Why's she dating HIM?

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If I were to not do that, I know that I would end up liking two people at the same time... I would have to invariably choose one or the other, and that means disappointing the one I didn't choose... I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings like that... even if we're talking about someone that I'm not attracted to or even have a friendly relationship with, it just feels wrong to me to hurt someone else's feelings like that...


If it's a bad date, I'm just making her waste her time... and it would almost invariably be a bad date if I don't know her that well because, not knowing what her likes and dislikes are, I would end up defaulting to talking about myself and dominating the conversation... and that wouldn't be fun for her at all...


All right All right... I guess I wouldn't need to go so far... you've more than made your point here and in other threads about the pressure... Would it be too much to ask for just a tiny bit of intimacy in a date then? Or even just for her to like me or something? A date just can't be a date if it's just two people just doing stuff like dinner... I can do that with anybody, even guys... there's nothing special there to make it something distinguishable...

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Last edited by r1x on 09 Aug 2009, 7:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

Okay, now I'm the one being taken out of context... for me, it can't be a *date* unless there is something special in there to distinguish it from two people just going out...


Well of course you can go out with a girl and have it be no big deal... there's nothing against that... but that's what you do with platonic friends anyway, regardless of gender... How can it be a date if it's just doing stuff that you would do with a friend of the same gender anyway?


I'm not even talking about sex. I couldn't care less about sex... Okay, fine, I would be willing if she (whoever she is) decides on her own that she feels ready for such an endeavor (I don't put any pressure on a woman for sex)... what I need more than ever though is some affection... just a little validation that I actually mean something to someone... otherwise I could just disappear and nobody would care...

My sincere apologies.

There seems to be a common theme in this forum, where people seem to expect things from dates way too soon, and when it doesn't happen they give up. My response to your thread was way over the top.

I hope you did not take offense.

Nah it's okay... if you notice, taking other people's words out of context is also a theme around here... God knows I'm guilty of that many times over...

In any case, I've already conceded the whole "dating to be in a relationship" point I was making, it's just that I can't see a date as just being something I would do with platonic friends anyway...

But then again, if I were to take your definition at face value, I guess I have already been on three dates in my life... I never considered them as dates, and I would rather not consider them as dates anyway, since if they were, in fact, dates, that means I've failed 3 times already... not to mention the 4 rejections I've already had to completely ruin my record... I've just gone from 0 for 4 to 0 for 7... not a good sign at all...

Life sadly isn't fair.

The people who deserve so much dont always get it.
And a**holes sometimes get everything handed to them.

Nothing we can do, thats life, it stings like a b***h at times : /

My brother met his ex girlfriend when they shared a desk at our local youth orchestra. After two terms, she hinted that asking her out would be a good idea, and he duly asked her out. He loved her, and she loved him. THEN they dated. They didn't go out before they both knew they liked each other, and so it has been with all my friends who have had a girlfriend. None of those people has been scared of the men they are dating.



When every relationship I have seen has started this way, what else am I supposed to conclude?



Again, that is how all the relationships I've witnessed have been. None of those dates ended with "let's just be friends."



I won't 'blow you off' just because you are a woman and an NT one to boot. Why should I reject good advice? However, if your arguments seem inconsistent with my experience, then I will challenge them just as you have been challenging mine.



So how come my brother managed to get a girlfriend without any experience at all?


I'm not trying to be clingy, desperate, aggressive or possesive. I'm not any of those things. I just don't understand why what my brother and my friends did is so wrong.

They were a couple from the moment he asked her out (and yes, in a roundabout way she asked him first). There was no experimental dating involved.



I think I see what you mean: it's the overtones of a mission which is scary. Fair enough. I'd assumed that if two people went on a date then there would already be mutual attraction and a desire to be a couple, and so there wouldn't be a 'mission' in mind. I'd never go on a date with an ulterior motive.



Right. So basically you are saying that people should practise dating with people they'll never be attracted to in a million years, just so that when the find someone they are attracted to they'll get it right. I can see the sense in that. It's just I always thought if you were dating at all then there must have been some attraction somewhere along the line, otherwise it's just a meal out with a friend/stranger. It must be very strange to have a passionless date.



Not in the case of my brother. He had had no previous dating experience at all. Also, if you see one particular method work several times over, you are bound to conclude that it is reliable. This doesn't just apply to dating.



Yes, it was the first time he'd asked a girl out, and considering they were 16 at the time it was probably her first time as well.



Granted, but even so she still asked my brother out. It was her initiative, not his.


Perhaps I am simply incredibly naive in my approach to dating.

Last edited by CrinklyCrustacean on 09 Aug 2009, 9:36 am, edited 2 times in total.

Have you ever heard of Speed Dating? If they have a Speed Dating organization in your area it's definately worth checking into. Basically, everybody is in a room with many tables. At each table there is a timer. A man and a woman sit down at a table and talk for a time allotted by the timer. It's not long, perhaps 15 minutes. Then everybody rotates. So eventually everybody has "dated" a dozen or so people and it is statistically unlikely they were attracted to all of them. This may sound bizarre and insane, but it will shatter the idea that you musn't go out on a date without prior mutual attraction. The women you go out on a date with really ought to exceed the number you wind up in a relationship with, or even are mutually attracted to. You may also have heard of "blind dates" (if you haven't, you don't have a pushy mom). Blind dates are generally set up by concerned older female relatives such as moms and aunts or by friends. Since they are blind (with somebody you have never met and no nothing about), the expectation of mutual attraction is patently absurd and therefore not even on the table. The virtue of both blind dates and speed dating is that they both blast away the idea that mutual attraction is a mandatory precondition for a date. They also give much needed dating practice.

Blind dates and speed dating are necessarily passionless. Yet people do them all the same. Partly out of hope that there is a 1/100 chance that there will be a spark (and that chance is there). And partly because they keep your chops up. It is indeed strange to have a meal with a stranger (blind date) but it keeps you on your toes as far as dating skills go. Yes, I've been on blind dates. No, they didn't end in relationships. What they DID end with however, was I got a lot less stuttery and a lot more confident on a date because the stakes were low.

Yes, I've heard of blind dates. Yes, I've heard of speed dating. No, neither of those ideas really appeals to me...

I really do need to know someone and at least some background information before I can engage in a conversation (except in professional settings where I'm meeting someone while working and the conversation is about what we're trying to get done)... Without any background knowledge, I don't have any idea what to say, and I would just sit there awkwardly or start rambling on about myself (neither of these are a good outcome if it's dating we're talking about)... That's another reason why I wouldn't date a total stranger...

That's something that still doesn't make any sense. Okay, I get the idea that you don't want to put pressure on her concerning a relationship... but two people talking is just, well, two people talking... there's nothing special in that to distinguish it from saying hi to somebody on the street...

Anything you think is stupid will be harder to do. This is for AS/NTs alike. Because we don't get social clues as well, many things that NTs consider important we consider stupid.

So, you have to figure out a way to make it important.

For example. I have been in the military most of my life. I think pressed uniforms are stupid. My leaders used to ask me if why I didn't take pride in my uniform. I would say because it's a uniform, why would I take pride in it. I would, of course, do many push ups for being a smart ass. Stupid people would attack me becauses my uniform was not pressed.

Eventualy I figured out pressing my uniforms and paying someone to shine my boots kept the stupid people from attacking me. I didn't have to agree that soldiers in pressed uniforms were better soldiers. Pressing a uniform has nothing to do with tactical or technical ability. But putting on my "brown noser" uniform kept me from being attacked by stupid people, which let me be a better soldier. I was MORE stupid because I was stubborn, not because I had AS.

So, if you want to be stuborn and lonely your entire life because you thing dating should not take practice and the statistical chances of you meeting the right person increase with each person you meet..then it's on you. It's your problem is not AS- stuborness. You might accidentaly meet someone. It does happen.

For years I could not spell because I thought the way english worked was inefficent. I Hate inefficency. I still can't spell because I spent my childhood thinking it was stupid to conform to one way of spelling a word. I now realize that if I want to get promoted and paid and respected, I need to spell correctly. And I get better every day. But my learning disability came from stubborness, not ADD or dislexia.

I didn't say I thought dating shouldn't take practice: I said that that in every relationship I've witnessed the first date was the confirmation of the relationship, rather than the point from which it started. Obviously, because I saw it happen so consistently I assumed that's how it was with everybody - a logical conclusion.

Janissy: yes I've heard of speed-dating and blind dates, and that's not because of my mum's attitude. However, I have never felt comfortable with the idea, because I like to get to know someone as friends first. It's hard to make a good judgement on someone's character simply by looking at them. I'm dating a person, not a rag doll. In any case, isn't the point of speed-dating and blind dates to find a partner, not to get general practise in dating itself?

If you've only been on three "dates" and your not married...wow..not a supprising. There are about 80 million single women over 18 in the United States. You now have dated three. 79,999,997 to go. get to work. You will not find someone for you, unless you meet those who are not for you.

I work in the personnel recovery field. Finding lost people in active war zones is not a "daily success" activity. In fact, on any given day, we have less than a .01% chance of finding anyone. It takes on average 200 "dry holes" to get a person back. It took us 19 years to end the mystery of Scott Speicher.

I think I probably went out on 100+ dates before meeting my first wife. None of them lasted more than five dates. I never tried to have sex or get a relationship out of any of them. I just wanted to make my life less boring. It worked. I was never realy that lonely because I went out every weekend to a club and asked random women to dance. I usually started with the best looking woman in the club, just to get the first rejection out of the way. Then I would get one or two more rejections, and eventually some woman would say yes. Usualy just to be polite. I was a complete social idot, and rarely got a date/phone number out of the experience. If I did, it would usualy last one or two more dates. I think the record was 5 dates up to age 26. Occasionaly, I would make out with some girl who was completly drunk, and her friends would rescue her from me, because only a drunk chick would think I wasn't an idot.

I never had a serous relationship. I had completly givin up the idea. I had become very happy with the 5 date record. I had bumped into my first wife at a post office accidentaly, and she said something both rude and funny. I told her I would oppologyze if she bought me lunch. She did. A year later we were married.

Second wife-Similar deal. We agread to meet for coffie off the internet. I had just come out of a rocky romance and just wanted to have some coffie with a sane woman. I was not looking for a relationship or sex. Actully had NO DESIRE for an LTR. but a year later, we were married.

In both cases, it happend naturaly because I was not expecting it. Now here's the down side. Relationships are hard work. Harder than having a job. If you think being lonely sucks, try getting into a relationship with an NT that wants you to go to parties and be nice to her friends and not stay up late on the computer and so on.

Marriage isn't my goal right at the moment... if it happens, so be it, but my primary objective in the love department right now is completely different...

And no, the objective isn't sex either... what I need more than anything right now is some affection, some feeling that there's somebody in this world that would actually give a s**t as to whether or not I even exist... I would be a lot more motivated in life knowing that there's somebody on this planet that cares...

Of the 70 or so million or so single women in America, there will be someone who cares about you. Someone who is quirky, beligerant, sarcastic, or needs something in your life that only you or someone like you could fill, even if only for a few weeks or months.

The challenge is to meet her by sifting throught the ones that are not right for you. Learning from each one that is not right. Each of us has a destiny, we simply have to wake up and persue it each day.

For example, my relationship with my X wife lasted 15 years. I regret only one day of that marrage, out of the entire 15 years. I regret several things I said or did, but I only regreat one day.