Need thoughts on girl I'm dating

[tokidoki]

So i hooked up with this girl at work a couple times. Both times we were both quite drunk, and I could tell she had the hots for me so I was quite forward with her about that. She commented on my confidence which I was quite flattered by as I don’t often hear that from girls. I went on vacation with my family and when I came back her tune had changed, she was very guarded and would cast aspersions about me in front of other people. I figured she wasnt interested anymore so I just stopped trying to talk to her after a few days. A period of about six weeks of awkwardness/silence followed until i just went up to her in the kitchen and said ‘we can just be friendly with eachother, there doesn’t need to be a bad atmosphere’. She denied that there was one but then agreed that it wasn’t really work appropriate to be passive aggressive. Since then things were fine, we speak within groups and to each other in passing now. I sort of lost interest because passive aggressive behaviour is a big turn off for me.

 

At a work function the other night, again we were talking in a group (this is the first time since hooking up that booze was a factor). Someone was asking about ‘turn-offs’ I said that mine was a thick cockney accent (its like nails on a chalkboard). The girl shouted accross the circle ‘oh my god you’re such a snob’ which I thought was a bit inappropriate with colleagues around. I said ‘that’s a bit rude’ and she snapped ‘you’re rude!’. I found the situation a little embarrassing. When someone asked her the same question, she said ‘arrogance, nothing else’. I had a feeling this was directed at me.

 

A while later, i was talking to a dude ahe’s quite close with about office romances, and how we thought they werent a good idea. I said ‘i’m sure you know I hooked up with her a while back - its been awkward ever since despite trying to smooth it over. He said yeah, she thinks you’re arrogant and doesn’t like being told what to do.

 

If she thinks I’m arrogant, that’s ok. She doesn’t know me and has passed up the opportunity to get to know me. Am I justified in feeling annoyed that she has shared these opinions about me with other people that we work with? There are things about her i don’t like but I wouldn’t dream of repeating them to colleagues, I think its inappropriate and not really fair on me.

 

I’d also ask, if she’s not interestec in me, why continue to cast aspersions like this...doesn’t feel very consistent.

[d0nnivain]

The fact that you confirmed to this other bloke that you & her hooked up was equally inappropriate. Office romances require discretion.

 

It happened. You can't take any of it back. Just leave it be. Only interact with her as work dictates & act like nothing personal ever transpired between you. You have both insulted each other enough

[tokidoki]

I get that. I don’t really mind if people know about it and he was telling me about a rather serious relationship he’d been in with another girl we both know. Gossip happens, that’s the reality of it, and tbh our conpany is quite bad for hookups because they lay on booze every friday night. I just feel a bit bad that she’s shared her opinions about my character with colleagues. Maybe that isn’t justified but I can’t help feeling that it isn’t really on...I wouldn’t comment on her character to people but I don’t mind if people know we hooked up. Its kinda inevitible.

[lovelymay]

So a few things can be going on here:

 

1. How was your contact during your vacation? Did you stay in touch with her while you were away or did you contact her less?

In case you didn't have as much contact as before, she may have interpret it as if you've lost interest and only want to hook up with her? That could explain her passively aggressive behaviour towards you.

 

2. If contact was still fine, then maybe she has lost interest and things you're clingy / needy. And because you're in a work environment and can't really avoid each other, she behaves in a negative way towards you?

 

I think it would be good if you just approach her and ask what is going on.

[tokidoki]

I actually didn’t contact her at all while i was away. BUT, i asked her on a date rigjt before i left, giving her a specific day and said ‘keep it free - date night!’. Which i thought was fairly good and to the point. She replied ‘haha! We’ll seee’ and I left it at that. It was when i got back that she was frosty, which is apparently down to me being arrogant/telling her what to do. That text i sent is the only thing i can think of that she could have interpreted as ‘being told what to do’ but I would just call it assertive. Surely she wouldn’t rather I ummed and ahhed about it and asked her if maybe she was free we could maybe go on a date if she wants to but its fine if she doesn’t etc. Etc.... feels like a catch 22. If i call her i’m needy, if i don’t, i’m uninterested and arrogant.

[lovelymay]

I actually didn’t contact her at all while i was away. BUT, i asked her on a date rigjt before i left, giving her a specific day and said ‘keep it free - date night!’. Which i thought was fairly good and to the point. She replied ‘haha! We’ll seee’ and I left it at that. It was when i got back that she was frosty, which is apparently down to me being arrogant/telling her what to do. That text i sent is the only thing i can think of that she could have interpreted as ‘being told what to do’ but I would just call it assertive. Surely she wouldn’t rather I ummed and ahhed about it and asked her if maybe she was free we could maybe go on a date if she wants to but its fine if she doesn’t etc. Etc.... feels like a catch 22. If i call her i’m needy, if i don’t, i’m uninterested and arrogant.

 

I think it's both you not contacting her while you were away and then coming back telling her to act normal.

 

If I can speak for myself (see my threads about this guy I've dated): when a guy first shows interest and then doesn't text at all while he's away I'm about to assume that guy is not interested.

Especially when you already hooked up and leave a silence (EVEN if you've set up a date with her), this can come across as if you're ghosting her or you've lost interest.

 

Some women answer this behaviour with:

- Moving on without mentioning anything (because we assume you've lost interest anyway)

- Partly moving on without mentioning anything. Partly, because we hold some feelings of being rejected which can create awkward behaviour. (In your case, she's being passively aggressive).

- Saying something about the situation and see how things go

- Feeling rejected and over analysing / mulling until men have initiated contact again

 

 

 

I think that may be a reason why she behaves like this...

[sabaton]

So i hooked up with this girl at work a couple times. Both times we were both quite drunk, and I could tell she had the hots for me so I was quite forward with her about that. She commented on my confidence which I was quite flattered by as I don’t often hear that from girls. I went on vacation with my family and when I came back her tune had changed, she was very guarded and would cast aspersions about me in front of other people. I figured she wasnt interested anymore so I just stopped trying to talk to her after a few days. A period of about six weeks of awkwardness/silence followed until i just went up to her in the kitchen and said ‘we can just be friendly with eachother, there doesn’t need to be a bad atmosphere’. She denied that there was one but then agreed that it wasn’t really work appropriate to be passive aggressive. Since then things were fine, we speak within groups and to each other in passing now. I sort of lost interest because passive aggressive behaviour is a big turn off for me.

 

At a work function the other night, again we were talking in a group (this is the first time since hooking up that booze was a factor). Someone was asking about ‘turn-offs’ I said that mine was a thick cockney accent (its like nails on a chalkboard). The girl shouted accross the circle ‘oh my god you’re such a snob’ which I thought was a bit inappropriate with colleagues around. I said ‘that’s a bit rude’ and she snapped ‘you’re rude!’. I found the situation a little embarrassing. When someone asked her the same question, she said ‘arrogance, nothing else’. I had a feeling this was directed at me.

 

A while later, i was talking to a dude ahe’s quite close with about office romances, and how we thought they werent a good idea. I said ‘i’m sure you know I hooked up with her a while back - its been awkward ever since despite trying to smooth it over. He said yeah, she thinks you’re arrogant and doesn’t like being told what to do.

 

If she thinks I’m arrogant, that’s ok. She doesn’t know me and has passed up the opportunity to get to know me. Am I justified in feeling annoyed that she has shared these opinions about me with other people that we work with? There are things about her i don’t like but I wouldn’t dream of repeating them to colleagues, I think its inappropriate and not really fair on me.

 

I’d also ask, if she’s not interestec in me, why continue to cast aspersions like this...doesn’t feel very consistent.

 

 

Don't brag about the girls you sleep with even if they are super hot with your work mates, or even with your friends because if she finds out that you can't help yourself and tell what you did with her, she'll feel her reputation just got hit, and your chances of hooking up with her again, poof, vanish like that

[tokidoki]

I think it's both you not contacting her while you were away and then coming back telling her to act normal.

 

If I can speak for myself (see my threads about this guy I've dated): when a guy first shows interest and then doesn't text at all while he's away I'm about to assume that guy is not interested.

Especially when you already hooked up and leave a silence (EVEN if you've set up a date with her), this can come across as if you're ghosting her or you've lost interest.

 

Some women answer this behaviour with:

- Moving on without mentioning anything (because we assume you've lost interest anyway)

- Partly moving on without mentioning anything. Partly, because we hold some feelings of being rejected which can create awkward behaviour. (In your case, she's being passively aggressive).

- Saying something about the situation and see how things go

- Feeling rejected and over analysing / mulling until men have initiated contact again

 

 

 

I think that may be a reason why she behaves like this...

 

I think you’re right. The time i spent away with my family was quite emotional due to the death of a close family friend so my mind was a little elsewhere; the assumption that I’m not interested is wrong. It wasn’t until much, much later that i asked if we could just be friendly. Afterl I had tried to talk to her and had re-iterated my offer of a date, all of which was met with passive aggression and shutting me out. I assumed she had moved on but she is still being quite cutting and casting aspersions each time we talk.

[sabaton]

I think you’re right. The time i spent away with my family was quite emotional due to the death of a close family friend so my mind was a little elsewhere; the assumption that I’m not interested is wrong. It wasn’t until much, much later that i asked if we could just be friendly. Afterl I had tried to talk to her and had re-iterated my offer of a date, all of which was met with passive aggression and shutting me out. I assumed she had moved on but she is still being quite cutting and casting aspersions each time we talk.

 

 

I'm sorry about the passing of your close family friend. So now you grieve and you heal, and then you start thinking about dating this woman or any other woman. Something that many women don't like is for their sexual adventures to be known.

 

 

For several reasons, like they don't want their reputation to get damaged, they don't want people to think they're easy, and they don't wany wayward men who happen to hear what she did, think they have a shot with her, and then to go on to harass her, like it happens with many women.

[Malin889]

When you are saying your “family”, do you mean a wife/kids or are you talking about your parents, etc?

[tokidoki]

Haha! My parents and siblings. I’m not talking about an extramarital affair here!!

[smackie9]

if you want to date this girl, just talk to her about it. If you show that you are considering her feelings about this and want to give it another try, that frost will lift.

[tokidoki]

i want to do that but girls have a tendency to interpret trying to talk to them as overbearing and clingy. I’ll be both arrogant AND insecure in her eyes, then.

[Saracena]

How exactly did you ask for the date? As personally I can't see why she would be put off by your request to keep the night free (that is unless she's one of those very 'touchy' kind of people who IMO are hard work!) so this combined with her response to your offer, makes me wonder if something else is at play here ie something that happened before you set off on holiday, which she's annoyed about. However, she does nonetheless, appear to be taking it a bit too far, which would be a bit of a red flag for me!

 

Exactly, what is your dating 'history' so far? Did you actually plan dates in advance before or were these all accidental ones on your nights out? Of course her attitude now may also be due to a combination of your actions so far and the text message that time, which sounds the most likely scenario, to me.

[tokidoki]

Good question. We first spoke on a friday night work drinks and she was putting herself near me a lot, touching me a lot and generally being very flirty. I could tell she was interested in me a bit.

 

The following week we had a similar thing, I don’t remember much about it but she told me that i’d said ‘look we’ve been vibing for a while, maybe we should have a kiss’, she laughed and stormed off saying ‘no of course i’m not gona give you a kiss!!’, but we got the same bus home and hooked up. It got a little frisky, but we were both v drunk so no harm done.

 

We chatted a lot and flirted a lot over the next week and we later met up at a birthday thing in the park, we had a chat about being confident and self assured and how I could initially just tell from body language that she was in to me (I don’t think its uncommon). At one stage she said ‘you haven’t taken me on a date yet’ so I said ‘well now i can’t ask because it’ll look like i’m only asking cos you want me to!’ (Jokingly) we walked home and kissed some more, and then parted ways. When I got back to my house i texted her ‘safe flight! [this date], keep it free - date night!’. And she said ‘haha! We’ll see’. Those are pretty much the only texts. I spoke to my mate’s gf and she said ‘you don’t want to seem too keen, so just let her enjoy her holiday, enjoy yours and chat when you get back, which i thought was sound advice, so I followed it.

 

I do feel like she has read too deeply into things i’ve said, or that maybe she has a hyperaensitivity to being told what to do residual from a previous relationship. As i said, passive aggressive behaviour is a big big red flag for me, ironically due to past relationships.

[Larry56]

I think it's more down to:

 

This chick wasn't serious to begin with...you didn't tick enough boxes in the boyfriend department.

 

When a girl is testing you hardcore from the beginning..it's usually down to you not ticking enough boxes (sorry).

 

Anyone who says when you try set a date at a specific time "Haha..we'll see"

That's too vague of an answer. When it comes to women. There are no maybes. Only yes and no.

Maybe = I have other options but I'll keep you in mind.

 

Just a question.

 

You said she was acting passive-aggressive in front of other people around you? But she was acting flirty and nice when you two were alone. Would you describe that as correct in your assessment?

[tokidoki]

Yeah i thought it was too vague of an answer which is kinda why I didn’t respond to it or text her while i was away. Didn’t really phase me and it was a bit of a red flag. Very gamesy, if you get what i mean. I do think she’s very touchy as well. Definitely not compatible personalities.

[tokidoki]

And no she has been passive aggressive towards me at virtually every opportunity since. If its with people, she’ll cut me down or say something disparaging. If we’re alone she’ll be fairly civil, though. I’m always civil and nice to her. Not sure why I’m arrogant, though. She did at one point say ‘i’m not used to not being able to have what i want’... which i kinda took to mean ‘I’m used to being in control when it comes to dating and I don’t feel in control of this situation’. So when she plays hard to get and says ‘we’ll see’, and I say nothing, she is unsuccesfully trying to gain control of the situation and have it on her terms, and in becoming frustrated, tells people that she doesn’t like me because i’m arrogant.

[Saracena]

Reading the run-up to this, I can see Larry's point about not being all in to begin BUT it doesn't explain the subsequent animosity she's demonstrated towards you since you've come back from holiday. If she wasn't interested, she'd have left with as they were. BTW I don't think you've done anything wrong then and certainly don't believe she objected to your suggestion to keep the night free.

 

No, something else is at play here. Now, I'm wondering if she could have heard something about you from work colleagues? Have you dated anyone else at work before, for instance?

[tokidoki]

Yeah I agree. If she wasn’t interested it would be very easy to make an excuse and let me down gently, not just ghost the whole thing and risk looking bitchy. I think my point about control is most likely. I didn’t take the ‘we’ll see’ bait so she got a bit frustrated and has gone cold to punish me, and used a percieved arrogance as an excuse, and told her mates that, when really the reason is, I’m not thecone in control and I can’t take it; i seem more into him than he is into me and i need to change that.

 

Nope, never hooked up with anyone else. I’m quite new there and generally keep myself to myself so no ammo for anyone else to pass on.

[Larry56]

Reading the run-up to this, I can see Larry's point about not being all in to begin BUT it doesn't explain the subsequent animosity she's demonstrated towards you since you've come back from holiday. If she wasn't interested, she'd have left with as they were. BTW I don't think you've done anything wrong then and certainly don't believe she objected to your suggestion to keep the night free.

 

I think it's down to this;

 

She's OK having around him when they are alone. She's catty when they are in public. I think this is down to her not wanting to be seen with him (in a boyfriend/dating context). She likes the attention he was giving her ...and she'll gladly accept that when they are alone...but she doesn't want everyone to know about it which is why she publicly demonstrates her animosity when they are around other people.

 

Don't underestimate the attention factor which feeds into her brain, this is a big one that alot of guys miss...that's like getting a free blowjob from a girl for doing nothing (if you were to look at it from a guys perspective).

[tokidoki]

I appreciate your point of view but for me, that doesn't ring true. I mean, She had me at an arms length for about 6 weeks until I eventually crossed her in the kitchen and said that I thought it was silly to be awkward with each other as, as far as I could tell, neither of us had a gripe with the other. We might as well just be friendly. After that she warmed up a bit but I think that was basically because she read between the lines, i.e. 'whatever you're trying to do here isn't working and you're making yourself look petty and vindictive'.

 

I just think that often, Girls will make a power play like this to feel more in control of the situation. They don't want to feel like they're more into us than we're in to them, so they ice us out and wait for us to come crawling back.

 

I didn't text her when I was away and she (mis)isnterpreted that as disinterest, so she acted cold to draw me back in. The thing she dodn't count on is that for me, game playing like that is a big red flag, so it didn't really work.