Here is where I have landed, and it is not where I started. For a long time I said men give up on women too easily, that we should show up every day and keep the door open. After the past few weeks I think I had it backwards. When a woman starts pulling away, the move that respects her and respects yourself is to pull back too, early, before you send the message you will wish you had not. I say that plainly in I Was Wrong: Men Should Stop Chasing Sooner, where my current answer lives.
If you searched for this because you are in the middle of it right now, here is the short answer. When she is busy, distant, or asks for space, stop chasing. Do not send the follow-up texts, do not explain yourself, and do not make promises you will have to keep while you are hurt. Give her the space she asked for and let her decide whether she comes back. That is my view today. It comes from three posts written within a few days of each other in late July and early August 2026, and I have left the mess in them, because the mess is the part that taught me something.
The woman in these posts was someone I met at yoga. We had a lot in common, our values, our work, our love of hot yoga, and for the first week she was close to me. She texted, she made time, we had a long walk, and one Sunday she spent six hours with me. Then, in the second week, she started pulling back. She said she was busy, wanted to work on her own, and needed space to walk with God. I kept chasing. I sent a string of pathetic texts, a voice memo asking for attention, and a message at 6:30 in the morning that I still wince at. I'm Done Investing Emotionally in Women Who Don't Invest in Me is the vlog I recorded in the middle of it.
The first of these, I Thought I Was Respecting Her. She Felt Rejected., covers the first date and the moment I now think hurt the most. On the couch she leaned in to kiss me, and I froze, because I had told her we would take it slow and that I would not try anything. I thought I was respecting her. She read it as rejection, and the week after that unwound from there. I made two other mistakes in that stretch that I would not repeat. I told her I would stop dating other women for her, which I now see as a mistake, and when she canceled with a long text full of crying emojis, I sent a whiny message asking her not to cancel. The right move at that point was to leave.
Here is how my view moved, oldest to newest. Before any of these posts I was arguing that men were quitting too early. In the rejection post I wrote that I had come to believe it is ideal to always be escalating. In the vlog I shifted to a different lesson: stop investing emotionally in a woman until she shows she is investing in me, and date several women at the same time so no single one carries all my hope. In the last post the lesson became the one at the top of this page. When she pulls back, I pull back at once, and I am not going to swap my kids for a night with a woman again.
I am not going to pretend these posts agree with each other. The rejection post ends with me saying I should hold back my emotions until I have had sex, and the vlog says I should date several women at once, which is a different answer from the one I give now. I have left those contradictions in, because they are what I actually thought as each week went by, and I think you can learn as much from the swings as from the conclusion.
Below this opening you will find a contents list and then the three posts in full, newest first. If you want the story, read them oldest first: the rejection post, then the vlog, then the reflection. If you want the conclusion, read the last one. For the wider picture on how I think about dating, see my dating mindset hub and my men, women, and the modern dating market hub.
If you want my take on your own situation, you can get a personal video review from me at https://jerrybanfield.com/review/.
On this page
Every post I have written on this subject is below in full, newest first, each under its own heading.
- I Was Wrong: Men Should Stop Chasing Sooner (August 1, 2026)
- I'm Done Investing Emotionally in Women Who Don't Invest in Me (July 29, 2026)
- I Thought I Was Respecting Her. She Felt Rejected. (July 29, 2026)
I Was Wrong: Men Should Stop Chasing Sooner
From my video published August 1, 2026.
I did a video before saying men were giving up on women too easily, and boy, was I wrong. I got a very painful lesson in exactly what I'm about to show you here. The lesson is that as men, we need to really value our time and attention. As soon as a woman starts making it clear she wants to pull away, or starts saying things like "I'm busy," it's time to withdraw and hope she comes back — or move on. Either way, I'm going to give you an example of how exactly I did this wrong and what I should have done instead.
The Woman I Met at Yoga
I met a woman at yoga that I just fell head over heels — or ass over tea kettle — for. A beautiful woman, and I had so many things in common with her: our lifestyles, our values, even our jobs were very well aligned. I don't know if I'd ever met somebody before where, for my logical brain, everything was in the right position. She's a few years younger than me and wants a family. She was okay with me being divorced and already having kids. We're both content creators. We both play tennis. We're both in great shape. We both love hot yoga. We're both obsessed with health. And I'm thinking, girl, awesome — this must be my next wife.
That first week, she kept coming closer and closer to me. She was giving me all kinds of time and attention. When she decided to go to work so she could make several hundred dollars, she made sure to immediately say she was so sorry and that she really wanted to reschedule — right away. And she made sure to see me later that same day, as soon as she got off of work.
One Week from Perfect to Pulling Away
Here's the timeline. I met her on Monday. She was very close — texting, flirting, sending sweet stuff — Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. At one point she said, "Oh man, I need to work. Can you please reschedule? Let's do it a couple of hours later. I'm so sorry." Sure, no problem. We had a great walk together, held hands, and had a fantastic conversation. Friday, she had a double shift at work and was understandably busy, but she still made time to text me. Saturday, she saw me first thing in the morning, very excited to see me. It was a really nice date — a great time together, laughing, crying together, and exercising — and she was texting me after the date. Then Sunday she spent six hours with me, and we had a fantastic time there again. We cried together, and we were all over each other physically.
And then Monday, she decided to start pulling away. Monday she texted me a bit, but she was too busy to see me. And instead of respecting my own time — and understanding that from my point of view it looked like she was playing games, because I show up very consistently — I kept chasing.
That said, I have withdrawn and given my mother space at least a few times in my life, where I didn't talk to her for a few months. But other than that, I am consistently there for my mother every day, and I don't plan on withdrawing like that again. What feels natural for me is to show up for someone every day. To text a woman first thing in the morning: "Hey, how are you? Thinking of you. Hope you have a great day." That feels natural. What doesn't feel natural for me is to really like someone and then pull away from them and question everything. That feels very weird to me. And that's what this woman started doing.
On Monday, a week after we'd met, now she's too busy. She wants to work on her work. She wants to do it herself instead of letting me help — whereas she'd let me help the day before, and we had so much fun doing it. From my point of view, it was just insane. I'm thinking, why do you want to do that? That makes no sense. We're having so much fun. Why would you want to spend the night sitting in your apartment by yourself instead of hanging out with me? Makes no sense. She told me, "I really don't do well under pressure." And this is where the lesson I had to learn the painful way begins.
Where I Should Have Stopped
What I should have done is immediately pulled back. As soon as she decided she wanted to sit in her apartment all night by herself instead of seeing me — when we live a fifteen-minute walk from each other — I should have stopped right there. As soon as she sent me that text message that said, "I'm going to spend the night by myself," smiley face, I should not have responded to it. I should have said to myself, I'm going to pull back as hard as I can right now, and I'm going to wait at this point until she comes to me.
But instead: "Oh, okay, that's fine. Maybe tomorrow." Then the next day she said, first thing in the morning, that she could see me. She was happy I'd given her space. But then she got all in her head and canceled the date because she needed to walk with God again instead. And instead of stopping right there — which is exactly what I'm doing the next time a woman does that — I kept going. Next time, I'm stopping immediately. I'm gone unless she comes back to me. I'm assuming it's over unless she comes back to me, because I'm just going to go out with other women who are paying attention to me.
I have two dates with two women that I just set up yesterday, right now. For me, I just need to date multiple women. I like lots of attention from lots of women. And the way I can easily pull back is if I've got dates with other women — then whether one woman is going to see me or not doesn't matter as much, and I immediately, naturally pull back. Unfortunately, this seems to be how a lot of us guys operate when we don't have any options: our one woman pulls back and we're like, "Oh my God, please, no."
The Pathetic Texts I Actually Sent
I sent her the most pathetic set of text messages. You know what? I'm just going to share them, because they're really bad, because it's embarrassing, and because this is an example of what not to do. I spent a week agonizing, crying, and missing this woman, and all she was doing the whole time was pulling back. I sent one pathetic, sad message after another because I didn't know the rule: stop here. As soon as she blocks you off with "I'm busy," "I'm going to take time for myself," "I'm going to walk with God" — I'm out. I'm done. I'm going to give you space. I'm not going to assume anything or have any expectations. I'm going to assume you're gone unless you come back. You want space? Go enjoy your space. I'm going to be going out with other women.
Here's how it went. She texts me, "I'm going to hang home tonight." I try to send a flirty message back about my Xbox being happy to hear that. Then she's texting me, "How's the massage?" — and she's texting me pictures and stuff, all while she's at home by herself. I should have stopped immediately and let her wonder: Is he done with me? Does he like me? Because it seems like women need that. I can't stand a lot of what some of these dating guys on YouTube put out, but on this one they're right: the woman needs to play this game with herself, have these feelings, and wonder, does he like me or not? For me, that feels inauthentic as a man, because what feels authentic is to just openheartedly love people. But that is not working at all in dating, and this last experience was a horrible example of it.
So let me read this. I hate to share it, but here it is. She tells me — four hours after telling me she was going to see me that day — she sends this message saying: "My communication hasn't been good. I need to walk with God. I realize space is what I need to process. I'll give you a call later." And I reply: "I'm feeling the same. I think we can help each other if we have a chance to connect. It's hard to make sense of things alone, and God encourages me to work with other people as much as possible. I'd love to walk with you. I'd love to talk to you tonight and share our thoughts. Please give us a chance to connect, because we'll both feel better."
Next message, eight or ten minutes later: "I miss you. That's the main feeling I have, and I think that's the thing behind your feelings too. It may come up as fear or too much overwhelm. Let's face it together. We can have so much joy together like we did this weekend. I think the choice to take space is a choice to suffer." Apparently — maybe as a man that's how it feels, and maybe women experience it differently. And then: "This is the last time I have available before your trip, since I have my kids tomorrow."
The Kids Swap I'll Never Repeat
And I did the dumb thing of clearing my schedule and giving my ex the kids instead of keeping them at my place. So I felt extra bad that I was sitting at home by myself while she was sitting at home by herself, just giving me space. And of course, do you think she messaged me saying, "Oh, I'm so sorry, you're right, I completely get what you're saying, I'd love to hang out"? No. She doubled down and said that space is necessary for her, that she needs time to figure out her feelings, and, "Maybe we operate differently." Yes. And here's the second thing she said: "Maybe the way I operate isn't the best. I don't want to be harsh or seem distant." Well, from my point of view, it is harsh and distant. But I also need to accept that perhaps it's a different experience being a woman than being a man, and perhaps we all have different human experiences. That's for sure.
But I can see the very clear lesson. As soon as she comes up wanting space, I back off — one hundred percent, immediately. You want space? I'm going to give it to you. I'm going to give it to you immediately. You're busy? You want space? You need to cancel? I'm out, immediately. And if she doesn't start chasing me a little bit, that's fine, because I've already got other dates lined up. Some woman at some point is going to be very interested in having your boy all to herself, and that's the only woman I care about being with. I am absolutely not putting up with any of this anymore. Because I could be filming YouTube videos, making money, and helping people. I could be hanging out with my kids.
Never again will I swap my kids to spend a night with a woman. That's what really hurt my feelings. It wasn't even that she gave me this runaround — it's that I could have spent the night with my kids. Now, the swap itself was a nice thing I did for my ex, because I was taking the kids six days in a row instead of my usual three so she could take a trip. But still. I hope I can help someone else make sense of this painful lesson. And if you've experienced this before, it seems like a lot of women want to play this game. They want to test you.
What Should Have Happened Instead
What should have happened after she sent me that crying-emoji message about walking with God? She should have gotten no response from me. And then she should have been left wondering how I'm feeling. Is he pissed off? Is he done with me? Is he dating other women? Is he out with somebody else right now? Does he like me? Is he mad? Is he mad at me? Now, I don't know all women — and some men too, gay and straight, all of us can have different experiences. But my experience is that this is very important: when the woman pulls back, I need to pull back too. Because that gives her a chance to feel safe. To feel like she has a choice. I think what I did here is I left her feeling pressured, like she didn't have a choice — like she couldn't ask me for space, and I was just going to constantly be on top of her.
And even now, since I've learned this, it took me another miserable week after all that — a week of her slowly pulling further and further away, wanting more and more space. My mind is still hoping that someday she realizes I'm the best man for her. The only way she's ever going to see that, though, is space. The last message she sent me was about a paragraph long, on Wednesday, saying, "I think you like me more than I like you." And at this point, I can see why she thinks that. I didn't respond to that, and I have no intention of ever responding to it. Because if she's sending me a message like that, she at a minimum needs space — if it's not totally over already. There's nothing I'm going to say at that point to convince her with logic that, well, actually, you do like me, and here's why.
Sending her one of my videos was such a bad idea too — but I did that. I made a whole vlog about it called "I Shouldn't Have Sent This Message at 6:48 a.m.," and then the next one, "The Queen Is Gone and I'm Back to Dating in 2026." My God, these were painful lessons to learn. Agony. The queen goes cold. It was such agony going through these lessons.
The Lesson: When She Pulls Back, You Pull Back
But if I can help someone else with this, here it is: if a woman pulls back, to me, the thing to do that demonstrates you understand women is you pull back too. And the thing that demonstrates you value your own time is that you don't send that message — or that message. You stop. If she pulls back and she wants space, I immediately give it to her. If she's busy, that means she doesn't value time with me that much. Because if she's interested in spending time with me, she will make time to spend with me. The woman I was all excited about made twelve hours to see me within a week of meeting me — and then she made almost no time for me at all, and it turned into negative attention.
And I realized that even if you're in a relationship, this still applies. With my now ex-wife, there were lots of times when she wanted to pull back and just needed space, and I struggled so much to give it to her. Now, I've finally got it.
I Want a Two-Way Relationship With You
If you've made it all the way to the end of this, you need a two-way relationship with me. Stop just reading and watching, and join the Jerry Banfield Family. Tell me about what you're going through, because that gives me perspective and helps me make better videos. I'm tired of just talking at you — I want to hear you. You can send me videos, you can post your dating profile, you can share your life story. When you join, the thing to do is introduce yourself, say why you joined, and help us all get to know you. There's a direct message button where you can chat with me, and if you want me to make a video about a specific subject, give you an opinion about a specific thing, or share my experience, I'm here for you. You're going to get a ton of value, and you're going to help me by helping you — I get to know you, and you know me. That's fair, and I'm looking forward to getting to know you in the Family.
If you want more of these painful dating lessons and everything I'm learning as I get back out there, you'll find all of it in my Dating playlist. Seriously though — what kind of person reads one of these all the way through to the end? I've got to get to know you.
I'm Done Investing Emotionally in Women Who Don't Invest in Me
From my video published July 29, 2026.
It's July 26th, 2026. God, what a day in utter agony. But I learned — I learned. And one of the lessons is that from now on, I'm not putting my vlogs out the day of. From now on, vlogs are going to be scheduled well in advance, just in case I need to censor them — so if I'm in an emotional state, I can calm down before I film. I appreciate people's consideration, but at the same time, it's like — okay, just because I'm crying doesn't mean my whole life is falling apart. It means I'm having some human feelings. And I did a lot of crying today, and a lot of hurting, a lot of suffering. So let me tell you how all that went down.
I'm mainly making this for myself. I want to go back and watch my vlogs from a year or two or three years ago so I can remember the stuff I already learned, because it seems I'm forgetting some things and learning the same crap over and over. So these are mainly for me, and to record real, authentic human experience.
Feeling Neglected by the Queen
Since my last vlog, which was yesterday morning before we went over to the family party, everything was looking pretty good — although I was feeling a bit neglected by the woman I'm dating. I don't know if that's even relevant anymore after the last 24 hours. But we're going to come up with a name for her, and I don't know what we're going to call her. The queen. We'll call her the queen, all right? Because that goes with the previous vlog series. The queen.
So I had been feeling a bit neglected by her. For example, yesterday she took 10 hours to reply to my message — although she is on a trip with her family, and she said she would not be looking at her phone all the time. So that's fair. I was wanting a little attention. We'll get to that in a minute. Everything was fine in the morning, except she took her usual several hours to reply, and I reached out for attention — which, as usual, look at what I do.
Sisters, Starbucks, and a Graduation Party
We went to my sister's house and had a really nice time hanging out with my sister and her daughter and the cats. Then we went to Starbucks and dropped $57 — and that includes a pretty hefty tip. I had some oatmeal at Starbucks. That was good; I don't usually have oatmeal. Damn, we're getting into the mundane details of this, aren't we? Well, I was telling my sister about the queen — we'll have to come up with nicknames for all these women — and she seemed really enthused.
Then I went over to my other sister's for a graduation party for her son. The kids were a little bored and were fighting at first. I was stuffing my face with a bag of chips and some Jimmy John's veggie sandwiches. They had bowling pins set up with footballs, and that was fun — I was knocking those bowling pins down with footballs. It was pretty sweet.
And yet this grief was hitting me: Laura, their mom, my ex-wife, not there this year. And not only that, she's got her boyfriend all weekend, which she doesn't usually get to do, because usually she has the kids on the weekends and I have Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. But she's having fun with her boyfriend all weekend while I'm up here with the kids by myself, and this sense of grief was just setting in. I'm like, man, if I had a new woman up here, it'd be better — but I don't. And I talked to the kids about that in the car. I told them: two years ago, when I came up here for the same sister's oldest son's graduation, I knew I needed to divorce your mom, but I wasn't ready to do it. I had some great conversations with the kids — maybe that's why they were acting up a little emotionally when we got there. But we ended up playing badminton, my sister got there, and we had some nice conversations.
Then I had dinner scheduled with the sister I came with — dinner with her son and her ex-husband. My other sister looked a little hurt when I said I was going to have dinner with them, and I realized, crap. Yeah, he probably should have been here at this graduation party, and he's skipping it, and then he's having dinner with me. It's a bad look for everybody. I'm like, ah, crap — sorry I got in the middle of that. But I went out to dinner and had a Caesar salad at Mavericks with an appropriate amount of croutons. There were a ton of croutons in there. I'm like, thank you — this is how a Caesar salad should be from now on. That's how many croutons you put in a Caesar salad. I ate the whole plate. And I was telling him about the queen, all the while she hadn't messaged me all day, which is recent — she's hanging out with her family all weekend.
Spinning Out at Night
Then I get home to my aunt's house and I talk to my friend from AA for over an hour. I'm starting to feel a bit emotionally unstable, and talking to him helps me for a little bit. But then I settle into the house and shower, and I'm getting ready and getting the kids ready for bed, and I start to totally spin out emotionally. Maybe I shouldn't have indulged myself privately right beforehand. Or maybe it was the family party and I'm picking up emotions. Or maybe it was the grief. Or maybe it was the queen taking 10 hours to respond to my two-minute voice memo — she had asked me a question, I sent a response, and 10 hours later she sends this reply that sounds really tired. And in it, she happens to mention that she had time to edit videos earlier. I'm like, that's nice. You had time to edit videos earlier, but you didn't have time to look at my messages. You have time to edit videos for people who mostly don't care about your videos — and even if they do, they don't care that much.
So I went to bed utterly pathetic. I was praying to Jesus — please. I'd been reading the Bible, the stuff she sent, and it says pray for what you need. I'm like, you need a message from her. And then I got the message, and I didn't even feel good. I'm like, this is so stupid. Because it sounded like she was putting in the effort, but kind of resentfully putting in the effort — like she didn't want to send me a message, but she felt like she had to. I'm like, this is so dumb. And I was up off and on all night, just miserable, having trouble sleeping, thinking I need to just not message her at all tomorrow. I should just not message her at all tomorrow. But then I'm feeling bad because I said I'd always reach out to her. And I'm like, God, I've got to stop saying I'm going to do stuff. I should be much more hesitant to say or promise I'm going to do anything. I said I'd be patient with her, too. How's that going? It's going great, isn't it?
Oh, I'm just having a real, raw, honest human experience. I'm sharing the stuff most people would keep to themselves, and I want a world where more people share the truth instead of lying and hiding. You know how to hide, how to lie. You need people like me.
The 6:30 A.M. Mistake
So I woke up at 6:30 in the morning and made my first bad decision of the day, which was to send her a message saying that I'm feeling sad and hurt after hearing her last voice memo, and I'd like to FaceTime with her later — when would she be available? Predictably, she didn't respond great to that. She's like, I'm sorry you're feeling that way. I don't know what I said, but I'm just trying to enjoy my time up here with my family. And there's this total sense that I'm just bothering her and she doesn't want to hear from me. Which is frustrating, because I canceled dates to date this woman exclusively — I was the silly boy who did that. I should have kept going out with the other women. Definitely should have kept going out with the other women. Well, I learned that the hard way. Canceled my matchmaker, told everybody, oh, I met this amazing woman. Yeah, she doesn't seem to think I'm that amazing at this point. But who wants to know the truth of somebody and can handle it? She did tell me when she met me that she wanted somebody she could be authentic with. Well, aren't I doing that, even if it's ugly? But maybe she does still like me. What do I know?
I messaged her at 6:30; she responded about 11. And I started to really spiral. My aunt's looking at me saying, you don't look stable right now. I'm like, all right, we're going to just have to put on a smiley face for you. No more truth for you. I'm not showing you my honest emotions with my face anymore. I'm doing great — yeah, this is me doing great. And I have to hide my thoughts, because we don't need you thinking I'm unstable because I'm trying to have some feelings.
So we get up and have a lazy morning with my aunts here and the kids here, and I'm just spiraling. I felt so stupid for sending that message. I'm like, you should have kept your mouth shut. It would have been better to send nothing at all than to send some message about how you're hurt and how you're sad. And when I woke up at like eight or nine in the morning and looked at it, her message wasn't that bad. I'm like, man, never send a hurt message at 6:30 in the morning. Come on. I swear I've done that before. Not doing that again — and I have to watch these vlogs to make sure I don't forget. I did snuggle with my son this morning, though, which was really nice.
So then she messages me, and she's predictably not that thrilled with what I sent. So I send her a voice memo with more stuff not to be thrilled about, saying: look, I just miss you. I'd like to see you. I'd like some attention. I'm very thoughtful and I'm very emotional and loving, but the downside of that is I like and need attention. I'm like a puppy — I'm great if you're ready to pay attention to me all the time, but if you want to go away, I'm going to chew the house up. There we go. So I sent her that, and you can guess — it took five hours for a reply to that. And then she's like, look, you're pressuring me. And I asked her, are you still interested? Like, should I —
I don't know if I said, should I move on? But I'm like, I could use a little validation. She gave me no validation. And basically: you're pressuring me, leave me alone. Maybe a little nicer — she wrote it a little nicer. But basically, in man language: you're pressuring me, leave me alone. So I sent her a message like, okay, got it. I will. I'm sorry for disturbing your family time. I am going to give you space and drop expectations. She's like, I don't see why you expect me to communicate with you so much. And to me — if I'm dating just one woman, I do like to communicate every day. I do. There you go.
By that point I was just in utter agony, trying to cry, miserable, having every dumb thought you wouldn't want to have. I'm feeling frustrated, too, because my kids are right there and I feel like I can't feel their love, and they're trying. They're loving. "I love you, Dad." My daughter and my son both snuggling me up, smiling, just trying to cheer me up. And well, it did work eventually. I sat with the kids and talked with them.
Pizza, Mini Golf, Go-Karts, and Laser Tag
Then I took the kids out. I'm like, I'll do whatever you guys want. I feel utterly depressed and absolutely miserable, but I'll do whatever you want. I don't care, I'll get out. So they're like, let's go get pizza. I'm like, okay — took them to get pizza. Then we came back home and I felt bad some more. Then we went out to go mini golfing, and the kids were wrecking me at mini golf. My daughter and son both hit a hole in one. I didn't. And they ran way up ahead — I was like two holes behind when I finally got to the end, and my daughter had finished four or five holes ahead.
Then we did the go-karts, and the first moment of significant joy I had was doing the go-karts. I got a nice, fast go-kart, and my son had to ride with me. At first I was being a little conservative, but then I let it out. I eventually held the pedal down the entire time around the course and slid around every corner and slid around the other cars like Mario Kart. It felt so good. There were like two or three good laps where I just went straight around fast, sliding around every turn and crushing my son into the door. They didn't even make me wear a seatbelt. And my driving was just amazing. My daughter's like, well, you were a police officer before. I'm like, yeah, I've driven a lot. It's pretty easy to slide that go-kart around the course once I got comfortable with it.
Then we did the batting cages, which was fun. I hit the 45-mile-an-hour baseballs, and it took a little while to warm up. Boy, did it take a little while to warm up. But once I started, I started getting some nice hits, getting some balls out into the outfield, and that felt good. My son and daughter both did the soft-pitch softballs, and we all had a good time there.
Then we went back to my aunt's house again, and then we went out to Zap Zone. My daughter tells my son, if you want me to go to Zap Zone, I'm going to twist your nipples — for a full minute. And I'm like, this is interesting right now. So we went to Zap Zone and played laser tag. I was in first place — I was camping, same as I play Call of Duty. I was camping up on the second floor, just shooting all kinds of people from above who couldn't even see me, then popping back and forth to cover my area. If I got shot, I just stayed there, camping. I'm like, I'm not moving. You lose points when you get shot, and I was up in first, and my son shot me right at the end of the match and I slipped to second. I'm like, crap. But I felt a little better after Zap Zone. We played some arcade games.
Sobbing in the Kitchen and My Sister's Perspective
I came home, but I was still so depressed. This time I got down on my knees and sobbed in the kitchen while I was cooking noodles. That was great. And then my sister came over — the one whose house I visited yesterday, whose son and ex-husband I had dinner with. And she cheered me up, because I know I don't have to put on a happy face for my sister. My sister can hear the full truth. And she's like — this is an older sister, like a decade older — you've learned a lot from this. You've learned some valuable lessons.
I'm like, yeah, I've learned that I need to be dating like three to ten women at the same time, not significantly emotionally invested in any of them. Then they can all take it slow, and one of them can decide that I'm their favorite. I should not ever be dating one woman at a time again. I should have so many women that I can barely keep their names straight. Because if I'm dating one woman, I get emotionally attached — I just do. I want to talk with her every day, and I want to think about and plan our life together. And it just seems a lot of women don't want to jump right into that, which is reasonable. Some women certainly do — and maybe, if one does, maybe that wouldn't be a good idea. The queen certainly had part of her that did want to jump right into that.
But then I was thinking: she canceled a date on Tuesday last minute, even though she was saying how hurt she was when somebody else did that to her the day before she met me. She did it to me. Then she didn't make time to call me the next day when she said she would. Then when she called me the day after that, she was super distracted — literally saying she nearly got hit by a car while jogging, and literally talking to me while jogging. And meanwhile, everybody else is getting higher-quality attention from her. She has calls scheduled with people she's sitting down with on Zoom. And — no, I don't want to say anything more negative about her. I would still like to date her. But at this point, I see I need to completely emotionally withdraw. I'm pulling back as far as I can. If she's interested in continuing with me, then I'll be here, but with basically no expectations. I'm going to assume she's totally done, and if she surprises me, that's fine. But I'm going to expect at this point that she's finished. She's run away from me — like she said she ran away from all the other guys who liked her in her whole life. And that's sad. It's so sad. The two of us have such insane compatibility. But I guess we're not that compatible when it comes to this: she thinks it's okay to provide hardly any attention when she's dating me, and I like attention. And she thinks it's okay to edit her videos instead of listening to a two-minute voice memo from me. That's not okay to me.
And my sister reminded me: remember, you guys did this together. Don't blame yourself for everything. She did her part to have you feeling this way, and you did your part. That's true. I need to stop having my part.
The Woman at Yoga and the Lesson About Investing
And something I'm really grateful to see now is the way I attracted this woman. There was a woman in yoga the other day — the last yoga class I went to. She seemed desperate to talk to me, which is not a feeling I usually get. To be clear, I don't usually think women really want to talk to me at yoga. But this woman was beautiful. She put her mat down right next to me, even though there were a lot of other spots. And then she just sat there for like three to five minutes after class, literally sitting in the same position as me, hands out behind her. And I could just feel it: I wish this guy would talk to me. Almost everybody else in the whole classroom had gotten up and was walking out. And because I'm dating the queen, I'm like, no — I'm not talking to this woman and then potentially having a good connection, getting her number, and then feeling disloyal. But if I had it to do over again, I would not offer to be exclusive. I would not offer to be a boyfriend until there was a significant reason.
It's funny — the queen said she really wanted unconditional love, but she's not prepared to receive it. And maybe my love's not totally unconditional if I want attention. But I really spun out into feeling like such an idiot. I'm like, I can't believe how many people I told about this woman. I feel like a moron for everything I've said about her at this point. And I know she might watch some of my videos, too. And it's like — why don't you pay attention to me instead of watching my videos? Literally, one night when she was avoiding me, she was up watching my videos. And it's like, why didn't you just see me that day instead of watching my video at one in the morning?
I would very much like to have an amazing life together. I don't want to be sitting here pouring all this out because everything else is more important than talking to me. And it's fine — I can play that game, too. Going forward, I'm going to minimize investing emotionally in women until they've demonstrated an investment in me. That seems reasonable — it's what almost everybody said I should do, because it seems the woman needs to invest. I can certainly give a taste of what I have to offer with my love and my energy. But I just went all in recklessly — recklessly — with the queen.
And today I was in agony, and most of it wasn't about her. Most of it was how dumb I felt. I put out these videos saying, I don't know what to do with this woman, I don't know how this woman has changed my life. And she certainly has. I'm getting my new Bible in the mail, which I'll be reading whether or not she wants to keep talking to me. And I would love to keep talking to her, but I'm hurt. I'm hurt by her pulling away and avoiding me and making so much time for other people. She's all about trying to spread all this joy to strangers, but from my point of view, the love she gives to me, the attention she gives me, is really valuable to me — more valuable than a thousand strangers giving me a little bit of attention. A thousand strangers' love does not equal her same amount of attention.
And this is something that she struggles to understand. Maybe this is more how men think — or maybe it's because I grew up with my mom in the military and we moved all over. But I generally put most of my emotions in five or ten people, and maybe I should start to diversify more. If you're not those five or ten people, I just don't hardly feel anything about you. You can do whatever you want to. I get my feelings hurt a little bit reading YouTube comments, which I'm not going to do anymore. But it can be challenging for me to receive love from strangers. Some stranger doing something nice for me — I honestly don't feel much of anything. It's like, thanks for letting me in, in traffic. My heart might feel a little bit of joy, but it's not one of those things that really motivates you to live. To me, it's like: which people in my life motivate me to want to live no matter what? Attention from those people is priceless, and everybody else doesn't matter by comparison. So there are kind of five or ten core people, and then maybe for me there are like 20 to 50 people who are a little on the outer edge.
And it looks like what I did is I moved the queen right into my inner circle, and she — I'm lucky if I'm even in her 50 or 100. That was a mistake on my part. Or maybe it was a mistake on her part to not move me into her circle. It's nice to realize you don't do things and live life by yourself. Everybody else's actions are impacting what happens.
Scheduling Vlogs in Advance
As I record this vlog, I'm glad I've learned: from now on, we don't put these vlogs out the day of. I'm glad this vlog will be out several days later, so if I need to edit something — because maybe she does enthusiastically respond in the next few days and I want to refilm this or edit parts out — I can just tell the AI to cut stuff. My feelings were hurt with her over that, too, because I'm like, look, I can edit all your videos with AI. Do you think she wants me to? Has she even given me one video to try doing that with? No. It's like, well, I guess we're not building that great of a team together if you won't let me help you with a simple task.
And yeah, it's amazing how much suffering I felt because of feeling like an idiot. I'm like, I shouldn't have told all these people on YouTube about this woman. I shouldn't have told anybody in my life about this woman. I need to just date a bunch of women at once and diversify. And now I'm actually getting good at putting my energy out in a way — especially at workout classes — where I can get a phone number and get a date. So that's my plan going forward, unless this woman warms up, which I don't see why I would assume she will at this point. My expectation is that she is permanently cooled off, and I'll be surprised if that changes. That would be a sign that she really is the queen, too.
How Much of Our Pain Is About Being Wrong?
But it's amazing how much of my pain today was wrapped up in being right — or rather, being wrong. And I wonder, in our lives, how much of our pain is wrapped up in being wrong rather than whatever else we're saying it's about? It's like, okay, if I don't want to be wrong — I realize what I've been doing with being a content creator for so long: I live my life sensational. And this is why I'm also pulling back from content creation. I'm tired of living my life sensational, where I always have something to do a video about because I'm creating drama in my life. Part of this whole thing with this woman was almost certainly to create content, because I made some interesting content out of this thing with her, didn't I? But what if I didn't have a motivation to try to make clickbait videos out of my actual real-life stories?
I'm interested to see how this vlog ages a year, five, ten years from now. If I want to keep up with my competition, I've got to go back and watch my old videos. And I'm really wondering — this has made it certain for me, too: I'm tired of living my life online. I'm tired of trying to please algorithms. I'm tired of knowing exactly what I could do to get a ton of views and money, and then not being willing to do it because it's gross. Sorry, this is getting repetitive by now.
I'm glad my sister came by before she left — we had a great time, and I've been restored to sanity. I'm sad that I feel like this little not-even-relationship is already over after two weeks. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe this entry is wrong, and the other videos in my Dating playlist are right. We'll see. So, there you go.
I Thought I Was Respecting Her. She Felt Rejected.
From my video published July 29, 2026.
I just learned a hard lesson in dating that I want to share with you so you don't have to learn it the hard way like I did. Let me give you the full story so you can understand each individual element of it — and if you want to share your story with me, join the Jerry Banfield Family, and I'm available for you. I met this woman at yoga two and a half weeks ago. Absolutely gorgeous. Extremely attracted to her. Very strong. I heard her talking about being a content creator, so after the other woman she was talking with walked away, I went up to her and did a very confident, strong approach: "Hey, I heard you're a content creator." I even talked in a different tone of voice — real, grounded. I came up, asked about her being a content creator, and then I told her why I'm a YouTuber and started asking her all these questions about her content.
Then she got very interested in me. She started asking a bunch of questions about me. We took it outside and talked for like twenty minutes after the class ended. While we were outside, she dropped her phone, and I said, "I think your phone wants my number in it." I was being playful, having fun. She gave me her number, and I said, "Let's set up a date right now, so we don't have to screw around on the phone trying to figure out each other's schedules. You've got your calendar, I've got my calendar — let's schedule it." We scheduled a date right then, on the spot. And then we talked for thirty more minutes. She told me everything she was looking for in a man. She said she wanted a man who was authentic and who wanted a family, et cetera. I realized we were extremely compatible. I was texting her, being flirty and fun, right up until our date.
The First Date and My First Big Mistake
She rescheduled our date to a few hours later, and we went for a walk in the park. One thing she said was, "I want to take it slow. I haven't dated anybody in a while. I haven't even been out on a date in months. I haven't had a relationship in years. I want to take it slow." So I said, "Got it. I'm happy to take it slow with you." And then I asked, "Well, can I hold your hand?" So we held hands. It was magical. I was so proud to be out with this beautiful woman, and I was so interested in her. I started to invest emotionally very heavily, and she seemed to be investing emotionally too.
Now, one mistake I made is that I told her I was dating other women and that I'd be happy to stop dating them for her. Big mistake. I would never do that again. Never will I commit to dating one woman until I am having lots of great sex with that one woman. Never again would I turn down dates with other women and stop texting women I've already been out with. Never would I do that again. But I got really excited about this woman because it seemed like we had so much in common — it felt like a perfect match. I even started doing vlogs talking about how she changed my life, which was true.
Doing Everything Right — Almost
So we had our date Thursday. Friday she was working all day, so she wasn't available. Saturday, I met her first thing in the morning and picked her up at her house — she had let me walk her home after our date, since we live within fifteen minutes' walking distance of each other. Really nice date. Saturday I picked her up first thing in the morning and I was doing everything right. I was crushing it. We did yoga next to each other. I was showing off doing my crow pose; she was showing off doing her handstands. She was turned on physically by me, I was turned on physically by her. We were complimenting each other, laughing. We went to the coffee shop, got coffee, and were having fun.
We went and sat down, and I held her hand. I sat next to her and I opened my heart. I was really vulnerable. I said that I learned in my last relationship that I have unconditional love to offer, and that I failed at offering it toward the end of my marriage. I told her I felt really bad about that and I was looking forward to the chance to do it again. She was very turned on. She leaned into me. Now, remember, she had said she wanted to take it slow — but she put her head on my chest, she put her hand on the middle of my thigh. She was very turned on, and she cried and said she loved that I have emotions and that she really wants that unconditional love.
I went to drop her off at her house, and it got kind of awkward when I went to hug her, because she was almost leaning in like she thought I was going to kiss her — but I didn't. So it just turned into a little bit of an awkward hug. That was maybe my second mistake in this scenario. I should have at least asked her if she wanted to kiss. It seemed like we were very connected — we had just cried together — and I should have at least asked for a kiss or gone for it, but I didn't. Me in my twenties would have absolutely jumped on a chance for a kiss right there. But for some reason — I don't know how the hell this happened — I was thinking, "Oh, she said she wants to take it slow." What if she didn't really mean that? What if that's just what she's done before? What if she was open to a different experience? What if that's how she felt before, but she didn't feel that way anymore? Her body language did not seem like she was trying to slow anything down.
The Couch, the Almost-Kiss, and Standing There Like a Statue
That was Saturday. Sunday, she came over to my house — and here's another mistake I made. I told her, "Oh, don't worry, I won't try anything on you. You can come over here and we'll take it slow." Another mistake. I would never, ever, ever promise that again. If a woman comes over to my house, having sex is definitely a possibility. Not that it's definitely going to happen, but I would never try to take that off the table again, because I do care about what I say. If I promise a woman I'm not going to try anything with her at my house, then I don't feel good going against that.
So she came over, and we sat on the couch for three hours, and the physical contact kept escalating. We cried together again. We were holding hands. We had our legs over each other. She was clearly very turned on. Then she stood up, and she started rubbing my hand — she was getting very turned on. We were clearly working up to making out, or we should have been. She gave me this long, hard hug, then pulled back and looked me in the eyes. And then she started to lean in to kiss me — but I didn't lean in to kiss her. I froze, because she had said she wanted to take it slow, and I had said I wouldn't try anything. So she leaned in to kiss me, and I just kind of stood there like a statue. And then she said something like, "I think this is moving too fast," or "I'm not quite ready for that yet." But I think if I had met her where she was, she would have gotten over that resistance and we might have had a fantastic kiss.
Instead, we sat back down. Then we went out to dinner, and I asked her to be my girlfriend. I would not do that again. She said no, it's too soon. Then we came back to my place, sat on the couch again, escalated things again — and I didn't even make any move in that scenario either. And then she went home. And from there, the entire thing went downhill. The entire thing slowly and painfully unwound over the next week and a half.
What I Actually Did: I Rejected Her
At first I didn't see what I had done. Even if I had gone for the kiss and she'd said, "No, we need to slow down," at least I would have offered. But what I ended up doing was rejecting her. She was trying to get through her own resistance to having love and joy and connection and making out. In my experience, women often carry a lot of resistance — especially if you were raised religious, there's been all this shame and guilt and programming. She was trying to break through that, and she reached out, and I was in a perfect position to help her get through it. Instead, I left her hanging and left her feeling like crap. I even acknowledged that — I sent her a video the next morning saying, "Look, I'm sorry I didn't kiss you." But by that point she had been in her head for a while.
Lots of times what happens when we get our feelings hurt is that we start trying to hurt the other person, and we may not even realize it. I don't think she realized that she felt hurt and rejected by me not kissing her. At least if I had tried to kiss her and she'd said, "No, this is too fast," she doesn't feel rejected. But when she tries to kiss me and I don't lean in — I knew. I used to be a police officer. I've dated enough women. I've been married. I can read body language pretty well. She was very turned on and very interested. The last time I saw a woman that turned on and that interested in going to the next level with me was the last woman I actually had sex with. And here I was, standing up all straight, trying to act like a nice guy. I am a guy who has a lot of love to offer — and you can be a nice guy who also wants to experience the joys of the human body with a woman. And obviously this dynamic can play out in any relationship, gay or straight, and it could play out the opposite way in a hetero relationship too.
I've come to believe it's ideal to always be escalating. Over the next week, I suffered, and I made so many more mistakes. All the learning comes down to this: I don't want to take it slow. If we're not constantly escalating, then I'm out. I will find someone else who will constantly escalate, because if we have chemistry, we should be constantly ramping the chemistry up — not getting stuck in resistance. Now, that doesn't mean you need to sleep together on the first date, although in my opinion there's nothing wrong with that — and I used to say there was something wrong with it. At this point I look at myself and think: bro, you have not gotten laid in nine months. If you want to sleep with a woman on the first date, then why not, right? Use protection, have fun, relax.
Why was I taking this so seriously? But I was taking it so seriously. In my mind, this woman was going to be my next wife and I'd have the perfect love story. Well, it would have been a better love story if I hadn't left her feeling rejected. And subconsciously — I don't think she sat there thinking, "Well, he should have kissed me." I think she thought, "I'm a bad girl. I shouldn't have been trying to kiss him. This is going too fast. We need to slow it down. I'm out of control. What am I doing?" She got it all in her head.
The Slow, Painful Unwinding
So here's what happened next. The next day, Monday, she said she didn't want to see me. Tuesday, she said she would see me and scheduled a time. And then she canceled — with a bunch of crying emojis and a paragraph-long text. I sent some whiny text back asking her not to cancel and to spend time with me. She sent a text back affirming her original decision and got cold with her next message. And I made another big mistake right there. When she sent me that first long canceling text, I should have been out right there. I'm out. See ya. If you send me a text like that canceling a date, that's a sign of very low interest. That's a hurtful thing, and I'm not going to give you any attention if you're acting that way. I'm pulling back, I'm withdrawing, I'm giving up on this. And then she's in a position where, if she really is interested in me, she just did something pretty hurtful — and it's up to her, if she wants to continue with me, to make it up and offer an alternative.
But instead, I told her, basically, that I had prayed and remembered Jesus's example on the cross, and that I was willing to suffer for her. What does that communicate to her? It communicates that she can treat me however she wants. That my attention isn't valuable. That I'm not a man who respects himself. And over the next week, she proceeded to hurt me over and over again and withdraw further and further. Thankfully, I did at least have the decency to make a video saying, "Look, either let's get on the same page, or I'm going to date other women — this has gotten bad." But I suffered so much over that next week as she slowly continued to pull away and I kept being in denial. By Sunday I was just miserable. And honestly, I wasn't as miserable over her as I was over feeling like an idiot — over feeling like, man, I'm going to have to show back up on YouTube and talk about all these mistakes I made.
The Beauty of Looking Stupid
But the beauty is that now I have this to teach. And I've realized I need to be teaching people this stuff in person, because there's only so much you can do online on a Zoom call. For example, with men, I need to be taking men out to the yoga studio and showing them how I am able to connect with these beautiful women, get phone numbers, get dates. That's something guys would pay very good money for. It's like: I'm going to tell you exactly where to go, exactly what to do, exactly what to think and how to feel that sets things up — and then I'm literally going to show you and get you started. And then you're going to keep doing this on your own, and you will meet amazing women in person who are interested in you.
And I know some hater will have something to say — but I'll never read the comments again. If you want to comment, you have to be a member of the Family. I'm never reading comments people post for free again. My attention is too valuable. That's exactly what I learned with this woman: my attention should be treated like gold. I'm not giving my attention out to people who just say whatever they want on the internet in response to my videos.
What I learned, though, is where I really felt bad: I looked stupid. That's where I really felt bad. It wasn't as much about her as it was that I looked stupid. But the benefit is that when you acknowledge, "Duh, I'm an idiot," then you're in a position to learn. When I go around thinking I'm smart and I know it all about dating, and then my experience brutally shoves in my face what I'm dumb about, I'm like — okay, I'm an idiot, let me see if I can learn a thing or two. And then I learn all these things. Sunday I was just in agony thinking about all the stuff I had said on YouTube that I would never say again.
Where I'll Actually Take It Slow From Now On
Here's where I'm going to take it slow from now on: with any fantasies or expectations about a woman. Maybe besides "it might be fun to have sex" — other than that, I don't need to be thinking this woman is going to be my next wife and we're going to have a whole life together. I'm going to take it slow on investing my emotions. There's no reason for me to be investing my emotions until I've gotten laid. No reason. Because until then, I haven't gotten the attention I want, I haven't gotten what I want, and there's no reason I should be giving my heart to a woman before I've had sex. That's how I thought in my twenties, and it worked fantastic. And once I did have sex with a woman where I was so in love and it was perfect, then I did give my heart to her.
I'm sad to say, though, that I withdrew it. But it does make sense. She didn't want to keep having kids. She wanted to be in charge and just dictate very important things in our lives, like having kids, rather than having a discussion, exploring, really understanding, and coming to a shared conclusion. If I had it to do again, I'd probably have gotten divorced in 2018 instead of 2025. But I got to have lots of nice times with my kids, and I wouldn't go change anything in my life.
I'm so excited to see what happens with everything I just learned and everything I just did wrong. Because last night I was giving out a whole bunch of attention, even reaching out to some women I'd messaged before — and I caught myself: bro, you don't need to go back to those women. You already know those are seeds that are not sprouting. You're not going anywhere with that. Meet some new women. So I'm so excited to get out there and meet some new women. And I'm so grateful I learned all these lessons, even though it was so painful — about as much emotional pain as I've experienced since getting divorced, ironically at about the same level. And yet I've expanded my emotional capacity. I've learned what not to do. And that's valuable.
If you want my personal feedback on your dating life, join the Jerry Banfield Family — hop in there, post your story, post your dating profile, and I'll give you feedback. I will jump in there and give you my attention. You give me money, I'll give you attention. That's how this works.
If this story helped you see something in your own dating life, there's a lot more where it came from — I share every win, every mistake, and every lesson as I live it in my Dating playlist. Learn from my mistakes so you don't have to make them yourself.