Disappointment
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| Fri, 04-17-2009 - 12:02am |
As I feared, Mr. Sweet Possibilities is going through another cool-down phase. Who knows, maybe the kiss I found so passionate and romantic just wasn't what he wanted. Maybe he hoped I would pull him into bed even though we were standing on the doorstep and he had said he had to go. Or maybe he got afraid of the relationship now that we advanced to the kiss. Or none of the above. Who knows.
All I know is that I haven't really heard from him this week, which means that we are not going out this weekend. Always before when we didn't go out it was because one or both of us had other commitments (friends weddings, business trips, illness). There was always friendly e-mail and talk of when we would get together.
This week, the e-mail has been scant and he did not phone as I expected yesterday or today to make plans for the weekend. (On Saturday he had said he'd call me to make plans about a movie.)
So that is that. My sense that he was losing interest has been confirmed. He may call me again at some point, but clearly "he is just not that into me."
I'll be fine. I'm just disappointed. He seemed very promising. At my age, there aren't that many men who "could be right."
D

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Hi Moonglow,
Don't ask yourself what you did wrong. Any guy who just disappears is showing that what is really wrong is his attitude (selfish). Whether he is driven by insecurities of his own or some (unreasonable) expectation of what the woman should be like, he has the obligation to contact her again when he led her to expect another contact. There are ways to end a connection other than disappearing. So by disappearing, the guys are showing that something is wrong with them.
Yeah, it's still disappointing. In my case the guy was speaking about our next date. Though he didn't actually say that it would be the next weekend (the weekend we are in) he certainly gave the impression that this was what he meant. So if he went home and decided that he really didn't want to see me again, he owed me an e-mail around mid-week saying that he was going to be very busy for the next few weekends and we might not be able to get together again for some time. This would be a polite way of letting me know he had stopped being interested without just disappearing.
Being disappeared on hurts more than being given a polite hint because you are never sure if he is going to contact you again. There's always the (unlikely) possibility that he might not have a good reason for disappearing (such as he and his computer were hit by a truck while crossing the street to save a bunch of puppies from a fire). You find yourself wondering if he _did_ write but the internet lost the e-mail and he is now feeling hurt because you didn't answer _him_, etc. In other words, it leaves us in unpleasant suspense. That is why it is so rude and thoughtless. The guy is avoiding confrontation (or delaying a decision about what he wants to do) at the expense of the woman's feelings.
But I repeat: it's not you. And it is not me either. I may ask myself what I did "wrong," but objectively I know that I didn't do anything to justify his just walking away.
D
Hi Bev,
I don't know about that. Sometimes a pile of manure is just a pile of manure. ;)
One thing I wanted to say is that this phenomenon of the guy just disappearing is not unique to guys you meet online. Though it may be worse in situations when there are no mutual friends or community, I had it happen to me in graduate school with a guy I met through the best friend of my roommate.
The guy called me regularly every Wednesday to invite me to the movies on Friday or Saturday. Once in a while we also went bowling and to dinner with some of our (mutual) friends. Once we went to a football game. He had a car and I didn't so he took me shopping a couple of times. This went on for two or three months. (There was some necking and hand-holding and stuff, but we were both from Catholic backgrounds and not in a rush to get too physical.) Then around "finals" time, he just didn't call. Since I was busy also, I kind of understood, but it would have been nice if he had called to say, "Look, I'm swamped with work, what about we don't see each other until next semester" or something like that.
Anyway, he disappeared from my life. My roommate and my roommate's best friend saw him on occasion, and they told me that one time _his_ roommate said something about me and that the guy had blushed and looked ashamed. Apparently the existence of mutual acquaintances who were judging him for not having the courtesy to contact me one last time was not enough to make him do it. (Note that we were all in our early twenties at the time.)
Flash-forward to three years later. I am working in a different town and I get a phone call from him. He has graduated and is in my town for a convention. My (former) roommate's best friend told him I was in that town and he found me on the phone book. He would really like to see me and buy me dinner. I have nothing better to do, and the restaurant he's mentioning is really good, so I say okay.
He apologized _then_ for disappearing. He said he had too much schoolwork, his grades were on the line, and he had thought he was just skipping one or two dates but then realized he had just disappeared and was ashamed to contact me again. We laughed about it, and we had a good time (no sex) and we exchanged a few postcards after that. I figured he had grown up.
Which brings me to my point. What these guys do is immature and irresponsible. If a guy in his early 20's disappears, it is still rude but there is hope he will grow up. When a guy in is 40's or 50's or 60's does it, you know that this is someone who never grew up to the point of taking responsibility.
We're better off alone. But it sure ain't fun.
D
LOL yep sometimes its just plain horses**t.
Your right its not just oneline men that disappear.
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Sometimes I think that if I could find several female friends to do fun things with I would totally give up on dating. But most of my female friends have the habit of putting their families first. ;) I want to be able to ask a friend to go with me to a play without having to hear about why she might need to babysit the grandkids or has to be home with hubby while he ignores her to watch the game.
I'm not all that young--54 on my last bday. (I think. Sometimes I get confused and add or subtract a year. They happen too fast.) Unfortunately the guys in my age bracket who are available all seem to have "issues." (A lot of those who aren't available and a lot of women will have "issues" too, but since I am not trying to date them, it's not my problem.)
I went ahead and wrote Mr Disappointment an e-mail saying something like, "Gee, imagine that, it's been almost a week since we exchanged e-mail. I hope it's because you were busy, not sick. I had an insane week at work but I've been enjoying the weekend," and then I mentioned a couple of fun things I did yesterday and finished up with a hope that all was well with him and that the next week treated him well.
The reason I did this is that if he doesn't answer it will mean that he is just rude and self-centered (or dead). Either way, I won't have to think about him anymore after tomorrow. If I had not written, I would wonder for another week or two if he was going to surface, what I would say to him, etc.
This way he gets a chance to do the polite thing and make some excuse for his disappearance. If he lost track of the days because he was busy or sick and wants to resume to friendship, he can interest his renewed interest. If he just wants to be polite he can write a brief vague message about how he's been busy, and I'll know that I won't be hearing from him again. In short, I can stop wondering and move on.
Dabela
"Mr Sweet Possibilities" (now better known as "Mr Disappointment") and I usually communicated via e-mail. He would phone me, but I never phoned him except to return a call. We had developed a habit of e-mailing pretty much every day, chatting about what we were doing, joking about current events, etc. Then he would call midweek to firm up plans for a date. The only exception was when he was out of town and then ill. We e-mailed during that time also.
Since he had said the previous Saturday that we should go to the movies the next weekend and he'd call me to discuss it, I expected to hear from him on Weds or Thurs of last week. If he had not felt able to phone, he could have e-mailed his excuses. It would not have felt as much like a rejection.
I can't help wondering if there was something wrong with my kiss. Granted that it is rude for him to not call or e-mail, but why did he decide to end our friendship in the first place? Saturday he was all affectionate and so forth. He spoke as though he thought we were beginning to become a couple. So what happened?
I will never know. But I will probably know just how rude he is if he doesn't take the chance to apologize and make some excuse for his silence. (I'm not hopeful he will want to go out with me. This has "JNTIY" written all over it.)
I'm sorry about your guy. They do give mixed signals sometimes. :(
Why don't you drop in casually to check up on him? Since he's always the one that plan your dates, I think it's ok for you to do it once in a while. Maybe he wants to know what's your reaction if he gone missing or maybe he's tired of being the one that keeps initiating the dates. It's all possibilities... But, if i were you, I would do it just to stop myself from wondering. Just take it as wanting to get the last confirmation that he isn't interested in pursuing the relationship anymore.
For my case, I think that he didn't give us enough chance to get to know each other better. What to say, I have done this to several guys in the past too. Nevertheless, I am still very dissapointed on how things turned out to be..
I know what you mean about gf's.
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As it happens, I just heard back from him. (A response to my "hope you are not ill" e-mail.) He makes no mention at all about ever dating again, but he gives me a detailed report on how his week went, how busy he plans to be this week, and how he might be going out of town the next week on business. I can take a hint.
What I have to decide now is whether to answer _him_. I'm inclined not to. I think the dialogue is over, even though he includes a couple of comments/questions about my response to some current events in our town. His silence communicated volumes. My silence can also.
I will always wonder what caused this sudden withdrawal of interest. Did I kiss him wrong? Did he realize he was getting too interested and rein himself back? Did he fear that I was getting too interested? Did the fact that I paid for the expensive tickets to the theater end up bothering him? (He's a man who likes to pay for everything.) Did it just happen that he realized that he wouldn't be comfortable with me for some other reason? I wish he had realized this _before_ he asked me for another date (which will now never happen) but what's the point of over-thinking? It happened, that is all.
Moon, It is always disappointing, but we need to set our sights on the next possibility.
As far as my dropping in on "Mr Disappointment," I have found that sometimes it doesn't work out well to drop in on people at work. Even with a guy who wants to be with you all the time outside work, showing up at his workplace can be disconcerting for him, like you are stalking him. Maybe it's just the guys I've dated (they tend to be really absorbed in their work) but I wouldn't have risked it.
Sorry about your guy. Now let's forget about them both and move on. ;)
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