Trouble with dating after wife passed away

[mikeyb]

After some advice.

I haven't posted here in ages, mainly because I fell in love and got married to this awesome girl. To make a long story short, she passed away last year, and now I'm dating again.

The first weird thing I noticed is that unlike a decade ago, now that I'm early 30s it's actually easy to get girls to go out with me. In fact, for the first time ever, a woman chatted me up at a running race. Online dating with match is relatively easy and I find more women are willing to go out for a drink as opposed to being a pen pal, and of those the dates go better than before because I'm more emotionally detached than before and happy to play the game as long as there's mutual attraction. As a result, I'm no longer desperate and prone to develop feelings for every girl I meet. Up until a week or so ago, I was like a fat guy at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

I met this one girl on match, the first one I went out with when I started dating again, who I just get along with. I had really low expectations at the start but I've been seeing her for a month now, we've had sex some number of times (probably double digits, lost count), and things seem to be moving in the right direction at the right pace - nothing too fast or too slow, she's smart and a lot of fun, and we genuinely seem to enjoy each others' company. Even though we haven't spoken about exclusivity I've put dating other women on hold and I'm fairly certain she's done the same...which you may say is too soon, but I just didn't seem to be able to date other women at the same time, I kept finding flaws with all of them or even feeling guilty about dating them while seeing this other girl, not escalating with the same energy, so ultimately was unsuccessful.

What bugs me is that, as much fun as this is, it doesn't satisfy me yet on an emotional level and this point is starting to suck the fun out of it. It just feels like each of us is trying to attract the other, which is fun and sexy, but because we've only known each other for a short time there's no trust, we only share superficial things with one another, etc. Deep down half my brain expects to slot this girl into the gap my wife left vacant and have the same type of interaction, which I know is completely unrealistic and took years to build up. It's just what one half of the brain expects.


I guess what I'd like to know is, how do I get back to the frame of mind I was in before, where I was just enjoying the fun part of the relationship and didn't care about anything else? If the answer is to date other women, then how do I get rid of this self-sabotaging part of me that seems to prevent me from seeing multiple women at once?

If you've read this far, thanks for reading, and appreciate any insight.

 

[Bible_Belt]

Do what makes you happy, whether that is monogamy or having a stable of hos.

 

[Augustus_McCrae]

After some advice.

I haven't posted here in ages, mainly because I fell in love and got married to this awesome girl. To make a long story short, she passed away last year, and now I'm dating again.

The first weird thing I noticed is that unlike a decade ago, now that I'm early 30s it's actually easy to get girls to go out with me. In fact, for the first time ever, a woman chatted me up at a running race. Online dating with match is relatively easy and I find more women are willing to go out for a drink as opposed to being a pen pal, and of those the dates go better than before because I'm more emotionally detached than before and happy to play the game as long as there's mutual attraction. As a result, I'm no longer desperate and prone to develop feelings for every girl I meet. Up until a week or so ago, I was like a fat guy at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

I met this one girl on match, the first one I went out with when I started dating again, who I just get along with. I had really low expectations at the start but I've been seeing her for a month now, we've had sex some number of times (probably double digits, lost count), and things seem to be moving in the right direction at the right pace - nothing too fast or too slow, she's smart and a lot of fun, and we genuinely seem to enjoy each others' company. Even though we haven't spoken about exclusivity I've put dating other women on hold and I'm fairly certain she's done the same...which you may say is too soon, but I just didn't seem to be able to date other women at the same time, I kept finding flaws with all of them or even feeling guilty about dating them while seeing this other girl, not escalating with the same energy, so ultimately was unsuccessful.

What bugs me is that, as much fun as this is, it doesn't satisfy me yet on an emotional level and this point is starting to suck the fun out of it. It just feels like each of us is trying to attract the other, which is fun and sexy, but because we've only known each other for a short time there's no trust, we only share superficial things with one another, etc. Deep down half my brain expects to slot this girl into the gap my wife left vacant and have the same type of interaction, which I know is completely unrealistic and took years to build up. It's just what one half of the brain expects.


I guess what I'd like to know is, how do I get back to the frame of mind I was in before, where I was just enjoying the fun part of the relationship and didn't care about anything else? If the answer is to date other women, then how do I get rid of this self-sabotaging part of me that seems to prevent me from seeing multiple women at once?

If you've read this far, thanks for reading, and appreciate any insight.

I’m sorry for your loss. Sounds like you had a happy marriage and that you really loved your wife.

Expect that it will take some time to move on. It almost seems like you’re trying to find/repeat the same feeling/experience that you had with your wife. As much as you can, try to let that go.

If you can, try to focus on living your life, following your dreams and passions. Don’t attempt to try to create the depth of feeling and emotion you had with your wife, just enjoy the company of a woman when you choose to be with one. Stay in your frame, keep following your path for what you want to do with your life.

-Augustus-

 

[mikeyb]

Thanks Augustus, that's what I'm trying to do. Probably just takes more time than I'm giving it.

 

[Spaz]

Sorry for your loss.

A year is a good enough time to go dating and just that - dating, don't jump into relationships just yet, it's been only a year and these sort of thing takes time.

 

[logicallefty]

Sorry for your loss. I personally have never lost a woman I love to a death. But I could see it being much more difficult to move on from emotionally versus your normal toxic divorce or breakup. Or even your not so average like one of mine was, getting married to a woman I found out was a bigamist 2.5 yrs after the wedding. Anyway based on what you wrote it sounds to me like you need to train your brain and eyes to better see and understand what women and dating is all about in the year 2019. You probably grew up trained with all these traditional blue pill ideaogies like we all were. Now you are having trouble in your head cutting the ropes and chains away from that mindset that’s so heavily engrained in you. For most of us it takes a toxic breakup/divorce or two to get there. For A guy like you it can be none if you learn from the experiences of other men like the men here on SS. The fact of the matter is that women are not holding back dating multiple people in 2019 so why should you ? When a woman wants to go out on a date she takes the whole list of all the men she has at her disposal that given minute, and picks the best one. You may be her pick on Friday night and she may say she wants to see you again Saturday night. But if she gets an IM from a better guy Saturday afternoon then she will lie to you and tell you her pet goldfish is sick or just ignore you, and go out with him. As for your solution, I would say just continue to read post after post on this forum. We don’t make this sh!t up. There are also some great YouTubers such as “The Happy Humble hermit”, Terrence Popp, Sandman, Turd Flinging Monkey, An Ear For Men/Paul Elam. Even some good man loving women to watch on YouTube such as Nola Girl and Diana Davidson. All of these channels will help you get your mind trained to women and dating in the year 2019. Hopefully you will learn enough for you don’t have to go through some of the toxic relationships that the rest of us have, many of which are what brought us here to SS. Good luck. We are rooting for you.

 

[bob2007]

Sounds like you said you are looking for someone to replace your wife. That is impossible. She was amazing in her own way.

New women can be amazing in their own way too. Your sense of loss can not be replaced in such a short period of time.
Steps. Dating. Long term relationship. Marriage. You're comparing an online date with a marriage is illogical.

From my experience, I haven't found a woman interesting enough to be married I'm slightly older than you. Never married. Don't be so hard on the gals.

 

[DEEZEDBRAH]

After some advice.

I I find more women are willing to go out for a drink as opposed to being a pen pal, and of those the dates go better than before because I'm more emotionally detached than before and happy to play the game as long as there's mutual attraction. As a result, I'm no longer desperate and prone to develop feelings for every girl I meet. Up until a week or so ago, I was like a fat guy at an all-you-can-eat buffet

Indifference is key. Being blasé, nonchalant, aloof is king.

You've been through a serious trauma and loss.

Its kind of a ****ed up Q to ask but, i will turn into the skid.

Is there some part if you relieved that your wife is gone?

In David Deidas book, way of the superior man, he speaks of getting past the validation and approval of the father. Even mentions a sense of relief from the death of the father. I suppose, there could be some here with yoyr wife. There's a predisposition in our culture to martyrdom someone after death.

She is human. She had her faults. She wasnt perfect. Even if she was a outlier, 1 in a infinite type, maybe she nagged. Maybe some of the guilt is relief and your backwards rational thereafter.

It would be worthy of investigation. You should do therapy. You can get past tge following but self care should be your mental point of origin. Busy self. Dating should be recreational at best. Routine is key. Start there.

 

[mikeyb]

Hey mike,

First of all, condolences regarding your wife, life can be really hard sometimes, but it's good that you are trying to get your life together again, I'm sure your wife would like the same for you after she passed away.

I think it's important to be honest to yourself.

Sometimes guy needs more mental caretaking that he wants to admit to himself, especially if your emotional intelligence level is high. I'd not stop having sex with the girl you are currently dating if I was on your place but perhaps I'd try to orient spending time with her differently (more mountain hiking, trips, hitting some cultural events, meeting with yours and her friends), it won't damage relationship as you are already having sex in adundance. Remember it's man that is leading the relationship and where it is going.

You know, after such a grenade thrown into your psyche you really don't need to have tons of sex - what you really need is some emotional support from a woman as well (screw guys saying otherwise) and women are really ready to give it to you if necessary (being widower is somewhat a chick magnet too).

You need to consider that dating multiple women might increase amount of sex you are having but not necessarily increase the quality of your life (considering emotional damage taken).

Also, if you feel tied with this girl and fresh relationship lost some magic already, consider breaking it with her - finding sutiable woman for LTR is rather difficult as it requires very high compatibility between both persons (Jordan Peterson said in one of his lectures that you have about 5 good shots for LTR in your life on average) so it simply might not be the one of those shots.

I'd be sincere about it towards her as well if there's no chance you see potential in it.

Thanks, appreciate your unique perspective. Over the last few weeks we have been spending time differently, more active dates (like hiking) as we have some of those hobbies in common, something we weren't doing at first. This is now going a lot better than it was when I first posted and in the end I didn't try to get back into the "date multiple women" frame, because my brain wouldn't let me. Not that I'm 100% sure about her - I'm not - but then again, I'm never 100% sure about any woman this early on.

 

[mikeyb]

Indifference is key. Being blasé, nonchalant, aloof is king.

You've been through a serious trauma and loss.

Its kind of a ****ed up Q to ask but, i will turn into the skid.

Is there some part if you relieved that your wife is gone?

In David Deidas book, way of the superior man, he speaks of getting past the validation and approval of the father. Even mentions a sense of relief from the death of the father. I suppose, there could be some here with yoyr wife. There's a predisposition in our culture to martyrdom someone after death.

She is human. She had her faults. She wasnt perfect. Even if she was a outlier, 1 in a infinite type, maybe she nagged. Maybe some of the guilt is relief and your backwards rational thereafter.

It would be worthy of investigation. You should do therapy. You can get past tge following but self care should be your mental point of origin. Busy self. Dating should be recreational at best. Routine is key. Start there.

That is a question I have thought about a lot, not least because everyone kept telling me to stay home, take time off work, stop running etc, but I just went straight back into it after a few days, and so I couldn't help but feel guilty about it initially which led to this very question. I think pressing on and forcing myself to stick to a routine is what allowed me to process what happened in my own time without falling apart or dropping any balls as everyone expected/wanted me to. In no way was this related to her qualities or faults - this was a simple decision to keep the cogs turning once my head was straight enough to do so. I don't feel guilty anymore for having done so.

To answer the question, yes, a small part of me did feel relieved. Partly to do with the circumstances of her death, but also because a small part of me saw a return to freedom - even though I was very happily married.

Whether I got back into dating too soon is a different question, and one I don't have an answer to yet.

 

[DEEZEDBRAH]

To answer the question, yes, a small part of me did feel relieved. Partly to do with the circumstances of her death, but also because a small part of me saw a return to freedom - even though I was very happily married.

Whether I got back into dating too soon is a different question, and one I don't have an answer to yet.

Its kind of ****ed up. I suspect wives feel the same. I have seen it in ny mates, eith the boys during a breakup. A woman msy have initiated seeking more (white picket fence, 2.2 children, wedding bells etc). Its funny hiw resistant guys are to LTR yet, most still indulge. Its also funny how women will con their way in by being feminine, submissive, and just a good person. Their interest is genuine though self motivated.

I think you are ready for change. Read Letting Go by David Hawking. The subtlety is what i think help create TM. Any sort of trauma work is ideal (gym, yoga, run, jogg, meditation, prayer, hike, nature walk, etc). Once you are back on top form, look into alternative routes to self-care. I trip, i explore consciousness, i read the tibetan book of the dead manual by Timothy Leary. I am getting ready for another dmt trip.

Find your path. Budy yourself for the time being.

 

[Stephen89]

I'm sorry for your loss.

Do what's best for you and what makes you happy.