Dinner ran three hours. She laughed at everything. You walked her to her car thinking this one's locked in.
Then: nothing. Two texts. No reply. What happened?
You did what most men do on a great date. You filled every silence, answered every question, and left her with nothing to wonder about. No mystery. Nothing to sit with when she got home.
Rule 3 of the "22 Rules" changes the ending: tell her a little, hold back the rest, and let her imagination do the chasing. The ghosting stops too.
You made your case like a lawyer. Stable job. Good guy. Ready for something real. All true. All irrelevant.
She weighed your points, nodded along, felt nothing — then fell hard for some tattooed bartender with a motorcycle and a gambling problem.
Logic is where attraction goes to die. The "22 Rules" work a level deeper, on the subconscious switches that decide within minutes whether you register as a MAN or as part of the furniture.
Stop presenting evidence. Start flipping switches.
That sentence contains at least five follow-up questions she WANTS you to ask. Where in Florida? What brought you here? How long have you been in the area? What do you miss? How does it compare to here?
She handed them to you on a silver platter. And you said, "Oh cool. I come here every week. I love this band. Ummm... pretty crowded tonight."
She smiled politely. Nodded. And never texted you back.
I was that guy for years. Talking too much. Listening too little. Panicking about my next sentence while she was literally feeding me the answers.
Then I found 22 rules that fixed the whole thing. Rule number one: shut up and listen. She'll tell you exactly what to say.
^^^^This.Mauser96 said:Fisrt of all, we need to distinguish something:
There is a HUGE difference in risk/reward when:
a) Dating a single mother with a career who pays her own bills and has a good job who became one by being married to the same man for 10 years, both kids are his, and things didn't work out - maybe through no fault of hers and
b) Single mother, aged 23, Grade 10 education, works part-time as a cleaner at an office building while her mother watches her kids, just like her mother before her did, 3 kids, 3 different fathers, never a relationship involved,.
Those are two VASTLY different scenarios.
My dad did the same thing when me and my sister were in high school. Married a liberal woman that had been mostly single her whole. Lets just say, it's one terrible decision I will never make lol.MOTU said:^^^^This.
I am a single dad. My kids play an important role in my life. After I divorced their mother, I rebound married a woman with no kids. It created lots of problems for me as she just didn't understand that my kids come first. So, the posters above who said you will come second to her kids - you are correct. If you can't accept that, you are best to avoid the single moms all together.
The theory that the woman won't respect you because you are raising another mans kid has some merit. That's why you don't raise the kids. You can be her partner while she raises her kids, and if you are a single dad, invest in her children to the extent she invests in yours.
As Mauser points out, it's a matter of screening. They need to:
- be educated and have a career
- be financially stable and independent
- have been single for a couple of years
- have kids from only one long marriage
- be a good parent
- not have had a string of boyfriends since their divorce
My GF has an MBA, works as an office manager at a water authority, pays her own way and I am the first guy to meet her kids since she divorced 3.5 years ago. So far so good.
So is she looking for a provider? Of course, to some extent. That would be in the best interest of her kids so how could she not? But is that ALL she is looking for? Is that the most important thing? Hopefully not. Time will tell.
Mauser96 said:Fisrt of all, we need to distinguish something:
There is a HUGE difference in risk/reward when:
a) Dating a single mother with a career who pays her own bills and has a good job who became one by being married to the same man for 10 years, both kids are his, and things didn't work out - maybe through no fault of hers and
b) Single mother, aged 23, Grade 10 education, works part-time as a cleaner at an office building while her mother watches her kids, just like her mother before her did, 3 kids, 3 different fathers, never a relationship involved,.
MOTU said:As Mauser points out, it's a matter of screening. They need to:
- be educated and have a career
- be financially stable and independent
- have been single for a couple of years
- have kids from only one long marriage
- be a good parent
- not have had a string of boyfriends since their divorce