I'll go back many posts to "Historian" - what does your heart/gut (maybe that's the same thing) say?

I married my late husband after about 7 weeks following a blind date - it was just right. I dated other people for eternities (OK, half an eternity) and it wasn't right.

What does your heart/gut say?

I am really glad that you have seen no other signs of excessive drinking and I hope that that continues. I, personally, don't condone drink driving because it only takes once and it might, well really would, be a deal breaker for me. But I understand that I have lost loved ones on the road to drink driving and am biased.

He really is rushing things with all this talk of moving and living together, it has been less than a week of real person to person meeting, you know? But at the same time as Judy says, when it's right it's right.

I REALLY did not mean to insult with that comment about you being naïve and older, the only base of reference I have is my own mother who got divorced and back out on the dating scene and the perceptions of her that I have seen people, both men and women, persume. As I said it was only a question and you and 'Denver' are the only ones that can shed some light on this.

As far as LA goes, I think if you had established, or have, an exclusive dating label then I may be hurt by this. At the same time, I think that you are both adults with full lives and if you felt for any reason that this may be uncomfortable for YOU OR HIM that he should understand and trust that.

MY best advice to you right now is to sit down and be honest with your feelings and see what he is thinking. Speculation breeds uncertainty and craziness. Be honest, it will be better for you both in the long run.

Talaniman Rule- Doesn't matter how intense the feelings, or how much fun you have, never give your heart to someone you don't know well, and thats only after the lust has worn off for you both.

My point is simple, have fun, don't get carried away, and no matter what our ages are, whats the freakin' hurry? Enjoy it for what it is, and don't worry about the rest for now.

Its always so good in the beginning, but the real test is seeing how you get it on when you start getting to know the real person that your talking to. That takes time, ( a few months isn't time, try 6/7 months, at least you should have more facts by then, the more the better. ) so be patient, and pay attention, and enjoy the now.

You don't have to be starry eyed to enjoy yourself, just keep it real, and in perspective, so when you see what you don't like, you can stop, and nip it in the bud.

And contrary to popular belief, 55 is not old, not teen aged mind you, but hardly old. We have plenty of pep left, and the common sense to go with it.

Don't question yourself, but always question him.

Okay. Things have been going really well. He's visited me four times and I am about to go visit him for his birthday and again in a few weeks, my second and third visits. We have definitely had some bumps, but most of the time we are able to resolve things, increasingly without much drama. I invited him to a memorial for a friend and he met a lot of old friends and I was proud to be with him. He has met my kids.

One problem is that his 22-year old daughter seems set on not meeting me.

But last night he casually mentioned that he has still not told his family (father and brothers and cousins) about me. He says that this is because he does not want his aging father to find out that he and his wife were separated four years ago. (She died last summer.) So they all think that he and his wife were living together when she suddenly got sick and died and are treating him like a grieving widower--when in fact, he says, he was finally getting ready to divorce. Also, unclear why it took so long.

This level of deception and omission and lack of dealing with reality (including not getting divorced all those years) is freaking me out. I can't even begin to imagine separating from the father of my kids and not telling anyone in my family.

He says it is because he doesn't want his father to know. But (a) he's already been divorced once before, a short marriage in his 20s and (b) he says his father is losing it anyway and doesn't always remember his own grand daughter.

He is totally sweet to me 99% of the time, interesting and SEEMS to have good values. How can such a great guy do such a bizarre thing?

Update: He just cc'd me on an email telling his brother about me and saying that even though he plans to move to the west coast, he will be spending more time on the east coast in the future helping with his father. Up to now, he hasn't been out there helping at all, although he helps in other ways. It seems like he is guilty about all kinds of things and trying to please everyone. I am wondering how I am going to fit into this family scene long term.

Okay. There's more. I am just so confused today. This weekend is his birthday and he was supposed to come out here, but decided he couldn't, so I said I'd fly to his city, and he was very enthusiastic.

I also had said previously that I wanted to meet some of his friends. He said he would introduce me to "David" and arranged for us to have dinner on Saturday and that he would invite his daughter (who doesn't want to meet me) and David's son who is his daughter's age.

Then his daughter said she was not available then and my boyfriend changed the time and date several times and finally made the party on Tuesday next week after I'm back home. He called me last night to tell me this. I was hurt!

I thought we had a date with David and pointed out that it was almost inevitable that his daughter would not come if I was there. So he called David this morning and persuaded his friend to have dinner with me on Saturday and with his daughter and the son on Tuesday. He also says he does not want to celebrate his birthday with David and me on Saturday. I just feel so weird, like he is just mollifying me since the "real" party is Tuesday. I feel embarrassed to even go meet this guy David now who is giving up two evenings so I won't feel bad.

I feel like the currents here are just so confusing. How do you all read this situation?

Last time I was visiting him, he set up three different times for his daughter to meet me (one for dinner, one for an activity, and one for just 5 minutes) over four days and she canceled each one. She is 22.

I think it wise to not trip over his daughter, she is an adult, and has issues. I don't think you fan the flames with her by force or coercion, just wait until she is ready and not before. This is not something to take personally, or even make a big deal over.

As to his friends, I see no need for a lot of fanfare and planning as its his birthday, a good time and private celebration is really cool, and as with the daughter, I do not see a need to force anything at all, as things will happen in due time.

My whole point is keeping it rather simple without complicating things makes it smoother in the long run, and natural, even though he has met your side of the family already, his seems to be a more complex problem. Given the distance and time constraints, and the unknown quality that you both have to deal with, patients rather than persistence is what I think should be the watch words here.

I think there is always a very real danger of getting out of your own routine during the dating process, that you can be overly accommodating with each other in an effort to please. Especially when he hints of family obligations that will take up a lot of time.

I don't think you're at that point of a true understanding of his ways as of yet to really be able to establish the kinds of communications it takes to keep things going well, but it is also slowing down the whole process for you and that's a good thing.

Sure you want the experience into his life to be as good as the one he has had into yours, but frankly the dynamic is totally different and one that says go slower with eyes open, because there is more there that meets the eye.

I think asking, its about enjoying and getting more facts, than investing more of yourself at this time until you have a lot more facts.

What I see at this point, is you moving a bit faster than him, and moving further along than he is, and maybe you are more skilled in those social types of things, but slow down and see what's going on and recognize you are more invested than he is right now. Balance that a bit and let him come out some so you can see what your getting into without influencing anything.

I guess all that writing comes down to saying he needs to chase more, so you can see deeper into him. Its been 6/7 months? I think you will have to get together to see how long this distance will be between you, before you can actually move forward, or decide the direction to take. If all he wants is a sometime date and pen pal, then if that's okay with you, so be it, but that's not what I am getting from your side.

Asking, I think that one of the issues is the distance. Things seem to be fine when you're talking over the phone and not having to fit into his life, but once you are in HIS environment, it all seems to go slightly pear shaped. Clearly he's having difficulty weaving you into his life.

There are a couple of mildly red flags, and one is that you're very accommodating as well as very keen to see it as a long term relationship, the other is his family.

First it was him being too keen and now it seems to be you. There is a sort of 'push-pull' thing happening here because as you want to get closer to him he's pulling away. Previously, when you were holding back, he wanted to get closer to you.

I question whether he's actually emotionally and physically available for you - east coast, west coast what's it going to be? His daughter may have more influence on his relationship with you than you realize, and there is not much you can do about that!

You don't have the luxury of seeing each other regularly to work through these things naturally so expectations will always be high when you see each other. Additionally, he seems to have a number of skeletons in his closet - I know you've invested time and energy in this guy, but perhaps back off a little?

Wow - a lot to digest!

I wouldn't push to meet his friends; I certainly wouldn't push to meet his daughter. She may very well be grieving; she very well may have met other women and doesn't want to meet one more; she may have some other agenda.

I feel the same way about friends. If you were in the same City I would see it differently but all of this arranging and rearranging simply complicates your relationship with him. I would build a relationship with him and meet his friends when that falls into place.

My bigger concern? Apparently he doesn't tell the truth (I am skirting the word "lies") - to his family, particularly about his status as a widower. I'd be concerned that he also isn't telling the truth to me.

He certainly lost a relationship and a person who was significant in his life. But pretending to be the grieving widower? That's an insult to anyone who has ever been widowed.

I'd back off a little bit.

Thanks, Judy. I am still puzzling over this relationship, which now beginning its 8th month. I guess this is an update and a chance for me to mull things over.

At times it is very good, one of the best I've had, and I am trying to just enjoy the good parts. But I still find a need to keep my distance emotionally at times.

I visited in June and the daughter came to town to visit (she lives 1.5 hours away) and texted her father to leave a piece of her mother's furniture out front of his house for her. She came while we were home but did not come to the door. She texted him later to say he'd left her the wrong thing. I was not comfortable with her coming so far out of her way to not speak to me. It's clear she would normally come in and talk to her father and she avoided us only because I was there. (Also, she visited someone within 30 minutes of me a month ago, even though she lives half a continent away.) I still have not met her.

He says his daughter has only met one other woman he dated. Daughter is almost 23 and as everyone says, it's only been a year since her mother died.

I lost my own mother when I was 14 and was uncomfortable with the girlfriend my father began seeing, but I would never have refused to meet her or socialize. It just seems like basic manners to me. In the end, my father's girlfriend and I became close and maintained a relationship even after she and my father broke up. The hard part was at the beginning which began immediately after my mother died suddenly in an auto accident. In fact, she was the one who told me my mother had died, so there was definitely some tension there.

I feel that things should be a lot different for my boyfriend's daughter. She's older and my boyfriend says he was apart from her mother for about 3 years before she died last year, although, to be honest, I am unclear about the exact timing as he gets vague about that and has given different amounts of time. But at least 2 years. He also says that the mother slept in the same bed with the daughter until the daughter was 10 and that the daughter wouldn't speak to him for most of her early adolescence, only talking to her mother. He says neither of them really talked to him much, which seems strange because he is affectionate and cheerful. Now he and his daughter seem close and he has taken her on several trips in the last year.

He sent me pictures of two of the hotel rooms they stayed in, reminiscing about how beautiful they were, and I was uncomfortable with how romantic they looked. But as has come up in other threads, I can be jealous. I told him in an email that it made me uncomfortable and that I felt he should transfer that romantic impulse to me. He was offended but asked if I would like to take a romantic trip together. I said yes, but he said he could not really afford it now. He suggested a weekend trip that would be as cheap as possible (pretty much the opposite of what he did with his daughter).

I am happy to wait, but it's worth noting that he just inherited half of the value of his wife's house and other assets. He does not share financial information with me, although he described how he had set up a complex arrangement of accounts so that his deceased wife could continue to pay her share of his daughter's education as a "virtual mother." I think this arrangement prevents him from settling the estate, but I have resolved not to ask about it.

I have planned some nice activities when he visits, which we both enjoy, but don't feel like he reciprocates. He has met my friends and family and spends the night when my kids are here--they are 17 and 21 and live with me. I have not met anyone in his family.

When I visit, our activities have included emptying his wife's house of furniture and clothes and walking his wife's dog. This was okay at first, I wanted to help, but I'm ready to move on to our own life together and I don't sense any real progress in that direction. The wife's house is sold and the daughter has the dog, but she leaves the dog with him so often that it's hard for us to plan to visit each other. That is, he can't leave town because of the dog. When I'm there, our days are all structured around the needs of the dog as its diet requires daily shopping and he never leaves the dog alone. (As far as I can tell, it is an ordinary looking healthy older dog.)

Over the weekend, the daughter brought her new boyfriend to meet her father. I found myself actually a little annoyed that she would expect her father to meet her brand new boyfriend when she has refused to meet me for months. But I am trying to be grown up. :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JudyKayTee

My bigger concern? Apparently he doesn't tell the truth (I am skirting the word "lies") - to his family, particularly about his status as a widower. I'd be concerned that he also isn't telling the truth to me.

He certainly lost a relationship and a person who was significant in his life. But pretending to be the grieving widower? That's an insult to anyone who has ever been widowed.

I'd back off a little bit.

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I have reread everyone's great advice. Now seems like a good time to back away.

He didn't exactly lie; but it was the most dramatic omission I've ever encountered personally. He certainly let's people think he's a widower, though he doesn't actually say he is. I found out he has done that with others outside the family as well--some of his clients. I agree with your take and it is only because we get along so well otherwise that we are still a couple. I find I have pulled back since learning about this. At least, he has finally told his family about the lie and about me, or at least he says he has. How would I really know? Once in a while, I wonder if there is anything else like this.

I just read the entire thread and I am wondering why you are putting up with this person (the father not the daughter).

How do you know the daughter doesn't want to meet you? Has she told you that or has it all been from his lips? The same lips that say he hasn't told his family (I'm not buying the cc of the email to the brother) because he doesn't want them to know he wasn't living with his wife when she died. Like his daughter couldn't let that slip (especially if they had been separated for over a year) or that a year later they wouldn't expect him to be dating again.

I think there is a lot more going on and I don't think it has as much to with the daughter or the dog as it does him getting what he wants while stringing you along with just enough line to keep you interested.;

Cat,
Thanks. I've had all these thoughts and more. He says his daughter hardly talks to his side of the family. He says he took her to see them last winter, but he might have told her not to tell them? I never asked that. Would she go along?

I have never spoken to the daughter, although we recently exchanged email--brief, friendly.

I agree that this is about him, not the daughter or the dog.

I have put up with it because 90% of the time he so extremely nice to me and most men I have gone out with have turned out to be angry and rather unkind.

I will admit that I haven't dated in a long time, but I do hope you keep a healthy emotional distance so you can see the red flags waving and be OBJECTIVE with what you are seeing.

After 8 months there should be no doubt that you both are seeing each other for the same reasons, and that may be partially true, as you both fill a gap in each others lives, and while not a bad thing, is hardly enough to build on, because its not equal, or mutually as satisfying, because you have doubts, too many for this stage of the relationship, and maybe your expectations are a bit much to fit his place in life at this time.

Maybe it's the timing, or the way you describe the personal dynamics, but I doubt he has the same intentions as you do, and has other priorities in his life to give you the time and attention you need.

This is more about him, and not his family, nor his daughter, because if that's all it was and he felt as you do then the obstacles would be overcome because you would overcome them together.

The biggest red flag though, is the questions you have that go unasked, and that's a clear lack of proper communications, and I can't tell if its your own fear, or his inability, or unwillingness by you both to put the cards on the table.

I highly recommend you do so, before the attachment gets any further along, if nothing else, just to clear the air.

You can't build anything solid, without eliminating the presuming, assuming, and emotional speculations, fueled by feelings, and no facts.

I think you will see as do I, your in deeper than him already. The distance between you physically doesn't help bridge the emotional, and spiritual distance that has to be closed by honest expressions of your feelings to him.

Not the sloppy love stuff, but enough facts that will show you whether further commitment is worth it, or not, and not just a situation that looks good on paper(?), but without true substance.

Fun is fun, for a diversion from the routine, but a relationship requires a lot more.

Hi Tal,
I really appreciate your thoughts. It's funny you think I'm expecting more than he is, because most of the time it feels like it's the other way around. He is the one who talks a lot about moving to where I live and even getting married. He calls me more than I call him and seems lonely when we don't talk. His days seem a little empty at times, whereas I feel too busy. He talks about helping me with things, but when he's here, it doesn't seem to happen. He does what he wants to do, not what I need done. I admit I don't make demands though.

It is hard to read him sometimes because he emphasizes how serious he is, but then doesn't always follow through on things. Other times, I'm amazed by his energy and ability to see things through.

I don't expect a fancy trip right now, if that's what you mean by expectations, but it bothers me that while he's taken his daughter out of the country twice this year on pretty elaborate trips, our few dates are to the bookstore for coffee or the cheap restaurants he goes to all the time. Most of the time this is fine, but a little romance would be fun. When I tried to organize something special for his birthday, telling him I would pay, he refused to let me take him somewhere nice. I guess, I'm confused by the messages I'm getting.

And I've told him that, but I don't really know what the answer is because I tend to get either 100% resistance or 100% capitulation. When I say, "I am not looking for you to just give in, I want to discuss things for a few minutes and find out how you feel and why, so we can find common ground," he acts like he doesn't understand. And it's not as if he doesn't like to talk and discuss things. We still talk an hour a day or more, so there's plenty of time.

I feel like I've tried to talk to him about nearly all this stuff and sometimes I feel satisfied with his answers, but other times he gives vague unsatisfying answers, or, like I say, just capitulates to the specifics without my knowing why he was resisting something in the first place. It's that "yes dear" syndrome, which leaves me baffled. I don't know what's behind it.

On days like today, the doubts seem to pile up. When he fills up his monthly schedule with dog sitting and says he can't come visit, then I think it's safe to assume I'm not a priority. He wants me to come see him, but I don't really want to fly 1000 miles to help him spoil his deceased wife's dog. And I've told him that in the past, but he somehow seems not to remember that we talked about this. So I'd have to bring it up again and it sounds so petty and selfish to have to say again that I want for us to have some time to play. Plus he's allergic to the dog and can't sleep when the dog is there and gets a little irritable.

I guess, yes, we have different needs at this time. He has said more than once that he wasn't really ready to start dating when he began pursuing me and basically apologized for that--and not because I complained either.

He seems like a genuinely nice person, but I think he often deals with even minor conflict through evasion or simply giving in to whoever pushes hardest. I guess by talking (at such length!) I'm starting to see what you mean about my having more expectations.

And I agree that we should be overcoming the family conflicts together and I don't feel that's happening although I've tried very hard to work with him. We've logged many hours talking about his daughter and her problems. Sometimes we agree on a plan, but then he does something completely different and doesn't tell me until later. I've become so used to this that I've sort of stopped investing in these conversations. I just listen.

I feel that he gets what he wants by a slow process, like water on a stone.

Its really no ones fault when people have a hard time interacting, especially when there is distance involved, and easy to overlook when words, and actions don't match up.

For sure, when you find you can't talk about everything, that's when you pay closer attention.