It means he's OK with you dating other people.
You pretty much told him you didn't want what he wanted, so you were looking elsewhere. And he accepted it like an adult.
I know it can be weird if you're used to drama, but that is how grown-ups handle things like this.
How can you take that to mean anything other than what he said??? I don't get how people (well, women generally) can read something into a statement that straightforward and plain...
there are a lot of men out there that AREN'T real. a lot of women like that too, i am not generalizing. but after one has dated a lot of the empty promises types, it can be very difficult to believe the ones that actually DO mean what they say. even if it is not what they want to hear. guys that do the disappearing act or the mixed signals types are much more common than the ones that just say "listen, i'm just not ready" that's why women get confused when confronted with straightforward. it doesn't happen often, so it can be difficult to recognize. if it happened more often than it does, generally speaking, this site wouldn't be nearly as successful as it is.
I agree Chrissie, there are so many guys out there that play go-go-stop, pushing with one hand and pulling with the other.
This situation seems very clear, but perhaps after a girl has been f'd over enough she has a harder time deciphering.
Many times when a guy is screwing over a girl he sends what seem to be very clear "I want you or miss you or need you or love you, signals." Perhaps you don't Mr. x or Neil, but plenty of unconscionable shits wanting sex do just that. Eventually, some girls are unable to get a good read on any guy and become unwitting volunteers.
I'm going to disagree. I've never had a woman describe a heterosexual male's words and behavior to me, and I get what he was thinking or actually saying wrong. Its like we speak two different languages or men use standard definitions while women don't. The other frequent source of miscommunication, misinterpreted actions.
One example I kept giving my gf early on was buying ice cream. A guy and his SO happen to stop 9at a grocery store to grab something quick. He goes in, she waits in the car. While he's there, he notices a 2 for 1 sale on ice cream in a cone so grabs two to go. His SO thinks he was being thoughtful and romantic. He actually was taking full advantage of the sale. Otherwise he would have just gotten ice cream for himself.
I remember your ice-cream analogy and think your motives are selfish.
In your analogy you gain personal satisfaction by saving money and she is a fool for thinking you had done something nice. So.. a smart girl would not have overlooked the possibility of a two for one sale and a foolish girl would twist the true meaning of the ice cream cone and think you had been thoughtful?
Yup, we do speak different languages.
No, there is no comment on the intelligence of the girls in either case. Smart or dumb, they both have no way of knowing about the sale. The point is that sometimes women read meaning (like smart and dumb women from my example) when it isn't there at all.
Back up a step.. Barring a sale, you would come out of the store without a cone for her?
No doubt, there are a fair share of immature guys who do exactly that. In this case, it seems to me like he realized that she wanted more than he was willing to give, and rather than lead her on and then try to slow fade (or pull some other immature crap like that) he's letting her know up front. To the LW, take what he said at face value. Stop trying to get with this guy 'cause it's not going to happen, and instead start dating around... there are plenty of guys out there and chances are some of them would love a real relationship.
spot on Jan, in both comments lol
Damn right, I hear you! This has gotta be the easiest situation to understand. He said he was OK with her seeing other men, and he meant it? What is so hard to understand about that??? Why does everything have to be some sort of secret code or hidden meaning? At least I got my morning off on a good laugh!
PS I'm gonna put myself out to get burned, and say she has some hubris and assumed automatically every guy won't be able to resist her, and is shocked that there was one guy who did...
He just wants a sexercise partner...
I may be off on this, but I feel like the girl liked the guy, and was hoping that his offer to be FWB would indicate that he would eventually like a relationship with her. And maybe her saying she would date other people was a way to test whether he really did have any feelings for her, and when he said he was okay with it, she was confused. You know, how some girls believe that if you make a man jealous with the idea of another man, he'll realize that he really is in love with you and yadda yadda. I feel like it's a girl trying to find a way for someone to tell her that this guy likes her.
But I could be totally wrong.
Totally agree with you AnnaFrog...seems to me she's just a young girl trying to play games by "testing" him.
Those are my thoughts too. It works like a charm in romantic comedies, but not always in real life.
Friends with Benefits = Will you give me permission to use you for sex?
Find a man with values. Dump this "friend".
Yeah, that's not how it always works. An ideal FWB is a **MUTUAL** agreement between both people, to have sex without being in a "relationship". Simply put, both agree to use each other for sex. Again, I don't get this "women are victims during sex" ideology I see recurrent on Guyspeak. You're saying you never enjoyed sex even once in your life?
The problem with most FWB is that one of the partners ends up wanting a relationship or something more, it's not always the woman though. Many times the man realizes he wants more too and also gets hurt in the process.
The man in this case HAS VALUES! She told him she wants to date other men, he said "cool", in other words, he respected her and he respected the arrangement. Maybe you need to reconsider entering an FWB relationship. It is not his fault that he didn't want more when she knowingly agreed to be FWB.
I wouldn't agree with that. I mean if someone is trying to convince you to sleep with them then something is up. But if two adults are comfortable having sex without persuing a real relationship this is by no means "using" of anybody.
I've never dealt with this sort of situation personally but I can honestly say if I found myself just messing around with a friend and she was happy with what we were doing I'd be pretty insulted by someone implying I was using her, or that she was using me for that matter.