Dear Prudence,
I (cis woman, mid 40s) met a guy online a year ago and we’ve been dating for almost 10 months. We’re both divorced with kids, so dating is slower than I’m used to. That said, we’ve been having fun, lots of coffee dates and lunches in the middle of the day. In a moment of impulse, I told him I loved him recently, which wasn’t reciprocated but I wasn’t expecting it so it was fine.
I hopped onto the app for the first time in ages the other day because I wanted to look up something from our first chat and he had new pics posted. I called him to ask what was up, he gave some sort of “I don’t know how that happened, I’ve been Incognito for months” response and sent me a screenshot of his admin page to confirm. The pics then came down. He came over, told me he wasn’t looking for someone else, that he knew I’d said I loved him but that he wasn’t there yet, and all seemed fine. But I’ve been spiraling since then. My ex was an alcoholic who tended to go missing, so much of my marriage was spent tracking him down to make sure he wasn’t driving drunk or worse. I am actively trying not to engage in that behavior again, but old habits are hard to break, and I find myself again looking for clues in every single interaction with this new guy, looking for reasons he’s cheating or looking for someone else to be with. It’s almost like I’m sabotaging myself.
At the same time, it’s been 10 months. I’ve met some of his kids but not in an official “girlfriend” capacity, and we’ve not met each other’s families or friends. We see each other regularly enough that I don’t think he’s seeing anyone else, but it still kind of feels like we’re sneaking around. I don’t know how to broach the conversation of “I don’t want to be your secret girlfriend, I want to be part of your public life and vice versa” and could really use some help trying to navigate these waters. Or should I pull back entirely because of the dating app thing and just consider this a 10-month casual dating thing instead?
—Dating Sucks