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  1. #1
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    Do you have a lot of trouble going from meeting someone on-line to meeting them in-pe

    In 2009, I was in daily communication with a woman who lived 3,000 miles away. We appeared to have a lot, and I mean a lot in common. I became extremely emotionally attached. We talked every day, sometimes twice a day, for two and a half months. She was very kind, sweet, loving, caring and affectionate over-the-phone.

    The day before we met, she told me she could not wait. She was so excited. She was beside herself. She said that this was the happiest she had ever been. . .

    . . .that is. . .until we met in-person.

    What a disaster. What a nightmare. I will never forget. I still have not forgiven.

    Everyone, and I mean everyone, from my immediate family to my Counselors, told me they had bad vibes. They all told me not to go. In fact, they begged me. Even God tried to stop me by cancelling my flight on the morning of departure.

    I went anyway. I took another flight. I was so so stupid.

    When I got off the plane. . .here this woman was. . .a 400-pound behemoth walking with a cane full of cigarette smoke. I had no Plan B. I was stuck for 7 days in a filthy smoke-filled apartment. 12 degrees outside. Snow. Airport closed for 2 days. Could not get a return flight home. It was so expensive to try and get home. I showed her the photo she sent to me. Now she tells me in person: "Oh that was taken 10 years ago". Some "recent photo" that was. She told me she had stopped smoking. Not the case. Now it was: "I am down to a pack a day".

    Lies. . .lies. . .and more lies. . .

    Yelling, screaming and throwing things. And that was her daily routine. Stole money from me. Wanna hear a freight train? Try her snoring. You could go outside and hear it clearly.

    She scared the daylights out of me. I am still not completely over it.

    When I finally arrived home. I cried. And cried some more.


    I am sure not all of you will have this type of experience. I don't think the average person lies about everything.

    You have to develop trust at some point.

    What I am saying is that you have to be very careful and cautious. Especially with your emotions.

    Make sure you ask the right questions.

    Always keep your eyes open for "red flags". If something doesn't seem right, it isn't.

    For example, if the individual says they are going to call you at a certain time, and then they don't, and they come up with an excuse that doesn't seem reasonable, make note of it. Especially if it happens on a regular basis.

    If the individual is 55, but their photo looks 35, that is a "red flag".

    Make sure you have a Plan B. Always. This is very important. If you need to get out quickly, make sure you have a Plan in place.

    Make sure you know your non-negotiables and present them openly to the person you are communicating with. If the person is wishy-wasy on the non-negotiables, that is a "red flag". An answer such as "We'll see about that when you get here" or "Maybe we can talk about that when you are here" are basically telling you that you can kiss your non-negotiables goodbye.

    Make sure you inform them of your symptoms. Be open and honest. If they act like they don't care or say something like "Oh that is too bad", that is a "red flag". Make sure they are very aware of ALL your symptoms and they are understanding of them.

    Make sure they have a car and they are able to drive. I didn't think to ask about that. Your health is important. If you have a panic attack or an anxiety attack and you are in a strange city with a strange individual, you may not know your way around.

    Make sure you tell at least one family member and one Counselor or Doctor where you are. Give them the name, address and phone number of the person you are visiting. If the person balks at giving this information for your safety (and theirs), that is a "red flag". I didn't think about this either.

    Make sure you call either a family member or a Counselor every day when you are visiting the individual. If the person you are visiting will not allow you to do so or says something such as "You need to cut the apron strings", that is a HUGE red flag.

    If the person says they work, but won't give you their work number, or they give it to you but never pick up the phone, that is also a HUGE "red flag".


    I hope this advice will be helpful for all of you who would like to meet an individual in-person that you have communicated with on-line.

    Feel free to add your own input and feelings and suggestions.


    Best wishes to all!


    Regards,


    Rick Thomas

  2. #2
    Jazz's Avatar
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    Let me first start off by saying Im so sorry you experienced that. I could only imagine how horrible that must have been. I find myself going to meet an online person in pe for the first time!! Although i am not getting any weird vibes from him or any red flags i feel very anxious.

    I've told him about my anxiety with men, but i haven't told him just how bad it is. Ive always been shy for the most part but i was part of something, i had an experience that may have caused me to develop this anxiety towards guys. After that experience i knew it difficult to communicate w/anyone but it was especially the case with guys. I've improved greatly with talking to girls (maybe cuz i am one lol) but not guys. Im in the process of learning just how bad i have it because i was in denial, i didnt want to believe, but as im finding its inescapable!

    So im struggling with telling him " hey so i think your a cool guy but im absolutely terrified to meet you even in a public place! I feel like I'm gonna go into a panic just at the thought" thats how bad it is ^^'

    So the first time i meet him it'll be with my best friend lol as support he doesn't know that. I feel like if im totally honest with him he'll think me to be very strange, or rather crazy!! I told him im very nervous (except the panic feeling) and he sweetly replied back to me telling me not to be he'll try his best to make me comfy as possible.

    I feel conflicted and well pretty pathetic :[

  3. #3
    nothing's Avatar Habitual Failure
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    I've never made any type of connection with anyone online because I suck at communication, but if I did, it would probably go down EXACTLY like that story.

    That was a terrible experience, it may not mean [BEEP] coming from me, but I'm sorry you had to go through that. Most people are liars and frauds, it's miserable to realize that, but knowing it may prevent you from getting tricked again. I want to be a liar and a fraud now, those assholes must have it all figured out, they can justify ANYTHING and NEVER feel guilty.

  4. #4
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    @Jazz-I think you should be very open and honest with him. I hope the advice I have shared given my experience will help all those who want to meet someone in-person that they have been communicating with on-line.

    @nothing-Thank you for your feedback and support. I just learned what to watch out for. It was a difficult and horrendous experience that is for sure. That doesn't mean I wouldn't attempt a meeting again. I would just go about it completely different.

    I wish for both of you all the best!

  5. #5
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    that's terrible. im so sorry that happened to you too.

    i met my first online friend the other day. he came to my house. and i guess this would be more of the reverse situation from the one you were in, because he was the one wanting to meet me. i didn't really care to meet him and i was quite worried about how it would go, but i didn't want to keep saying no to him and create friction in our friendship, so i just said fine finally. turns out i wasn't really what he expected, and in a way that was a let down, not a pleasant surprise. so that was just great for my self esteem. im much weirder and more aloof in person than he thought by our online interactions, but i always thought he was reading way too much from my online postings and messages that wasn't there, so what was i to expect to have happen. there was no good reasons he should be as interested in me as he was, but it took him until he finally met me to see that, i guess because he built up all these wrong ideas in his emotions clouded dumb head.

    to me his visit went better than i'd hoped. why? because nothing disastrous happened. but to him, because he had expectations, i wasn't what he had hoped. and yet, because he's such an open minded person and still thinks there's redeeming qualities in me despite me not being what he wanted, he'll still meet me more times. i think he's being careful not to show his disappointment in all our conversations that have followed the meeting. meeting me really changed the way he thought about me and about us i think, but he's willing to accept and go along with these changes instead of moving on from me and trying to find someone else who would actually live up to or exceed his mental model of them (which there would be plenty of). i don't really know why this is, and why he would be spending more of his energies on me after this let down, but maybe it means he thinks i could still become more of what he wanted, and i just need his help to do that. plus he was so sure i was *the* person for him to befriend, and invested a lot in trying to get to know me at a time when i didn't want to talk to new people, that i don't think he wants to give up on me just yet and accept he was so wrong about me, and wasted so much of that time sending me all those long and eloquent messages.

    so it wasn't really completely a failure for him if he'll meet me again, but in a lot of ways i was like that girl you met to him, like he thinks im not taking care of myself, which i don't know why he assumed the opposite, but yeah, in a lot of ways but to a smaller degree him meeting me was like you meeting that lady. a disappointment on multiple fronts, but not to the level that was crushing, so he still sees some tiny hope for me, like you might've seen for that girl if she wasn't as different from what she presented as online.

  6. #6
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    My meeting was crushing, especially emotionally. I have not met anyone since that I have communicated with on-line. I want to do so. I am not counting it out. Maybe it will happen again, maybe it won't. I am just way more cautious. And yes emotions due play a part in thinking for some of us. Like I mentioned, I became extremely emotionally attached. My emotions took over all my thought process. Obviously not a good idea to let your emotions make decisions for you. That I have learned. It was a reality check. A major one.

    The lady I met-it wasn't just the fact that she was different in-person than she was on-line. It was all the lies. Lies, lies and more lies. True, you cannot tell by my writing that I am even disabled or that I have a Degree in Marketing or studied Law or was a Teacher's Aid or a Sporting Goods Manager. But I don't lie. I am very up-front right away. And since I met this lady, I have become even more up-front and open right away, especially with my symptoms and my desires.

    Best wishes to you and thank you for sharing.

  7. #7
    nothing's Avatar Habitual Failure
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    You've become more open and upfront about your symptoms and desires; this is great, it's a very healthy way to approach things. It seems that something positive did come out of your bad experience, so give yourself credit for that.

  8. #8
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    you just seem really clear headed by your posts that its hard for me to see how you could have been deceived so bad. im not nearly as clear headed as you, and yet i've some attachments to my online friends, and feelings that they're the right and best people for me out of the hundreds or thousands, that's really mostly emotionally based. how could i justify that they're so great for me as i think them to be on a rational basis? i can't. i pretend how i see them is purely in an objective way and how they really are, that their specialness is indisputable and apparent from their internet posts, but i know not everyone sees in them what i see in them. so i pretend all those people are blind and wrong. but really i may just be seeing things into them that aren't there. now i don't think so, of course, i trust my feelings above anyone's words of caution for me, but when i see someone like you, who just seems to think in a better and clearer way than me, and see the way in which you were fooled, it does give me more doubts about my own perceptions :/

    it would be very nice to hear that you met some of the online people you know and that they did turn out to be approximately how you thought. i hope you do get to meet more of them and it does turn out good. you really deserve that after what happened, and obviously its very possible so i hope you're not entirely closed off to it, but also you don't want any repeats, so the caution you're bringing to it now is probably wise. for every utterly nightmarish story there is one where things do turn out splendidly. i've heard of a lot of couples who met their spouses online, talked to them for months or years as the case may be beforehand, then finally met, and were as good a match as they'd always believed they'd be. i didn't even seek these stories out to give me reassurance. i just continued to come across them one way or another. they did give me more assurance that meeting the people i would want to meet from the internet would turn out well.

  9. #9
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    I once watched an episode of Oprah Winfrey where she had this fraud prevention person. He said if your first impression of someone is "How Charming" Your immediate question in your head should be, "Why?" I've kind of found this to be true. Unfortunately these people have skills at manipulating people that I would say the majority of AS members will never have.

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