This week I decided to get back into the dating game, that I've been out of about four years, and I learned a little something. I mean, I guess I always knew it, but chose to ignore it, however this time I decided to pay attention to it and write a blog about. Because, ya know, blogs are therapeutic, lol.
I started dating when I was 16, well officially dating, and it hasn't been the best experience.
When I was 15 I "met" the guy I used to consider my first official boyfriend. We met online, with Yahoo Chat, and "dated" off and on for four years. He lived in a different state, was a graduating senior in high school, and had recently enlisted in the Navy. Most of our communication was chat rooms, email, and some text. I mean, it was 2000 for crying out loud so texting was EXPENSIVE!
We talked about everything and anything, growing really close. Or I thought. With him being in the Navy there were periods of time we simply couldn't talk. One of those times lasted four months. Within that four months I met my sons dad, but I'm not to him yet. But, he lead me to believe he wanted to be with me, help me raise my son, and live in Ohio with me.
We did get to meet in person one time (when I was 18), when he was on leave, and driving home to see his family. He came to my apartment and we spent three hours together. I was head over heels for him, but he kept telling me he was scared to tell his family about me. For a few reasons; how we met wouldn't have sat well with his family, he was Hmong so he was expected to be with an Asian woman, and we lived in different states.
All of the sudden, after four years, and months of talking about finally being together and living in the same state, he just stopped talking to me. He vanished. Emails were being returned as "unable to send" and no one on his ship knew where he was.
Before me and "internet guy" made it official, when I was 16 I started dating another guy who just graduated high school. We were in the same school together and started dating the week before summer break, the day he gradated high school. He had enlisted in the Air Force and was leaving at the end of summer. We talked on the phone, text (still pricey) and spent a few days a week together at Kings Island with a large group of friends. He was my first kiss and my first heart break. I should have known something was wrong when his group of friends, when we hang out at KI, would get on him constantly for not spending any time with me. After about a month of dating he realized he wasn't going to get me to sleep with him and dumped me because "He just wanted someone to have sex with before he had to leave for the Air Force."
Looking back now, I am not sure why I dated him since I found his best friend more attractive.
At 18 I dated this guy that, unbeknownst to me, was dating two other girls at the same time. He was just in it for sex. Again.
When I was 19 I reconnected with a guy I knew from where I worked when I was 17. I had a major crush on him when we worked together, he knew it, but he had a serious girlfriend at the time. When we reconnected when I was 19 he was single and we spent practically every day that we weren't working hanging out. Hell, even when he was working we were hanging out. He worked at a gas station, and I was his ride back and forth to work, and sometimes I would just hang out with him until I had to go to work. He knew I wanted to be more, but told me he couldn't "date someone he was friends with" but had zero problem sleeping with me every weekend. I knew I shouldn't sleep with him if he refused to date me, but I was filled with self hate and a serious lack of self confidence, so I took what I could get. I ended up telling him I couldn't handle not getting what I wanted out of it anymore, about 3 months later. We still hang out, but that was it.
Also, at 19, I reconnected with another guy I used to work with when I was 17. The three of us (the guy above included) all worked at the same place. I thought this guy was annoying when we were 17, but at 19 we started dating the day we reconnected. Which was about a month after I stopped sleeping with the guy above. We also got pregnant with our son 23 hours after we started dating.
Three weeks into dating, and a week after we "officially" found out I was pregnant (i knew the next morning when I woke up) he broke up with me, through text, telling me he was still in love with his ex girlfriend. Who I should add was currently locked up in a psych ward for trying to attack someone and threatening to kill herself.
I'm going to sum this one up quickly, he would say all the right things to get me to take him back and then leave me again three weeks later. Over and over and over for 6 years. I was convinced that I loved him, wanted to spend the rest of my life with him, and would never be happy with anyone but him. I even married him when our son was three, and kicked him out about 2 weeks later after he told me "he couldn't be himself" while married to me. Which translated into "I can't sleep around if I'm married" Over the course of those 6 years he got three other women pregnant, one while we were still legally married AND she was the girl he left our marriage for.
During one of my break ups with my sons dad I started talking to a guy that assumed that because I had a child I was going to sleep with him. When he found out I wouldn't he locked the bedroom door, while we were in there, and told me, point blank, that I wasn't "leaving the room until I gave him what he wanted." I threatened to Lorraina Bobbit his ass and he let me out of the room.
When I was 21 I dated a guy for a couple of weeks, got pregnant, found out he had a gf, and he denied ever touching me or spending time with me, and his mother threatened to call the cops on me for lying about being pregnant with his child and harassment.
I swore off dating for a little while after getting tired of being with crappy guys, and met a guy at Cincinnati Job Corps when I was 24. He was 21 and gorgeous. I was happy that he found me attractive and wanted to be with me. We were together for 18 months and it took me that entire 18 months to realize I had managed to get stuck in an abusive relationship.
At school he pretended like he didn't know me, then would call me as soon as he left to go home. I lived at the school, he didn't. He would start fights over everything and blame all the fights on me. He would tell me I was "lucky" that he wanted to be with me and it would be "no problem for him to leave me for someone more attractive".
He was jealous of the time I spent with my son, he hated my best friend and would yell at me for spending time with her, to the point that I stopped telling him when we were hanging out, which resulted in a fight when he did find out.
When he would hear about me talking to our friends at school about how he treated me he convinced them that I was being over dramatic and that wasn't at all how things were. They believed him until they over heard one of our fights over the phone. He was screaming at me so loudly they could hear every word he was saying.
We were talking about moving in together but I had to look for jobs for him to apply to, I had to find apartments to look at, I had to figure out where he could go to college, and I wasn't allowed to have my son spend weekends at our place because "the 4 year old is too loud". I didn't have custody of my son, so weekends were my time with him if I moved out of my moms house.
Every time he was unhappy with out relationship it was my fault. Every fight we had was my fault. If he "didn't have gas money" to come see me it was my fault. If we couldn't go out and spend time together it was my fault. Everything was my fault. After 18 months I finally opened my eyes and saw that I was in an emotionally, financially, and verbally abusive relationship. Within those 18 months, he never hit me, but I wouldn't have put it past him if I stayed with him longer. I even moved to Arizona to get away from him, which resulted in one of our biggest fights to date.
Even after I was in AZ he would try to get in contact with me to "fix" our relationship and get me to move home. He met his (now) wife while I was out there and trying to talk me into giving him another chance. When I did eventually move back home he tried to get me to meet up with him and then would curse me out when I said no. He has his wife convinced that I was crazy and the relationship was shit because of me.
I should also note that he was an alcoholic from the day I met him, but didn't know it until after three months. He was even born addicted to alcohol, so he never should have touched that shit as he grew up. He drank so much that he was told about 5 years ago (last time I heard from him) that if he kept drinking it would kill him.
When I was 29 I met a guy online and we made plans to have a double date with a friend of mine and her bf. We decided to go bowling, and he was drunk halfway through the first game. As we were taking him home he threatened to kill my friends bf over some stupid thing they didn't agree on and even pulled out a knife. Me, being desperate to be in a relationship, didn't cut things off then and there.
Every time we would go out I had to pay and he would have AT MINIMUM three beers each meal.
Keeping this one short, we dating seven weeks, and the day I broke up with him was when I found out he used heroin and was always high when I had my son with us because "that was the only way he could handle being around a fucking annoying child."
Now that I am trying to get back into the dating game, I have my standards VERY high. I know what I never want in my life and what I do want in my life. I won't settle for less. Which means this guy I am currently trying to talk to is probably not going to make the cut. Only 5 days into talking and I'm not happy with what I'm getting out of it.
I will never put myself in a situation where I end up in another scenario like I've been in in the past. If that means I'm single until I'm 50, then so be it.