When You Find The Right Person, Titles Won’t Matter

Earlier this year I found myself excitedly diving head first back into the dating pool. Thanks to technology and social media the dating game is a tricky one, it’s hard enough being in a relationship these days but apparently there are now different ways to be single.

Who would have known?

I only ever thought there was two stages in the dating game. Single or in a relationship. Apparently I was wrong. Since I found myself single, well I done what most single girls do. No, no, not cry myself to sleep and browse for cats online while eating ice cream. I started well, dating. I met a few nice guys, we went on dates, we kissed, we texted. We were dating right? That’s what single people do? date? Right? Well, Wrong. Apparently things had changed. And oh boy had they changed.

One guy, Ben, wanted us to date exclusively. This shocked me. We’d only know each other for a month or so, surely exclusively meant relationship right? Wrong again. What was the world coming to? In his words, technically I’d be single, but only seeing one guy, (him) and him only seeing me. Yet, we weren’t in a relationship?

How the hell was that supposed to work?

Although he may have been alarmingly handsome and with a cheeky grin, this just wasn’t something I was going to sign up for. It seemed pointless. If he liked me enough to want to date me and only me, liked me enough to not want me to date anyone else but him, surely this meant he liked me enough to be his girlfriend, right?

Yeah you guessed it. WRONG AGAIN.

The entire situation baffled me. Yes, we’d only know each other about 6 weeks, way too soon to be in a full blown, meet the parent’s relationship. But wait, what, he actually wanted me to meet his parents? (What was going on?) His whole family in fact, he wanted me to meet them all at his Dad’s birthday.

Was I missing something? He wanted to introduce me to his family. Be 100% exclusive but the thought of calling me his girlfriend made him cringe? What kind of alien species was he?

The more we talked about the technicalities of the situation, the more we seemed to argue about it. Of course I didn’t want to date anyone but him, I’d know this from our first date, but the thought of someone telling me I couldn’t date other people, yet not willing to step up to the plate and commit to me himself. Well to be honest, sort of just pissed me off. He was not. And I repeat not, going to have his cake and eat it too.

It just didn’t seem fair to me, and the longer he put off wanting to tie me down, well the more I ventured out to play. He got jealous and he tried to play it cool. Well wasn’t this what he wanted? Me to be single? This is what people do Handsome Commitment Fobe Ben. They date, they see what and who else is out there.

Now call me old fashioned but, when shopping for a new car, you test drive a few nice new models, see how they operate, pick your favorite and drive it safely home. I’d done that. I was bored of car shopping. I’d found my dreamy, perfect car, yet he seemed to be stuck test driving the same car, the only car over and over again. He still couldn’t make up his mind weather or not to buy it and bring it home? He disagreed with this theory of course, but this is how it felt to me. And It really, really, hurt my feelings, what was he so unsure about? What about me made him so unsure weather or not to call me his other half?

So I waited. If he wanted to play this game, then bet your bottom dollar I was gonna win. I made it obvious when I went on dates with other guys. Even when he asked not to know to save his feelings, he still managed to find out. I stayed at his house, I messaged other boys from within the comfort of his bedroom and I even met his parents. Yet he still insisted a title meant nothing.

So an ultimatum came. And no, surprisingly it wasn’t from me. He got annoyed with me dating other people and told me I had to make a choice, be exclusive, or else he was going to walk away.

So, what did I do?

Well, I dealt my own cards down on the table and told him, fine. But then it meant that we were together. Months later, finally being able to call him my boyfriend, we still argue over the technicalities of how we, “officially,” got together. But now, looking back, I understand his fear of relationships meant more than he was willing to admit at the time and well, I guess a title doesn’t really mean anything when you’ve found someone you just click with, as long as you are with them and your happy. That’s all that matters, right?