I'm Sorry, Who Are You Again?

I'm experiencing a perplexing yet intriguing trend in the world of dating these days--guys who totally change personalities several weeks into a "relationship." Perhaps you can relate. You meet somebody and you hit it off well enough that you decide to go out. The dates are successful. The guy is cute and charming, opens doors, pays for dinner, is a decent kisser, sends fabulous emails, entertains your desire to not sleep together right away. Everything is great. You're glowing constantly and your friends can't wait to meet him. And then, out of nowhere he does a total 180 on you and starts acting completely weird. He can't hold up his end of a conversation and acts bored when you attempt to, is dismissive of your ideas and basically acts as if being at a baseball game with you is the last activity on earth that he'd ever want to participate in. Suddenly you're ceremonially deleting his number from your phone while at lunch with your girlfriends and actively seeking out rebound hookups.

Sometimes the experience hurts and even resembles something like heartbreak. Other times you're just offended enough that you're actually pissed off about it, and sometimes you can barely muster the energy to even care about it and spend a good amount of time assessing your desire to date anyone at all.

I know I've been guilty of similar sins, especially when I was younger. I can admit that in the past I have grown salty towards guys who have attempted to get too close too soon. Yes, I shut them out and there is probably a small handful of guys in this planet that would tell you I'm a bitch. I can accept that, and knowing this flaw of mine has enabled me to address it and now I do it far less often than I used to, if ever. But what is up with turning into a totally different person? I see it as a sign of declined interest, which is fine as people lose interest in one another all the time. But if you aren't that into me anymore, don't send me 20 emails a day and certainly don't ask me out on a date. It just wastes your time and mine. I'd be happier reading a book on a Friday night than trying to make conversation with somebody who doesn't have enough respect for me to be courteous and polite.

It's truly annoying. Wouldn't a crystal ball to forecast these changes in character be the most awesome thing ever? And yes, I know what you're thinking--perhaps one should be better at looking for signs that this sort of thing is about to go down. But how demoralizing is it to spend your social life analyzing behaviors and combing over actions for the sake of identifying a potentially negative personality trait? And many times early in a relationship, people are on their best behavior and they don't give you enough bad stuff to work with. This is supposed to be fun, after all.