Romance

I am going on a date soon!

I hope it goes well, Wispy! We're rooting for you!

Good luck!

Sadly my date cancelled.

But we are rescheduling our date to next Saturday.

That's ok. You'll be ok.

Okay so a few days ago I broke up with my edgy-as-balls boyfriend for two years.

I AM OFFICIALLY A SINGLE PRINGLE.

How are you holding up?

I'm still recovering, admittedly. He's said a lot of terrible things, and honestly? I'm glad we're not together anymore. Not only am I not in love with him anymore, I'm starting to see the cracks that he made.

He's changed, yeah. But I'm keeping a close eye on him.

At least he taught me what kind of man I should NOT be.

I hope things go well for you in the future. If it didn't work, can't let things keep hanging on. Whatever makes your mind clear.

I'm beginning to think I'm too eccentric for a relationship.

Well, there's always the chance that there's someone as eccentric as you.

Nobody's "too" anything for a relationship. It entirely depends on the other person in the relationship. The difficulty is in finding the person that doesn't just accept/tolerate but enjoys who you are, without wanting you to change. Any change should come from wanting to be better for your partner, and being eccentric isn't a bad thing that needs to change. You just need someone who can roll with it.

I'd contest that statement that nobody's "too" anything for a relationship. I'm Exhibit A; too old for the women at my school, too weird, too depressed, too racked with anxiety to flirt, and thus I get too drunk to care.

Counterpoint: you've been stuck in the same cycle of self defeating retreat to alcohol for half a decade minimum, and by now it's just finding reasons to keep the cycle justified.

"Too old for the college girls" isn't "too old to date". Just "too old to make a pass at any woman in your immediate vicinity".

Sometimes I worry about possible age gaps between me and potential dates. Right now, the only place I normally go to that has a realistic chance of meeting eligible women is the coffee stand in the train station across from where I work.

Long-time followers of this thread might remember me talking about me trying to find a chance to ask the then-manager out years ago. While that manager no longer works there and turned out to already be seeing someone anyway, I still get my morning coffee there everyday during my morning break. The baristas there are very friendly and nice, and I often wonder if any of them would be interested in me. But in addition to all the obstacles that made asking the then-manager out difficult (to recap; not having much time for small talk before I have to get back to work, not wanting to interrupt their work at a busy time just to hit on them, the possibility that being friendly to customers is just part of the job to them and I'm reading too much into it), I'm 35 and their tip jars are labeled "Student Loan Fund".

On the other hand, my parents' ages are about 20 years apart. My mother is only 3 years older than my father's oldest child from his first marriage. But my parents' marriage was a stable one right up until he passed away.

Since it's been a while since I posted here, I should mention that there's been a further complication to my search for love. Earlier this year, my mother had to be rushed to the hospital. Between the ensuing emergency surgery and recovering from its complications, she spent two months away from home. While successfully fending for myself during that time and disproving the Basement-Dweller stereotype was a major boost to my confidence in myself, it also makes it that much more frustrating that I'm still single. And while my mother is no longer in immediate danger, the incident has done some damage to her mobility, and I now have to do more to take care of her, which leaves less time for dates.

But the biggest obstacle of all remains my introverted personality and solitary and male-dominated hobbies giving me few chances to meet women. My half-brother (the child from dad's first marriage I mentioned earlier) and his girlfriend recommended E-Harmony. I wonder if I should give that a try.

Edited by Lightblade on Oct 17th 2018 at 9:24:01 AM

On Monday, my girlfriend said that she had Thursday off, but she wasn't bringing that up to suggest that we meet because she works very early on Friday. Then tonight, she says, "actually, do you have plans tomorrow?"

Thursdays are my hardest day to plan for. I help in an office unpaid, and then in the evening, I review a movie for a personal project. With warning, I can do the review early, but I try to get them up for Friday morning and unless I know I need Thursday night for something else, it ends up getting done Thursday night. So yes, I have plans.

She said, "oh, I understand. Working a job you don't get paid for is more important than seeing your girlfriend. Better forget it then."

That's how I learned "do you have plans tonight/tomorrow?" means "cancel your plans, I want to see you".

I've already stopped doing things in the evenings that we can't text during because I went to a movie and forgot to tell her and she got worried, and I stopped buying tickets to events in advance because the last time she dropped "I have the evening free" on me at the last minute, I'd already paid for something else.

When we're together, we have fun, but we've got very different expectations for what being in a relationship means and it's always my fault when they clash.

AHR: fair point, but at this point my self-loathing has become terminal - even the days I don't get drunk it's always there. Could always go back on antidepressants, but those made me feel totally numb. Like no personality at all. Though perhaps that's what I need.

Even after all the other times it's happened this year, I still can't believe we went from happily planning our next date to "do you want to break up?" so fast.

I'm terribly sorry to hear that. :(

@T Paradox: I'll be honest: the part where you stop doing things you want to do because you feel like you need to be available whenever she wants you, 100% of the time? That's... maybe not a relationship that should continue, unless it changes.

@Mark: Well, anti-depressants might be better than, you know, self-medicating with alcohol...? Unless the part where you get too drunk to care was just a joke - but even in that case, I would suggest taking in serious consideration the idea of doing whatever you need to do to learn how to fight your self-loathing, if it's so strong.

Care to explain how any of this is your fault? Because from where I’m sitting none of it seems to be your fault.

Look people can operate in different ways and that’s fine, but when two people operate in different non-negative ways that requires mutual compromise.

Right now it seems you’re doing a lot of compromising to cater to her desire to make plans on the fly, while she is doing what?

Her being increasingly demanding about your time and you being always available is a big red flag by the way, especially if it means isolating you from others you might spend time with.

Seriously, none of this looks healthy. If I told my girlfriend I didn’t want to go out one day because I had work the next day and she made other plans I’d have no right to get annoyed at her for that.

That kind of heavy passive aggressiveness is not healthy, she shouldn’t be speaking to you that way and you shouldn’t be tolerating it. I can give you a good comeback but it won’t fix the basic problem, that she doesn’t seem to respect your commitments and use of your time despite her demanding you show a huge amount of respect for her commitments and her use of her time.

Edited by Silasw on Oct 19th 2018 at 10:41:43 AM

Fuck. I had a drama thing last night and the girl who I had a crush on and had a falling out with was there. I felt like I was going to have a panic attack when I saw her. I had to leave and I'm pretty sure she saw me like that. I hate how its turning out between us.

I've apparently picked up that habit recently too, which is very unusual for me. It's like I want to go up to him and have a chat, but my brain enters overdrive mode and forces me to get away. Afterwards, I was planning to apologize and blame not-really-there social anxiety, but I ended up not having to.

A girl in my class asked me out to lunch. Maybe things aren’t so bad after all.

Edited by Spinosegnosaurus77 on Nov 14th 2018 at 1:27:40 PM