make this a pattern and suddenly become sporadic, the person is distracted or not interested.  Perhaps both.  That’s what has happened here.

Guy #4 randomly IM’d me and we began talking again.  He began IM’ing me every day along with sending texts and calling me.  Again, I was flattered at first and then I wondered what the urgency was.  I just broke up with my boyfriend so I didn’t want to jump into anything right away and wanted to take things slow.  Oddly, given all this “attention”, he never asked me to go out other than an initial invite to go to his place for dinner which he would cook.

I think dinner is an intimate gesture and at the time I didn’t feel comfortable with going to his place.  Dinner leads to drinking a glass of wine which leads to sitting on the couch talking which leads to kissing which leads to …

Anyway, although this guy continued to invest a lot of effort for us to connect online or with phone calls, that was it.  Then he started texting later and later.  This can seem innocent enough if you truly live different schedules, but I think there’s an element of lost respect and expectations when you begin texting someone after midnight asking what they are up to or if they awake.  This was warning flag #1.5.  (The .5 warning flag comes from the high-level of attention he was paying me initially.)

After a pretty intense and personal conversation, where he revealed a lot of past personal hurt, the tone of our texts changed and his calls were non-existent.  I decided it was better to call whatever this was between us off than end with one disliking the other.  After expressing my concerns, he expressed his continued interested in me and said we would connect during the next work day.  There was no IM, text or call.  Warning flag #2.5 … no need to go to #3.

In an earlier conversation I mentioned to him that flakiness is not something I accept and I think it just makes a person appear unreliable and immature.  He agreed and said he knew he can be flakey at times.  So while he is aware he can be flakey, he is either unaware or uses flakey behavior either to avoid awkward situations.  The reason isn’t really important.  The fact that I recognize his flakiness and am saying I deserve better is HUGE!!!!  I’m not into casual relationships or friends with benefits.  I don’t have a crazy biological clock or an urge to get married.  I simply want a real relationship without immature behaviors – mine or his.  I’m not going to compromise myself because I know what I am asking isn’t too much or hard – and I deserve it.

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The Dating Game

I recently broke up with my boyfriend and all of a sudden several guys from the past have cropped up. It’s like this cosmic test to see how much I have grown or how lonely I am.

• Guy #1: I met while on vacation. There was a definite attraction, but there were several red flags that cropped up. He’s very accomplished, but yet insecure; he’s intelligent and manipulative; he’s caring and attentive and then can turn and be purposely hurtful on an emotional level. He’s had some crazy personal experiences in the past few years which he says has changed his personality. I won’t don’t want to break his confidence and relay the details, but they are significant enough to where I have extra compassion for him.
• Guy #2: I met online about a year ago and went out on an initial coffee date to meet and see if there was an interest to pursue anything further. There wasn’t. The guy was nice, but he had crazy ugly teeth and his thoughts about people and his job were far too different from mine. He worked for the government to collect back-taxes. He didn’t seem to have any compassion for the people he pursued for back-taxes. I’m sure he has run across some jerks in his career, but not everyone who owes back-taxes owe them intentionally or are jerks.
• Guy #3: I also met online. He’s an attractive, good-hearted man with an amazing soul. There wasn’t a romantic connection when we met and we decided to be friends. Eventually our dinner invites faded and we stopped exchanging emails.
• Guy #4: I met through work and went out on two dates about three years ago. It never progressed into anything – we didn’t even kiss. I was fresh out of my divorce and he was a bit flakey. I also learned of a nickname of his that led me to believe he was a man-whore. We didn’t end on bad terms … I started dating my lovely hippie, masseuse guy and he started dating another girl. Oddly, we worked less than about 50 feet from one another last year and rarely exchanged hellos. We simply had different lives.

With Guy #1 I have to be careful that I don’t fall back into a role I played with my family. It’s sometimes easier to put others in front of my needs. This is something I have to remind myself of and try to change when I realize I am doing it. I also have to remind myself that my boundaries are most likely more distorted or accepting of unhealthy behaviors than other people because that is what I grew up with.

He lives in Chicago, so I don’t really have to face the reality of dealing with him on a day-to-day basis or really consider a potential romantic relationship with him. (Although he has offered to fly out here or fly me to him.)

Guy #2 IM’d me a few weeks ago asking if I was interested in meeting for coffee. I was out doing something, but forgot to sign out of IM. By the time I got the IM it was several hours later so I never responded. There’s no reason for me to respond. I had told him after the first coffee date that I thought there were too many differences and not a romantic connection.

I don’t think Guy #3 reached out to me for romantic purposes, but it was out of the blue. We hadn’t communicated at all for at least 6 months or more. Then all of a sudden he sent me an email telling me about new things in his life and asking how I was doing. He since made a decision to quit his job and travel through Asia for a while. We have exchanged a few emails and IMs, but haven’t had any significant conversations.

Guy #4 always made me nervous. I’m not the giddy type, but for some reason around this man I get nervous and sometimes tongue-tied. He randomly reached out to me on IM and began flirting. I was confused about his intentions and how bold he was being, but agreed to meet for drinks to talk and ask questions. He said that he didn’t reach out to me randomly or out of the blue and that he has thought about it for a while. We talked about the events we experienced during the past three years. I told him I could offer friendship and see what might develop from there.

He has since invested a lot of energy to IM me and to call or text every day. He’s been very bold in his conversations, but there’s a large element of caution I have. I was honest and told him I am not interested in a casual sexual relationship or sex between friends. Although he said he wasn’t interested in just sex, sometimes his actions indicate otherwise. For example, yesterday we exchanged a few text messages and I told him to call me if he got bored. He texted after midnight to ask if I was asleep. He has also called late at night another evening and asked me to come over. (Keep in mind we have never kissed and since re-establishing contact we have only met in person one time.) This all adds up to a booty call in my head. Perhaps I am reading more into it, but I don’t think you invite a girl over late at night if you are interested in getting to know her outside of a carnal sense.

While I am not ready to jump into another relationship, it is comforting to have hope about a future relationship. I guess I just need to be patient and believe I will meet someone when the time is right.

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Breaking Up – It’s Never Fun

I broke up with my boyfriend the other week. I feel horrible for breaking up, but I know it was the right decision. He’s an amazing guy, but there are certain differences and behaviors we can’t bridge. I guess it’s more of me not being able to bridge or accept those differences.

I’ve talked about concerns with his drinking and those concerns came to a head one recent weekend. It made me realize that I don’t want to be someone’s caregiver in that way. I most definitely want to be someone’s lover and not a potential lover’s mother.

The break-up was as good as a break could be. There’s sadness on both sides, but I know his heart is broken more than mine is. I don’t think he understood how deep my concerns where when we talked about them before the break-up happened. Now he is running through the what-if scenarios. I HATE hurting people. Too often I compromise myself in order to avoid hurting someone.

What I find interesting is the selective memory that follows a break-up. I find myself remembering only the amazing qualities and fun memories. I guess it makes sense in a way because you aren’t seeing or dealing with the stuff that you don’t like.

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Stuck In A Moment

You’ve got to get yourself together. You’ve got stuck in a moment, and you can’t get out of it. Don’t say that later will be better. Now you’re stuck in a moment, and you can’t get out of it. And if the night runs over, and if the day won’t last, and if your way should falter along this stony pass … It’s just a moment. This time will pass.

The above is an excerpt from U2’s song Stuck In A Moment, and it’s very appropriate for the phase I am in.

If I look around I see what’s wrong in my life – personal and work. If I look to the future, I see the short-comings of the present or the demands of the present. I don’t want to look to tomorrow for a fix and instead want to know how to change my perspective now … in the moment. I don’t know how to live in the present because I feel I am always preparing for the future.

I’m stressed out because I am not sure the person I am dating is a long-term partner for me, but I am being pressured to consider moving in together within a few months. I feel trapped in a corner and am shutting down my emotions rather than exploring them.

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Feeling Numb

Sometimes I wonder what’s the matter with me? I have a protective strategy where I disengage and push emotions deep inside until they are almost hidden everyone – me included. I’m concerned I have turned this into more of a daily behavior than an “in case of emergency” one.

For example, I thought I was falling in love with the man I am dating. Perhaps I did, but somewhere along the way I pulled back and I don’t know what I feel. I know what I am supposed to do and say if I love this person. I also know what this person expects of me. This allows me to continue on in a muted state without much visible difference in the way I act. I don’t think this is normal. Yes, everyone has their ups and downs and every relationship does too, but this is different. I feel like a scripted character.

Here’s where the problem becomes complicated. I don’t know if I am feeling this way because I am scared of committing or if I am not into the relationship anymore. It’s hard to know when you don’t trust your judgment.

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Rambling About and Pondering My Relationship

I’m not quite as confused today as I was a year ago or even a few months ago, but I am still confused when it comes to dating and relationships.

The first issue I am facing is a no-drama, healthy relationship. Most people will read this and think I am crazy, but remember my crazy family, upbringing and even previous marriage. The man I am currently involved with is drama-free, attentive, mature and considerate. He’s not perfect, but I don’t want perfect.

What I wasn’t expecting was a feeling of “boriness”. Coming from a drama-ridden and chaotic perspective, healthy and drama free can feel boring. We laugh and enjoy spending time together, but there’s not that adrenalin rush that comes with crisis. While I LOVE the no-drama and healthy aspect of dating this man, it is different from what I am used to and I have to put in effort to change my perceptions.

Although I know there are a bunch of similarities between myself and the man I am dating, I am wondering which differences are big enough to create concern or discord. For example, he’s a process and needs to think about things before responding. There are times when I will ask him about something from his childhood and he will say he needs to think about it and get back to me. I’m completely the opposite and can jump quickly between topics and recall memories or throw out random thoughts. My thoughts may not mean anything to else, but my processing time is quick.

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