A
female
age
51-59,
*otallyScrewed
writes:Okay, so here is my dilemma, I recently met a terrific man on an online dating site. It was actually a rather explicit site that seemed to be mostly for flings and casual sex. I wasn’t at all interested in either of these things and was there solely doing research for a book I am writing (fiction) and a little inspiration. I set up a fake profile saying that I was only 24 instead of my actual 36. I also used a fake name, and didn’t upload a picture. In the about me section of the profile I very plainly stated I was just interested in a little online flirting and that I would consider sending a picture after I had gotten to know whoever I was chatting with a bit. I met some nice people who I was very honest about why I was there and they answered my questions. I had gotten what I had gone there for and was about ready to cancel my account when I caught site of one of the few men I had considered contacting (most of the men contacted me after I looked at their profile), I hadn’t sent him a message even though he too said he was only interested in ‘online flirting’ because he said not to bother if I didn’t have a picture posted. The picture he had posted was of his chest and he had this large tattoo that said something and I was dying to know what it was. I love words and think they are extremely powerful and I just felt like if someone felt strongly enough about something to have it permanently (and painfully) engraved across their chest I wanted to know what it was. I sent him a brief message explaining my curiosity and offering to email a picture if he told me what it said. We exchanged a few brief messages on the site, I gave him my email and sent him a picture, one not of me. I never intended to keep talking to this person. I thought I would find out what the tattoo said and that would be the end of it. I was packing and getting ready to leave for a rather long vacation while this was all going on and right after I sent the picture I left. I was doing quite a bit of driving to get to my destination and had a few stops to make along the way. At the first stop I checked my email and had a reply from him. We continued emailing during my stops and they continued after I reached my destination. For five days we had a wonderful time getting to know each other and sharing things, I personally shared things with him that I had never been comfortable sharing with anyone else. We both exchanged very long and very personal ‘about me, and who I am’ emails that chronicled the type of person we are and about our past. This is where things for me got really sticky. I had told the original lie about my age and so I had to make the ‘about me’ section fit that. I made up an ex boyfriend and provided lots of details to make it all seem real. I changed other things to fit my lie (ages and time frames of siblings and things like that). Lying had bothered me from the beginning, I never thought anything would come of it, and after a little ‘harmless flirting’ I would end it and that would be that. The flirting ended up being anything but harmless as I found myself really falling for this guy. I realize there is the chance that he lied too, but I really don’t think he is. On the morning of the sixth day he sent me an email saying he had a busy day at work and that we would be able to talk that night. I replied how forward I was looking to that night and wished him a good day. As I ate my breakfast that morning I was overcome with guilt, this was a real person, with real feelings, and there was no way we could ever meet because I had told a HUGE lie. I sat down and spent the next several hours composing my confession and telling him the WHOLE truth. I took complete blame for everything and flat out said I had no excuses or justifications for what I did. I explained how and why it started (he already knew why I was at the site and I had closed my account down right after we exchanged emails) and I told him why I couldn’t let it continue. I told him I didn’t expect to ever hear from him again and that while I had considered coming up with more lies to ‘let him down gently’ that I felt I owed him the truth. While I was writing out this email, one from him popped up. I was afraid if I read it I would change my mind and continue my charade. I told him the picture was a fake and told him why I sent it (I needed one to fit the age I had stated and I didn’t want to be recognized if ever we ran into each other, we live pretty close), I also sent a real one so that he would have a face to put to the story and that if I ever ran into him I would only get what I deserve. I finished my email and hit send and then after about an hour of intense crying my eyes were clear enough to read his email. He said such sweet and wonderful things that I knew my decision to delay reading it was the correct one. In this email he told me how much he was enjoying getting to know me and how much he appreciated my listening ear. He told me that he had never been a big fan of online chatting and emailing but that with me it was different and then he asked me some feeling type questions that every girl only dreams to be asked by the guy she really likes. I replied to this email clarifying that everything I had said I had FELT all along was true and genuine, and I again took all the blame for everything. I wished him and his kids the best in life and said goodbye. I honestly never thought I would hear from him again, although I really hoped that wouldn’t be the case. Ten hours after I sent my confession I received a reply. He started it by saying ‘Wow’ and letting me know he had never been deceived like that. He told me that if he didn’t trust women before he certainly didn’t now. He told how he had just looking to find someone he could chat with and share the good and the bad and have a little fun while doing it. And then he told me that he had a little respect for me for coming clean when I did and for not letting it go any further than it did. He came out and said that any trust he had for me was thrown so far out the window he couldn’t even see it. He told me he wanted to get angry and let me have it but that he wasn’t going to. He said he knew I felt bad enough on my own and I didn’t need his help to feel worse. He told me not to expect to hear from him again but that maybe I would. He suggested I make a new year’s resolution to be more honest and up front with people from the beginning and he ended it by saying that he would have talked to me about whatever and that he wasn’t that shallow.I sent another reply, this time from my regular email address. I told him that I didn’t want him to hold my transgressions against anyone but me and that not all women were liars, I told him that this was a first for me and was honestly my biggest regret in life. I had also told him how telling him the truth was the hardest thing I had ever done and that his little bit of respect was more than I deserved. I also pointed out that he was someone I could talk to about ‘whatever’ even when it came down to telling him everything. I left the prospect of trying to start over up to him but I did say it was something that I would like to try. I also stated how hard I knew trust was to earn and that I was willing to put in the work to try. Throughout all of my emails from the confession on, I made sure to let him know how sorry I was, how I blamed no one but me, and that I took full responsibility for all of my actions.I can’t stop thinking about him. I have stopped sleeping, the little bit I have eaten was because I forced myself to get something down, and I am an emotional wreck. I realize that meeting someone online and thinking they are the one after only a few days is probably nuts, but he is really the person that I have had the strongest emotional connection with ever. I am two years older than him and in some of our earlier emails he said he had dated older women before so I don’t think there is an actual issue with the age. I know the actual issue is with my deception. It has been over 24 hours since I have heard from him. My question is what should I do. Should I write him again and let him know how I feel? Should I give him more time to reflect? Should I skip the email and just call him? He gave me his number a while ago but I never used it. Is there any chance that after something like this we could recover and start over? I realize this is long but I wanted to give potential answerers as much info as possible…Thanks
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at work, flirt, liar, tattoo Reply to this Question
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Fancy yourself as an agony aunt? Add your answer to this question! A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (2 January 2010): I do not fault you for lying but for letting it go longer than t should have as discretion is the better part of valour. You don't know who the people out there are as they could be in prison for all you know and they don't know you and don't need to know you until you both are confident in each others true motivations for being on the site.
I think you are wrong to have bared your soul to a stranger that very well may be lying to you. You have deceived yourself into falling for the wiles of a stranger, a character, that your mind has embellished more so than he could have himself and could end up being the victim of predator (you've never met and all he has communicated to you is hearsay).
I say put your shield up and weapons on stun.
A
female
reader, TotallyScrewed +, writes (2 January 2010):
TotallyScrewed is verified as being by the original poster of the questionAll good advice... I don't agree with everything, believe me or not I was motivated by wanting to know about the tattoo.
And I don't believe I only 'want' him because I can't have him, this is actually something I had thought long and hard about before I posted the question.
None of my emails to him were this long although we did both share some long ones...
Any other thoughts would be welcome...
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (1 January 2010): Well, you obviously are a good writer, but I think there is a couple of dangers here that you are not thinking clearly about.
The guy went on a sexually explicit site to do some on line flirting? I don't think so, at the very least he was curious about hooking up with an unknown woman for a casual fling and he wanted to be able to pick her out from a photograph like picking out a piece of fruit at the grocery store, why he said don't bother contacting him if you didn't have a picture posted. He posted a picture of his body without a face, call it what you will, his word caught your attention, but he is looking for sex or he would have posted his face not his chest.
When you open up and can tell someone on the net things about yourself that you wouldn't normally reveal to someone in person, you are also feeding that person the information they need to create the kind of person they think you will like or respond to. Especially on a site like this where men and women are trying to meet and stroke each other. So you don't really know how honest or self revealing this man was with you.
He is also more than likely actually disappointed in your real photograph and that you are not 24....he was interested in that woman remember?
I don't know this would be the main reason, but I think it is something to consider. I also think you are toying with the idea of meeting a man on one of these sites for a fling as well and may be just sort of lying to yourself about that. Why would you take the initiative to contact a guy with a chest photo otherwise? I don't buy the tattoo theory with the words, sorry it just seems even a bit too fluffy lacking in substance.
So, you learned a lesson about the dangers and pitfalls of meeting a guy on one of these sites.
Your ego and pride are bruised but that is about it, you aren't really falling for anything real in my estimation, you like someone else on here said, just want what seems to be elusive.
I think you would be better off coming out from behind your self protective wall and trying to meet a nice man in the real world face face and don't give too much information so quickly and you will get a more accurate picture of who the man really is.
Take care.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (1 January 2010): Let him go. You are infatuated by the "forbidden fruit" here, the man you can not have because you lied from the very beginning. Maybe you could have had him if you were honest from the onset, so why you kept on lying I don't know. Perhaps you lied because, like you said yourself: you weren't that interested. And I am afraid the only reason you are now interested is because you can not have him. When you could have started it off clean you didn't want to. You made your choice. But as it is, you only barely got to know him in a few days, there is no foundation or grounds for a proper relationship. So let him go, take the lesson you learned with you, and grow from it instead. But look at it logically: you barely know this man. He made you feel great, but so will another man, and you will be able to make that other man truly happy in return. With this man however, the ship has sailed.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (1 January 2010): I am sorry to say this but if you send e mails as long as this post I think you will scare him off-it does go on a bit
sorry!!
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