rejection Archives - Paging Dr. NerdLove

How Do I Friend Zone Someone Without Being a Jerk?

March 10, 2021 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hey Doc,

I’m the type of guy that never really prioritized relationships in high school or college. I was also focused on career, school, and my health. As a result, I never really had any relationship experience, or any experience with women, and, to be honest, I’m just a typical socially awkward nerd (and proud).

However, as I’ve started taking steps towards interacting with women, I realized that while I’m a socially awkward nerd, I’m a nerd who won the genetic lottery. I’ve netted from independent sources that I’m a really good-looking guy. I guess I just got lucky but while I’m really just trying to build friendships with women they tend to jump the boat from friendship to dreaming about a relationship or asking me out when we’ve only really shared a couple classes together and talked a few times over lunch. I usually reject them since I’m really not looking for that right now, but how do I do it without being a huge dick?

With one girl I flatly said “no” to a dinner date proposition, and I really wished I could’ve delivered that nicer because I could tell she was really hurt. I didn’t mean to make her feel that way I just wanted to be honest and not skirt around it like when girls do to guys. I know that’s because they’re socialized to be nice, but most men find it confusing so I just wanted to be blunt. With another girl I could tell she was beginning to catch feelings and I wanted to avoid another situation similar to the one above, and kind’ve just got confused with how to act and cut her off. The friendship fizzled out and it’s a shame I thought she was a cool person. How do I navigate people’s feelings for me without being a douche?

Thanks!

Strictly Platonic

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She Ghosted Me. So Why Can’t I Get Over Her?

February 8, 2021 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hi Doc, hope you’re doing fine.

Long time lurker, first time writer. I met this girl back in April, before all this madness, and we really hit off. She gave me her number and over the next months we chatted almost daily.

We had a lot of things in common and we talked about many issues, some serious, some just chitchat, sharing memes and the music, movies and series we liked. Many times we spent all night long talking and having fun, even when be both had to get up early to work.

We had four dates before the outbreak of coronavirus and we didn’t see each other again because we both resolved to stay at home until this pandemic died off. So for the last months we only texted each other and nothing changed, we still talked a lot and things were cool. However, I began to notice she became less and less engaged in our conversations, taking a lot of time to text back or even leaving me on seen many times. Suddenly we didn’t talk for days, but then we would talk for three days in a row and then radio silence for a week. One day, I sent her a text and she left me on seen. I thought it was the new normal and she would reply a few hours later. But nothing. She was online almost all the time but she didn’t reply.

I asked a couple of days later if she was ok or if something happened (she told me before some health issues within her family and I got worried) and she left me on seen again. I didn’t bother her anymore, because maybe she was really busy or had something going on in her life or just didn’t want to talk to me anymore. A few days later I checked and her profile picture is gone, meaning she deleted me from her contacts. So, after solid three weeks, now it’s certain that what we had is over.

The thing is, we didn’t have a relationship and we weren’t really friends. Maybe we could have been. I’m highly inexperienced with girls and this was my first time getting to know someone. It was my first time sharing time and feelings with a girl and also the first time someone was interested in me. I guess I became too attached and more emotionally involved that her. Maybe I scared her away because of that. I liked/like her and this was the first time I had a crush or feelings for someone and I actually could get to know that person and like her for how she was.

I’ve had experienced infatuation, oneitis, crushes and all that, but it was always based on speculation or idealizations, never by discovering the personality of a girl, with her positive and not-so positive traits. This was the first time it was ‘real’. As I said, I know it wasn’t a relationship, but it feels like a breakup. Or what I imagine a breakup is like. It hurts so much. I’ve been crying a lot since things ended and I can’t even work. I only want to lie in bed all day and cry myself to sleep. Or just be there staring at the ceiling.

I feel also so ashamed for allowing this to affect me this much. She moved on easily, while I’m still mourning something that never existed. And to tbh, as the song says, I’m still crying, waiting and hoping she would text me back and things we’ll be normal again and each time I get a notification, my heart beats faster hoping is a text for her.

Is this normal for someone absolutely inexperienced in dating and relationships or I’m showing how immature, childish and overly emotional am I and that’s the reason why someone would leave me? It will take more time to get over her?

Heartbroken for No Reason

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How Do I Stop Leading People On?

December 7, 2020 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Dr. NerdLove,

This is a pretty minor problem compared to a lot of the ones that you deal with, but I’ve really valued your advice over the years, so I thought I’d send it in anyway.

I was very nervous and awkward as a teenager, but I have spent the last decade working actively on my social skills. I’m proud of how far I’ve come! I’ll always be a bit dorky, but I am able to have conversations with a wide range of people. I have an upbeat personality and really like getting to know people, but I am also a bit over accommodating.

This leads to a dating problem—I feel like I lead guys on. When I’m on a date I tend to smooth over any conversational rough spots, get enthusiastic about their interests, and actively listen to the things they want to rant about. If someone isn’t engaging with me and I have to carry the entire conversation, I can and will do that. I can tell that a lot of guys leave our dates feeling like they’ve really connected, only to be completely blindsided when I reject them. I feel like I’m the woman on the other side of every story about how “I thought it was going so well, I just don’t know what happened.” Rejection hurts, and it especially hurts when you didn’t see it coming. I’m sure all women experience this to some extent, but my I-Don’t-Want-To-Date-You conversations can get super messy and make me feel like the bad guy.

I’m not trying especially hard on dates and never promise anything–it’s my default conversational style that’s the issue. I really want people to have a good time, and don’t know how to do “lukewarm.” To a lesser extent this is also a problem in my friendships, as it’s become a pattern that other people get much more invested in me than I do in them. I think sometimes by trying to be nice in the short term I end up hurting people in the long term, and I feel awful about that.

Do you have any advice on dialing it back? Should I learn to let awkward silences hang and invest in a resting bitch face? I know that there’s got to be middle ground between “what I’m doing now” and “actively being mean” but for some reason I’m finding it hard to navigate. Or should I just accept that part of life is sometimes accidentally hurting the almost stranger that you are eating a giant plate of tacos with? I don’t want to close myself off to other people.

Thank you for your time!
Feeling Rotten About Unrequited Desires

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My Fiance Cheated on Me. Now He Wants An Open Relationship.

November 16, 2020 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hi there Dr NerdLove,

I’m in a mess. I was supposed to get married this summer until we postponed for COVID; then two months ago my fiancé confessed to cheating on me. Not like once or twice, but probably twenty times with maybe a dozen different women, from one-night stands to hookups with a friend of his who I always distrusted to paying for blowjobs at a strip club, happy endings and prostitutes, to more one night stands and bar make outs, to an acquaintance of his (I had seen him flirt with her which feels awful), and lastly with a friend of mine several times after he moved in with me!! Ha!! This was mainly in the first three years of our relationship though earlier this year, while in pre-marital counseling, he ditched me to hang with some poly friends of friends and made out with a woman, though he confessed after.

My last ex cheated on and gaslit me terribly, which fiancé knew. Meanwhile, I knew my (ex?) fiancé wanted to explore sleeping with other people and I did try to have the conversation about how to make it safe for me. Obviously it was never going to be because he was dishonest and had disrespected me and been unethical. Also he never responded to my many efforts to open up a conversation around it, the most serious of which all happened after most of the cheating. Now he says he still needs an open relationship, and he seems to not want reconsidering that to be open-ended. We are living separately and in couples counseling; I’ve told some friends and family but my parents still think I’m engaged. Also, I’m about to be 37, and we were off birth control when he told me and in theory moving on to being open to having kids. I certainly can’t see opening anything up unless I feel radically safe and heard and prioritized which I never have been, and what’s way more important to me is having a secure foundation for being parents. I in theory can be down with sexual exploration but in all honesty it’s just not a priority. (I should also say that in our relationship I had the higher sex drive for years before lowering my expectations, and I almost never said no and I believe when he tells me I gave him the best sex of his life).

Obviously I loved him and wanted to be with him before I knew; when I found out I could clearly see the behaviors I had been ignoring and looking past and could kick myself for tolerating it, and him for letting me go down this path with someone who was being dishonest. I honestly don’t know if I can forgive the laundry list of betrayals, which still make me mighty mad.

Can I forgive him and also deal with his sleeping with other people in future under some theoretical framework that I question he could honor? Even less unsure! I guess I’m just looking for an outside opinion on what to do. He confessed out of guilt and has been willing to apologize and work on things, though some projection and resentment have popped up from him along the way that haven’t helped. He fundamentally shuts down when I need support a lot of the time, so maybe I just can’t at all be with him despite the other times together he made me happy. It sucks and I kind of can’t believe I have to deal with something this egregious again (but like, more so).

Heart Needs a Second Chance?

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I Want To Find a Friend With Benefits… But I Don’t Know How.

August 28, 2020 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hello Doc,
I am not currently in the mental state to be in a long term, committed relationship, but I would like to be intimate with a woman/women. But I have no idea how this even happens. How does it start? And especially, how does a guy even bring up this idea without being labelled a douchebag/creeper/fuckboy?

I’ve asked similar questions to this online on multiple sites, just simply asking how a guy looks for this without being creepy, and have had answers along the lines of “it’s impossible, because FWB is creepy”, or “you’re basically asking how do I do this creepy thing without being creepy”, or “you don’t think she’s good enough to date but you’d still fuck her, you don’t see her as a person”. I don’t think I said anything to warrant this kind of reaction, so it seems to just be that they don’t like the idea. It would be one thing if this was just a matter of personal preference, but they seem to carry the implication (or in some cases, explicitly remark) that any guy who would want this or look for this is creepy, predatory, misogynistic, and awful.

So it seems like, when finding someone, that I have to be lucky enough to:

1. Not have any hangups about the idea, not think that it’s inherently creepy,
2. Not have any hangups about me in particular asking

and that’s in addition to

3. The whole thing with approaching in general, that she has to be fine with both my approach and the venue.

And of course, there’s no way of truly knowing any of this without asking in the first place. And these three things are just what I need to not be seen as a reprehensible creep for this, not even to actually FIND a FWB. At this point, it seems less like finding someone and more like playing the lottery.

So, how does this happen, and how does a man do it without being seen as evil?

Benefits Package

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