30 Romcom Moments Men Wish Women Would Stop Expecting IRL

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Men from Ask Reddit explain all the things they wish women would stop expecting from them.

1. Waiting three days before sending a text

“I’m still surprised this was ever a thing. I generally assume if it takes a girl more than 3 hours to respond they’re probably not very interested in me.

Heck, if it takes them 3 days I just assume they’re not even interested in being friends.” — Zerole00

2. Expecting him to chase you

“Believing that I’m not going to give up pursuing you after you reject me once.” — OkayMeng

3. Playing hard to get

“The whole hard to get thing pisses me off… If you are interested, say yes, if not, say no… I am not telepathic…” — WeirdWolfGuy

4. Believing your love will fix him

“Your love/relationship ‘saving/fixing’ him. Even if you could fix Broody McBadboy, then he would lose all of his allure and become just another stable guy. I don’t understand why this even exists.” — hraefin

5. Getting showered in attention

“Be as dedicated to chasing them and flowering them with attention/gift/etc as the underdog in romcoms are. In real life those guys are the niceguys/neckbeards/creepers.” — meeheecaan

6. Confessing feelings to someone who is taken

“Confess your feelings to someone already in a relationship. It seems like a lot of movies I have seen make this seem like the honorable thing to do for some reason, but I’ve never seen it work out irl.” — foogers

7. Testing men

“Stop ‘testing’ people to see if they actually love you.” — goat-of-mendes

8. Lying about being fine

“‘Are you alright?’ In a sad voice she’d say yes. So there’s CLEARLY something wrong and there’s absolutely no way of me knowing what. And she’ll never tell me what’s wrong. Please. Just do. It pains me when there’s something wrong and you don’t tell me.” — Pylomithious

9. Assuming women get to choose when to have sex

“Women don’t get to unilaterally decide things have progressed to the point of sex.

I knew a girl who literally got pissed as fuck cos she spent all this emotional energy working up to the decision to have sex with a guy only to have him be like, ‘uh, maybe another time but I’m not in the mood right now.’

She’d never even considered that would happen.

It’s amazing that he also gets to say no.” — joydivision1234

10. Playing games

“Stop. Playing. Games.

Have I upset you? Is it obvious I’m unaware I’ve upset you? Don’t fucking ignore me for three days until I send ‘is something wrong?’ Just fucking say something. ‘Hey you did this and it upset me.’ ‘Okay I’m sorry, I won’t do it again.’ Boom. Problem solved, no games.

If you don’t fully 100% trust me, break up with me. Don’t play silly games that lead to self fulfilled prophecies. If you can’t fully trust me, I don’t want to date you. Because I know that I’m very loyal and trustworthy to my SOs. I’ve never even cheated emotionally, let alone physically. So do us both a favor, if you don’t trust me, break it off.” — __celli

11. Thinking cheating is okay (if she does it)

“Rom coms perpetuate this idea that cheating on men is perfectly fine just as long as the woman is making some choice who she loves most.

That’s some seriously entitled, self-centered and sociopathic bullshit that needs to stop.” — usernumber36

12. Owning an expensive home

“Holy shit, the ridiculously lavish lifestyles and impossible jobs these people have.

No one is living in a 4000 square foot mansion in Santa Barbara working as a flower shop owner who only works 2 hours a week so the rest of her time can be available for romantic misunderstandings.” — SeaTie

13. Expecting someone else to save you

“If you are in a relationship, no matter how bad, I am going to respect that. I am not going to save you from your asshole boyfriend. Save yourself.” — Scoob1978

14. Expecting him to make the first move

“Seriously, guys don’t NEED to make the first move. It is 2018, I feel like we should all be able to agree on ‘Like someone? Tell them!’ rather than waiting for them to both pick up on AND reciprocate your feelings. That shit is frustrating!

Guys want to be asked for their number too!!! We want to be told we look nice today. But I always see women in rom coms essentially going ‘I REALLY like him, but he doesn’t notice!’  The hell is that bs!

My current gf asked ME out, and I’m still girlishly giggling over how cute that is. Ya’ll gotta start shooting your shots.” — BlackShyGuy68

15. Going on expensive dates

“The whole expensive date or unique date ideas.

I’m a guy, you’re presumably alive, let’s just get some food and watch a movie and walk around the park. I’m not taking you fucking horseback riding or skydiving or whatever the guy making 50K a year but somehow spends 200k in a year without any trouble in the show does for his dates. In the real world, we don’t spend 4x what we earn and y’all are gonna have to accept that.” — Quicksilva94

16. Decorating rooftops

“Decorate the loft building roof with lights and flowers and candles, and have food and drink ready for the magical moment when you emerge onto the roof. Or even to have access to a loft building and its roof. Heck, the last loft building I had access to would fine you $500 for going onto the roof. Romance can happen at ground level, you know.” — masterpososo

17. Thinking crazy is cute

“Thinking that I will find your craziness adorable.” — HoldMyHandMan

18. Expecting an instant connection

“I wish they’d stop expecting an instantaneous two way romantic connection.

Real people and relationships take time to develop. Movies condense this stuff for narrative and time convenience.

I repeatedly see women (and men, but I see this more with women) go out with someone for an hour for coffee and then think, ‘Well, yeah we had a lot in common and they were nice, but I didn’t really feel that spark, so I didn’t see them again.’

No shit you didn’t feel that spark, you are both strangers. You don’t know this person. That’s why you meet up with them in the first place. If you keep waiting for some bolt of lightning to hit you in 5 minutes and tell you that this is totally the person then you will be waiting for a long time because you are taking all the work out of meeting people and demanding it just happen.” — DoubleJumps

19. Thinking love is all that matters

“That loves conquers all.

No, relationships take a lot more than just love, ignoring that is a recipe for disaster.” — BeliefsoverTruth

20. Expecting him to miss you

“Expecting us to constantly express how much we miss them when they go on trips.

Without fail, every time my girlfriend goes out of town on business she starts texting me how much she misses me and starts asking if I miss her. No, I don’t miss you. We haven’t seen each other in 12 hours. This is like every other day. Do I love you? Yes. Do I miss you? No. I’m in my boxers playing Destiny 2 getting high as fuck, trolling your dogs with fake door knocks and enjoying not cleaning up the house.” — buzzfrightyear

21. Having exotic careers

“Stop expecting us to have super-cute, adventurous, or exotic jobs. Vets work a lot and can’t take time off during the day. Mechanics and construction workers are smelly, dirty, and work long hours and may not make a ton of money. Investment bankers and lawyers are generally dicks. A lot of normal guys have normal, boring jobs, but HEY WE STILL HAVE JOBS AND MAKE DECENT MONEY!” — contraphd

22. Making grand gestures as an apology

“Redeeming ourselves with a grand gesture after making you upset.” — mattreyu

23. Dropping everything for her

“Drop everything and save them from their own crappy decision-making.

People who need constant saving don’t deserve anything from other people.” — Xuxa1993

24. Assuming gay men will be your girlfriends

“As a gay men a lot of women think that I am just a woman with a penis. That I will like all the things they do cuz we both like men. I’m sure there are some stereotypes that exist but in general gay men are just dude who also like dudes.” — PEACEMENDER

25. Getting pampered like a princess

“Throwing a childish hissy fit and expecting the guy to pamper you back into a good mood.” — PM_ME_YR_PUFFYNIPS

26. Reading her mind

“Reading their mind. I don’t know how you’re feeling or what you want me to do unless you just tell me. Or I’m really bad at reading people’s faces.” — trainerkevin4

27. Showing up at the airport

“Run through airport security, dodging the security guys, to make a last minute declaration of love before her plane leaves.” — smorgasfjord

28. Cheating on a workaholic

“If I’m working late at this office to pay the mortgage and keep this whole thing going, please do not cheat on me with the artsy barista because he has a nice smile and talks to you.” — ItsJoeyDigs

29. Acting like she is out of his league

“Expecting me to abstractly put myself below her in the relationship. As if i’m the replaceable one that’s ‘punching up,’ and boy ‘how did I ever get her.'” — EnzoScoli

30. Whisking her away on surprise vacations

“Surprise vacations/travel Doesn’t need further explanation.” — JackGaroud