You get to tell me I told you so...

Hi,
look at it this way: you have problems to be in a relationship he wants, he has problems telling you that he is frustrated and unsatisfied. Be tollerant.

Good luck. I believe it is not easy - for either of you.

 

Hi,

Emotions are like freight trains... slow to stop once rolling. Your emotional engineer is ignoring all the flag men simply intent on keeping an arbitrary, self imposed schedule regardless of the problems the haste is creating.

You said you took it slow... What the heck is "slow" to you? (Sorry)

From here your "slow" is to strap on a jet pack and operate at it half throttle.

First... You are totally expert at being a closeted 59 year old man.

Second.... Zero, zilch, nada, none experience being an openly gay man.

Would you put your youngest behind the wheel of a car and set her on the expressway ith no experience? Or would you take her to an empty parking lot first?

"R" is an openly gay gay man. Has been for years. He expects a certain level of gay maturity, or what passes as gay maturity. Of course he will be frustrated!!!!

You lack adult gay experience. Nothing can replace time and experience.

Yes, your friends (therapist) see you going off the tracks but you are the man at the controls.

Tom

 

If your not ready, then your not ready. no amount of readiness from him is going to make you ready. i know im not ready myself, not because im greiving my former marriage but because im still looking for me:icon_wink what i need and, i think, you need is friends, if their friends with benifets great but friends who can help you discover who you are is more important. the eventual ralationship will come, but i think it will be better for you, and me, if we are confident in who we are.

all the best, bud.(*hug*)

 

Well, my knowledge of the gay dating scene could be written on the head of a pin, red jockstrap and other fantasies notwithstanding, so I'd never say I told you so. I suspect the good Lord dropped Richard and me next to each other because he couldn't bear to watch the messed-up train wrecks that the two of us shy, insecure introverts could have made of our new gay lives had we not gotten together. After all, why come out if you're just doomed to end up being the weird guy down the street who has too many pets and never leaves his house? Lord have mercy....and he did.

I guess the question is, do you WANT to have some form of a relationship with R, or not? I wouldn't automatically assume the email to be cowardly and childish (although it sounds a little bitchy). It sounds like someone who had very different expectations than you did, perhaps with less maturity and realism to his approach. If you like him and want to continue some form of relationship, then you may have to take the email as hurt rather than complete childishness, and respond with a basic apology for the clear misunderstanding between the two of you. If the talk revealed that he's just too immature and needy for you to be saddled with at this point, then perhaps a graceful exit is in order.

Either way, it's a good lesson for the future. Being up front about expectations right off the bat isn't the worst thing. If he knew clearly that you were just testing the waters, he might have reacted differently, and if you knew that he had the issues he does, you might have high tailed it out of there. Lessons learned. Not fun, but it won't kill you, and you're clearly open and increasingly comfortable with (and knowledgeable about) who you are, so the next time around will be a clear improvement. Chin up, Tim. Things will get better.

 

You're right, life is too short to deal with people like that.

The part I highlighted above is also part of the problem in dating today. This is DATING, you are NOT exclusive to each other! This seems to be lost on most people who get into this game. It is especially prevalent in situations where one of the two likes the other more than the other likes him (this has been happening to me lately). They interpret the actions of first romance, whether it be weekends or even sleeping together as an instant relationship, people are very impatient, it's all about satisfying immediate needs rather than savouring the game as it is being played.

I have often brought this up, it is sublime to take the indirect route, it is savouring the time taken and the dance of discovery. We're too hung up on relationships and we're too focused on the goal; but relationships don't work that way, no one is keeping score.

You did the right thing in being honest, yes, it can be disappointing to the one who is rejected (perhaps we need a less-harsh word for this) but dating is a game for grown-ups.

 

GW can I make an observation... Could be off base...

Dr. Joe Kort stated that gay men who were married to a woman often have better relationship skills than life long openly gay men. With that said, I would infer we (once married) are more adept in recognizing potential relationship mistakes (we pick up on bad relationship skills) which we can sidestep.

As I mentioned to tscott otherwise, I feel like I am playing the gay dating game with a different deck of cards. All their trumps are sex cards. LOL. My trumps are loyalty, friendship, trust, commitment and love.

It is as if the gay community has a different set of dating/bonding rituals.

Your experience?

Tom

 

Excuse me? Since when is dating not a relationship and not exclusive?

Has something been lost in translation, or are you really serious?

 

Hi Skiff,

Without painting too broad a brushstroke, yes, we of the formerly married set have acquired some knowledge of how relationships work (or don't!) and yes, we recognize the danger signs (to put it in harsher terms than I intend) of a potentially problematic relationship.

Bob Marley said it best: "Everyone will hurt you, the trick is finding someone worth suffering for."

I just don't think it is exclusive to the LGBT community, I think this is a much more widespread phenomenon, brought about they the ease with which people can hook up. Lately, there have been surprising findings, that hookups do, at times, lead to longer-term relationships, it seems sex has become a calling card, after which the dating game can proceed...O tempora! O mores!

---------- Post added 16th Sep 2014 at 01:09 PM ----------

Yes, I am.

Until "the talk", until there is an agreed-upon commitment between 2 people in a couple, there is no exclusivity to dating. I do think it is bad manners to have more than one thing going on at the same time, absolutely, but, dating is exploration and there is nothing that says that ending it requires all the drama.

 

It sounds like from the get-go, you wanted different things out of this relationship with each other. And although you both knew it, you stuck around because...well, I guess it's easy to think that somehow things will work out. It sounds like he finally figured out that it wasn't going to, and he's mourning that. Sucks, but there it is. Wish him well, and move along.

Lex

 

wow, the world has changed since I dated. I haven't. Once two people start going out, going to the movies, kissing, cuddling - it is exclusive and there is commitment. I am glad I have never met anyone who was thinking differently. If it all is just exploring and game and play and you are not willing to work on things that may not be so great after some time, you can hardly move forward.

But if you are happy with this system, then it's OK I guess. I have friendship (no intimacy) - (always exclusive) dating - stable relationship. I am keeping it

 

Nick,

Many expect full intercourse first night in dating. A deal breaker for many of us but we do not set the stereotype that all strive for.

The world has changed... Hookups are the rule.

When you f&#% the first night what does "date" mean?

Tom

 

The play I am talking about is quite serious, the game has a purpose, mainly to learn about the other without being trapped into a relationship that isn't ready to happen. This is actually how it used to be done when there were rules about such things. Not saying we should go back to those rules, but it does require a point at which exclusivity is agreed upon mutually.

The work that you talk about will need to be there if and when that stage in the relationship is reached.

Chip is right, there are stages in the dance of courting. As long as both are on the same page, it works as it should.

 

Well, it's getting OT. All I can say is, enjoy your way of dating. I am happy I have mine.

 

Wow--what an interesting thread. It's been a while since I dated but I did a fair amount of it back in the day so I will wade into the conversation.

First off I think of dating more like Greatwhale--sort of like going out for a malted back in the day--you don't go to the movies with someone and maybe catch a kiss on the way home because you want to spend your life with them you do it to see if you might want to spend your life with them. And come on, the odds are that you won't want to--that's just the way it works. There are a few people out there who find their prince without kissing a few toads but not a lot of them... I had a lot of fun with some of those toads.

I think the main thing with all of it is just to communicate as truthfully and as fully as you possibly can. If you think going to the movies means you can't go to the movies with any one else, that's cool as long as you both realize that. If you think sleeping together means you'll be together forever or don't even think it means you share phone numbers after--either is fine as long as you're both on the same page. And in my experience the only way that will happen is if you discuss it--all of it. Anything you assume about what the other person wants will be wrong in at least one crucial aspect--and someone's feelings will always get hurt.

It's interesting to me that a lot of people on this board talk about everyone wanting to be casual. My experience was exactly the opposite--it was like there was this relationship fever--we'd go bowling and they'd be picking out china patterns. It was truly bizarre. I remember once a guy in one of my seminars in grad school asked me to go out for coffee after class. I agreed and we were having a nice little chat--mainly about the class we were taking together--when my boyfriend came up in conversation. And he lost his shit! I'd lured him there under false pretenses, I was an awful person, etc., etc. I guess coffee means something different wherever he is from.:lol:

Any way I guess all I can say is do everything you can to get on the same page, whatever that page might be.

 

"If you think going to the movies means you
can't go to the movies with any one else, that's cool as long as you both
realize that."

I would say it a bit differently. Going to the movies or having a coffee doesn't count as dating unless you also holding hands, kissing etc. Once you start, you are exclusive and you do that with hope that he is Mr Right.
I can't imagine to sleep with someone knowing that I don't want him as a long time partner.
But that's me

 

I have just realized the difference - I have sex only with people I am in love with. It's natural that we are exclusive then and planning the future together.