Waking Up Sure She Won't Reply
I woke up this morning and felt so down after last night when I had my third Talkify match, first date, really liked her. And now today I'm feeling like there's no point even texting her. Why even bother following up? She's probably not going to respond. It's funny because she put in her profile. She appreciated somebody with an optimistic outlook. And my outlook is so negative and toxic. I'm like, this isn't going anywhere. And I know it. It'd be better if I never even texted her. But I just got to know for sure.
The Sleepless Night After the Date
I had a hard time sleeping last night, which is unusual. I woke up at two in the morning and was up for a couple of hours. My body was so stimulated by the time with her that it was difficult to even calm down, although I did what I could to try and help the process along. I got up and I'm like anxious, which is unusual. I'm like, when am I going to text her? What am I going to text her? I don't even want to text her. I don't even if I just don't message her and she wasn't even going to reply, then I feel like at least I'm in a better position.
Then again, I realized that I might be wrong. This is really toxic thinking and it's fine. So here I go. Let's just see what happens.
Starting the Day in the Studio
The kids have off of school today. I'm playing tennis later. So I start the day out working on getting the studio setting up and the lighting just right. And it seems like it's going pretty well. I crank out a crypto video and thank God for all the validation from my crypto audience. Really appreciate all the likes and all the shares on my Jerry Banfield ICP channel. All the comments is the constant affirmation is really nice. Then my friend texts me. He says he can work on my car today and flush my brake fluid. It'll be $150 and he's ready at noon. I'm like, awesome, because I need to get out of my house and talk to somebody.
I did take a walk by Crescent Lake today to try and just clear my head. And get to work. And I go to see my friend at noon and I just pour my heart out with him. Having someone to talk it through with is everything on a day like this, so if you ever want to pour out your own dating situation and get some honest feedback, you can join Jerry Banfield Family and bring it to a weekly call.
Googling How to Text a Girl at 41
I watched several videos on YouTube talking about how to text a girl the next day, which was ridiculous. I'm 41 years old. I've been out with a lot of girls in especially in my 20s. And I already had a successful marriage for 13 years, although some would say it's not successful because we got divorced. But I really enjoyed most of the marriage. The dating went really well. We have got two beautiful kids that are healthy and that we love. It's awesome. So I'd say that went pretty well. And yet I feel like I'm just doing this stuff for the first time. I'm like, I watched this girl's video.
The strange part is how new all of this feels even after years of dating and a long marriage, which is exactly what I wrote about in I Can't Date Like I Did 15 Years Ago.
She's like, yeah, text, send a text the next day at noon. Send a two part text one saying thank you for a nice night and two, whatever you want to do next. My friend tells me maybe you should just text and see how she's feeling. I'm like, no, he's like, well, just be yourself. I'm like, myself is very direct. Myself is saying, like, hey, I get my phone out while I'm my friends working on my car and I send the following text message, which is it says I exchanged numbers at the end of the date. So I said, do you want to play pickleball on Sunday afternoon based on what she told me about herself and her schedule?
That seemed like it worked perfectly.
No Reply Is Its Own Answer
And do you think I get a reply all day? Nope. No reply, which no reply is a reply. No reply is apathy. Or something's not working. A no reply is a clear no. And I'm just so I'm so annoyed. I'm like, why do I do this to myself? I just shouldn't even date women. And I then grieve, the loss of my ex some more. And I'm glad this process is clearly helping me. But I go home and I'm just like, I know she's not going to reply. And sometimes knowing what's going to happen and being right and having an intuition is annoying. It's like I shouldn't even have sent the message.
Getting no response stings every time, and I worked through a similar gut punch with my matchmaker in A Single Mom Ghosted Me — and My Dating Coach's Response Was Epic.
I already knew she wasn't going to reply. And I just end up feeling stupid.
Not Dumping My Feelings on My Kids
The kids come over right after I get home from getting a car serviced. I'm clearly very sad. And what's nice, though, I don't dump my feelings on them like there's a lot of us end up dumping our feelings on other people, especially the people that are always putting on a happy face and acting like everything's fine, often do very subtle, nasty, manipulative things emotionally to dump feelings on. Other people, especially kids or people like me that are sensitive and I got to be careful and not let people dump their feelings on me. And I'm grateful that my kids have a great time with me and they don't get any of my feelings dumped on them.
We play settlers like a tan and they struggle getting the board set up that they won. Jack wanted to put his settlement there and Madeline wanted to put hers in the same spot and she put hers there first. And but we get through that. We play the game. I managed to win, even though it didn't look like I was going to win. I got all these victory points off of the development cards I bought, which and I got the most nights. So then the kids go play some Roblox on the new setup I've got in here, which they really like. Then the kids head out.
I give my ex a hug and tell her the basics of how it went. And then, I have a really good, like hard cry after everybody leaves. I listen to some Kesha like dancing with tears in my eyes. That was one of my old like 15 year ago cry song and I'm just like sobbing. I'm feeling so much emotion that I start to feel like I'm like I've got angel wings or, like that I'm this fiery bird. Like I start to transcend the ordinary day to day reality. And I love that. Like feeling intense emotions is a way to kind of get into your best, highest level spiritual self.
And God, I felt them today. I went to play tennis. I'm so grateful to hang out with all the guys playing tennis. I played tennis again. I played tennis this first guy and I come out with my serve and volley strategy and win a couple of games. But he fights back. We end up getting tied five to five. We do a tiebreaker that goes to eight to ten. He wins. And it was a great workout. I play the next guy who I beat last week, like five to one. He beats me like five to two this week, destroying me. His serves just acing me, which he couldn't get him in last week.
Then I play the next guy and we're just laughing and hitting balls all over the place and he wins.
Pouring My Heart Out at the AA Meeting
And then I head home to shower, get my nice clothes on, go chair my AA meeting. And I pour my heart out about people being really raw and vulnerable has helped me love people and stay sober. I talk about how crushed I was that I didn't hear back from this girl and how predictable it was and how I already knew it was going to happen. I didn't share about all that, but I share like a really heartfelt topic and about loving people and staying sober and AA. And my grand sponsor now, he poured his heart out at meetings. And the meetings, I don't know, I don't know.
The meeting goes incredible. There's almost maybe there's like 60, 70 people. It's a very full room. My ego is very satisfied. I'm like, this is how many people should be in an AA meeting I'm leading. And the topic really hits deeply. There's a lot of really heartfelt shares, whereas sometimes the topic person does the opposite. They share some surface level crap and the meeting's basically useless. But the meeting tonight's deep. Even one girl shares that she always just performs when she's sharing and she has a hard time really being vulnerable in a room full of people like me. Like I'm I can do it because I saw people who did it and I did that.
I come home from the meeting. I'd stay for like 30 minutes talking with people afterwards. So many people shake my hand and I'm like, thank you. This is what I need to kind of to feel better. And I know that even though today's been an emotionally down day where I just feel hollowed out, that I've grown, that I've learned, I've got all kinds of ideas for videos. I'm inspired that I need to make my videos like this. Like if somebody's searching for an experience that somebody's not going to having a talk if I date that, bam, you find my video like here's my third talk if I date exactly how it went and the matchmaker I gave them.
I'm turning these dating experiences into videos so other people can see how it really goes, and you can follow the whole series in my my Dating playlist.
Being around people who show up raw and honest is what keeps me going, and if you want that same honesty in your corner, you can join Jerry Banfield Family.
I gave great feedback on this girl. I gave my matchmaker positive feedback like I thought this was a great match for me. Now, does the girl think I was a great match for her? I don't know.
Why I'll Keep Showing Up Anyway
But I imagine if I keep doing this, I will find a second wife and have more kids with her and have a really happy second marriage. Then someday I'll be like 60 and be doing videos on my third wife. I don't know.