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Why Is She Always The Fling And Not The Girlfriend?

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Alias (DO NOT USE A REAL NAME!!): THEFLINGBEFORETHEGFConfused-girl

Comment: So, I have noticed a pattern that I am often the “fling” and then literally right after it ends, the guy gets in a relationship. I was seeing a guy for 7 months and he recently got in a relationship with a girl I had asked if he was talking to and he had said he wasn’t! And no we weren’t just hooking up, we went out on dates, we talked a lot, and I even met and spent an evening with his parents. But this is the third time this has happened. I know I am not perfect but why do you think that is? And every time I try to take things slow, it never happens. How do you learn to just take things slow with someone you are attracted to?
Age: 27
City: RICHMOND
State: VA

 

First, there might not be any correlation between these men choosing to get into serious relationships right after dating you. It could just be a coincidence. You may be connecting a dot that doesn’t exist.  That it appears to happen to you consistently is what is telling. Based on what you’re saying, it sounds to me like you keep getting involved with men who bide their time with you while looking/preparing for a serious relationship.

I’m not sure the problem is that you don’t take it slow. Taking it slow isn’t going to make a guy see you differently or change where he is at in his head. When I hear the phrase “take it slow” I assume that is in reference to not sleeping with someone too quickly. The sex probably has nothing to do with why these men aren’t dating you seriously. They’re not dating you seriously either because they don’t want to date anybody seriously or because you’re not someone with whom they see long term potential. The real question here is how do you identify guys who think of you as just a fling.

As you can see, this last guy exhibited behavior that is widely considered to be “boyfriend behavior.” You went on dates, you met his family, etc. Meanwhile, this guy is chatting up another woman so brazenly that you knew about it. He was lining up another relationship while with you, which is what many people do. It’s the swinging branch theory. People stay in relationships that aren’t working and don’t leave them until they know that they have other options waiting in the wings to grab on to. You were so busy counting the milestones that you really weren’t paying attention to what was actually transpiring between you two. This is why so many people think that their break-up was out of the blue. It wasn’t. The signs were always there. They just ignored them because they were too busy scratching milestones and empty gestures off a list. Forget about that stuff. Those things are nothing but distractions. Focus on how you and they interact and the things they’re telling you, as many people like to drop hints and clues in order to avoid hurt feelings and conflict.

Either this guy knew from the start that he didn’t want to be serious with you or he decided this along the way. This is why getting a guy to commit really isn’t the milestone many women think it is. Anybody can commit. There’s no penalty for deciding after the fact that you know longer wish to be involved with that person. The guy tells the woman what she wants to hear in order to keep things conflict free and because he’s enjoying getting to know her and likes the consistent sex. Then, when he’s made up his mind definitely, he manufactures a reason for wanting out of the relationship. This usually leaves the woman confused because she thought things were going great. She doesn’t realize that, at the time he committed, he likely wasn’t all in but rather going along to get along.

The way to stop this pattern is to be very clear with men you’re dating about what your goals are. If you want a serious relationship, then after you’ve been dating a short while, you need to tell him that. By the one month mark or so, you should be in a comfortable enough place to express what it is you’re looking for.  You can’t just go with it and hope things will eventually work in your favor. You have to communicate what it is you want. You also need to make it clear that if he doesn’t think you and he are on the same page, you’d like for him to tell you. I happen to believe that most people are honorable and decent and so they’ll do the right thing. There will be a few jerkfaces along the way, but that’s par for the course and you’ll never be able to completely avoid them.

Another reason why you might keep getting cast as the casual hook-up/fling is because you’re choosing to ignore the glaring red flags or not listening when a guy tells you he’s not looking for anything serious. Asking some one what they’re looking for after a handful of dates is not being pushy or needy. I don’t recommend having this conversation on the first few dates because many people will naturally go on the defensive and say they don’t know just because they’re still feeling the other person out. But after, say, five or six so dates I think both people should have a workable idea of where they see things going over the next few months.

If you’re not speaking up about your expectations, that’s a big reason why you keep ending up as a fling.

 

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