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Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Approach A Stranger on Social Media?

November 12, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hey Dr. NerdLove,

I got out of my one and only relationship (of seven years) four years ago. It left me really damaged and it took both a physical and mental toll on me. I’ve been spending the past three years building my confidence back up. I’ve been working with a therapist for a while and last year I got bariatric surgery to lose some of the weight I put on. I’ve improved a lot, but I realize that it is time to take off the training wheels, so to speak, and I’m rather nervous about that.

One of my biggest problems has been putting myself out there. I’ve recently decided to join a recreational sports program to try and give it a go. I ended up meeting a guy there who was really funny and sweet and he got me out of my shell pretty quickly. We had about an hour of downtime between games and he hung out with me and had a great conversation. It was animated and perhaps even a little flirty. At one point he said that he wanted to give me his number so I could send him a video we were talking about, but we were called to play a match so he never did end up giving me his number. After the event was over, a bunch of us went to an after party at a bar. The whole group hung out there for a while until people started to leave little by little. The guy came up to me to say goodbye and he gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek and left.

This guy left such a good impression with me that I felt compelled to track him down. I found his work email and his Facebook pretty easily, but now that I have this information, I question if I should reach out to him at all. I know men are not used to being approached by women and I don’t want to come off as creepy or stalkerish because I tracked down his contact information. I also keep questioning if I had read the situation correctly to begin with. I have a bad track record of misinterpreting friendliness for flirting, and the last thing I want to do is create a reputation of being “that desperate creepy girl” at a rec league that I enjoy and very much want to keep attending. So Doc, am I misinterpreting this guys interest, as I always do? And if I did get it right, would it be creepy for me to reach out to him?

Sincerely,
Forever Confused

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Why Do Guys Only Want Me For Sex?

November 9, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hello Dr. NerdLove,

I am at my wits end trying to suss out why men only see me as worthy for sex, and not a relationship. I see you advise many men on being awkward and asperger-y, but if there’s a woman one related to my issues well I’ve missed it. I’d kill for some advice.

Grew up in rural hell, overweight since age of 8, relentless teasing followed and a spate of boys asking me out as a ‘joke’. My sisters say “toxic masculinity”, but the day it started to feel more personal was when I changed schools hours apart, lost weight, AND IT HAPPENED AGAIN. So no dating for me as a teen despite wanting is ever so badly.

Hit 18, move far away to the city, get down to a respectable 140lbs and feel it’s time to come into my own. Only skeevy men (like 60 year old bar flys and 50 year old tow truck drivers) ask me out, usually hinting it’s less out than in, and I become disillusioned. After hitting clubs, becoming more confident, and even asking a guy out I liked (only to have him lick my face like a dog) I decided this wasn’t the time.

I end up in NYC, gain the weight back to about 200, and a weird version of my prior problems begins again. Men asking me out, not as a joke, but only for sex and lying about actually wanting more than pussy (I mean, yeah I know it’s not uncommon). I’m young, naive, fall for it all, finally have sex, and get into two 1.5 month relationships. The final one ends when I find out he actually had never broken up with his prior girlfriend.

My life… gets worse. An unrelated GamerGate-like situation happens and my life is ruined, I gain PTSD and an anxiety disorder, also jump to about 220lbs higher than ever before. I try counseling, first guy is great…the rest are awful.

I end up back in NYC last year, met a man I swore I was going to marry. I finally felt good about myself and my prospects for the first time in years. It had been about 4 years between the prior 1.5 and this man. We have similar interests, I find him wildly attractive, he challenges me without putting me down, and he doesn’t do anything wildly inappropriate when we meet.

We date but once again, it’s a secret. I set a boundary: okay fine cuz I’m crazy about you, but at the 3 month mark its either real or done. First month I swear by that BS about ‘something good comes after the rain’ but then it slowly becomes my worst nightmare. Turns out in retrospect I truly believe for various reasons he is a sociopath, and he was mimicking my emotions with no sincere care or feelings of his own.

It becomes emotionally abusive and I’m stunned in my 30s with all the work I’d done on myself that I’d fall for this shit. I no longer feel good about myself, he’s constantly mocking my weight, ptsd, and fact I’m just plain not good enough. He even went to meet my family, then claimed it was never serious and I shouldn’t have read into it!!! Shockingly I ended it after watching Archer and seeing him be that way to Pam, who my asshole ex was sure Archer would never sleep with.

We unfortunately are around each other, not by choice, despite the end, and I lose all my sanity within months. He gets a new gf and tells me how she’s thin and better than me. He continues mocking the fact I was alone, so sets me up with a friend of his thats only a friends with benefit thing. That ends not badly but because that’s just not my scene man.

I have a nervous breakdown. I move away again. I see a new therapist. She seems great until one day she declares I should have just kept my legs shut then abuser wouldn’t have been a problem! I swear off therapy forever as this is not the first bad incident I’ve had (the prior good guy was like 1 in 5 attempts). I go for the weed and prozac. And now I’m alone, 32, and in rural hell again.

When I was a kid they mocked me because I wasn’t good enough. Now I’m too good at what I shouldn’t be (have traveled, have done things out in the world when they haven’t left the state line), and still bad at what I should be (weight). I seriously pursued bariatric surgery after the breakdown, but I have a hard time believing I should seriously curtail my ability to eat and drink in life so maybe a few more bar flys will find me worthy.

Online dating sucks in the city and in rural hell. I am succinct and put no hookups, all I get is hookups despite the app, the area, the pictures chosen. And frankly not having kids and not loving Trump already made the replies low in this place.

All I can conclude now is that through a decade, through thin and fat, confident and not confident, good and sane and now broken, city and rural, the only constant is me. And it must be something wrong with me. I have literally never been asked out in a manner that didn’t imply it was going right to the bedroom (or just out and out said it). The only time in my life I could get interest is when I was looking for hookups to fuck the pain away over my abuser. I can go to bars, concerts, lectures, book stores, whatev and nobody ever engages me. The last guy to engage me in a thrift store told me I should wear the thin shawl I was looking at for Halloween, and only it. When I quipped that would be mighty cold he laughed and told me to tell ‘him’ (bf/husband I assume?) he tried. He had to be over 55 and looked like the old barflys.

Dr. NerdLove I am seriously at my wits end. I’m lonely, bad at reading social cues anyway (the conclusion is I’m probably on the spectrum; but no one has ever done a full test), and absolutely baffled as to why I am so unworthy of genuine love. And I’d like to stress I find older men (of good taste, not barflys of course) handsome, fat and thin I’ve been with, white and black and latino. Most of my dates I end up paying my share (the last one the guy tried to sneak his beers on my tab… I just let it slide because it was so awful and I wanted it to end). I can’t imagine wanting a clean (hygiene and appearance) guy between 25 and 60 is such a high standard. The last tinder convo I had asked me if *I* was clean STD wise…after agreeing they weren’t looking for sex. I deleted it. I’ve done POF, Match and OkCupid too.

I’m lonely as hell and about to resign to it. Please help.

Fantastic Frustrated Female

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: I Made A Mistake. Is It Too Late To Fix It?

November 5, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Greetings Doc,

A small preface about me and my dating history: I am a 27 year old male who has never been in a serious relationship, though have had a few flings last about a month. I am a reasonably handsome and pretty fit guy. I’ve never felt the need to necessarily ‘chase’ women – I’m okay with being alone. If I’m out with my buddies and I talk to a lady, great. If I don’t, great. That being said, for a long time my self-esteem and opinion of myself was pretty low, as well as dealing with a self sustained injury to my genitals left me feeling indifferent to the whole dating scene, until recently (thanks in large part to reading your work). I’ve taken steps like upgrading my wardrobe and taking better care of my body/health (everything works as it should).

A few months ago I asked a girl I work with if she wanted to grab some drinks – it was totally platonic, I had the night off and wanted to get out of the house, and she was game. We continued to casually hang and grab drinks every so often, whenever schedules allowed – we are both bartenders working at the same pub. I knew she had been dating a girl for almost a decade (she identifies as bisexual), and didn’t think anything would necessarily happen – until it did. One night as we were hanging out, we got into a little tickling/roughhousing fight, I picked up some serious signs, and made a move. Again, I was under the impression she was still with her girl at this time, although in the moment she did inform me that they were on a break. Great, I thought. A little fun for me!

Afterwards, working with her continued to be great, no issues, business as usual. We hung out and hooked up again, and at that point she explained what she was looking for: nothing serious, just exploring herself as she figures things out. Here is exactly when I caught some serious feelings.

We continued to go out on dates, having fun, always talking for hours and sharing a lot of laughs. She never checks her phone even though I know it’s being blown up, and always looks great and arrives on time.

One day at work I couldn’t help but notice a fella at the bar took quite the shine to her, and I couldn’t help but notice myself getting very jealous. I felt like it was written on my face and made work awkward, so the next time we went out I felt like I had to apologize. Then the floodgates opened: I basically did everything but propose, venting all my frustrations and unrequited love for her. At the time, it felt like a great weight was lifted. Now, I can’t believe how selfish I was: she’s going through something I can’t imagine, her phone is probably being blown up by her ex, all her girlfriends telling her what she should do, checking in on her, on top of whatever other messages she gets from Tinder or Bumble. My feelings and my problems are my own, not hers. My job should simply be her friend – she’s going through something I can’t imagine and the least I can do is just make her laugh and all.

Working with her continued to be great – no lingering awkwardness, still playfully punching/tickling/poking each other, still with the inside jokes about certain annoying patrons. She texted me that night after the date explaining that she was glad to have had that conversation as adults, and stressed nothing would change.

I let things mellow out for a couple weeks, until last week when I asked her to go bowling. Went great, lots of laughs, grabbed drinks afterwards and hung out all night. Said goodbye with one of my patented big ol’ hugs – the kind where I pick you up with a big bear hug. She always giggles and wraps her legs around me as I squeeze a liiiiiitle bit longer than usual. I felt good after that night, so naturally I had to think and ruin my mood. I notice of late she has been lending her car to a manager of ours who I know doesn’t have one, and is going through a rough patch with his own girlfriend. Obviously I began to think the two of them were an item, which again I felt is/was written all over my face.

I suppose my question is, what do I do? Should I let things calm down for a while/no more dates, and accept the fact I’m back to square one? Should I continue asking her out on dates/hanging when we can? Our schedules make it so that we would only have maybe one day/night off together a week, something she would also know. I should also mention I’ve begun using apps like Youper and Headspace to help process my emotions and have felt much better since starting that.

I feel like I know what answer is right, though hearing it from you would mean a lot more than some bullshit bro-science stuff from my idiot bro friends.

You do incredible work. Any response is greatly appreciated, and I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to read this.

Regards,

Insert Foot (a) Into Mouth Slot (b)

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Is This An Affair?

November 2, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hello Doc!

I know you normally do dating advice, but I’ve seen you do marriage advice too.

I have been married to my husband for 9 years. We have three kids together.

Back when he and I were dating, I went to visit him out of town (same town where my parents lived) where he had an internship. He wanted to fool around and we really didn’t have a place to go (he was living with my parents for free during his internship) and so he wanted to fool around in the car. When we finally found an empty dark parking lot, he said he wanted to get in the backseat and I told him specifically that I didn’t want to. My ex had sexually assaulted me in a car, and although I didn’t understand that’s what happened at the time, I told my (then) boyfriend that my ex had been “gross” with me in a car and it made me gross out to mess around. This made my boyfriend snap and he started yelling at me “we better not have come out all this way for nothing!” For various reasons I complied. I was scared of losing him, I didn’t know anything about consent, so I just laid there looking at the ceiling while he helped himself to a hand job from me. I wanted to break up with him, but coming from a very abusive home, I quickly blocked what happened and moved on. And we got married. And our marriage sucked but I got pregnant right away.

Fast forward to 2016 during Trump’s election and I finally have the words for what he did to me and I confront him. We fight for weeks but he owns up to it and apologizes sincerely. On New Years Eve we have sex for probably one out of three times that year and I get pregnant. Things are still rough but my hope is that with everything in the open, a new baby on the way, we can turn over a new leaf. We don’t. Once, when we were going to go see a movie with a couple that he knew (he worked with the girl) we got into a fight and he asked what I wanted to do. Crying, I said, “Please, let’s just go home” Well, he pulls up to the movie theatre, gets out and tells me that the couple will drive him home.

Then I find out that the girl he is working with is moving away. He and I were always very comfortable with each other having opposite sex friends, and he goes to three different going away parties for this girl. I am exhausted and pregnant, plus I am also childcare for our other kids so I stay home. He tells me he’s a social person and when I come home from work and lie in bed, it’s hard on him. So he goes out. Once, while we were watching a movie on his phone, the girl who left his work is lighting up his phone and it’s almost 10pm. She’s sending text after text. I don’t know what they say. But the next day, I look at the texts. Husband and I have always felt fine with having the password for each other’s phones. Once or twice a week, we’d lose a phone and use the other’s phone to call the missing phone. I’d grab his phone if it was close to look stuff up etc.

I see texts that talk about them having lunch together. Daily. She’s talking about crying because she doesn’t want to leave. He tells her he hopes our daughters grow up to be like her. He talks about feminist theory with her. Etc. Nothing sexual. But he did lie. He told me they rarely spent time together. I pressed him on several details about the time they spent together. He lied. And after I asked a few questions about her (he didn’t know I looked through his phone) the next day, he changed his password of two years.

Once I saw that he changed his phone I told him I had seen their conversations. I told him that he had been lying about how much time they were spending together. I told him to stop texting her.

He didn’t. I caught him replying to a text she sent him about something innocuous. And then magically, she didn’t text him anymore. There were other text convos in his phone with other women. One where he told her he likes having deep conversations and low key flirting, but I can tell that she was trying to keep things friendly so I wasn’t as worried about that.

Here’s the thing. He says he didn’t sleep with the woman who he became glued to while I was pregnant. He says he didn’t have feelings for her but when I press, he doesn’t say she didn’t have feelings for him. But he lied and lied and lied to me about how much time they spent together until I told him I read his texts, and his face turned white. “Believe what you want but nothing happened.” And he was trying to making me feel like I was crazy until I had black and white proof. So I have no idea if he really took it too far with this girl.

There are very, very complicated reasons why I haven’t left, but I need to know, from a guy’s perspective, am I making this too much of a big deal?

-Doubting

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Where Do I Find People I Want to Date?

October 29, 2018 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Dr. NerdLove,

Hello there, I’m a huge fan of your work and I feel like you’ve really helped me advance as far as dating goes. Using your advice I started online dating (using OkCupid) a few years ago and I found out that there are women out there that find me desirable, which I found to be amazing because I’m not conventionally attractive in the slightest (I’m 5’7, Babyfaced, and slightly chubby). I’ve gotten a lot of likes, had messages responded to, had several first dates, and last year even had a girl ask to kiss me. Sadly that same girl rejected me after three dates because she suddenly lost interest (she said it was because she loses interest in relationships really quickly and that that was why she hadn’t had relationships before, I don’t really believe that and think she was just letting me down easy but, whatever).

The problem is it seems like the online dating environment is evolving in such a way that greatly disadvantages guys like me. Apps like Tinder have long since overtaken OkCupid in popularity and to be successful on that app you absolutely have to be strongly conventionally attractive or you won’t get anyone to swipe right. You don’t get to make the first move and your profile is basically meaningless which unfortunately means I can’t make up for my appearance with a thoughtful first message or a well-written profile. And of course OkCupid is changing itself to be more like Tinder: your messages are basically invisible unless you both like each other, you can’t see who’s visited your profile, and you can only see who likes you if you buy a subscription. I’m terribly afraid that people like me or going to be forced out of online dating and that I’ll lose the only way I have to find a relationship. Of course, the obvious solution would be to try and get dates in real life, but there a couple of problems with that. For one, trying to hit up strangers just sounds wrong, I can’t think of anything that would scream “I’m a Creep and Probably a Rapist” more than trawling through town hitting up random women who look single. And the second issue is…well…

I don’t have any friends. There, I said it. It’s not like I’m not socially functional, I have a ton of acquaintances, usually from places I’ve worked, who I’ve joked with, helped out, and had long conversations with. Hell, there are coworkers who’ve basically told me their life story in the time I’ve known them. I’ve also taken steps to make friends in the past: I’ve gone to Meetups, started two Meetup groups of my own, even scheduled a hang out with a coworker once. But all of these fell through due schedule conflicts, groups dying out, and personal conflicts (the coworker I hung out with has recently broken up with his long-time girlfriend and isn’t currently in the mood to hang out).

But honestly, I don’t really feel the need or desire for friends anymore. Most of my hobbies are solo pursuits: playing single player video games, reading, relaxed hiking, and biking, watching anime and youtube videos, collecting albums from obscure and forgotten bands, etc. I play guitar sometimes but I’m nowhere good enough to play in a band (if I could even find anybody in town with similar musical tastes). I have a good relationship with my family who I currently live with (I’m not a loser, I have a fulltime job and I’m getting my Masters in Library Science; I’m just staying to save money till I graduate) and thanks to my psychiatrist I have meds to deal with my anxiety issues. Besides, having someone to occasionally hang out with if I’m not too busy, I want physical affection (no, not just sex, but hugging, kissing, cuddling, etc.) and someone who sees me as something special, someone who finds me to be an attractive person instead someone cool enough to watch youtube videos with for a couple hours.

But of course, the only way for me to date if online dating stops being an option would be to meet people through friends. I don’t think it a good idea to make “friends” just so I could meet women, that would be unfair to my “friends” and probably wouldn’t work anyway. Besides, making friends takes a long time, several years probably, and as someone who’s almost 26 and never had a girlfriend, I’m not sure I want to wait till I’m deep in my 30s before I can even attempt to date, especially since my chances will have dropped dramatically by then. So I guess my question is, what should I do? Can I adapt to new online dating environment? Do I just need to suck it up and ask strangers out in real life? Do I have to spend the next several years making friends and hope I eventually meet a girl?

Thank you,

Loner Boy

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