'My fun new man is ignoring my messages and I'm paranoid'
Resident agony aunt Coleen Nolan has advice for a frustrated reader who's been seeing someone new but is confused over his lack of communication and what it means
She brought her frank views to Loose Women - now she is Britain's straightest-talking agony aunt, giving advice on your sex, relationship and life problems. EMAIL: dearcoleen@mirror.co.uk – sorry, but Coleen can’t reply personally WRITE TO: Coleen Nolan, The Daily Mirror, One Canada Square, London E14 5AP Don't miss her newsletter every Saturday. Sign up at bit.ly/MirrorColeen
Dear Coleen
I’m a woman in my 40s and I’ve been seeing this very handsome guy for a few weeks now. Physically, he’s the dream – tall, dark and sexy – and he has a fun, quirky personality too.
Things were going great, but he cannot communicate like a normal person. He leaves my messages on “read” all the time and takes days to reply, and he hates talking on the phone.
I tried to convince myself it’s “just the way he is” but, the truth is, his communication style – virtually none – is making me feel insecure and wondering where I stand.
I basically feel ghosted and find myself on tenterhooks.
And I'm constantly checking my phone to see if he’s got in touch, which isn’t healthy.
But when I’ve brought this up with him, he claims I’m the one who’s weird and that he does communicate; he just isn’t glued to his phone the way I am (I’m not!).
How can we build a relationship like this? When we’re together, it’s a lot of fun, but in between there’s almost nothing. I feel too long in the tooth for all this.
Coleen says
I’ve had experience of this years ago and what happens is you start to lose yourself and become a bit paranoid.
You start questioning yourself and thinking “maybe it is me” and you become desperate for some acknowledgement. I can only tell you it’ll lead nowhere because this person is avoidant and the more you push, the more they run away.
Maybe it’s down to something that happened to them in past, which they haven’t dealt with, and any emotional attachment feels as if they’re being trapped in some way, so they cut themselves off.
But they also send little “breadcrumbs” now and again after days of not being in touch. The result: you will lose your peace and it’s not worth it.
If someone likes you enough, they don’t’ treat you like that and you have to love yourself enough to say, “I deserve better”. You will never help them become the person you want them to be if they don’t want to be that person.
It is difficult, though, because there’s something in your psyche that loves the challenge and keeps you going, and even adds to the attraction, but it will end in heartbreak.
In my case, even though I really fancied this guy I was able to take a step back and look into the future with him and realise that once I’d got used to his looks, I’d be left with this person who didn’t give me the same respect back. Respect yourself enough to move on.
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