61 Things Women Said That Made Men Go From Interested To Looking For The Exit

Modern dating has made the first impression a little strange. You can spend days talking to someone before meeting them, learn their favorite movie before hearing how they actually sound in person, and feel like you know them surprisingly well before you’ve even had a proper date.

Eventually, the person on the other side of the screen has to become an actual person sitting across from you. As Love Certain points out, moving from online conversations to a face-to-face meeting can bring a whole new set of impressions into the picture. And sometimes, that’s when you find out that the person you thought you knew is quite different.

Dating apps have made it easier to meet people you probably never would have crossed paths with otherwise, but more options don’t necessarily make dating easier.

Pew Research Center found that recent online daters commonly reported both excitement and disappointment. At the same time, some felt overwhelmed by the number of messages they received and others felt insecure about getting too few. It seems finding love comes with an inbox problem.

There’s a reason a tiny comment can sometimes stick with you more than an entire date. When we’re getting to know someone, we pick up on all sorts of things, including their habits, personality, values, and how they see relationships. You might be enjoying their company perfectly well, then they say something that makes you think, Hmm. I’m going to need a minute with that one.

Everyone has their own version of that moment. For some people, it could be an attitude toward money or marriage. For someone else, it might be the way a person talks about their ex, treats other people, or imagines life with a partner.

Research on romantic dealbreakers has found that people consider a surprisingly wide range of traits when deciding whether someone is worth pursuing, and those preferences can change depending on whether they’re thinking about a short-term or long-term relationship.

A person might be willing to overlook certain quirks when they’re casually dating, but become much more selective when imagining that same person as a life partner. In a study involving 285 participants, researchers found that people generally had more dealbreakers when considering a long-term relationship than a short-term one.

The funny thing is, a dealbreaker may not arrive wearing a giant red flag and carrying a marching band. Sometimes it slips into an ordinary conversation so casually that the person saying it probably doesn’t realize they’ve just revealed something important.

This is partly why these stories are so interesting. Looking back, someone can hear a single sentence and suddenly understand why the relationship would have been a very bad idea.