Things have been progressing well with “Man Candy”. He’s a unique man because he hasn’t pressured
me to have sex with him, we talk (not text) a lot and it seems like we are both
looking for the same things. From early on, although the attraction was
strong, we agreed not to rush into sex.
The monumental third date came and went without knocking boots and
things were going along at a great pace.
We ended the night with a hot and heavy public makeout session against my car, goodbyes were exchanged but no clothing was removed.
After the first few dates went well, I breathed a huge sigh
of relief, we were falling into a rhythm of him calling me every night, texting
me first thing every morning, some kind of weekend plans assumed. We had fun on our dates and we genuinely
enjoyed our time together.
This would now be our fifth date, I had an empty home for
the evening and we made plans to finally spend private time together. I was looking forward to having some quiet
time with him and having him in my home.
My stomach and my nerves weren’t as happy about tonight as
my mood. All day at work my stomach was
tied up in knots and I felt nervous thinking of the possibility of him seeing
me naked for the first time. Gulp.
To only add more pressure, he is a lifelong athlete and
works out regularly. I’m neither of those, yet he is attracted to curvy women
and I’m working on… how shall I say this… um… smoothing out the curves a
little? Yes, perfect. I’m on a little diet, and trying to lose
a few here and there (but not there... ;).
My ex played the spoiler when he was being stubborn about
picking up our son on time. He seemed
to always sense when to pull off a move like this and his timing was perfect to
make the night more complicated.
As I was doing the mad dash to hide sneakers, errant school
books and run the vacuum, I thought a lot about how easy it has been being with
“Man Candy” and how he has seemed interested since day one and not given me
reason to doubt that. He has been
somewhat concerned about the amount of time that I have to work and not being
able to spend a lot of time together because of it. We haven’t had one minute of drama or even
anger in the four weeks we’ve been together.
It’s just been so easy.
He seems happy, there have been no “L” bombs dropped (Love)
and I’m not sure I’m feeling it, just yet.
I’m convinced I could without too much but I’m trying to contain my
emotions for the moment. I definitely
feel attached to him and I look forward to hearing his voice every night, and
when we do say goodnight on the phone, I have to concentrate to NOT say “I love
you” because it feels like it could slip out.
Our experiences with dating have been similar, he’s been
dating about 7 years just like me and although we haven’t traded a lot of war
stories, we have talked about how hard it has been. He told me that he’s changed his
expectations of finding a perfect woman and has more realistic expectations
now. Enter me and my many
imperfections…
Earlier this week, he casually brought up how excited his
son was to meet me, that he’s told him about me and I’m stunned. It feels like a big step, but things have
been moving so smoothly that it feels right.
This is a big deal to me and makes me feel more confident that he’s sees
us working.
Tonight’s date feels like a step forward, a big one and I’m
admittedly scared and texted him so during the day as we were finalizing our
night’s plans. He comforts me, but my
mind flashes to thinking of everything I have to get done when I get home and
getting showered and ready for him.
The time went fast and I was going to just have to rush
through my makeup and hair. The phone
rang and he told me he was at the exit and would just be a few minutes. Once I heard his voice, I felt relieved but
had a lot to do.
I threw on some jeans, heels and a sexy blouse. After, I lit a few candles around the house,
put some ice in glasses and had a quick drink, the doorbell rang. I opened the door and he just smiled at me
and came inside. He swept his arms
tightly around me and kissed me hard. He
held my face in his hands as his mouth covered mine. We
shared several long kisses before I stopped him and took him by the hand and
led him into the kitchen for a drink.
He helped himself and made drinks for both of us which we
took to the family room and sat together on the couch. It was like our nightly routine of catching
up about our days, except we were face to face, his arm around me and my legs
draped over his.
I was intentionally casual, not fussing too much and just
trying to make him feel like he was at home.
It was easy being together and we were comfortable just hanging out,
watching tv.
Moments of hot and heavy making out were contrasted with moments
of handholding or snuggling on the couch.
The night was what I wanted it to be, casual, romantic and
passionate. It was comfortable having him here and he made
himself at home right away.
When it was time to go to bed, it felt like going to bed for
the hundredth time together, not the first.
After brushing teeth, we turned down the bed and kissed goodnight. As we were kissing, his hands and mouth
moved over my body and mine over his. We
made passionate love and were both satiated and fell asleep in each other’s
arms. It was perfect and it felt good to make our
couple status "official".
It wasn’t a restful night’s sleep for either one of us, he
had a lingering cough and I had trouble sleeping the night through, for some
reason. We kissed a lot in the
morning, the smell of coffee and bacon setting the scene for a cozy start of
the day.
He seemed a little cranky which I attributed to not feeling
well. He made comments about my
suburban neighborhood and how boring it was and poked at me for a picture
hanging a little crooked on my wall. He
seemed a little off and I didn’t make too much of it.
We talked for a few minutes and his tone was unusually serious
when we talked. He asked a lot of
questions about how much I work and seemed a little concerned. He seemed satisfied with my answers, and
headed off to pick up his son, kissing me as he left.
Through the morning, I couldn’t wipe off the smile on my
face, it seemed right that we waited to take this step together. Warm and fuzzy thoughts of our future and us
spending time together came to mind as hope started to seep into my heart. For the first time since I met him, I felt
like I could love him and that we were off to a good start.
During the day, I texted him a couple of times and didn’t
get answers back quickly. Although this
was odd, I wasn’t too alarmed. I was
still replaying the night before in my mind and catching myself grinning. After a few hours of still not hearing from
him, I texted him asking him directly what was wrong. My phone rang instantly with his call and I
pulled over to take his call.
I was stunned to hear what he had to say. He expressed serious concerns about how much
I work and that my life doesn’t have a good balance. For the first time, we addressed a lot of
the challenges I’ve been facing recently with my ex not working and how I feel
so much stress to work extra hard. I
told him about my blog for the first time and how much it matters to me, how
much time I put into it and why and how it was a part of my dream. He asked a lot of questions and seemed to
process the conversation from every angle.
My mouth dropped open wide when he revealed that he didn’t
know if he saw us being together based on all of this. I shared my thoughts but wasn’t going to
plead. I told him I was willing to make
some changes but there were some that were outside of my control at the
moment. I explained that I love what I
do and I’m a part of building a small company.
As we talked I suggested a compromise that I cut out the extraneous
projects I do on the side. He seemed
somewhat appeased but still held on to being skeptical.
He mentioned that he felt that things seemed to be moving fast all of a sudden and I immediately objected that he would say that since he was mostly the one setting the pace.
We’ve talked since and traded some texts and have decided to
not see each other, at least for now. I’m
not one to go back to an ex, so I don’t see being together down the road. I’ve told him that this is a temporary time
of my life and he is being impatient and unfair with this decision. He acknowledges it and has said that it’s
very likely that he will regret letting me go.
He told me all along that he hasn’t met a woman that cared
about him as much as me in a very long time, and he said it again. However, he didn’t see a future together and
we should say goodbye. We didn’t fight, had no drama saying goodbye, we respect
each other a lot and knew we were both hurting.
I’ve had a few days to process this and it still doesn’t add
up to anything other than fear on his part. I miss him terribly every day at 10:00, which
was when he called me and I feel a huge loss.
The frustrating part is that I’ve made the mistake to be sexual with
someone too quickly and it blew up in my face, and this time I did things right
with the same result.
I guess the only thing that is remotely a good outcome from
this is that for the first time I was somehow able to hold onto my heart and
not fall deeply in love. I suppose those
scars I’ve accumulated are good for something.
Ironically, a couple of days ago, I signed up for a new dating
site and it sent me a handful of people it thought I’d be compatible with, “Man
Candy” was one of them. I’m sure that
he received it too and I wondered how he felt about seeing how much we were
alike.
I’m trying hard to let him go, it’s been impossible to sleep
through the night and I keep checking my phone for texts that aren’t there. My workload is getting better but we have a
lot of extremely important negotiations right now. It’s just too bad that he couldn’t be a
little more patient and support me until things calm down. So,
my yummy “Man Candy” snack is now just a memory and hopefully in time,
recalling him will be sweet, but for today it’s not.
Thanks for reading and for your support.
Smooches,
The Single Mom
