She Told Me She's Not Emotionally Ready After 3 Months of Great Connection—What Happened?

[Jonny1793123]

I’ve been talking to and seeing this girl for about three months now. We are long distance only a few hours away. We’ve known each other for eight years, so we already had a solid foundation as friends before things became romantic. She got out of a 4-year relationship last year mid year, which I knew about from the start. I was understanding of her situation and didn’t push anything too fast.

Here’s the timeline and key points to give you some context

**The Connection:** We’ve been communicating daily since reconnecting. She initiated most of the conversations, and I felt like she was genuinely into me. After our first two dates, the communication got even better—more detailed and consistent. I stayed confident and not overly clingy.

**The Dates:** Each of our dates went really well. She even complimented me multiple times on the second date and said things like, “What you’re looking for in a relationship is exactly what I want too.” We kissed several times on the second date, and I left feeling like things were heading in the right direction

**New Year’s Eve:** Our most recent date was on New Year’s Eve. I drove up to see her, and we had an amazing night. We went to dinner, met her friends (who all said they liked me), and spent the night kissing and acting like a couple. She was very affectionate and told me how much she liked where things were going with us. At the end of the night, I slept over at her place, but we didn’t have sex due to her period. She brought this up early in the night, saying she wanted to be upfront about it, and even said she wanted our first time to be special. I was completely fine with that. We kissed a lot, and she was affectionate in bed. The next morning, everything seemed fine—she wasn’t rushing me out, and she texted me later to check if I got home safely.

**The Shift:** After New Year’s, something changed. She became more distant—taking longer to respond, sending lower-effort messages, and sometimes not replying at all. This was a huge shift from how things had been before. I started overthinking, wondering if I did something wrong on New Year’s Eve. Did I come on too strong? Was I too affectionate in bed?

**Her Explanation:** After a few days of this behavior, I called her to get clarity. She told me she wasn’t emotionally ready for a relationship and felt like she couldn’t give me what I deserved. She said she really liked me but couldn’t commit because of where she’s at emotionally after her last relationship. She also said she’s not seeing or talking to anyone else and that this has nothing to do with me.

**My Questions:**

* **What do you think happened?** Everything seemed so consistent up until New Year’s Eve. Could something I did that night have caused her to pull back? Or is it truly about her emotional unreadiness, as she says?
* **Is she lying to me?** I can’t tell if “not emotionally ready” is just an excuse or if she genuinely means it. I feel like if not emotionally ready was the truth, it would've came up way earlier.
* **Did I move too fast?** Should I have taken a lighter approach on New Year’s Eve? I feel like my actions might have unintentionally pushed her too far.
* **What’s your take on this situation?** I’m trying to understand if this is something I could have handled differently or if her emotional state was always going to cause her to pull back, no matter what.

Any insights are appreciated. I’m struggling to make sense of this, and I really want to know if I could have done something differently or if this was out of my control.

[Gebidozo]

6 hours ago, Jonny1793123 said:

I feel like if not emotionally ready was the truth, it would've came up way earlier.

I agree. Unfortunately, the most probable theory is that something turned her off during that quasi-sexual experience on New Year’s Eve. From your description, it’s hard to understand what exactly you did. Did she expressed dislike of something you attempted during that night? Did she say something then?

[Jonny1793123]

1 hour ago, Gebidozo said:

I agree. Unfortunately, the most probable theory is that something turned her off during that quasi-sexual experience on New Year’s Eve. From your description, it’s hard to understand what exactly you did. Did she expressed dislike of something you attempted during that night? Did she say something then?

No we made out for a while and she even expressed how she wishes she wasn’t on her period. Plus, I laid around with her for hours the next morning and we even got breakfast together. She was in no rush to kick me out. I would think if something bad happened she would’ve had an excuse to get me out in the morning early.

[NuevoYorko]

I can believe that she's being honest; however "not quite feeling it" might be the exact same thing as "not emotionally ready."

It sounds like you two had a very nice thing going and your relationship was progressing, but then, as it alway happens, it came to the "go forward or terminate" moment and when she reflected upon it, she was not ready to go forward.  Maybe the NYE makeout session was not quite right.  I'm sorry but you'll probably never know about that.

How many times did you go out?

[flitzanu]

the advice not being given here, is don't beg or question her.  consider it a done decision that she's basically breaking up with you, and don't try to "be friends" because that's not what you want and not going to work.  

it may be nothing you did, just that as Nuevo noted, enough time passed for the "is this going to work or not" phase and she doesn't feel it working, so she's ending it so she doesn't drag it out any longer.

regardless, she's ending it, so i'd suggest taking steps to accept that as in deleting/blocking contacts and not sticking around to be "friends"

 

[Jonny1793123]

25 minutes ago, NuevoYorko said:

I can believe that she's being honest; however "not quite feeling it" might be the exact same thing as "not emotionally ready."

It sounds like you two had a very nice thing going and your relationship was progressing, but then, as it alway happens, it came to the "go forward or terminate" moment and when she reflected upon it, she was not ready to go forward.  Maybe the NYE makeout session was not quite right.  I'm sorry but you'll probably never know about that.

How many times did you go out?

We went out 3 times including NYE. We live hours from each other but talked everyday. All of which she initiated daily. I only texted her first to set up plans.

[ExpatInItaly]

Maybe her ex came back or she's also been seeing someone else. 

[NuevoYorko]

I'm sorry,  I know you're feeling hurt and disappointed.   3 dates is not a long time - but it's enough time for someone to know that it's not "right" for them.  The reasons really don't matter.  

The distance definitely was not a positive.   Three dates over a 3 month period is pretty sparse.   Texting in no way supplants face to face, real life interaction.  Feelings can be a lot different in person from the way they go via text or phone.  

As @flitzanu noted, please just wish her well and move on.  It will actually help you move on if you delete her from your devices.   

[ShyViolet]

10 hours ago, Jonny1793123 said:

* **Is she lying to me?** I can’t tell if “not emotionally ready” is just an excuse or if she genuinely means it. I feel like if not emotionally ready was the truth, it would've came up way earlier.

Honestly, yes.  When people say this, it's usually a BS excuse, an easy way to end a relationship that they are just not into.

We have no idea what really happened, we would only be guessing.  Maybe she realized she is just not that into you, maybe she got turned off by something about you, maybe she simply met someone else or an ex came back into her life.  This doesn't have to mean that you did something "wrong".  Stop racking your brain trying to think of what you did wrong.  There is no point in speculating.  The reason doesn't matter.  This happens in dating all the time.  You have to take it in stride and move on.

[Gebidozo]

6 hours ago, Jonny1793123 said:

No we made out for a while and she even expressed how she wishes she wasn’t on her period. Plus, I laid around with her for hours the next morning and we even got breakfast together. She was in no rush to kick me out. I would think if something bad happened she would’ve had an excuse to get me out in the morning early.

I see. Well, in truth, it could be a myriad of reasons. Maybe someone she’d wanted to date before she met you called her and told her he was willing to try. Maybe she met someone else and felt a strong connection and got confused from that. Maybe there is an ex in the picture. Maybe she had some sort of an epiphany that made her realize she isn’t in the right emotional place for a romance. Maybe something just clicked and she found out she wasn’t as attracted to you as she thought, after all.

The bottom line here is this. A few dates over the course of 3 months is nothing. Anything can happen during this time, anything at all. It is very normal and common that people feel excited at first and then lose interest right about that time. If I were you, I’d stop trying at this point. Don’t be her “friend”. Don’t keep contact with her. And, above all, stop torturing yourself over what you might have done wrong. You haven’t. It just happened for whatever reasons she had, and it’s pointless and painful to try and understand them now. I know it sucks, but you should try to move on.

[Interstellar]

It sounds like you’re the rebound guy. She’s not over this ex yet plus you’re long distance. Heck, she’s probably even still talking to him. Have you considered that? You got two strikes going against you. You should’ve continued seeing other women on the side and not given your heart to this one. Oh well, good lesson to learn for next time.

Anytime a woman wants to yap over the phone just politely tell her to just save it for your date. You gotta be assertive.

Edited January 18 by Interstellar

[BreakOnThrough]

It really doesn't matter, move forward and learn from the experience.