My romance with Dan was a bit of a whirlwind one. We met through a mutual friend and though, I was sceptical about dating him, he was relentless. After months of pursuing me, I finally gave in during a house party at our friend’s place. That was probably the best and worst decision I’ve ever made in my life. I even got to meet his mother three times.
Dan was a giver, and he went out of his way to give me anything I wanted. My sceptical self thought it was suspicious how he was so willing to make me comfortable even when it had nothing to do with him but my friend insisted that he was a good man. So, I let my guard down and he spoiled me like no one ever had. I used to brag about him to everyone and they’d all say the same thing.
“He sounds unreal.”
However, when they met him, they could attest to how good he was not just to me but to everyone. Not to mention, he was the ideal man – tall, somehow athletic with lots of money. For once, I was the envy of my friends’ group. Everyone wanted to know how we met and they couldn’t believe that I almost said no to him.
“Are you crazy, Abi? He’s perfect.” One of my friends remarked after telling her about the house party story.
“I know, but something rubbed me the wrong way when we met,” I explained.
“Well, thank God you came to your senses. Look how good he treats you.”
It’s not like I needed a man to take care of me and buy me nice things. I had a good job and I’m not really a materialistic woman. At that time in my life, I wanted a serious relationship. Dan wasn’t keen on making our relationship official but he was diligent on other boyfriend duties like taking me out, helping me with my errands and showering me with gifts. We dated for another three months until I grew tired of waiting for him to make me his girlfriend.
Then, out of the blue, he asked me to accompany him to visit his parents. During our two-hour drive to his childhood home, we talked about our relationship and he finally asked me to be his girlfriend. My heart skipped a beat. I’m not sure if I was excited about the relationship or simply being someone’s girlfriend. Either way, this was one of the happiest times in my life. I felt like I had met my Prince Charming and he was all mine.
When we got to his parents’ house, something rubbed me the wrong way again. They were excited to meet me – a bit too excited. His mother had nothing but good things to say about her son. He seemed like the perfect child which I didn’t doubt but was a little suspicious.
“He didn’t even get a suspension from school?” I asked as his mother narrated his childhood stories.
“Never. Danny was the best child any parent could hope for. He never even had a girlfriend until he got a job.”
That didn’t seem like Dan at all. Even when we were dating, he would flirt with women all the time. He seemed to be the type that had multiple girlfriends when he was younger. However, his mother insisted that he was a golden boy and who was I to question her?
Having made our relationship official, I now felt comfortable to post about him on social media. I shared our romantic dates and tweeted about him constantly. It was like falling in love with him all over again. Things were going great until I got a DM from a girl claiming to be Dan’s girlfriend. It read:
“That man is my boyfriend from university and we have a 7-year-old son together.”
The message took me by surprise. For some reason, I believed Dan was different. If someone had told me that he had a girlfriend a month or two ago, I wouldn’t have been surprised. However, he got my hopes up by making our relationship official and introducing me to his mother. I started questioning everything about our relationship.
Why did he ask me to be his girlfriend? Did his mother know about the other girlfriend? Why did she lie about it? How do I even ask him?
I ghosted him for two days as I gathered my thoughts to confront him. Eventually, I returned his messages and asked him to meet me at my place. I’m usually a calm and rational person but my demon come out from time to time and I didn’t want to cause a scene in public.
He got to my house shortly after I had asked him to come.
“Babe, what’s wrong? Why haven’t you been returning my calls for 2 days?” he asked.
“Is there a reason why you didn’t tell me you had a girlfriend and a 7-year-old son?” I asked trying not to yell.
He was quiet just as I had expected.
“Your mother, was she in on the lie?” I continued but he still didn’t reply.
I sent his girlfriend a DM, who didn’t live far from where I was, asking her to come to my place. She got there just as fast as Dan did as confirmed that he had come from her place. He finally found his voice and tried to defend himself. After ranting for 30 minutes, I asked him to leave my house and never to even look at me if he ever saw me in public.
The whole experience left me fearful of all relationships that I couldn’t trust anyone for a while. However, I reached out to Dan’s mother who had become a good friend, and sort clarity about the issue. She explained that Dan really liked me and wanted things to work without external interference since most of his girlfriends left him once they fo youund out he had a child. I was still angry at him for lying to me but I was able to heal and move on from it. I’m back in the dating scene but not looking for anything serious.
