i almost got got by the classic “nice guy”
Nice guys,
They’re always so unassuming. *Joey was, at first. And if nothing had happened between us, I would still have the same assumptions, as I’m sure many people that we work with have. But alas, that did not happen. Instead, I did in fact get to know him. And to my dismay, he might have become one of the worst “Nice Guys” I dated.
—
I’ve been thinking a lot lately since moving to New York about the “Before” and the “After.” Before I moved before I got hired at certain places before I met certain people. And then the after. Before I went out with Joey, he was just another guy at work.
Now mind you, I’m friendly with everyone at work. I have come to find out however that many times, men will mistake being friendly with flirting. For instance, if a woman simply acknowledges the man’s existence that is a beacon of “she wants you, dude.” I’m not going to lie to you I didn’t even know I could flirt (if that is what others call flirting). I say that because I would be quite clear with my flirts and cues to let them know I was interested, but if I was just being friendly I wouldn’t be the wiser.
But Joey thought I was all over him.
I wouldn’t say this unless he told me, which he did. And when he did, I gave him a face with the look of, what made you think I was all over you?
—
The nice guy is looking for a game that is always off-season.
It took Joey a minute to realize that I wasn’t all over him and he is probably still processing it now. He is just beginning to connect the two that it’s not that I was all over him, but that I socialize with everyone at work. That does not make him special. But the moment I gave him something he thought:
oh she wants me.
—
Now the nice guy is bitter for the canceled transaction
Joe Duncan put it so well. I made it very explicit early on that whatever transaction he was thinking he was going to get, whatever endgame there was, it was not going to happen. I said it more than once and I said it early on.
So why did he end up confessing to my best friend at work how bitter he is about it? Because he’s bitter that his nice guy stunt didn’t pay off.
—
Duncan mentioned several points that really peeled my cap on this whole experience.
First, he said:
For my own personal reasons, I won’t say why this man was riled up but if you read between the lines you can figure it out. I will say, he told me so many times how shocked he was on my brief history of dating guys because I’m just so pretty. When I told him that my journey is my journey and I broke his illusion that guys were chasing after me, I just nearly broke him. You see, he could not fathom that someone that looked like me could not be wanted so feverishly in contemporary society.
Now listen, I’m no Megan Fox here but, I guess on a good day I can look promising.
But I could clearly tell after a long time processing that he was buttering me up to get buttered up. That I’m a real solid girl, who with enough adjectives thrown at her, she will be tossed around in bed.
—
He didn’t understand taking it “slow”
If you really cared about me, you wouldn't groan at how long advancing to the next steps would be.
He mistakenly always called himself a nice guy
Now I thought he was kidding when he said this, but I came to realize that he genuinely believes it. That is the scariest part. That is the part that should’ve made me run away from where I stood, but when you saw that face you thought, I mean he is kinda nice after all right? He wouldn’t harm me? He’s been so caring after all?
—
The final straw: it was always about the transaction, not the girl
Today, when Joey confessed his side of the story for why we ended to my best friend, (because that was the perfect person to have side with you), he only talked about the transaction.
Let me fill you in on a secret: when he tried to “get me back,” do you know what he did? He kissed me. That was it. And the second time? Well, I don’t know what he really did, but he wasn’t on his knees that’s for sure.
He didn’t ask her what to do to get me back. He didn’t confess why I was so great, why I am worth saving. Instead, he drilled her on a very important looming reason why I turned him down, and how it doesn’t make sense. Hearing him say that to her again, another woman with very similar experiences to my own, nailed the head in the coffin, or his head in the coffin, however, that term goes.
In his mind, there was one thing he was focused on. He thought a conversation with me would hash things out, but it didn’t. I ended it. Now? His ego is broken. His nice-guy persona is in question as he screams, what does a man gotta do!?
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What does a man gotta do?
My ex was a fool, but he was also a nice guy, in a good way. I have to hand it to him though, Joey could learn something from him. For a man his same age, he has the maturity of 17 yo. I know men develop slow, but it is quite scary at times. My ex wanted me, not just what I could offer, or a pretty face he could put under the “catch of the day.” And when I ended things, he threw himself on the ground for me to take him back. I didn’t know then that that’s what feeling wanted felt like, not just feeling desired.
—
I still have to see him at work now and think of all the people who are also thinking, so unassuming.
I wish I could’ve stayed in that before. I wish I didn’t know about this side of the nice guy. The one with the facade. The one with the wild expectations. The one who slowly manipulates you, who makes you feel bad, who convinces you that he’s not like other guys, who gives you what you want to hear and see, for an exchange that means another one in the books for them, and everything to you. Because you thought they would be more. Because you thought their words meant something. Because they said you were worth more.
You are worth more, trust me. You deserve more, you know it. Just stay on guard. Oh and um if they say they’re a nice guy, definitely make a run for it.
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Quotes are taken from Joe Duncan’s article: What Most Guys Don’t Understand Why Women Don’t Date Nice Guys
*Names have been changed for anonymous purposes
