love and dating Archives ⋆ Page 2 of 5 ⋆ Virginia Jones

From Love.Tv: The Unicorn Charmer

Hi, my name is Virginia Jones and I’m a comedian and writer. I made a girlfriend six years ago who was beautiful and smart and kind and fun to be with, and at one point she told me she was a still a virgin in her late 20s, and I was pretty surprised. In the years since we met, she has transitioned into non-virginity, and she agreed to sit down and talk with me about it. Historically, virginity has been so important in religion, in vampire lore, and in marriage, but now it doesn’t seem as significant, and I wondered what her thoughts were on the topic. In this interview, I’m calling myself by my initials, VJ, and I’m calling her Unicorn Charmer, because in Medieval times it was said that a unicorn would only lay his head in a virgin’s lap.

VJ: At what age did you lose your virginity?

UC: I was 30. When did you lose yours?

VJ: I was 15, which at the time I felt was ancient and now I am totally grossed out by. When I see 15 year olds, I think, well, these are children.

UC: Oh myyyy.

VJ: How many partners have you had since then?

UC: I’ve had five sex partners — spread out over the past five years. Two long-term boyfriends, three shorter term. You?

VJ: Some multiple of that. Have you ever had a one night stand?

UC: I tried to have one in Europe with a sexy European man, but he kept in touch and it became an affair that kept going for a while — so I still haven’t successfully had one. I guess I maybe had one with someone I had been in love with forever — but that feels more like a continuation of our friendship. Once I had sex for the first time, he was someone I wanted to circle back and have sex with.

VJ: What was the original motivation for keeping your virginity, and did that change?

UC: I was raised in a very conservative Baptist household and was definitely taught that sex was for married people, and lots of scary stuff about STDs. When a boy first kissed me, I was quite sure I had AIDS. I was engaged for three years starting at 19, and when that engagement ended, I decided, well, I don’t have to be married, but I’d like to have sex with someone who loves me and who I love back. So, that only took… another seven years.

VJ: That’s a minute.

UC: It was. It wasn’t all the guys’ fault. I’m sometimes… fickle.

VJ: Have you ever lost partners or relationships because you didn’t want to have coitus?

UC: None of them ever admitted it, but looking back, I think, yeah. I think it’s not something you want to say is the reason.

VJ: It’s not a good look. Do you regret anything about waiting?

UC: I don’t regret my age or the timing when I lost my virginity — but I would have liked my first to be a different person?

VJ: Why is that?

UC: I thought he loved me and that he was the right partner, but it turned out that he wasn’t faithful and didn’t care for me the way I thought he did. Later, I felt like I was a conquest. It seemed like the right person at the time, but looking back, could have been better

VJ: I think most of us feel that way.

UC: Ha! But I don’t regret waiting, either. All I missed over the years was sex with people who weren’t in love with me, which I feel is missable.

VJ: What are some positive responses people have had to your sex history? UC: Women have been 100 percent positive, girlfriends all think it’s great. Lots of men, friends and ex-boyfriends have been respectful of my decision. One man I did sleep with said it made him feel extra special. Which he is! “I had built a lot of my self-image on being a virgin, on being that girl”

VJ: What is something that you changed your mind about after having sex?

UC: Strangely, I have changed my feelings about oral sex, which for years was my main sexual activity — now it seems VERY intimate and kind of more precious than sex — like, I can have intercourse with someone way before oral sex. I have to trust them more.

VJ: I’ve heard that’s the feeling a lot of millennials have, that sex with a condom you can have with anyone, but oral sex is more intimate. It’s the opposite of when I was growing up. What were you surprised about after the first time you had sex?

UC: I thought it would be really bloody and painful, and it wasn’t. I was surprised that it wasn’t actually that big a deal — I wasn’t a different person, I wasn’t transformed in one way or another — it was strange, I had built a lot of my self-image on being a virgin, on being that girl, and I had to figure out who I was again!

VJ: Ha! Right, part of our worth as a woman is your sexual purity — It gives you the idea that you will be a different person once you have sex, but you’re not. Like a button is pressed and POOF you are a different being.

UC: I guess so! But I just had to train myself out of thinking of myself in relation to what I hadn’t done, and think about myself in the context of what I have.

VJ: Have you had any negative feedback on staying a virgin for longer?

UC: Unfortunately, yeah- it usually gets thrown in my face by partners or men when they’re angry with me or want to hurt me? Stuff about I’m frigid or not normal or can’t come during sex, which I can — Lots of men want to tell me that because I waited, I’m gonna have hang-ups or other issues, that I’ll never be normal in bed.

VJ: That’s cruddy.

UC: It is. One guy in particular has hit that one same note over and over, that I’m not normal, normal people just hook up a lot and don’t put a lot of importance on sex, but you know, I know those people, and they don’t seem that happy to me.

VJ: Maybe not.

UC: And I know that I’m worth more than that.

VJ: Well, I think everyone is worth more, both women and men. But we believe what people tell us, which is that the only thing available to us is hookup sex, so we’d better take it, or get nothing. (laughs)

UC: Ha! Right. “I was relieved that a penis didn’t feel like a giant finger inside me.”

VJ: What were you relieved about when you lost your virginity?

UC: I was honestly glad not to worry about it anymore. Also…Oh, god…

VJ: What?

UC: I was relieved that a penis didn’t feel like a giant finger inside me.

VJ: Haaaaa!

UC: Well, I wasn’t sure.

VJ: Well, how could you be? Thank you for sharing your sex history with me, babe. The Unicorn Charmer has just ended a serious relationship and is currently out meeting new dates and potential partners in her new city, and is having fun, mostly!

Til Death Do Us Part: Sex, Dating, and the Animal Kingdom- originally published on LOVE.TV

It’s Springtime, when the earth renews itself and mating season begins for many animals!
People go on dates and remember that sex and dating can be hard.

It can wear you out emotionally.

But at least you can physically survive it- not like in many parts of the animal kingdom.

Here’s a list of animals that die for sex- to remind you that things could be worse!

Praying Mantis

Oftentimes, the female praying mantis bites the head off her mate while they have sex, and apparently the male thrusts more vigorously after he’s dead, making the sex more likely to generate progeny. (This is probably not true of human men.)

Remember that the next time a woman you’ve exchanged a week of flirty text messages with flat doesn’t show up at an Italian restaurant and won’t call you back- you might leave with your head hanging down, but at least it’s still attached.

The Antechinus

This very cute ratlike Australian marsupial, goes on a mad sex parade with multiple partners for up to 14 hours and then drops dead of exhaustion. There are advantages to this, for example- he doesn’t have the opportunity to get in trouble with any of the multiple cute ratlike partners he had sex with in the same half-day, but on the other hand the Antechinus never meets his children, nor coaches them in Soccer, which he would call Football, because he’s from Australia.

That’s better than the time you went on a drinks-filled double date with your best friend Allison and your boyfriend’s roommate, and she came home with him, but after you’d left for your house, she snuck into the other bedroom and did your boyfriend as well. Right? Still better than the cute little dead sex rat. And you don’t have to speak to Allison ever again.

The Dark Fishing Spider

He dies of natural causes after he mates with his lady- ejaculating makes his blood go bad. Nature wants him to die immediately after he has sex, which is one reason insects don’t masturbate.

This helps you understand that you’re still better off than a dead spider, even after you’ve been seeing someone you’re crazy about for a couple of months and came to find out he was also dating most of the women you know, and you were all in a weird sad sisterhood of women getting identical flirty text messages and photographs from him, which is why they were always non-sequiturs.

Furcifer Labordi Chameleons

These Chameleons mate furiously and violently, then after the eggs are safely inseminated and laid, they both die. No-one is left to tell the tale of their passionate romance, no-one is left to mourn their death or wear black, or just turn black, because they are a Chameleon.

That means the time you stopped hearing from someone you’d been seeing for six months and thought you were in love with, and you couldn’t get him on the phone or online, and you assumed he’d gone to prison or rehab and cried anxious tears and couldn’t concentrate on work, and two weeks later you saw him on Facebook tagged in a picture at a bar from that day and you realize you’d just been garden-variety dumped, that’s better than dying postcoitally as a couple. Probably.

Male Orb Weaving Spiders

These spiders die while still joined with the female, so that while she is pregnant with his offspring, other dude spiders can’t have sex with her because she has another dude’s body sticking out of her. It’s desperate, but effective.

That puts into perspective the time you went on a work trip and brought your husband along and realized he was having an affair as he smiled into his phone and went to the bathroom to have whispery conversations as you tried to stop crying long enough to go to professional events and network. It was pretty bad. You might remember the hurt and humiliation of it sharply. But at least your dead body wasn’t hanging off his junk, being dragged through the snowy cobblestone streets of Boston!

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/til-death-do-us-part-noir-humor-of-sex-dating-and-the-animal-kingdom/#sthash.vbeJ5qlB.dpuf

5 Love Lessons I Learned Driving for Lyft- From LOVE.TV

Buckle in for some magical ride oversharing.

Like many Angelenos, I write and act and drive rideshare. I meet all kinds of people with all kinds of love lives, which they tell me about. Here’s a selection of lessons I have learned from my passengers.

The Ride With The Puppy

Dude gets in the car holding a pink box and a puppy, looking sad.

Me: Oh wow! Donuts and a puppy! Are you gonna make someone’s morning or what?
Sad dude: well, I wanted to, but she threw the donuts back in my face.
Me: Oh.
Sad dude: And the puppy. She also threw the puppy in my face.
Me: I’m sorry, man.
Puppy whines slightly.

Lesson: Sometimes even donuts and a puppy won’t save you. You’ve tried the nuclear option and it’s time to move on, but do raise that puppy.

The Ride With Nicole

Picked up a drunk couple from a bar, they were on a Lyft Line so I headed to pick up the next person.

Girl: You’re going the wrong way.
Me: Oh, we’re gonna go pick up Nicole real quick!
Girl: Who is Nicole?
Guy: Oh, honey, I did Lyft Line.
Girl: What’s Lyft Line?
Guy: It’s like Uber Pool.
Me: Save a couple bucks, reduce traffic!
Girl: You cheap F**K.
Guy: Hon, are you really mad? We’re not in a hurry…A few moments pass, she seems to forget about it, we talk about other stuff.

And Then

Girl: Why are you going east?
Me: We’re…gonna pick up Nicole real quick?
Girl: Who the f**k is Nicole?
Me: She’s… The next rider on the Lyft line?
Girl: What’s Lyft Line? She sounds, sorry to say this, like a c*nt.
Guy: Um… don’t say c*nt?
Girl: And you can ignore him. He’s never even been in a three-way. I’ve been in like 30.
Me: That sounds like a real calling!
Girl: Plus, he’s the only dude I’ve dated who hasn’t wanted to move in after six months! What the f**k is that?
Guy: Uh.
Me: (Trying to lighten the mood) Well, I’ve dated guys for six months before I put their names in my phone!
Girl: WHAT are you SAYING I want to GET OUT.
Me: Oh, here’s Nicole!

Part 3: We Meet Nicole

Girl: Hi Nicole, where are you going?
Nicole: To No Vacancy!
Girl: Oh cool that’s a cool place to go to get f**ked by a 27-year-old white guy with no job.
Nicole: OK?
Me: Ok, you guys are almost to your destination!
Girl: I don’t wanna go to his house. Can you drop me at my house (gives address)

OH, GOD

Me: Well… I can’t change destination on Lyft line, because, you know, we have to head near where Nicole is going.
Girl: You cheap f**k!
Me: (Last attempt at humor)No fighting in the cab!
Girl: I don’t want to go to his house EVER AGAIN!
Guy: (whispering) are you serious right now?
Girl: AND NICOLE THERE’S BAR LUBITSCH IT’S A GREAT PLACE TO GET F**KED BY A RUSSIAN DUDE.
Me: (silence)
Me: (screeching brakes) OK here you are! Thanks so much!
(They get out, fighting because she wants to break up with him)

Nicole: What was that
Me: Sorry, I know!

Postscript

Lesson: If you’re a nice guy and she walks all over you, she’s not worth being with. If she loves you, she’s gotta love your spendthrift ways!

The Ride With The Valentine

My first ride of the day was a lady who grumbled a little when I told her happy Valentine’s day.

Lady: Sheesh. Not for me. I just broke up with my dude of three years.
Me: That sucks, man. I’m sorry.
Lady: Yeah, my girlfriend banged him, so they both suck.
Me: They do, they suck. That sucks.
Lady: And the incredible thing is, this is her second time pulling this shit! Like, there are so many dudes, why can’t she stop screwing my dudes?
Me: You still kept being her friend after the first time?
Lady: Yeah, well, she said she was sorry and that she wouldn’t do it again.

Lesson: If your girlfriend bangs your boyfriend once, it could be an accident. Twice, it’s a hobby.

The Ride With The Late Night Romancers

I pick up a cute, fairly drunk guy at 2 a.m. in downtown Pasadena, and he gave me an address. We pick up a cute, fairly drunk girl and the magic began.

Guy: Let’s go to [name of bar].
Me: Uh, I think they’re closed, it’s 2 a.m.
Guy: I think it’s open?
Girl: I just think I’m a… real easy going person.
Guy: I know, I know. I try to live in the moment.
Girl: You just… have to.
Me: Guys, this bar is closed.
Guy: (to me) Oh! Let’s go to [restaurant]. Have you ever had a conversation this amazing happen in your cab before?
Me: (dryly) Sure.

Third Destination

Girl: You just came up to me and asked me to dance, and I couldn’t turn you down!
Me: OK, I’m sorry to say this restaurant is also closed.
Girl: I don’t even need to eat. I’m good.
Guy: OK, we’ll just go to In-N-Out and get a shake.
Girl: It’s like, you just… you took down all my roadblocks.
Guy: I know, I know. You told me.
Girl: All my defenses, just gone.We get to In-N-Out. It is also closed.

Fourth Destination

Girl: OK, I guess… Take me back to my place?
Me: OK.
Guy: Naw, we can get out here.
Girl: Oh… OK?
Guy: My house is right over there. We can hang for a little while and get another car later.
Me: OK, here we are then.
Guy: Isn’t she just so cute?
Me: Yup. Here we are!
Girl: I just can’t believe how strong we vibe on each other.(Moments pass. They’re just sitting in my car talking)
Me: You guys… Can you go fall in love in someone else’s Lyft?

Lesson: If dude was in love with you, why is he hitting you up after the bars close?

The Ride With The Family Man

I pick up a dude who is holding a Starbucks coffee and a phone and looks shell-shocked. He gets into my car and says, “man, you’re gonna hear a conversation that’s kind of intense but I have to have it right now.”

Me: No problem!

Dude: (on phone) Hey, baby, it’s me! You’re pregnant?! I’m so stoked! I mean it, I want to have a baby with you! You didn’t want to tell me? Come on, I’m your man! I’m your DUDE, I’m WITH you!

Do you wanna get married, I mean, what’s your mama gonna say? Are you excited? Are you scared? Baby, I love you, I want to get married, I want to have a baby with you. You know, I’m 40, what the fuck else am I gonna do? I mean it. I’m coming over. Yeah, my driver is getting an earful. Yeah, it’s magic and it’s real and I can’t wait! I’ll see you soon!

Me: Wow, congratulations man!

Dude: God, I can’t believe it, but man, we were just at my friend’s house and he has this two year old girl and she’s so perfect and we were saying, man, we can do this, and then she finds out she’s pregnant a week later, I mean, it’s magic time, man!

Me: How long have you guys been dating?

Dude: Six months, but I know, I KNOW this is my lady. But she’s a passionate lady, and we were together this afternoon but she flipped out on me and left, and now I know it’s because she was scared to have this talk.

She just found out this morning.

Me: And when did you find out?

Dude: (Crying) She texted me that she was pregnant, and then I called you. I found out literally a minute before you got there.

Me: You can do this, man. This is sometimes how babies come. You can do it. (Also crying)

Dude: Yeah, I mean, I always wanted to be a dad and now we’re gonna do it! I’m scared shitless but I know we’re gonna be great!Me: Good luck. Be good. Here’s some tissues.

Dude: Five starrrrrs!

Lesson: Sometimes amazing things happen by accident. If you’re with the right person, look in your heart and see if you’re ready to roll with it.

Adventures In Sexbot!

The next generation of interactive sex robot will be available starting next year. New tech includes warm skin and warm sex organs. And it’s scaring the crap out of us.

There’s already a website about the campaign against sex robots, (campaignagainstsexrobots.org). There’s an international meeting taking place in London promoting and exploring the problems and benefits of sex and love with robots.

We’re so worried that over and over articles go up saying “Holy crap sexbots!”

What is it that we are we afraid of?

We fear men will prefer loving a robot, who is never in a bad mood. A sex robot is always up for anything. How will this affect men’s relationships with real women? What if a sex robot makes men forget about consent– a sex robot has no boundaries and doesn’t say no.

And the proposed user is universally male- just as the existing sex doll market is aimed at straight men. There are male dolls for gay customers, but the sex doll market is small for straight women.

We’re afraid that sex with a perfect, endlessly servile, sexy robot will replace sex between humans, reducing our birth rate.

What happens when our expensive sex robots go out of date? Imagine how embarrassing it’ll be when your friend’s robot can speak in four languages and your robot can only moan and point at stuff!

We fear the end of human intimacy, that men will fall in love with sex robots. We’re afraid that men will become addicted, filling their days and nights with computer games and dirty robots. We’ll be a world of single people, men at home with their sex robots, and women making increasingly intricate Pinterest pages.

Women could be jealous of sex robots, who don’t gain weight or sweat or have body hair, unless you have requested some on the form.

The fact is, technology has always been scary in the bedroom.

Vibrators were originally developed as an easy way for doctors to give women orgasms as treatment for “hysteria”. Hysteria was medical talk for women being stressed out by life without the release of orgasms, because their spouses didn’t believe women could have them. The vibrator has existed since the 19th century, and men still regard them with suspicion, worried that women prefer them to sex with a partner.

I think sex robots will be much the same- no matter how good they get, they won’t be the same as sex with a person. When we say people are “in love” with their sex robots, that’s a fallacy.

They may enjoy their experience, but it’s not love. I like my vibrator, but it’s a tool. I don’t connect with it. Even if it was attached to a Hugh Jackman RealDoll, I wouldn’t love it. I don’t care if silicon Hugh Jackman has an orgasm or experiences pleasure. I can’t connect or bond with him, and that’s a big part of having sex with another person. There is no eye contact with the Hugh Jackman RealDoll, who also doesn’t exist, because I just made him up. The smell of another person, the feel of their touch, the look in their eyes, the condition of being desired by another person– these won’t be replaced.

When we examine these fears, we can say: there will be men who are so challenged and frustrated with human relationships that they will only interact with sex robots. But they will always be a minority.

Sex robots could be a practical comfort on long trips, during space exploration, during breakups or between relationships. To say that all men want from relationships is subordinate sex is to grossly oversimplify what relationships are. To believe that sex equals love is childish. Having a realistic sex robot doesn’t stave off loneliness. Like legalized weed won’t make for a world of marijuana abuse, sex robots will only add to the human sexual experience, not replace it.

How To Get A Boyfriend!

A friend gets engaged. Another friend gets engaged. Two friends move in together.

Checking your phone, you don’t have a response back from a text you sent last night.

Why does your boyfriend say that you expect too much?

Well, he’s not your boyfriend officially, but you’ve been dating for a couple of months, so at some point he’ll be your boyfriend, right?

Congratulations! You’re dating an avoidant!

Does this sound like your partner?

“My partner always seems to be comparing me unfavorably to some past, or ideal future partner”

“My partner flips on me, very affectionate one day and cold the next.”

“This person seems to find it difficult to emotionally connect with or support me.”

“They get uncomfortable when I get too close.”

Conversations with an avoidant:

A: “I’m surprised that you’re angry that I was seeing (other friend), I thought you knew I was seeing other people.”
B: “Of course I knew you were seeing other people, you kept giving me your address and re-introducing me to your cat, and going offline for long periods of time. What is it that you want?”

A: “Oh, I don’t like to stay in anything too long if it’s not working.”
B: “It seems like you planned for failure- I didn’t hear from you much, and we weren’t really building on any kind of intimacy. Romantic attachment is not something that just happens to you, like winning a lottery or being hit by a bus. It’s something two compatible people who like each other build.

If you’re just running through women looking for the ‘right’ one who will make you have emotions, that’s not going to work.”

It sometimes feels like everyone on the dating scene is an avoidant. That’s because avoidants are busy meeting new people! Like Alice’s White Rabbit, they’re always late for another date! Although it’s hard to believe, they only represent 25% of the general population.

Only 25%? Are you sure?

50% of adults have a “secure” dating style, they’re people with healthy boundaries who aren’t afraid to connect with the right person, and who are actively looking for that connection. 25% are “anxious”, people who are obsessed with connection and overly concerned about their partner’s love and fidelity, and 25% are “avoidants”, who are always looking to meet but never to connect.

It can feel like everyone on the internet is an Avoidant because:

Secure people tend to enter into healthy, balanced relationships, and they tend to stay in them for long periods of time. If you meet one, it’s because they’ve left a long relationship, not because they just “have been dating around” for a decade.
Avoidants tend to bounce out of relationships pretty quickly, and they don’t date other avoidants, because if two people are not returning texts, that fizzles out pretty quickly.
Avoidants see most people as “crazy” or “clinger stage 5” because they see healthy interest in another person as something to be avoided.

What do I do to stop dating avoidants?

First thing- let go of the idea that it is naïve or old-fashioned to want a relationship. Relationships make us live longer, happier, more fulfilled lives.
Second thing- They say that the only way to find a prince is to kiss a million frogs. Your path to meeting someone who actually wants to get to know you and have a relationship is through filtering avoidant partners. Call ‘em f*ckbois, call ‘em ghosters, call ‘em whatever you want, but stop calling ‘em if they do the following:

If you meet someone who says “All my exes are crazy.”
“You want to know if we’re dating? I really don’t like labels.”
“I need a lot of space.”
“Work’s so busy, I don’t have time for anything serious.”
“Women are always trying to trap guys into relationships.”
“I’m not ready to commit” (even after dating for months or years)

How do I do it?

Just stop interacting with them. You don’t owe them anything. Keep meeting new people. When you meet someone you like who’s clear about wanting to see you again, who makes plans and keeps them, who listens to you and shares intimate details with you, think about continuing to see that person.

I was talking with a friend, and she told me a story about “my boyfriend, but he isn’t really my boyfriend, he’s just a guy I’m sleeping with, you know. I mean, who has a boyfriend anymore?”
Well, I had one.
She asked, “How did you do that?” She thought maybe I had some grandfather clause or a deal with the devil.

“I have a new rule I’m following, and it’s simple: I don’t have sex with people who don’t want to be with me.”
She stared at me wide-eyed.
“I know it sounds weird and unachievable, but it isn’t. I met someone who cared about me, and who wanted to be in a relationship. Before that, I made out with a couple people, and kissed lots of people, but I didn’t have sex with anyone until I met someone who really wanted to be with me.”

It’s totally OK to date casually, but it’s also OK to want something more. Don’t listen to people who tell you differently. Date to find the people worth keeping, and move on from partners who don’t want the same thing that you do!

Based on quotes from Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller.

Movie Love Lessons!

You get to a point in life where you think, hey, I just keep dating awful people, I wonder why? Then you start thinking about your favorite movies from childhood!

Beauty and the Beast:

A beautiful village girl enters a monster’s castle to plead with him to release her father. She submits to her own incarceration. He throws temper tantrums and tries to force his way into her room, and then breaks up his own furniture.

She falls victim to Stockholm Syndrome and falls in love with her captor. Once she proves her love is true, he is revealed to be a prince!

This teaches us that if you have patience and love a bad person for long enough, he will become a good person.

What are some lessons we can take from this?

Don’t trust people who wear too much velvet.
Don’t date guys who have kidnapped any member of your family. Not even a cousin.
Rich doesn’t always mean nice. Some might argue that it never does.

Grease:

Two attractive people meet over Summer break, fall in love, and then when they get back to school they’re worried that if they date, their friends won’t think they’re cool anymore because she is a “soc” and he is a “greaser”. They spend the WHOLE SCHOOL YEAR pining for each other. At the end they put on different outfits in order to meet the expectations of the other person, and then they die, as they get into a convertible and their car drives into the clouds.

Lessons:

Date who you want. It doesn’t matter if your friends don’t like their jacket.
You don’t have to change to be loved.
Don’t have unprotected sex with Kenickie, or anyone really.

Some Kind Of Wonderful:

In this film, Eric Stoltz plans a dream date for a woman he has barely spoken to and only loves for her appearance.

At the end of the date, she turns down his gift of extremely expensive earrings. He feels that she is being a real a-hole.

When a guy has a best friend who’s a girl and they hang out all the time, that girl is already probably in love with him, although she dresses like a demolition derby driver.
If someone plans an elaborate first date to try to win your love, and isn’t happy just to meet and talk over coffee, it’s probably a desperate attempt to paper over their own insecurities!

Pretty Woman:

It’s a cute retelling of Pygmalion/My Fair Lady, in which a street prostitute becomes a trophy wife, which is the same thing but in longer pants.

She gets an emotionally distant workaholic with no family ties, and becomes a kept woman- that’ll be fun in marriage counseling!

“Hey, I think our power dynamic is screwed up.” “Why is that, I wonder?”

When a man buys a woman, it’s like buying a car- he’ll trade her in eventually.

Just remember that romantic movies are a fun fantasy, but many of the relationships depicted in them are a real nightmare!

Love on a Trail of Breadcrumbs

I had a great first date with a curly-haired breadcrumber who kept in sporadic touch with me, which made me sad because I wanted to see him again.

Technology has changed the way we interact with each other. A few years ago, if you’d been dating someone and you didn’t want to anymore, you had to say “hey, thanks for dating me, but I don’t want to anymore.” It was rude to do this over the phone! You had to meet someone in person to reject them!

Now we ghost, fade, or breadcrumb our way out of hard situations.

Ghosting Has Been Well Documented

You’ve gone on a number of dates with someone, and then you Keyser Soze them like in Usual Suspects- you’re just in the wind. No text, no call. Everyone hates it, but everyone does it. Having been ghosted implicitly gives you permission to ghost, like being bitten by a werewolf makes you one yourself.

The first time I was ghosted, it took me by surprise. I assumed that the person I had been dating for nine months was in rehab or prison (either one would have been a pretty good idea.) Then, after two weeks of silence, I saw him tagged in a photo in his favorite bar.

I was amazed. I didn’t call it ghosting, I called it “being dumped by a sociopath”.

Ghosting happens because it’s the easiest option. There’s no confrontation, and also, ghosting never really closes the door. In the ghoster’s mind, they’ve never really broken it off with you, so there’s still a possibility of dating you in case what they’re pursuing peters out, and also the thing after that, or if they someday reach the end of Tinder and it’s just a picture of a cat with a colander on its head.

Breadcrumbing is the same- they might not want to date you now, but they maybe want to later? Or not?

Fading is a slow ghost.

Responses just get shorter and less committal until they’re gone, but by the time it’s done, you’ve gotten used to not hearing from them, like when you taper down from smoking or eating carbs.

Monday after a date: You say “That was fun!” Three hours later they say, “Ya!” You say “Have a great night!”, they say nothing!

Tuesday: Still nothing

Wednesday: You ask about plans, three hours later they say “rly busy, talk later”

Thursday: Nothing

Friday: You ask, “Hey! Good week? Weekend plans?”

Saturday: No word back at all! Spooky, they’re a ghost!

In many ways, breadcrumbing is even more infuriating than ghosting or fading, and this is how it goes:

They don’t make plans with you for months, but sometimes you’ll get a text out of nowhere that says, “TGIF!” or “Happy 4^th!” or “Hope ur gr8!” The two weeks between Christmas and New Year’s are filled with enough breadcrumbs to fill a bakery, as people have free time and think “I guess there’s worse things than going out with that girl again.”

They never have a long conversation, but just drop a three syllable text from time to time. Dropping tiny bits of attention your way keeps you from forgetting about them.

If you respond, they might say something back and they might not. You might get a picture with a caption that feels generic/out of context, and this is because they’re sending it to a bunch of people. (IF YOU THINK THIS IS ABOUT YOU THEN IT IS.)

If you’re Facebook or Insta friends with them, they might wordlessly “like” a particularly nice selfie, just pressing a button to change the color of a heart somewhere in the universe, to remind you that they still exist.

What Happened Was

I had a really great first date with a curly-haired breadcrumber who kept in sporadic touch with me, which made me sad because I wanted to see him again.

I ran into him six months later and he asked me out again, and when I told him no, he was surprised.

Me: “I have a two-three week test period on dates. Your window of opportunity to ask me out again has long since expired.” (This is fancier than how I really said it, I think the f-word was in my original response.)

Him: “I wish I’d known that was a requirement.” (That’s what he really said)

Me: “I think it’s pretty normal. If I see you every six months, that’s less often than my parole officer or my hairdresser. That’s not dating. I don’t know what it is.”

If the ghoster is keeping you in cold storage, the breadcrumber is just keeping you on the bench. They might get back to you. They might not. They’re “keeping in touch.” It’s infuriating. And it’s a tiny, gradual waste of your life.

What are they after?

They’re either a player and like to have lots of people in rotation or else, and this is the sadder option: they really think this is what dating is. They think if they keep meeting people they’ll find the right one, and until they’re sure you’re not the right one, they’d better keep you on the line.

What’s hard to explain to a breadcrumber is that romantic attachment doesn’t happen like in the movies, where you both reach for the last box of brown cinnamon Pop-Tarts at Von’s and your eyes lock and you fall hard.

Romantic attachment and feeling is something two compatible people who like each other build, with communication and intention, not with breadcrumbs but out of whole slices of goddamned bread.

What do you do if you’re being breadcrumbed?

The only way to stop it is to be clear about what you want from the other person.

“Hey, I’m interested in you. Do you want to make plans with me?” If they respond, great, go out with that person.

If they don’t respond with plans, cross them off your list of prospects. Now, you can spend all the time you spent waiting to hear back from them talking to people who want to date you, and put that emotional energy into people who’ll give it back!

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/looking-for-love-on-a-trail-of-breadcrumbs/2/#sthash.8KKcLPqp.dpuf