Long story warning:
For a long time I’ve joked about typing up all the ridiculousness that has occurred in my dating life. From the dick pics, to the lies to some crazy first (and singular) dates. Sure there have been good times and relationships that have ended amicably. Those are not what this is about. These stories are everything else. So what finally pushed me to the do it? Who was the final straw that has lead me to telling all? Let’s talk about Jon.
PART 1
Now if you’ve been on dating apps for longer than 48 hours with the goal of meeting guys anywhere between the ages of 20 and 40 you’ll know why this guy stuck out as so rare to me. When I matched with Jon I was at a point of being open to dating with the potential of it eventually being more.
I’d say at least half the guys I match with can’t seem to spell or form a coherent sentence. If they can, it often quickly turns into a parade of dick pics or photo requests. Of the maybe 20% that get past these two factors, there’s overly needy with random aggression, can’t hold a job or lives with their parents, or some other random reason I decide we shouldn’t meet.
I actually paid attention to the numbers at one point. On average, I swipe right on 1 of 30 guys whose profiles I view. Of those I swipe right on, 4 times out of 5 its and instant match with occasional filtering in later. Of those I match with, I end up in conversation with about ¼. In a 6 month period I went on 20 first dates. I was asked on a second date by 19 and actually ended up on 3rd dates with 3 of them. Jon was one of those.
His profile was simple yet clever enough.
Professional
Blue Eyes
6’1”
I have the best dog ever. If you want photos of him you’ll have to ask. (winking emoji)
Between this and something in his smile in his photos, it just caught me. He was mid/late thirties and seemed more put together than so many others. We matched instantly and he messaged me right away.
The conversation was smooth and easy. We talked about our careers, schools, what we liked and disliked about our city (since we’re both not from here). What intrigued me the most was that we also talked about our goals and the fact that he truly had goals with a plan to obtain them. It was a great conversation.
About an hour in he asks me to meet him right then.
Jon: I know it’s fast but do you want to meet
Me: Yes. When?
Jon: Now. It’s only 8 pm
I explain to him that ‘now’ wasn’t good but that I was 100% sure I wanted to meet him. Between our work schedules (we both travel quite a bit) and the fact that he had his daughter every other weekend, the next opportunity to meet was a couple weeks later.
He lives in an area of town about 20 minutes south of me. He asked me to pick a bar and is more than happy to come to my area. I get there first and get a table. Less than 5 minute later he comes in and much to my delight he’s even cuter than his pictures. Bright blue eyes, great smile, and (what I consider) a great 6’1” build with just the right amount of muscle. He looked a lot like Tom Welling in season 3 of Lucifer (If you don’t know who this is, it’s worth looking at).
He seems to reciprocate:
Him: I’m so glad you actually look like your photos (dead serious it’s the first thing he said to me in person)
Me: Haha thanks…I think
After that the conversation in person flows just as easily as it did through messaging. In the blink of an eye, 3 hours and several drinks pass. We decide to head to another bar to shoot some pool. While there we never get to shooting pool. As soon as we sit down at the bar we are holding hands and both seem to be trying to have as much publicly acceptable physical contact as possible without being “that couple”. You know, that annoying couple that can’t keep their hands off each other. I’m really not a fan of PDA, mine or anyone else’s. The couple next to us even comments that we were “an adorable couple”. We finish our 1 drink at that bar and decide to head to my place.
For the second time that night he did not disappoint. The sex was great, except for a ‘glitch’. When things got started I had grabbed a condom and handed it to him.
Him: Do we really need this?
Me: **makes face and points to condom
Him: **puts condom on
Several things happen but the last position puts me in a direction where I’m not facing him. He finishes in that position. That’s when I see it. The condom clearly discarded onto the floor next to the bed.
Me: Is that what I think it is?
Him: Yeah, but it’s no big deal. I trust you. I feel like we don’t need condoms.
Me: I’m not on birth control right now.
Him: WHAT? Why wouldn’t you be on birth control.
Me: I told you to wear the condom.
I’m not sure how, but there was some yelling and eventually me calming down. I agree to stop at the pharmacy in the morning to get a morning after pill and tell him I’ll ‘keep him in the loop’.
I woke up to a sweet message from him the next morning and we continued to chat through out the day.
Somehow I end up getting more angry with time. I did take the morning after pill and in the end everything worked out fine, but the more I thought about the whole situation over the weeks, the angrier I got. I stopped talking to him and even canceled plans a few times. As soon as I got my period I shot him a message to tell him he was in the clear and then deleted him from the app.
I should have left it there.
PART 2
Fast forward about 6 weeks. At this point I’ve talked to others and gone on some more dates. Nothing has really clicked in even remotely the same way.
One night I’m talking to my friends about being done with dating and the apps since everyone just seems so disappointing. A couple of bottles of wine later, I’m stuck on thinking about him and how easy it was with him. Even my travel and work schedule didn’t bother him.
As I drink more wine I get the idea that I want, no I NEED, answers. I look him up on Facebook and decide to send him a message, at 1 am on a Saturday morning. While I don’t recall exact wording the summary was this: How dare you and what were you thinking?
Much to my surprise I woke up to an extensive message from him. Jon apologized and told m that he thought I knew the condom was off. He said I had turned to face him and he thought I had given him the nod and that’s why he took it off.
I spent the next couple days thinking about whether or not I believed him. Then there was the fact that he acted like the whole morning after pill part never even happened.
I message him back and it’s like we jump right back to where we were. We agree to see eachother the next weekend. He tells me he has his daughter but that he could come my direction in the morning for a couple of hours. We can grab some coffee, catch-up, blah, blah, blah.
At this point we resume seeing eachother and the sex is just is good as I remembered it. Better if you consider that the first talk we had was coming to an understanding on the meaning of ‘consent’. No more condom issues.
We still seem to only find one day every other week that works for both of us but I’m actually pretty appreciative of this. It seems to work for both of us. We’ve agreed to keep things casual for right now and I think I’m happy with this situation.
About a month, maybe more, into things again I notice that he’s always more than willing to come to my place and my area of town. I don’t mind it but start finding it odd. Initially he tells me that it’s because I already tend to be on the road plenty for work so he’ll just drive. Also, that way if I want to drink I don’t have to worry about driving and it gives me more time with my dogs and less stress, etc. Additionally, he tells me his housemate is getting worse.
Jon had originally brought up his housemate the first night we were messaging on the app and had even gone into some details about this guy’s autoimmune disease and how he’d lost his job and a whole bunch of other details. He had brought up the housemate a few other times but had cited him as a reason he doesn’t really like to have people over to his house and would rather just meet me out or at my place.
It didn’t seem like a big deal but then I noticed some other odd things. The first was that when he wouldn’t text me from his personal phone. He was fine with me having his work number or contacting him through facebook messenger but wouldn’t text through his personal phone with the reasoning that he only gave that number to his brother and daughter. Possible but unlikely.
Finally, the times of communication were strange. I normally try not to message personal things while at work so that was normal. But when he was in town, he’d never message before 10pm. When he was out of town for work he’d message consistently and throughout the day.
The messaging and phone situation was the ultimate reason that I decided to do some digging. Forewarning, you’re about to see what level of creeper I can go to, without even leaving my couch. I got on and app called Safe Dating and typed in his name with a focus search for our city. Two options popped up and I selected the one that correlated with his age.
From there I did a quick scan of the information. Nothing seemed out of place or refuted anything that he had told me at this point. He was divorced and it had his ex-wife on there. He worked for a local engineering firm and owned a house. I clicked on the address, curious to see if it would tell me who else lived there. Maybe I could look his housemate up if I could figure out who he was.
It did not disappoint. In addition to Jon living at the house it listed another person. A female. Who was my age.
I go to his Facebook (which I still wasn’t friends with him on) but can scroll through his friends and find her. She’s pretty, but outside of her profile picture I see nothing. For my last creeper attempt I decide to see if I can find her on Instagram. Fifteen seconds later I’m scrolling through IG photos since that was completely open.
There are pictures of the both of them. Clearly more than friends. Pictures of their dogs, including the one he had shown me when I asked about his dog. And finally, it was very clear that they lived together in this house and had for about 4 years.
BOOM. Or so I thought.
I go back and forth with how to handle it. About 6 hours later I know what I have to do. I screen shot a chunk of our chats over the past couple weeks that clearly show we’ve been together and that there wasn’t an intent to stop on his part. After I do this, I delete and block him from every form of communication I can think of.
I then send her all of these screenshots in her IG messages with this message:
ME: So I’m not sure if you two are in an open relationship but he’s been kinda shady recently so I’m guessing you know nothing about me. Either way I’m out and don’t plan to speak to him again.
Her: We are married
Her: This sucks. We just got married 2 months ago.
Me: I had no idea. I’m sorry!
Her: So you two have been hooking up?
Me: Yes
Her: Like, you’ve been having sex?
Me: Yes, since (4 months ago)
Her: Thank you for letting me know
Now first, if you’ve ever been on either side of this conversation you know it sucks. I felt horrible for her and have no idea if or how she dealt with it but I’m glad I told her. Also, she handled the whole situation as well as I could’ve imagined given the situation.
This was why. I’ve decided it should be told. If Jon was the first married guy it would be one thing, but he was the fourth. That is right, I’ve had 4 guys that I’ve dated that were either married or got married while I was seeing them. They go to great lengths to hide it. One guy even had an entirely separate apartment – but that’s another story.
I’m going to continue to date. I’ll probably even use the apps again. But now, when shit hits the fan, I’m telling the story.
Blocked & Deleted