Why do women (In my case, not being sexist) bail when asked to meet up?

[Karin2rinkashi]

I have a serious question for ladies.

 

So, you find a person on a dating app or website, and you hit it off. You have all the right interests, and even she says that she would like to see your work (whatever it maybe). Anyways, a few days (2 or 3) go by and you are texting back and forth. And i mean, you are having legit conversations. She acknowledges the fact that it should be good to meet up because the conversations are getting REALLY lengthy for texts, and interesting enough that a face to face meeting can be really fun.

 

Then, you start deciding where to meet, and you see this change coming. And it is not a surprise anymore, but still very confusing.

 

What is it about meeting up with someone that drives women away? In a public place, not in a lonely place.

 

It is like, their phones stop working, and all of a sudden they are busy.

 

Surely, not all of them can be flakes, or maybe?

 

Just want some thoughts on it...

[cessna]

I wish I knew, but sadly I don't.

 

This happens to me 90% of the time with women. I know I'm the common denominator in all these interactions but I really struggle to see where I am going wrong.

 

If I had to guess it would be that women like getting attention from men, it makes them feel good about themselves and so they will continue to communicate without the intention of ever meeting up.

 

It's immature and frustrating when it happens and the reason I've given up on dating or pursuing women.

[Jj66]

Not to be mean but she probably found someone more exciting. Women get tons of messages. You weren't doing it for her good enough to hold her attention given the others vying for it.

 

You need to make her excited to meet you and strike while the iron is hot. Get her off the online meat market as soon as you can. You can have all these important conversations later.

[oberkeat]

Not to be mean but she probably found someone more exciting. Women get tons of messages. You weren't doing it for her good enough to hold her attention given the others vying for it.

 

You need to make her excited to meet you and strike while the iron is hot. Get her off the online meat market as soon as you can. You can have all these important conversations later.

 

This is close to my take on it. I think women who date online have too many options. Men outnumber women on those OLD sites by a lot. As a result, they always think there's someone better and move on to other guys at the drop of a hat. They end up in permanent dating mode. The deck is really stacked against most guys in online dating. There's too much competition.

Edited August 17, 2015 by oberkeat

[Jejangles]

I don't usually agree to meet and bail but I have sometimes bailed right after someone asks to meet and not given a response. Here's the reasons why I bail (plus one more more I have heard from other women):

 

- I'm dating someone else and we're in that grey zone where we're not exclusive but it's starting to feel weird to go on dates with someone else. Usually I'm hoping things will become clear (either we'll commit or end it) and if I like the guy I'm chatting with I don't want to cut it off prematurely. This happened to me recently and now it's been so long I'm not sure whether to start up again.

 

- There's something about them I'm unsure about and while I debate it time passes and then it seems like I've left it too long to get in touch again. This could be anything, maybe he has kids and that seemed ok when we were just chatting but now I'm not sure. Maybe our messaging revealed some incompatibilities. Maybe I looked at his pictures again and don't like what I saw.

 

- I'm super busy and dating drops off the priority list. Sometimes my schedule is so full I can't fit the person in for weeks and it feels silly to ask them to wait that long. Or I'm so busy I read the message and thought I'd respond later and never did.

 

-This one doesn't apply to me, but a blogger I read recently posted that she does it due to insecurity about her looks and weight.

 

So yeah... there's tons of reasons someone might drop the ball, most of them have little or nothing to do with you. You can prompt them once if you're really interested otherwise get chatting with others. Oh and don't think only women do this, in the past two months I have had at least three guys flake on me too after we had agreed to meet.

[Jj66]

I have flaked before, so guys definitely do the same. Actually I have never flaked after concrete plans have been made but I HAVE flaked after we agreed to meet in principle. The last case it was because I was so busy with travel I couldn't meet her for a few weeks and I was also in the early stages of dating someone else. By the time I was free to meet her I was no longer interested because on of the women I had just started seeing captured my attention.

[Empyrea]

I think a lot of girls are just idle users. Be it for an ego boost or just casual browsing without being extremely invested in going on a bunch of dates.. or they are already quite demotivated from having been on a bunch of dates..

 

Also (and I do apologize for this gender stereotypical generalisation), I feel like girls might be more in it for the quality rather than quantity of it. I have guy friends on tinder whose bar is really randomly low and they just try to chat up anyone, because they know only a select few will bite. As it is usually the female's role to be selective. So it kind of works out to a lot of guys approaching a girl, so she'll be overwhelmed with options. And from all those options, I would only go out with someone that truly peaks my interest rather than just being okay on paper or really persistent. Also I would prefer to build a connection BEFORE agreeing to meet them in person, but very few guys on dating sites care to invest so much time in one girl without knowing if anything will come of it and prefer to invite them on a date straight away.

 

But I understand that in your example a connection had already been established and it was a last minute flake out. In which case I would just explain it as a lack of motivation. For whatever reason. (Jejangles listed a number of great ones!) For example I know that if I've developed an interest in someone, but it's very early still, then I still keep chatting to other people online so as not to get too invested, but I would be hesitant to meet them in person, because I'm hoping that it will work out with the guy I already had my eye on. On a positive note, knowing how the dating game works, it probably won't and she'll be ready to explore other options in no time

[kismetkismet]

Ok I'm a female and I will admit that I have done this a couple of times. Part of it for me is that I really don't actually like dating or hanging out with people i don't know that well in general. So while things are going fine on the phone it seems all well and good, until it's proposed that we meet up and then I suddenly don't really think that it's worth it. It's easy chatting on the phone and it's not awkward and I don't have to worry about being judged in the same way or anything...plus I don't really have to worry about feeling uncomfortable or bored since there's a screen between us. So a guy has to VERY big connection via phone for me in order for me to actually meet someone, whereas I'll carry on chatting with someone via text a bit longer. I'm not defending it, but I understand why it happens.

[kismetkismet]

What Empyrea said is right as well.. That everyone has different levels of engagement/involvement and different reasons for being on there. I'm not actively looking for a boyfriend right now, I'm just on there to keep my options open because i live in a city that is notorious for being filled with cold people and it being impossible to meet anyone haha. So i'm not really in a place where i feel like going on a bunch of dates every week.. i just still want to feel like there's a possibility I'll meet someone.

[Empyrea]

Ok I'm a female and I will admit that I have done this a couple of times. Part of it for me is that I really don't actually like dating or hanging out with people i don't know that well in general. So while things are going fine on the phone it seems all well and good, until it's proposed that we meet up and then I suddenly don't really think that it's worth it. It's easy chatting on the phone and it's not awkward and I don't have to worry about being judged in the same way or anything...plus I don't really have to worry about feeling uncomfortable or bored since there's a screen between us. So a guy has to VERY big connection via phone for me in order for me to actually meet someone, whereas I'll carry on chatting with someone via text a bit longer. I'm not defending it, but I understand why it happens.

 

Yeah, I agree. A guy would have to REALLY stand out for me to agree on a date. So it's perhaps a difference in the timing of the weeding out process - some people (esp guys) would rather go on dates and meet people in real life to see if there's a connection, others expect a connection before meeting to justify even going on a date.

[kismetkismet]

Yup exactly. I definitely think you have to meet someone to know whether there's a connection.. but I'm quite busy, and first dates are the WORST haha. I would rather hang out with my friends or even at home alone than try to make awkward conversation with someone I met on the internet. It's easy to go into something with the best of intentions/feeling like you want to give it a shot, but then when it comes down to actually committing the time to it you make excuses to yourself why it wouldn't work and/or realize reasons why it actually wouldn't.