Doubts part II

[Ban Hammer 13,293]

I didn't meet my husband in a chat room. I hate those! Filled with Pervs like Charles.

i'm offended!

Charles, sweety...what took you so long?

not on at nights for obvious reasons

on another note, was late replying to this as the entire office just attended a funeral procession. i'll post that in ot in a bit.

[~Jackie~ 30]

I am suprised at the longevity of this thread.

Jackie

[Caladan 19]

deeshla hit the nail on the head. There is something between chastity belt and orgy, and most relationships are somewhere in the middle, and *all* of them change once the person is married.

How couldn't it? To take one little thing, our relationship won't be defined by visits any more. It won't be fun mini-vacations, but life where we're both working.

Most relationships change over time regardless. I don't think it constitutes a sham marriage though. You can live with someone for 10 years and still not really know them.

No one said 'sham.' (I said 'all change once the person is married.') I do think it's easier to put something over on someone long distance, even if you have a webcam, but that doesn't mean that all relationships that are long distance are fake, or that all relationships that aren't long distance are true. But playing the odds?

[Ban Hammer 13,293]

I didn't meet my husband in a chat room. I hate those! Filled with Pervs like Charles.

i'm offended!

Charles, sweety...what took you so long?

not on at nights for obvious reasons

on another note, was late replying to this as the entire office just attended a funeral procession. i'll post that in ot in a bit.

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/index.ph...mp;#entry532344

one of our boys comes home to rest

Edited October 27, 2006 by charlesandnessa

[Veiled Princess 1]

one of our boys comes home to rest

He was a friend of yours Charles?

[Ban Hammer 13,293]

one of our boys comes home to rest

He was a friend of yours Charles?

no. his mom, however, works at the same chapel his ceremony took place in.

[caybee 21]

I totally understand that. But my question relates more to - how does one look for these cues when using the internet as a medium. I understand how one does it face-to-face. But I really am interested, *and* I think it would be useful to other readers perhaps, about the dynamics of going through this when using the internet, where you often can't see facial expressions or hear the tone of voice.

Here's a basic one for the early days of an online relationship, especially one that seems to be moving unusually fast: If someone is using a particularly nice turn of phrase in an email, so much so that it catches your attention, google that phrase. There are plenty of websites full of love letters, and even apology letters. Why think and feel when you can cut and paste? Sounds easy to spot, but you'd be surprised, especially when the person can carry on a decent conversation without the props, in a pinch. Cyrano's words have shocked more than one intelligent person. Google is your friend.

[Veiled Princess 1]

no. his mom, however, works at the same chapel his ceremony took place in.

Oh. I'm sorry for her loss.

[honeyblonde 0]

I can certainly tell you what I looked for online or otherwise. I was very wild in my 30s and dated a lot of guys. At that time I would break up with the nice guys quickly because I didn't want to hurt them, and just hang out with the ones looking for a good time. By my late thirties I was sick of "having a good time", back in school, and working full time.

During my wild years I learned to recognize the wild guys because they were who I was looking for. More than once I sat at my desk and listened to men lying to their wives or girlfriends about having to work late and then taking off with me to the clubs. I learned to recognize lies by watching them happen. I can't tell you what the clues are - which is why I still get paranoid when Abdel tells me he is working Saturday and he has a ride to work (he didn't want me to have to wake up at 5:30 on my weekends but finally realized I wouldn't be sleeping anyway if I hadn't dropped him off at the gate at work and wasn't picking him up covered with sugar at the end of the day).

I guess those years helped me get a feel for when I should be suspicious (always at first!) and when I finally got the internet at home and was logged onto messenger while sitting at the computer studying I didn't have a lot of trouble weeding out jerks.

Rebecca was right, I did meet my ex in person, while on a cruise to the Bahamas. I had been working 2 jobs and hadn't slept much in several months so dating was ancient history. When this gorgeous young man bumped into me in the market in Nassau (later he told me it was on purpose) and asked me for coffee, i figured "why not have a fling while I was there?" I made the mistake of giving him the right number when he asked for my home phone number, and when I got back from my cruise my son informed me that he had been calling night and day since about the minute I left the Bahamas. He continued to call constantly until he finally convinced me to come back and marry him. I began to think "What do I have to lose? I can marry this hot young guy and have fun and if it doesn't work out, oh well, who cares?" So, I went and married him. I was extremely naive about men looking for green cards at that time (this was 1998, long before I got the internet at home) and had been too busy working for about 2 years to be wild any more.

By the time I met Abdel online, I had talked to several men for a decent length of time online, even gotten serious with a couple who vanished about the time I made plans to meet them or came to meet me, only to turn out to be married jerks looking for booty calls. I met one guy online who was a graduate student at the art school in our city and we dated for a few months before he took an out of town internship and we broke up. When he got back to town he wanted to get back together but his recreational drug use was something I refused to tolerate.

I didn't start getting hit on by Arab men until I went online, then they popped up a lot. There was one guy who was finishing his doctorate in Engineering at Georgia Tech and wanted to be able to stay here instead of going home to Turkey. He was cute, but pushy and it wasn't difficult to see he only wanted a green card. He ended up chosing a girl that he also met online that lived only 1 hour from him (I was 4 hours). I told him congratulations on finding his green card and blocked him.

I have this quirk of keeping all of my chats and e-mails on a correspondence file on my computer, like a diary. When I met Abdel it wasn't hard to compare my chats with him to those of other men and see a huge difference. Maybe I can post a comparison that isn't too personal to give you an idea of the obvious differences. I guess the bottom line of online conversation for me was the same as it would be in person - I would have to be able to talk to that person for hours and still want to talk to them and still have something to say; I had to actually enjoy them, not just tolerate them; and both of us had to actually listen and remember what the other had talked about before, not because we were memorizing details but because we really cared. Oh yeah, the other test I used when I dated for real, not just had fun - he absolutely could never lie to me. At the first lie, he was history.

I think the bottom line in any relationship is the same - respect. If he doesn't respect you online, he isn't going to when he's here. If he doesn't respect you he isn't going to mind using you either.

[jordanianprincess 0]

I didn't start getting hit on by Arab men until I went online, then they popped up a lot. There was one guy who was finishing his doctorate in Engineering at Georgia Tech and wanted to be able to stay here instead of going home to Turkey. He was cute, but pushy and it wasn't difficult to see he only wanted a green card. He ended up chosing a girl that he also met online that lived only 1 hour from him (I was 4 hours). I told him congratulations on finding his green card and blocked him.

Turkish people are not Arabs.

[mybackpages 0]

Turkish people are not Arabs.

BTW I love Turkey...the country not the bird.

[~Jackie~ 30]

I love Turkey too,,,with a little mayo

Jackie

[Ban Hammer 13,293]

Turkish people are not Arabs.

BTW I love Turkey...the country not the bird.

turkey reminds me of western texas i liked turkey too

[honeyblonde 0]

You are right, Abdel would have made the same comment. Ok, how about "men looking for green cards?" See, I'm still learning about that part of the world across the ocean that isn't exactly European or Asian or African - just kindof in the middle and all lumped together by dumb westerners like me, including the ones who named this forum!

I bet in about a month you'll all be saying "I'm sick of turkey!"

(ok, what happened to the puking smiley? Was it never on here?)

[Ban Hammer 13,293]

You are right, Abdel would have made the same comment. Ok, how about "men looking for green cards?" See, I'm still learning about that part of the world across the ocean that isn't exactly European or Asian or African - just kindof in the middle and all lumped together by dumb westerners like me, including the ones who named this forum!

I bet in about a month you'll all be saying "I'm sick of turkey!"

(ok, what happened to the puking smiley? Was it never on here?)

i lived there for 6 months