How to Avoid a Relationship Meltdown via Text
Texting should not be a primary mode of communication between any two people who care about each other.
The Golden Rules Of Texting:
Anyone that’s important to you deserves the actual face time.
Anything that matters to you requires the time and attention it takes to be clear.
Anything that you can’t say in person should never be said via text.
Electronic intimacy won’t keep you warm at night.
The following case studies are shared with full client permission, but the names have been changed to protect the innocent and not so innocent…
1. Kelsey met Curt at a baseball game. He was sitting right behind her and they immediately hit it off. They’d exchanged phone numbers before the sixth inning and she was thrilled when he texted her the very next day to ask her out. They had a great time on their first date. So, you can imagine she was thrilled again when he texted her to ask her on a second date.
After the second date, the texts got much more “intimate”. She loved the attention, but even in the beginning realized there wasn’t much connection. However, they continued to flirt heavily via text. Curt never called. He was very busy. Kelsey told herself that was OK. She really liked him. So, she also told herself it was OK he didn’t really have a lot of time to go on proper dates. He kept in touch via text and they got together when he had time.
After six weeks she asked him to go to a work function with her. He very politely told her via text he didn’t feel like he was ready to take their relationship public. By her own admission, it wasn’t long before Kelsey felt like she was Curt’s booty call. Two weeks later he told her via text he’d met someone else.
Kelsey made the early error of making her relationship very informal by allowing all communication to be via text. She gave the impression it was OK even when it wasn’t. Kelsey made excuses for his communication, that led her to make excuses for all kinds of things.
You should never allow a guy to plan dates via text message. You are worth the time and attention it takes to call and make plans. You should also never develop a relationship in it’s early stages via text. It creates a false intimacy that can lead you to believe things are going in a direction they aren’t.
2. Laurie and Gabe met through mutual friends. In the beginning, he was really attentive and consistent. However, after several dates, he quit calling as often and quit asking her out altogether.
Laurie knew better, but she felt insecure, so she started sending him cute, friendly texts. It was nothing over the top. Just little texts to “let him know she was thinking about him”. She said she didn’t text that much, but admitted she texted more than what felt good.
Later she learned from the friend who introduced them that Gabe was buried studying for the bar exam. He’d failed once before and was embarrassed to admit it. However, he shared with the friend that although he’d really liked Laurie in the beginning. But he began to see her as needy. He was distracted by the text messages. He felt like she was clinging on.
Sending a text message when you know you shouldn’t call is something you should NEVER do. Also using texting as an excuse to make yet one more contact when you’re feeling insecure will backfire. Text messages are not the way to manage your fear of abandonment.
3. Caroline and Andrew were planning a dinner party for their friends and family where they were going to announce their engagement. Fourteen text messages in Andrew said he didn’t have time for all of this right now. Caroline was hurt. She couldn’t imagine anything being more important than announcing their engagement. So, she told him so, in the continued text conversation. Andrew expressed he had to focus on work at work. Caroline told him he always put work first.
It doesn’t take a psychic to know how this went down. 272 text messages later, over five hours, Caroline and Andrew broke up while planning their engagement party. 272 texts over five hours might sound insane, but trust me, it’s totally doable when you’re fighting. Angry people can fire off text messages at warp speed and it is insane.
Fighting over text message never, ever has a happy ending and get off in the weeds so fast you didn’t even know you were crashing. Worse yet, things said in text are permanently on record. People type faster than their brains work. People can actually type faster than they might naturally talk because there is no pause for the other person to respond.
I’ve seen more than one happy relationship blow up in minutes via text. So much valuable information can’t be communicated that way. No emoticon can replace actual tone and sound of the human voice.
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Lisa Hayes, The Love Whisperer, is an LOA Relationship Coach. She helps clients leverage Law of Attraction to get the relationships they dream about and build the lives they want. Lisa is the author of the newly released hit book, Score Your Soulmate and How to Escape from Relationship Hell and The Passion Plan.
