Hi Andi,
I used to hook up with this guy a couple years ago, and after a while I caught feelings. Now I try to stay away from him, but whenever I find myself to be “in the mood” he’s the only person I think of, but when I text him he never comes. This is confusing because when I saw him earlier this year he said that he wanted to mess around again, but why doesn’t he come when I send him the text messages? I don’t believe he is in a relationship, and I hate the feeling of being rejected. What is wrong?!
-Desperate to Know
Dear Desperate to Know,
Guys like to say that women are the confusing sex, but in reality, they are pretty confusing too. You have history with this boy, so this can further complicate things. He has explicitly told you he wanted to continue to hook-up with you, but obviously something is up—what gives?
There could be a number of reasons for his lack of response. For starters, consider that you could be wrong. Maybe a girl has come into the picture and slipped under your radar. It is also possible he is talking to a girl but hasn’t gotten into a public or official relationship yet. This could explain the sudden change of heart.
Another reason could be that he misread your signals. You mentioned that you had caught feelings for him and pulled away—I’m assuming, because you did not want to become too serious or involved. He might have misinterpreted this as you having a wishy-washy personality. This might explain why he has said one thing, but acted out another—he is uncertain about how to take your advances and therefore unsure how to act.
One additional option to consider is that he is not getting what he needs from this set up. Perhaps he wants something more or perhaps he is too busy to hook up. Maybe he’s on the market for a girlfriend and can’t waste time with casual intimacy. Or, maybe he caught feelings and is reacting in a similar way.
What does all these mean? Well, frankly, it doesn’t change anything. Figuring out the why may offer you a peace of mind but it certainly won’t alter the circumstances. So what can you do now? First, realize there is nothing wrong with you. He was obviously in to you in the past, and reaffirmed that interest when he said he wanted to keep messing around. You can’t take this personal. Obviously some sort of change in his interests or perceptions is causing him to act differently, but it shouldn’t make you feel less confident or worthy. Second, the only real course of action is to explicit address this with him.
Think about it like this: the worst thing that can happen as a result of you being direct is that he will continue to be a D-Bag and ignore you, the best case scenario—he’ll respond and either give you peace of mind or a piece of himself (wink wink). Text him, direct message him, Facebook message him, whatever. Simply say something along the lines of “Hey you told me you wanted to hook up but I haven’t heard from you. If you’ve changed your mind just let me know so I don’t waste our time.” Anything that has a combination of 1. reminding him of how he said he wanted to continue this, and 2. Asking him to let you know if he doesn’t want to see you should work perfectly!
You can’t control how other people chose to act, but you can control how you chose to interact with and react to them. If he is still giving you the runaround after you are straightforward with him, then he’s not worth your time. Because no matter which of the many reasons he has for not coming to you, none of them will excuse him for not letting you know the reason why.
xoxo Andi