Dating Anxiety

Why is it that the mere mention of wanting to date me exclusively is enough to send me into a swirling paroxysm of anxiety right now? Or does that have more to do with the people who have recently expressed their desire to do so?

A couple of weeks ago a really sweet, nice and completely incompatible man that I have worked with for several summers sent me an email pouring out his heart to me, and expressing his strong hope that we could take our friendship, which consisted mainly of friendly email banter at work and the occasional visit between offices, to the next level: dating. I freaked out and disappeared. I haven’t spoken to him since, or emailed him a response to that email, despite the fact that I promised him I would. It’s not that I dislike him, he really is very nice, just extremely not my type. A bit of a social misfit, and awkward around me at best I just couldn’t take him on right now.

I want someone that is at ease with me, and I with him and that would not describe our relationship in person. It’s easy to hide behind email and formulate the perfect witty responses and easy banter that we shared, along with a slightly twisted and sarcastic sense of humour. When we did share the occasional inter-office visit to chat and mutually roll our eyes at work conditions, it was fun but there existed an almost palpable awkwardness between us, and not in the fun way that denotes the beginnings of a new and promising relationship. Think junior high school dances of sweaty palms and dancing with two body lengths between each other.

As much as I tried to put him at ease, he just couldn’t completely relax around me. The simple act of patting me on the shoulder in reassurance was stilted and almost robotic when he attempted it. To make matters worse, he was wildly sensitive and irrationally angry at times about things that I would have just let roll off my back. I weathered the brunt of his hypersensitivity a couple of times through email at work and was less than impressed. This fact alone made me afraid of a closer relationship with him, even as friends. Where I am right now in life I do not want a man who is insecure and in constant need of reassurance and babysitting.

In simple terms, I do not want a “fixer-up” relationship, or one where I need to invest more emotionally than I would be getting out of it. I loved, supported, emotionally built-up and was basically the “strong one” for 6 years with Mr. Intellectual. He was demanding at times and very insecure. I was the one who always had to be the strong one, even when I felt like nothing was farther from the truth and it took it’s toll on me. I wasn’t allowed to show my vulnerabilities completely and to this day he still does not know how serious my depression, suicidal ideations and feelings of self-hate were. He couldn’t have handled it, and when I began to show him more of it, he withdrew from me to the point where I had to end the relationship. A relationship with Office Boy would have been even more disastrous since he appears almost perpetually insecure and needy, a fact I will attribute to his tender age of 21. His age was something else that made me uneasy when considering a relationship with him, even though I am only 24, he is not exactly a mature and self-confident 21.

The other man to press for a serious, monogamous relationship is The Fuck Buddy. TFB for a myriad of reasons became TFB because he was unsuitable as relationship material. He insists on calling himself my boyfriend, calling, emailing, saying “I love you” even though I never respond in kind and never will, and generally making himself a pain in the ass lately. He is far too old for this type of behaviour, and should know better - I’m not even close to being the first woman he’s involved himself with in this manner. That’s why he was an appealing choice for me to become TFB. It was supposed to be fun, undemanding and very casual. He has tried to re-negotiate the terms of the arrangement without consulting me in the very least and has displayed a level of selfish inconsideration that makes me very uneasy. He is quickly becoming a loose cannon that I’m at odds with how to appropriately deal with, having never been in this type of situation before.