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Post by northstarmom on Oct 16, 2018 21:52:58 GMT -5
GC said: " Once again you are full of double talk. "Still doesn't mean you know a person". Wrong, wrong, wrong. You don't know shit, you weren't there. I learned plenty and we shared plenty. Definitely enough red flags to end it. A good learning experience . Especially after years of zero communication with a controller."
I don't think it would take me 2 weeks of long texts and phone calls to know whether I wanted to meet someone in person. Sure, I believe you learned plenty and shared plenty. I still think the list that you sent her was way too much to be sending a person you barely knew. My point is you didn't know her well enough to be offering her:
"My past, my present, and my future.
my time, patience, and money ( traveling to see you, bringing you to see me, bringing you back home, buying you meals and things)
Words of affirmation, compliments.
My undivided attention.
My sympathy, concern and apathy for your physical and mental health.
An opportunity to say "yes" to take a risk, to let your guard down, to open your heart a little at a time, to be your true self.
An opportunity for a relationship with my family.
My body, and for me to desire yours.
Intimacy and respect for your boundaries.
The ability to date other men, and compare."
With her red flags waving, you'd be offering someone an opportunity for a relationship with your family? Your past, present and future? Why would you be offering her such a list when you don't even know her and when you see red flags?
The texts/calls you'd had with her were enough for you to know whether or not you wished to meet her in person but not much more than that.
Curious about what you meant by this: "My sympathy, concern and apathy for your physical and mental health." Did you mean "apathy" or was that a typo?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 16, 2018 21:56:15 GMT -5
GC and NSM:
You two... at it again.
Honestly, the mom in me wants to put you both in time out sometimes! 😂
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Post by northstarmom on Oct 16, 2018 21:58:49 GMT -5
"GC and NSM:
You two... at it again.
Honestly, the mom in me wants to put you both in time out sometimes! 😂"
Yeah, we do butt heads a lot. I'm a first born know it all. I wonder if GC is, too.
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Post by greatcoastal on Oct 17, 2018 6:31:37 GMT -5
GC and NSM: You two... at it again. Honestly, the mom in me wants to put you both in time out sometimes! 😂 LOL ! Thank you for that! Yes I wish it wasn't true. However ,I come on this forum, I offer myself. My stories, the good, the bad, the ugly. Very few of us who have made it to oppositland seem to want to do that. Anyone else is free to respond and share their opinions, advice, praise or scorn. Very few do. My other option is to just leave the forum. |
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Post by northstarmom on Oct 17, 2018 7:08:34 GMT -5
Gc said: “
LOL ! Thank you for that! Yes I wish it wasn't true. However ,I come on this forum, I offer myself. My stories, the good, the bad, the ugly. Very few of us who have made it to oppositland seem to want to do that.
Anyone else is free to respond and share their opinions, advice, praise or scorn. Very few do. My other option is to just leave the forum.”
We butt heads but are both here to be helpful and are trying to be helpful even when we vehemently disagree.
I’m also hear to figure out my life and to continue to learn how to be a good person and live a fulfilling life, aspirations that didnt stop once I got to Oppositeland. Being here also helps me appreciate my life now something that can be easy to do with the everyday hassles (which today include months of dealing with $30k in hurricane damage. Still, life could be much worse. I could still be with my ex.)
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Post by elkclan2 on Oct 17, 2018 7:24:30 GMT -5
I think we've all learned from this thread that we should end conversations with people who start them from Nigeria. :-)
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Post by greatcoastal on Oct 17, 2018 7:51:02 GMT -5
"GC and NSM: You two... at it again. Honestly, the mom in me wants to put you both in time out sometimes! 😂" Yeah, we do butt heads a lot. I'm a first born know it all. I wonder if GC is, too. I am the youngest of two. My mom was bipolar, my father avoided her. My older sister confronted her head on. I watched my sister get it worse for even trying to communicate. I took the same direction my dad went in. I avoided it as much as possible and said very little for years. So here I am feeling like I am communicating with mom again, yet I am not avoiding it!  My letter sent to this woman was an act of kindness. I went above and beyond what any man who has attempted to be with her has done. I did not ghost her, or drop everything and run the other way. I have received multiple responses back from her. She claims she lost a very good thing, and is very regretful. She now talks about " the error of her ways , the things she is going to give up and the positive things she wants to work on". It's beginning to feel like stalking. We will see. Good for her! I won't be a part of it anymore. Those red flags appeared through our conversations.That "list" was all in my mind ,and made up AFTER having multiple conversations, revealing these things a little at a time. That IS how I got to know her, by offering these things and seeing how she reacted. ( not at all in the words that where on my list) When someone wants to know , "are you there? Did I screw up? I haven't heard back from you?" I respond honestly and open another door, to see how they will react. Such as, " I could not respond back to you because, my daughter is having surgery today, she has been on crutches for a year and a half, I'm glad I get to be there with her today, she wants to stay with me for her healing and not her mother. I will be busy taking care of her for the next few days. I also had to bring my other daughter home from school, she has a stomach virus that is going around. It's the first time ever the two of them need to be home like this." I send a pic of me and my daughters together at the beach. I then get responses all about caring for children and wanting to get to know my daughters. All a part of getting to know the real greatcoastal. I like hearing those responses. Then I get texts that are full of name calling and how she is tipsy from drinking, how she needed a drink just to talk to me. A BIG RED flag. Yet it took days of conversations to learn these things. My size verses hers. How none of her pics where below the shoulders. She confessed about her embarrassment of her extra 60 lbs. To me that's a lot, that's obese ( sorry to offend anyone). Yet I still offered to meet her in person. She cancelled it! Her choice. I tried to offer her hope for a new beginning, but she has to help her herself a lot more. I am not going to be another knight on a white horse again. I learned how wrong that is to be nothing but a giver again. __________________________________________________________ The next woman who I actually was able to meet online, then go out with is very different. She has her own place, she lives alone, and on and off with her 22 yr old daughter who has aspergers. She lives 4 miles from me. She has her own car. She lived through a SM. That is why she got divorced, we share religious beliefs. She attends the church I used to work at. She has a son who is 20 has moved out and doesn't communicate with her. I can relate. What she needs from me is someone who will cherish her, respect her, and desire her. Someone who wants to have intimate times together. She wants a LTR and so do I. She already wants a second date. We want to go to the beach together and go boogie boarding on the first breakers! The only flag for me, so far, is that she occasionally smokes, and is desperately trying to quit. I am willing to accept that and deal with it for now. My past present, and future, do not bother her she said "yes" to those. My time, patience and money. She said," yes" it's okay. Words of affirmation, physical touch, and quality time together? She wants and needs that too, she said "yes" to that and began to show it our first time together and online. My undivided attention. She said "yes" to that. I was able to give that to her and receive it back from her, online and in person. My sympathy, concern and empathy for her physical and mental health. She said "yes" to that and openly shared with me some of the stressful things she deals with in her work. She could use some relaxing, joyful times. I can do that! And I feel she can give that back to me. One thing on her bucket list is to be snuggled at a movie, she has never done that.( A lot of you ladies on this site can relate to that.) An opportunity to say "yes" to take a risk, to let your guard down to open your heart a little at a time, to be your true self. She did all of those things for me, and accepted me doing that for her. An opportunity for a relationship with my family. She does counselling for girls who have been sexually abused. My body and for me to desire yours. We already sent each other classy pictures and met in person, no problem there yet, including our long good night embrace and kiss. A memorable first date. And have spoken about our sexual needs. Intimacy and respect for your boundaries. We communicated and agreed that " when the time is right we both have strong desires for the same things". The ability to date other men and compare. There is no comparison needed. All the other men who she has met online have been total jerks, she is done with it. She is very impressed and glad to have met someone like me. I did use the word "apathy". My screw up! I mean "empathy". My bad. New words for me, I have to learn to use them better. |
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Post by shamwow on Oct 17, 2018 8:06:43 GMT -5
Those are the basics? It sounds more like an interrogation. What ever happened to "tell me about yourself" and let the conversation take a life of its own. Yes those are basics. Things that you would hope to learn from "tell me about yourself". Now, obviously you have zero experience with being involved in today's email, text dating sights. Your own testimony on here proves that. I do have woman who tell me what it's like to talk with men on line. " hello, want to fuck?" So they don't want a conversation with them, they don't want to know any more about them. You're right that I know squat about today's dating sites. But I do know a tiny but about beginning and building a relationship over text. ballofconfusion has posted, what, 20 or 30 messages on the forum? Every bit of communication we had was via text. Only later came phone calls. And only a few weeks before we met in person did we talk over Skype. We are blessed that we still have the first month or two of PM conversations available to us before switching to kik. My first message to her was a simple message to her letting her know that she had found a place where we understood what she was going through. That's it. I'd sent similar messages to other people on the forum (men and women) saying similar. She didn't reply at all for two days. Over the next few weeks, we chatted via PM. Sometimes every few days. Sometimes daily. Sometimes back and forth throughout the day. As our friendship grew we became mutually attracted to each other. Now this may sound like a whirlwind romance. It wasn't. I was a barely recovering alcoholic in process of divorcing his wife. My plans, stated to her were to fuck as many women as quickly as I could to prove to myself that I still "had it". She was gearing up to leave her SM while simultaneously having an affair. We both had tons of red flags waving in the air. But still, I bought an airline ticket and she stepped on the plane. Think about that for a second. She broke off the relationship with her AP (it was already in decline) to see me. I had recently broken off an EA I'd developed with another lady here on the site. She trusted me enough to fly to Houston and stay in my home (no escape if I were a creep). How in the hell did we wind up where we are at a little over a year (and 32 flights) later? How did this thing start? It started over text. It started, essentially, with "tell me about yourself". |
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Post by greatcoastal on Oct 17, 2018 8:32:51 GMT -5
VERY nicely stated shamwow@ BRAVO! Very nicely done! I wanted to say in my last post " I am very happy for you guys!!".
So basically you both did your own interrogation, and found out all those basics before getting on a plane, is that correct?
Look ,I am discovering that being honest is my approach. Being open. Okay, sometimes TOO honest! (TMI) However, so far I have found that if the person I am being honest with can't handle that and has trouble responding, well... they have things to hide or are not at all who they say they are.
Then there is the person who admires it and likes it, a lot. They respond back with openness and kindness. You are not "offending" them.
On a side note: I think about my trucking days. The times when I would get pulled over at the weigh station and have my vehicle inspected and go through an interrogation. (especially when I was hauling hazardous material across state lines) My attitude was: YES, bring it on! I have nothing to hide. Can you look inside my cooler, to see if I have any open containers of alcohol? Yes! Do you get close to me to smell my breath? Yes! Is my log book, licenses, placards, weight, ties, bands, all in place? Yes! Did I stop every 2 hrs. or 200 miles and inspect my vehicle? Yes! ( listed in my log book) Am I courteous and respectful? Yes! Did I get the same in return? Yes!
And I would thank them for it! For making the roads I travelled safe for me and others
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Post by shamwow on Oct 17, 2018 8:35:58 GMT -5
Women are complicated. They want a man who makes them feel safe and secure. They also want to feel desired. In our society, men are usually expected to take the lead here.
When a man expresses desire, it is a spectrum with apathy (why isn't he in to me) on one end and intensity (woah buddy slow down) on the other. You've got to get it just right, and what is just right can vary greatly from woman to woman. If she guesses wrong? She gets used and thrown away.
On the safety front, it ranges from nice guy (zzzzzzz) to bad boy (am I gonna get raped). If she guesses wrong the consequences could be life threatening.
Now, let's add some spice to the mix. We are going to do this all online where you have no idea if the person you're talking to is even remotely who they say.
On the other hand, for some reason this environment also tends to remove all civilized constraints from some men. They do and say things to a woman they would NEVER do in person ("wanna fuck" or unsolicited dick pics). So the bar for a good man is pretty low.
So GC, reading your posts here, you seem to need to tone the intensity down. There is a reason that women like "cool" guys. They are not threatening. I doubt any woman getting to know you is going to think you will rape her. But stalk her? Oh yeah. Cut off the interrogation techniques and promises of a blissful future together after two weeks and I suspect you will have MUCH better luck.
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Post by shamwow on Oct 17, 2018 8:42:59 GMT -5
VERY nicely stated shamwow@ BRAVO! Very nicely done! I wanted to say in my last post " I am very happy for you guys!!". So basically you both did your own interrogation, and found out all those basics before getting on a plane, is that correct? Look ,I am discovering that being honest is my approach. Being open. Okay, sometimes TOO honest! (TMI) However, so far I have found that if the person I am being honest with can't handle that and has trouble responding, well... they have things to hide or are not at all who they say they are. Then there is the person who admires it and likes it, a lot. They respond back with openness and kindness. You are not "offending" them. On a side note: I think about my trucking days. The times when I would get pulled over at the weigh station and have my vehicle inspected and go through an interrogation. (especially when I was hauling hazardous material across state lines) My attitude was: YES, bring it on! I have nothing to hide. Can you look inside my cooler, to see if I have any open containers of alcohol? Yes! Do you get close to me to smell my breath? Yes! Is my log book, licenses, placards, weight, ties, bands, all in place? Yes! Did I stop every 2 hrs. or 200 miles and inspect my vehicle? Yes! ( listed in my log book) Am I courteous and respectful? Yes! Did I get the same in return? Yes! And I would thank them for it! For making the roads I travelled safe for me and others You are sooooo close. Neither of us did an interrogation. If either of us had the other would have run like hell. We chatted about that this morning and both agree. What we did is have a conversation. It had no "goal" other than to get to know each other. Neither of us was LOOKING for happily ever after. You cannot force these things. It will happen or it won't. I know that is maddeningly frustrating to hear but the more tightly you grasp for it the less likely you are to find what you want. |
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Post by greatcoastal on Oct 17, 2018 9:07:28 GMT -5
Yes we are close shamwow@! Tomatoe, tomato? Potato Patatoe? (However you spell those to make them sound right!) Interrogation vrs "tell me all about yourself" well it sounds like splitting hairs. Arguing over "word salad". If neither of you were able to ask a single question of each other and would have "run like hell" Sorry, that sounds bad, dishonest.
"You can not force these things". No and you can't grasp oil in your hand either (proverbs) But you can ask questions, observe, communicate, through words and actions, and then decide if you want to avoid that person. That they have red flags,to not end up dating your ex all over again, so you don't end up having to "run like hell".
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Post by shamwow on Oct 17, 2018 9:25:48 GMT -5
Yes we are close shamwow@! Tomatoe, tomato? Potato Patatoe? (However you spell those to make them sound right!) Interrogation vrs "tell me all about yourself" well it sounds like splitting hairs. Arguing over "word salad". If neither of you were able to ask a single question of each other and would have "run like hell" Sorry, that sounds bad, dishonest. "You can not force these things". No and you can't grasp oil in your hand either (proverbs) But you can ask questions, observe, communicate, through words and actions, and then decide if you want to avoid that person. That they have red flags,to not end up dating your ex all over again, so you don't end up having to "run like hell". Maybe it is semantic. After all, ballofconfusion certainly have discussed all of the things I label as "interrogation" on your part. The difference is that our conversations have taken place over the course of months. It will be two years since my first message to her in February. And even last weekend we discovered new "triggers" with each other. It takes time to get to know someone. If you recall, during the Iraq war there was a bit of "unpleasantness" in the Abu Graib prison. They used enhnced interrogation techniques to try to squeeze information out of. Prisoners. They stacked them in naked pyramids. One of my best friends took over interrogations there to clean up after that mess. He explained to me that just having regular conversations with people was a much more effective technique than the "Joe Friday" method of "just the facts". Now, I am NOT suggesting you are performing "enhanced interrogation techniques" on your online dating matches 🤣. I am suggesting that a more EFFECTIVE technique is to slooooow down and just continue the conversation. There is not a clock ticking here. The goal is to meet people, not to be back in a long term relationship ASAP. It is also a lot more fun. |
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Post by greatcoastal on Oct 17, 2018 9:27:13 GMT -5
Women are complicated. They want a man who makes them feel safe and secure. They also want to feel desired. In our society, men are usually expected to take the lead here. When a man expresses desire, it is a spectrum with apathy (why isn't he in to me) on one end and intensity (woah buddy slow down) on the other. You've got to get it just right, and what is just right can vary greatly from woman to woman. If she guesses wrong? She gets used and thrown away. On the safety front, it ranges from nice guy (zzzzzzz) to bad boy (am I gonna get raped). If she guesses wrong the consequences could be life threatening. Now, let's add some spice to the mix. We are going to do this all online where you have no idea if the person you're talking to is even remotely who they say. On the other hand, for some reason this environment also tends to remove all civilized constraints from some men. They do and say things to a woman they would NEVER do in person ("wanna fuck" or unsolicited dick pics). So the bar for a good man is pretty low. So GC, reading your posts here, you seem to need to tone the intensity down. There is a reason that women like "cool" guys. They are not threatening. I doubt any woman getting to know you is going to think you will rape her. But stalk her? Oh yeah. Cut off the interrogation techniques and promises of a blissful future together after two weeks and I suspect you will have MUCH better luck. How about this? By telling about yourself, and offering yourself, you are asking for the same thing in return. That is taking the lead. Things like, I like to dance, I like to ride my bike early in the morning, and at night. I like to paint, I go surfing near my house, I keep a clean house, I am financially independent. I work out regularly,I crave intimacy! Intimacy leads to sex...etc.... These are typical "interrogation" questions that you answer for an online dating sight. They are things that make up your profile. Woman (and men) get ticked off at people who don't even read their profile and are only interested in your picture. |
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Post by northstarmom on Oct 17, 2018 9:29:15 GMT -5
GC said: " am the youngest of two. My mom was bipolar, my father avoided her. My older sister confronted her head on. I watched my sister get it worse for even trying to communicate. I took the same direction my dad went in. I avoided it as much as possible and said very little for years. So here I am feeling like I am communicating with mom again, yet I am not avoiding it! My letter sent to this woman was an act of kindness. I went above and beyond what any man who has attempted to be with her has done. I did not ghost her, or drop everything and run the other way. I have received multiple responses back from her. She claims she lost a very good thing, and is very regretful. She now talks about " the error of her ways , the things she is going to give up and the positive things she wants to work on". It's beginning to feel like stalking. We will see. Good for her! I won't be a part of it anymore. Those red flags appeared through our conversations.That "list" was all in my mind ,and made up AFTER having multiple conversations, revealing these things a little at a time. When someone wants to know , "are you there? Did I screw up? I haven't heard back from you?" I respond honestly and open another door, to see how they will react. Such as, " I could not respond back to you because, my daughter is having surgery today, she has been on crutches for a year and a half, I'm glad I get to be there with her today, she wants to stay with me for her healing and not her mother. I will be busy taking care of her for the next few days. I also had to bring my other daughter home from school, she has a stomach virus that is going around. It's the first time ever the two of them need to be home like this." I send a pic of me and my daughters together at the beach. I then get responses all about caring for children and wanting to get to know my daughters. All a part of getting to know the real greatcoastal. I like hearing those responses. Then I get texts that are full of name calling and how she is tipsy from drinking, how she needed a drink just to talk to me. A BIG RED flag. Yet it took days of conversations to learn these things. My size verses hers. How none of her pics where below the shoulders. She confessed about her embarrassment of her extra 60 lbs. To me that's a lot, that's obese ( sorry to offend anyone). Yet I still offered to meet her in person. She cancelled it! Her choice. I tried to offer her hope for a new beginning, but she has to help her herself a lot more. I am not going to be another knight on a white horse again. I learned how wrong that is to be nothing but a giver again." GC, you tend to see me in a way that I'm not. I'm not bipolar nor am i like your "manipulative, controlling" ex. I do suffer from chronic depression, however. To my surprise, the word that close friends, my ex therapist and even my ex h used to describe me was "compassionate." That was a big surprise to me and it was something I had to learn to embrace as being real as my late mom was convinced that I "had no heart for the underprivileged." This was projection as she was the person who so lacked empathy that when the 6-year -old daughter of the neighbor across the street was struck by a car and killed crossing the street, when my mom heard the girl's mom broke down in tears seeng the chalk marking where her daughter's body had been, my mom said she wouldn't have cried if she had been in that situation. She would have gotten a bucket and mop and scrubbed the marks off. Anyway, back to you. What stands out for me about your experience with that woman is how you went above and beyond what was needed and you did that for a virtual stranger. I think you've said that you tend to get trapped in trying to rescue people, and that is something to watch out for in your forays into dating. I actually have to watch out for that myself because i have antenna that can tell even when complete strangers -- people like cashiers -- are in emotional pain. With the help of my former therapist, I learned that it isn't my job to save them. I can silently wish them well, do a lovingkindness meditation for them, and carry on with my life not befriend them and invite them over as I did with a sad looking woman i saw at a lecture. She ended up getting me to give her one of my favorite plants, and then she got a dear friend of mine whom I introduced her to to put up the pictures in her house and act as her personal chauffeur for a while! When I started dating, i was still in therapy, and my therapist also helped me start my relationship on the right foot with my now partner of 5 years. On our first date, I noticed his hands were shaking out of nervousness during dinner, so I realized he had some insecurities. My instinct was to jump in and try to heal/save him. My therapist told me that wasn't my job. My job was to see if he was a good fit for me and not to become the kind of emotional protector that i had been of my ex h and ex boyfriends. I literally would notice their insecurities or other pain and decide that my job was to shield them. Anyway, due to my therapist, I didn't get into saving my current boyfriend. And I learned that while he is initially nervous with people, he is perfectly capable of dealing with it. I am his girlfriend, lover, partner, not his healer or protector (except of course in situations like when he needed emergency surgery). Sure, I listen to his problems and do things to make things easier for him when he's under unusual stress at work. But I don't do this at my own expense or figuratively try to put my body between him and bullets. Back to you and that woman: There were red flags that you saw including the fact that she lacked a body type that you find physically appealing. There was no need for you to go over and above by sending the letter or meeting her in person. You were on the dating site looking for a romantic partner, and she obviously wasn't what you were looking for. You could have ghosted her -- which is fairly typical in how virtual strangers act on dating sites when they don't think a person is a fit. You also could have just sent her a brief message saying that you didn't think you were compatible romantically, but wished her well in her quest to find a partner. That you were able to recognize your getting on your white horse was great progress on your part. Perhaps with more experience, you'll notice that earlier and will realize that you don't have to go the extra mile with women whom you can tell won't be a good fit. And you won't ask them out. Why waste time and money on someone whom you know you wouldn't want a romantic relationship with? After all, you're on-line dating to find a romantic partner not to meet friends. Presumably, the women on the site are looking for romantic partners, too, so going out on a date with someone you know is romantically incompatible would waste their time, too, and eventually make them feel more rejected than if you had stopped communicating earlier with them. When it comes to the woman whom you have dated, it sounds like there are some nice possibilities there. There are, however, three things i wonder about: 1. How is it that she has never been snuggled in a movie? i'm wondering whether she has had a history of picking men who are emotionally and sexually unavailable. After all, she picked a man (men?) like that, married and stayed married for a while to a man like that. If that's the case, unless she's done a lot of personal work, she may not be able to handle a relationship with sustained emotional/physical contact. 2. Her saying she has no reason to continue dating around. Despite having had a date and some other communications, you still don't really know each other. Anyone can put on a good act for a date or two and texting communications. It seems very early for her to say that she doesn't need to date anyone else because she has found what she was looking for. I wonder if she's someone who idealizes people and then gets disappointed when she begins to notice the real person. 3. Her working counseling sexually abused girls. Every person I know who has chosen to do exclusively that kind of work has been sexually abused as a child. If this is the case for her, I wonder whether she has healed enough to have a normal sexual/emotional relationship or whether she'll distance herself as your relationship with her progresses to more in person sexual and emotional intimacy. Could she be hoping you'll be her white knight that will help her become a sexually healthy adult. Anyway, I can't read her mind, so I could be totally off base. But this is why I think it's wise to take relationships slowly and not to assume the other person has been totally open (They may not be deliberately misrepresenting themselves. They may not realize some things about themselves) is on the same page as you. I do appreciate your generosity in sharing your post SM dating journey. We all can learn from your stories. |
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