Things are going great! Then they suddenly stop responding. We were emailing each other every other day, and he expressed clear interest in me, with compliments, longish engaged emails, even a hint already in the last one he sent that he might want to meet we live far apart this would be no small feat. The last email I sent to him was nearly a week ago, it was rather long several paragraphs, I was answering all his questions, offering thoughts and new questions, like in a real conversation and included a couple compliments to him which I had not done before though he was offering them to me. What do I do? Trying to Understand What Went Wrong and Why Often Nothing Did This is a real guessing game whenever I hear about this situation. When I was excited to talk to a woman I could barely wait to write my next email and actually had to force myself to pause sometimes. Are Long Emails a Risk? Long email risky on your first contact? Yes, often it is. However, once the long emails start I believe the unspoken social contract has basically been signed and continuing to write long emails it totally acceptable. Can Compliments Scare Someone Off? The second different you pointed out was that you complimented him. Compliments can go either way. For example, if I wrote a woman said that I thought she was very pretty, that seems safe. Both are compliments but in one case it could scare her off. So I guess it depends on what you were complimenting him on. Often women are very sensitive to avoid scaring guys off when they date online and given some concerns you express in your email along these lines, I would be surprised if your compliments were the problem. Your situation will likely vary but my thoughts are generally the same: some tiny detail on the difference in your last email is often not the reason. My best guess would be that it is a combination of the nature of online dating and also any areas he may have been concerned about in regards to building a relationship in this case the distance between the two of you although it could be anything. With online dating it is common and even encouraged to be talking to many people at once. Again, distance is only one possible reason in the grand scheme of things. For other situations it could be having different religions or beliefs or just something as simple as not feeling a strong connection as quickly as he expected. There are any number of things that could happen but I do believe that if he wanted to pursue a relationship with you, he would be. Barring a major emergency, a guy is not simply going to stop talking to a girl out of no where or vice versa. Something along these lines would work fine: Hi So-and-so, How have you been doing? Things have been great here although very busy! Well, I hope things are going great. And honestly, you could send an email like this after a few days. I understand not wanting to come off as obsessive or desperate but honestly an email after a few days is neither of these things. For the first or second case, that would cause me to believe even more in my theory that he has started talking with someone else. In these cases, I think writing an email requesting some closure is totally acceptable. However, be sure you want to walk down this road. If, on the other hand, he apologizes for being out of touch with you then there is still a chance but I would be cautious. We live in a world that makes communicating easy so, even if he does apologize, this whole situation should be counting as a strike against him in your mind and cause you to approach the possibility of a relationship with him with more caution. It happened to me more than once twice that I can remember although I know it happened more often than that. While there is no trick to preventing this 100% of the time, there are steps you can take that will cause this situation to matter a bit less. Many people make the date-a-lot-of-people argument but I make it for a different reason than most. Primarily, it makes these types of situations much easier to handle and they are much less of a bother. Is it ever easy to have someone you like simply drop off the face of the earth? But a full dating schedule definitely lessens the sting. The reasons for stopped communication might simply be out of your control. About the Author: Brad initially struggled with online dating but over time became quite successful using it. He met his wife using online dating and has been giving advice and helping people improve their results since 2007. He has written a to help others find success with online dating. You can learn more about his personal experience using online dating and running this website. David Allen April 29, 2011 I think your assessment is pretty good. In any case, we must not take this personally. Who knows what the cause is? She could have your best friend read her messages if she wants an outside perspective on what she says and how she says it. But really, as you say, in the modern dating world, a flowery email is not much of a committment from someone who is articulate. I like how you suggest a pleasant email. I also like your caution about if he apologizes. People who send signals of ambivalence have conflicts. And we ignore those hints at our peril. Maybe he is really terrified of true intimacy or tends to feel over-responsible, and he feels safe with emails. And he is beginning to realize he has to stop emailing or meet scary! Or what you suggested met someone closer, easier seems much more likely to me. From personal experience, I know guys email various women on dating sites and often they have a couple that they really have their eyes on! So most likely he was also having email exchanges with other women that were closer to him and rather than continue emailing you, he just wanted to disappear. It seems like he was leading you on, which is selfish on his part. I would never lead a person on with long detailed emails just to knowingly disappear. I suggest asking him why he stopped emailing you… and if he doesnt reply or gives you a nonchalant reply, move on because that definitely means hes not interested. Hes being careless about his effect on you, provided that he came off as interested just to disappear. And for whatever reason he dropped off, while receiving a polite explanation might feel more desirable, in reality many of us just find that becomes an opportunity for someone to reply back with an argument… or worse! Much better and safer to usually just let things come to a quiet end. While 24 hours later I sent her another email. It has been over 48 hours and I still have not heard back. Should I wait another day to send an email and how long should I wait after that one before moving on? Bottom line is how long should anyone wait before moving on? Up until the point that it becomes clear that both people are interested in being exclusive, I encourage people to keep their options open. At the end am badly hurt cos I remain lonely all over again. After 1 month I got lucky and ended up meeting a girl. When someone does respond to my messages even more unusual! I just ask them about their hobbies, and tell them about mine. I just wish people would show me the same kind of behavior. I have been pretty unsuccessful with the dating site I am on. However, only a few respond and only some of them actually like me. I sometimes get hurt by this because I feel rejected which also makes me a little upset since acceptance for us is so important to us humans. Do you have any advice for me? Women get lots of emails and most guys use that very subject. Which email would you open first? I finally came over a profile that I was very much interested. He emailed immediately back. It was a short email attempting to start a conversation. He mentioned he traveled a lot, so I told him I love to hear more about your travels. He mentioned something about his profession on his profile that he deals with politicians and stock brokers, so I wrote him that I am looking forward to hear more about it and asked him what he exactly do and explained to him what I exactly do. It has been 3 days and got no response back. I know that he read my email. So, I am now wondering what went wrong in one email and in one day that this man who sounded so excited one day and turned off in the next. Any feedback -from anyone is appreciated. I understand that it seems like something went wrong but he might just be busy or very slow to respond or absent minded. Or it could be any number of things…but we can really only guess. That said: DO NOT write him and ask him what you did wrong. That will kill the conversation forever. Hope your week has gone well. If someone just disappears without explanation after seemingly positive conversation, consider yourself lucky. I really like this man, we have a lot in common childhood, past, tragedies, way to elaborate stress, taste in food and movies, some hobbies, etc. But she always tells me she has a young son and wants to take things very slowly. Once when she took a while to return my email she said it was because of her son. Perhaps I made a mistake by twice asking her if she lived with her parents or had brothers or sisters. Maybe she was offended because many Thai women exspect foreign men who marry them to take care of their entire famies. Should I move on? I think he got mad at me. We have a 15 hours time difference. When I replied to his messages I got no reply from him for 2 days now. Was there something happened to him? I find men complicated and most do not want to get married. I know a friend who travelled 3 hours every week-end one way,rain or snow to see his girl-friend for 2 years. She now lives with him. These days one has to be so careful what they say or how they say it to a potential partner or they hit the ground running. Why is political correctness so important? People did not sweat the small stuff and there was alot more respect for us women. I am 67,retired R. I feel one day I will have a great man in my life.
