Left on read....did I bring this on myself?

[TheBlingRing14]

I think I might be getting the cold shoulder, and worse....I think it might be my fault. Even if unintentional. 

So I met a guy on Hinge. We clicked pretty well, and pretty quickly fell into an easy flow with each other. Which led to him asking when he could see me. Hurray. So, we made plans for a date for this coming weekend. Great. 

Last night, we were texting, and the last thing he told me was how excited he was for date. I responded that I was as well. 

Fast forward to this morning. He texted me that he was done with work, good morning, etc. But, today was crazy busy for me, I was swamped, so I didn't get a chance to look at my messages till lunch. When I did, I replied that I was sorry for the delay, work was crazy busy. He responded relatively quickly, maybe 8-10 minutes later. But, by that point, I was back to work. I did briefly see that I had new messages when I was looking at my phone for my Authenticator app. But, I didn't open any messages. In hindsight, maybe I should have opened the message and replied. But...I was swamped. 

Side note: neither of these texts showed as new messages.....even though I hadn't opened them yet. So, I am not sure if they showed as opened or Read on his end. 

So....as soon as work was done for the day, I shot him a text, let him know it wasn't a bad day (he had asked), just a busy day. 

Then....crickets. 

I didn't hear anything all night, still haven't. Going on almost 5 hours. He's usually pretty prompt on texts. So, at 2 hours, it was strange. At 5 hours, it feels like something is wrong, at this point. Don't get me wrong....there are any number of reasonable explanations. But, my gut instinct tells me it has something to do with our contact throughout the day....or lack thereof. I do want to point out that he did not text me while he was at work.....nor would I ever expect him to. And if I did message him during work hours, I would not expect to hear anything back until after work. 

So the latest update: my texts finally moved from delivered to "Read." This was about 45 minutes ago. So, if it didn't feel intentional before....it definitely does now. 

I don't appear to have been blocked (yet). Should I give it another day? Should I just check in maybe Thursday to confirm the date? Should I apologize? 

[Gebidozo]

Apologize for what?

You were busy and you replied when you could reply and when you wanted to reply.

If he gives you cold shoulder because he can’t handle a text reply delay within the same day (!), I don’t think he’s worth pursuing.

Frankly, I think it is insane how impatient some people appear to be regarding text messages.

Edited Wednesday at 01:53 AM by Gebidozo

[Sony12]

It's extremely common for people to go poof when doing online dating. It happens to everyone. It doesn't sound like you two ever met in person so he probably just got cold feet and decided he didn't want to put forth the effort.

It would be nice if people let you know but going poof instead is extremely common.

It's likely nothing you did or didn't do. He likely was just on the fence the entire time.

Edited Wednesday at 03:20 AM by Sony12

[ExpatInItaly]

You're really overthinking this.

If he is a reasonable person, he will understand that we can't always promptly reply when at work. If he is upset about that, then it would be my evidence that this isn't the guy for me as that would tell me is not a reasomable person. I would not be able to date someone who is that demanding of my time and attention. 

Are you generally a very anxious person? I think you are unecessarily stressing yourself out over how long it took him to read your message. Do you usually count the hours like that? 

[Acacia98]

OP, give it some time. It's too early to start jumping to conclusions. 

If it turns out you're right, then be glad that he's shown this side of himself while it's still early days. Trust me when I say you don't want to be in a relationship with an unreasonable person who gets offended easily.

Edited Wednesday at 06:55 AM by Acacia98

[MsJayne]

He's playing the I'm-Super-Busy-Too game. He's butt-hurt that you didn't respond for hours so he's pretending that he's got so much happening that he hasn't had time to respond. I'm guessing you'll hear from him soon enough and he'll tell you how busy he was because he's afraid of appearing needy. People who get upset if you don't respond to casual texts within a certain time frame are needy. Different if they've asked a question which requires a prompt reply or if it's someone you're close to and you have an established pattern, but for casual conversation with someone you're unfamiliar with take it as a possible negative. 

[Els]

No reasonable person expects a working adult to respond to non-emergency messages while at work. I think you're internalizing this way too much (which probably ties into the self-esteem issues that people have talked about in your other threads). 

[Sanch62]

Anyone who is healthy and reasonable can appreciate lags in responses as part of life. They also probably wouldn't be in constant messaging-mode with someone they have never even met yet, either.

If someone is micro-focusd on response times, then that already tells you your life would be a living hell trying to cater to that person all the time.

Chill. If he doesn't contact you early enough to confirm your date, I'd ask him whether or not you're still meeting. If no response, then consider yourself as dodging a bullet.

[Gina2005]

You shouldn't get too worried.

 

If he gets mad because you are busy, and tries to play this "now I'm busy too" you should take that as a warning sign and consider yourself lucky that you noticed this early how he behaves when he doesn't get his way.

If he really is busy as you are, then he'll  get back to you when he can, and most of all, he will understand that you can't always reply inmediatly to his messages.

[ShyViolet]

I think you are getting really carried away with the obsessing over how long it took either of you to respond to texts (when it's only a matter of hours, still the same day!). This is pretty ridiculous.  If he truly would lose interest in you just for taking a few hours to respond to a text, on a particularly busy work day, then let him go because that is truly unreasonable and absurd.  We are not all sitting on our phones at all times, waiting to respond to people's texts immediately.

[TheBlingRing14]

18 hours ago, Sony12 said:

It's extremely common for people to go poof when doing online dating. It happens to everyone. It doesn't sound like you two ever met in person so he probably just got cold feet and decided he didn't want to put forth the effort.

It would be nice if people let you know but going poof instead is extremely common.

It's likely nothing you did or didn't do. He likely was just on the fence the entire time.

 

13 hours ago, MsJayne said:

He's playing the I'm-Super-Busy-Too game. He's butt-hurt that you didn't respond for hours so he's pretending that he's got so much happening that he hasn't had time to respond. I'm guessing you'll hear from him soon enough and he'll tell you how busy he was because he's afraid of appearing needy. People who get upset if you don't respond to casual texts within a certain time frame are needy. Different if they've asked a question which requires a prompt reply or if it's someone you're close to and you have an established pattern, but for casual conversation with someone you're unfamiliar with take it as a possible negative. 

 

I think both of these are legitimately possible things. 

 

I am not discounting Option 1, but I guess I have been around long enough, and poofed enough times.....more than any one person should be poofed...that I know the warning signs. I know the vibe. The guy feels generally low effort. It feels like I am doing a lot of the heavy lifting, that I am the one pushing things forward. I can usually tell when guys are "on the fence," as you put it. 

Up until this point, this has not been that. Bear in mind, the last message he sent the night before was "I'm so excited for our date this weekend!" Then, he wished me a good morning with some nice pleasantries. And, even at lunch time, he expressed concern that I was having a hard day. So....he was not acting differently at all. 

So...for a guy to exhibit interest, to be the one initiating. To be the one to ask me out....it's a very different feel to it. Which makes the turn feel that much more drastic. 

 

 

As to the second....so, I did wish him good morning yesterday. He did respond eventually, and the response was that he had been sooooo tired, that work had been rough. I immediately thought of your comment. It felt exactly like that. In my mind, I was like....ohhhhh, okay. I replied, and then, he said he was going to take a little bit of a nap. I wished him well, and got on with my day. 

I didn't hear from him the rest of the day, and he didn't read my reply until several hours later. 

 

Anyway, I don't believe in coincidences. Is it possible that his fading away and acting differently coincided with my being unavailable and less responsive.....for ONE day? Sure...I suppose it's possible. Correlation, not causation.    But, as someone who doesn't believe in coincidences....the timing definitely raises my suspicions. 

 

Anyway....his behavior 2 days ago and yesterday I think could be go either way. Not sure...

 

[Sony12]

15 minutes ago, TheBlingRing14 said:

 

 

I think both of these are legitimately possible things. 

 

I am not discounting Option 1, but I guess I have been around long enough, and poofed enough times.....more than any one person should be poofed...that I know the warning signs. I know the vibe. The guy feels generally low effort. It feels like I am doing a lot of the heavy lifting, that I am the one pushing things forward. I can usually tell when guys are "on the fence," as you put it. 

Up until this point, this has not been that. Bear in mind, the last message he sent the night before was "I'm so excited for our date this weekend!" Then, he wished me a good morning with some nice pleasantries. And, even at lunch time, he expressed concern that I was having a hard day. So....he was not acting differently at all. 

So...for a guy to exhibit interest, to be the one initiating. To be the one to ask me out....it's a very different feel to it. Which makes the turn feel that much more drastic. 

 

 

As to the second....so, I did wish him good morning yesterday. He did respond eventually, and the response was that he had been sooooo tired, that work had been rough. I immediately thought of your comment. It felt exactly like that. In my mind, I was like....ohhhhh, okay. I replied, and then, he said he was going to take a little bit of a nap. I wished him well, and got on with my day. 

I didn't hear from him the rest of the day, and he didn't read my reply until several hours later. 

 

Anyway, I don't believe in coincidences. Is it possible that his fading away and acting differently coincided with my being unavailable and less responsive.....for ONE day? Sure...I suppose it's possible. Correlation, not causation.    But, as someone who doesn't believe in coincidences....the timing definitely raises my suspicions. 

 

Anyway....his behavior 2 days ago and yesterday I think could be go either way. Not sure...

 

His fading away and acting differently coincided with him having to soon put forth the effort to actually meet a date.

Flaking around the time of the first date is one of the most common times for people to flake. Stop beating yourself up over it. It's likely that no matter what you did or said he would have found a reason to lose interest around the time he was about to meet you. Chances are also likely that this is a bit of a habit for him. He acts really interested until the time when things start getting more real. He starts asking himself at that point if he really wants to do this.

Edited Thursday at 11:35 AM by Sony12

[MsJayne]

9 hours ago, TheBlingRing14 said:

 Anyway, I don't believe in coincidences. Is it possible that his fading away and acting differently coincided with my being unavailable and less responsive.....for ONE day? 

Yes. Looking at it from another angle, he could be a guy who’s experienced a lot of knock backs, ghosting, etc, the same sh***y treatment that most people get through online dating, and so he’s become jaded and immediately lowers the effort if someone appears to be withdrawing. 

[Sanch62]

13 hours ago, TheBlingRing14 said:

But, as someone who doesn't believe in coincidences....the timing definitely raises my suspicions. 

Anyway....his behavior 2 days ago and yesterday I think could be go either way. Not sure...

Respectfully, this all sounds like you're spinning your wheels. Once I set up a first meet, I'm not focused on tracking the guy's interest level. If he reaches out, great, if not, I'm busy living my life. Either we confirm before meeting, or we don't, and I just show up anyway. If I'm stood up, I've caught up on my reading on my phone and I take my coffee with me--it's no skin off my back. I'll just meet the next one I've set up.

Too much investment prior to meeting is an energy waster. You don't need to figure anyone out. Just let them show you who they are.

[ShyViolet]

15 hours ago, TheBlingRing14 said:

Anyway, I don't believe in coincidences. Is it possible that his fading away and acting differently coincided with my being unavailable and less responsive.....for ONE day? Sure...I suppose it's possible. Correlation, not causation.    But, as someone who doesn't believe in coincidences....the timing definitely raises my suspicions. 

You are spending way too much time obsessing over the interest level of a guy you've never actually met in person.  It's like you are analyzing his texting behavior hour by hour.  He is not worth all this energy at this point.  Just see if he shows up to that date.  I'd text him the day before, saying "Looking forward to meeting tomorrow" to make sure he still replies to confirm.  And then see how the date goes.  All this analysis of whether he texts or doesn't text... it's really over the top and overly anxious.  You really need to relax.  If he shows up to the date then great.  Only then you will really find out whether there is chemistry here.