why is he so protective of me if he is cheating/browsing for other women?

October 16, 2014

Hello everyone.

I met this guy on a dating site a month ago. We both are 21 years old (seniors in college, graduating this may). We go to different colleges- 3 hours away. However, we are both from NYC, which is how he found me and messaged me on the dating site.

the 2nd day we were speaking we wanted to have a 30 minute phone conversation, but we enjoyed conversing so much it ended up being a 5 hour conversation. He has a lot of qualities I am attracted to. first of all, he calls me every night without me having to ask. Even when he is super busy (his plan is to go to med school), he always calls and multitasks with homework sometimes showing that he loves talking to me. we also skype. also, he is smart, athletic, talented, good-looking (exactly my type), and jewish (I am jewish too). I love how he states his true opinions on things etc. but at the same time he is kind of cocky (he thinks very highly of himself), but not enough to the point where it bothers me.

but i feel that he got "too attached to me too soon". by the 2nd week of talking he already asked me to be his girlfriend BEFORE meeting up in person (skype doesn't really count in my book). i said yes though, because i do really like him. he doesn't like the idea of me hooking up with other guys, which is probably why he asked me to be his girlfriend so soon?

both our schools had a break a week ago so we planned to meet up in nyc (where we are both from). we had a nice time, but i felt he was being a little inappropriate. he was trying to touch me in inappropriate places in the park. it was night time, but still. i kind of let him because it felt good. if i showed more resistance he would have stopped. the day after our date we were still talking and spoke on the phone for 5 hours that night. he was telling me that we should visit each other at our schools and that he wants to hang out thanksgiving, meet my family etc.

i'm going to backtrack and tell you that we both deactivated our dating sites after the 1st week of talking. but we got into a fight the week before we met up in the city. i logged back in to see if he reactivated it and he did, and he was online. i didn't care so much because we were fighting and we haven't gone on an official date yet. so i didnt say anything. but then i noticed a few days after our date in the city, after we got off the phone i logged back in to find him "online" on the dating site. he didnt deactivate it after our official date, which bothered me. (btw i only reactivate it and deactivate it to check on him and see if he's activated, online, etc). i called him and asked him about it and he basically made-up a bs excuse. he also got very defensive.

anyways we are on good terms now and he went back to deactivating his account. i am surprised at myself for not caring more that he reactivated his account and he was online. is it because i'm too infactuated to care? is it because i have low self-esteem? it's just weird because he seems to be protective of me and wants to take it fast with me.

more background info about me: I'm a virgin. I am waiting for someone special. he is not a virgin- he has had 2 girlfriends in the past.

i feel that he may be speaking to another girl, even though when we first started talking i told him i'm looking for something serious and i don't want to be betrayed how i was in the past. and he kept reassuring me that he would never betray or hurt me. he also talks about having sex with me a lot, but he knows i'm a virgin and he wants it to be special with me and wait till i'm ready. even though him and i have only known each other for a month, and only met in person once, we talk so much on the phone that it feels like more.

October 16, 2014

I don't want to be judgemental but EVERYTHING you say here sounds very unhealthy.

You agree to be this guys GF before you ever meet. He immediatly looks for other options after you have one fight.

By your own admission (and your use of the word "inappropriate") you are incredibly inexperienced with relationships yet this guy seems to be moving you into things as fast as he possibly can and calling the shots. He wants to touch you before you're ready and also wants to have other options on the side. It all sounds very predatory. It doesn't sound like he's really a nice guy who is just a bit cocky. It sounds like he's a bit of a narrcisist and is someone who uses others and doesn't feel he has to play fair (hence being over-protective yet still looking at other women).

The fact that he's so willing to jump into a relationship with someone who lives three hours away indicates he still plans to fullfill his relationship needs with people closer when you're not around. That's not to say everyone in an LDR is looking to cheat. It's just that realistic people who have been in relationships don't usually jump into LDRs without a lot of careful thought, a good deal of real dating, and a lot of caution.

he 2nd day we were speaking we wanted to have a 30 minute phone conversation, but we enjoyed conversing so much it ended up being a 5 hour conversation. He has a lot of qualities I am attracted to. first of all, he calls me every night without me having to ask. Even when he is super busy (his plan is to go to med school), he always calls and multitasks with homework sometimes showing that he loves talking to me. we also skype. also, he is smart, athletic, talented, good-looking (exactly my type), and jewish (I am jewish too).

Maybe I'm off but this sentence made me think that you've probably come from a bit of a conservative or over-protective family (along with the fact that you've never been in a relationship). Sounds a bit like you're trying to make sure your first BF is someone your parents would approve of.

I think there's a lot of girls in your position and sadly you're easy pray for certain guys. They also come from semi-conservative backgrounds and feel that they should have a nice jewish/christian/whatever girlfriend who hasn't dated before and is thus pure for them. They rush into these relationships because it's what they're family would like. At the same time, they've gotten used to getting laid a lot so they're likely to cheat when they can.

The EXACT same thing you describe happened to my cousin several years ago (though in her case, she was Christian and Palestinian to boot). She met a guy online who she was happy was also a Christian. She had also never been in a relationship (and was about your age). They started dating really fast and she told him she wasn't ready for sex (and didn't believe in it before marriage). He had previously been with girls but said he was a good Christian now and respected these desires. Shortly afterwards she found him looking for other women online. She confronted him with it and he said he had accidentally forgotten to close his account. Not believing this, she created an alternate account on the dating site (I think eHarmony since this was before the rise of OKC) and started chatting with him. Eventually (under this alias), he asked her for a dinner date. She agreed and showed up at the resturaunt to confront him about trying to cheat on her. He once again claimed he didn't mean to (that it was just hard to go without sex) and promised he would never do it again. Except he did (as we all knew he would); and she finally dumped him.

Bottom line is; don't fall for the first good looking guy who can scoop you up because he's the right type. You're more vunerable than others because you havn't been in a relationship before. You want to find someone who is sincere and willing to let this go at whatever pace you want it to (if you want to jump his bones on the first date that's fine as long as it's what you want). Focus on that and not on some person being the right religion or ethnicity.

I'm Palestinian and my girlfriend is Jewish. In theory, we're as far as humanly possible from the type that our families would approve of. Yet, each of our families have been very encouraging about the relationship once they've met the other because they can see how good we are for each other (though a few distance friends/relatives of hers have suggested she's a race-traitor but she didn't really like those people anyway )

October 16, 2014

but i feel that he got "too attached to me too soon". by the 2nd week of talking he already asked me to be his girlfriend BEFORE meeting up in person (skype doesn't really count in my book).

you are 100% correct on a couple counts. It IS very concerning he is moving so fast. He hadn't even met you or got to know you and was pressuring you to commit to him. This is a trait of narcissists, manipulators, con men, date rapists and abusers.

This is a huge red flag.

You are also correct that electronic communications don't count. Anyone can say anything. Just because someone says it, doesn't make it the least bit true. You don't know that he is really in college, really from NYC, really Jewish or anything. Anyone can say they are in premed. He might be but you haven't cross-checked any of and haven't had any of that substantiated. Nor has he substantiated anything you have said. He knows nothing about you yet he is pressuring you to be his GF.

This means he is either a player that picks up and manipulates women on the internet, or it means he is a complete failure with real women in the real world.

If he was all that, he'd be going out with women in his own town that he knows personally and not pressuring women on the internet that live 3 hours away.

The reason he has to do that is the women that know him in real life won't give him the time of day.

i said yes though, because i do really like him.

you like the image he has portrayed to you on the internet and the image of him you have conjured up in your mind.

If he was that good of a guy, women in his own town would snatch him up and he wouldn't have time to be sky ping for 5 hours a night.

he doesn't like the idea of me hooking up with other guys, which is probably why he asked me to be his girlfriend so soon?

that is called being possessive and controlling and it is a primary characteristic of abusers.

He just me you, he has no right to try to control what you do or who you see. You have only met each other a few hours.

we had a nice time, but i felt he was being a little inappropriate. he was trying to touch me in inappropriate places in the park. it was night time, but still.

so he cops a feel on girls he just met and pressures them to get physical on the first meeting. That is another huge red flag.

I am going to talk about this more but actions speak much much louder than words.

He may talk sweet and say the right words but his actions are he's a park masher.

i kind of let him because it felt good. if i showed more resistance he would have stopped

isn't that the point of resistance and saying no? ....to stop inappropriate behavior and to protect personal boundaries. This is another red flag but it is a red flag for you.

This indicates that you don't have the awareness and street smarts and backbone to stand up for yourself and deal effectively with this type of person. This is what is called "victimology" This indicates the kind of people that people like this pick out of the crowd to mistreat.

. the day after our date we were still talking and spoke on the phone for 5 hours that night. he was telling me that we should visit each other at our schools and that he wants to hang out thanksgiving, meet my family etc.

I am sure you are nice and pretty and all, but do you think this is normal guy behavior and is indicative of how normal, decent guys act after the first date?

i'm going to backtrack and tell you that we both deactivated our dating sites after the 1st week of talking. but we got into a fight the week before we met up in the city. i logged back in to see if he reactivated it and he did, and he was online. i didn't care so much because we were fighting and we haven't gone on an official date yet. so i didnt say anything. but then i noticed a few days after our date in the city, after we got off the phone i logged back in to find him "online" on the dating site. he didnt deactivate it after our official date, which bothered me. (btw i only reactivate it and deactivate it to check on him and see if he's activated, online, etc). i called him and asked him about it and he basically made-up a bs excuse. he also got very defensive.

a couple things wrong with this picture. Neither of you should take yourselves off the market or limit your options over a pen pal. He was in the wrong for pushing for exclusivity in the first place but then he did a double-cross and went back on it and then lied about it and got pissy when was caught and he was called out on it.

There is so much wrong with that I don't have the time to point it all out. I hope you can see the problems there.

anyways we are on good terms now and he went back to deactivating his account. i am surprised at myself for not caring more that he reactivated his account and he was online. is it because i'm too infactuated to care? is it because i have low self-esteem?

I am hoping that is because you are starting to realize he is not what you think he is and have lost interest and just don't care any more.

it's just weird because he seems to be protective of me and wants to take it fast with me.

it's not weird. That is very standard behavior for people who aren't any good. It's very disturbing and concerning but it is not weird at all.

more background info about me: I'm a virgin. I am waiting for someone special. he is not a virgin- he has had 2 girlfriends in the past.

this means you don't have the sophistication and street smarts to identify bad people and deal effectively with this type of situation yet. You are out of your element here. This is not a guy in your league.

i feel that he may be speaking to another girl, even though when we first started talking i told him i'm looking for something serious and i don't want to be betrayed how i was in the past. and he kept reassuring me that he would never betray or hurt me.

you have only known each other a few hours. Neither of you have the right to ask for nor promise any kind of future or any kind of commitment.

he also talks about having sex with me a lot, but he knows i'm a virgin and he wants it to be special with me and wait till i'm ready.

actions speak louder than words. This is very important. Anyone can say anything but words mean nothing. Actions mean everything. His actions were molesting a girl in the park he had just met and pressuring her to get involved with him faster than she was comfortable with. His words are hollow.

Anrapist can tell his victim he will wait and be special while he is raping her. Which counts, the words or the rape?????.

even though him and i have only known each other for a month, and only met in person once, we talk so much on the phone that it feels like more

once again, you are correct. It does FEEL LIKE IT IS MORE. But it still doesn't count and it still isn't for real because you have only known each other a few hours and you don't know anything about each other in real life..

Some responses to your situation above.

October 16, 2014

i understand what you are saying and where you are coming from. thanks for the advice!

there is one thing you are wrong about though. i know he goes to cornell, he's a biochemistry major, he is also a tutor at the school. i have googled him and everything. i deactivated my facebook in May (before i met him), and he told me a few weeks ago he wishes i could reactivate it so we can become official on facebook. he also wants to visit each other's schools and he wants me to meet his friends. his last relationship lasted for 8 months and he met this girl in person on a trip to israel. i have ways of knowing.

does the fact that i know all of this make the situation any better? i don't want to throw someone away who i like talking to and who i'm really attracted to.

October 16, 2014