I honestly don’t understand the dating landscape anymore.
It used to feel simpler. You met someone, you got to know them, and if there was a real connection, you eventually became their boyfriend or girlfriend. There was at least some kind of shared understanding of what you were building toward.
But now, everything feels intentionally undefined.
No one wants the label. No one wants the responsibility. People want exclusivity without commitment. They want emotional access, loyalty, intimacy, consistency, and all the actual parts of a relationship, but without having to actually call it that.
And that’s the part that confuses me.
Because you can’t ask someone to act like they’re yours while refusing to claim them. You can’t expect the comfort of a relationship while keeping the door cracked open in case something better, easier, or less demanding comes along.
It feels like everyone has one foot out the door now. So the second things get uncomfortable, or vulnerable, or inconvenient, they disappear.
Poof.
They throw away the whole person and go find a new one. And somehow, because there was never an official title, everyone acts like it shouldn’t hurt as badly because it was never “technically” anything.
But it does hurt.
It hurts like something real because, emotionally, it was real. The attachment was real. The time was real. The hope was real. The intimacy was real. The confusion afterward was real.
People want to keep everything casual in name, but serious in practice, and then act surprised when someone gets hurt or there’s a misunderstanding. I don’t understand how anyone is supposed to build something stable in that kind of environment.
How do you build a solid foundation with someone who keeps digging an exit every step of the way?