Getting the Cold Shoulder

[EasterJoy]

Yes I read that a bit later too. I believe my cold shoulder was unfair to me too but moving on and giving it no further thought is IMHO THE THING TO DO.

Annie

I think you are right. It is not fair, but making an issue of this is really not an option. He needs to hope her reasons are good and her methods will improve if she’s ever in this situation again, but it is best to serenely give her the wide berth that her behavior is asking for. If he misunderstood her, oh well.

If he is asked to serve with her on a project again, he ought to let the opportunity pass by without comment. There will be other things to work on.

 

[EasterJoy]

“over sharing”. Yup. That was it.
Lesson learned, move on.

It could be a case of “true, true, and unrelated”…yes, he over-shared, yes, she is avoiding him, but no, the two things don’t* necessarily* have any connection.

After all, that case of over-sharing isn’t what anyone in the world could fairly consider a “come on.” I do not see how he can possibly be accused of impropriety in terms of seeming to be grooming her for some kind of sexual relationship. He’d would be among the worst “lounge lizards” in history, if he were up to that! No, the danger is in gradually becoming too close to someone who is not his wife. He may think he’s too old to be attractive, but the history of young women and admirable older men says otherwise.

 

[LongingSoul]

mdleagedguy, have you asked your wife what she thinks might be going on? You said that you had met the girl through your wife. Being a woman herself and knowing the girl, she might give you some ideas.

 

[dedo]

I am a happily married man with a large family. I met a nice young lady through some volunteer work. She is a fellow parishioner. She asked me to take on some projects, which I did. I worked hard at them and we had some successes. One of the projects was quite involved and lasted over a year. I made a lot of personal sacrifices for this project. We worked together on it, and I thought she had become my friend. Not a close friend because I will only have my wife as a close female friend, but a friend. A friend like the friends I have at work. We got a lot of stuff done and I enjoyed working with her.

When the project ended, she began to give me the cold shoulder. Shortly before it ended she backed out of it without explanation. I invited her to have dessert with my family and she looked very uncomfortable that I asked this. She declined with a lame excuse. She won’t say “Hi” back if we run into each other after Mass and I say “hello”, and acts as if she dislikes me. It’s very confusing to me, and I have no idea why she’s doing this. At any rate, since she seems to have developed a dislike for me and is uncomfortable I resolved not to try to initiate a conversation if we run into each other. But on Sunday I ran into her again, and without thinking I gave her a wave. I’m a personable guy and I wave and say hi whenever I run into someone I know. I got a scowl back, without her even making eye contact. I said a prayer for her in my heart and went on my way.

Now I realize not everyone is going to be my friend, and no one owes me anything. If that’s the way she’s going to be that’s her prerogative and I don’t want to be friends with anyone who doesn’t want to be friends with me. But it still hurts my feelings a bit, and I feel a bit used for having worked hard on a couple of projects that she asked me to work on where she acted friendly when she wanted something.

Why do people do this? Is it because I’m a married man and she’s a single female? Because I’m older? Or is it just that ultimately it doesn’t make sense so I should just forget it? Other people don’t do this to me, and I didn’t do anything different with her than I do with anyone else, with the exception of working on an important project with her. What are your thoughts?

I think she is not responding to your desire for friendship because of societal norms. When you were working on the same project, you had a reason to collaborate. When the project was finished, that reason is gone. Thus, continuing to collaboration between someone in your position and her position is frowned on by society for scores of reasons, many of which have been covered in this thread.

So if you want to be friends with someone half your age you are going to have to keep it in the boundaries of what society says is proper e.g. working on the same project in a location where other people are around, coaching a team etc.

Corresponding outside of that sort of structure will just draw flak for one or both of you. She realized this before you did. Thus, there may not have been any offense or improper feelings . She is just doing what is socially proper. Maybe she thinks interacting with you would hurt your marriage, and she is trying to keep you out of trouble.

Its a little surreal but you can be criticized for almost any interaction with people of the opposite sex outside of the structure of common project / team etc. However inside that structure, almost any mutually agreed on interaction – joking or whatever is fine.

I have wrestled scores of people of both sexes, when we were on the same team at the same school. However, if you so much as follow the wrong person’s public social media, someone may take a shot at you and start to weave innuendo.

That is just the way the world works.

 

[dedo]

I am a happily married man with a large family. I met a nice young lady through some volunteer work. She is a fellow parishioner. She asked me to take on some projects, which I did. I worked hard at them and we had some successes. One of the projects was quite involved and lasted over a year. I made a lot of personal sacrifices for this project. We worked together on it, and I thought she had become my friend. Not a close friend because I will only have my wife as a close female friend, but a friend. A friend like the friends I have at work. We got a lot of stuff done and I enjoyed working with her.

When the project ended, she began to give me the cold shoulder. Shortly before it ended she backed out of it without explanation. I invited her to have dessert with my family and she looked very uncomfortable that I asked this. She declined with a lame excuse. She won’t say “Hi” back if we run into each other after Mass and I say “hello”, and acts as if she dislikes me. It’s very confusing to me, and I have no idea why she’s doing this. At any rate, since she seems to have developed a dislike for me and is uncomfortable I resolved not to try to initiate a conversation if we run into each other. But on Sunday I ran into her again, and without thinking I gave her a wave. I’m a personable guy and I wave and say hi whenever I run into someone I know. I got a scowl back, without her even making eye contact. I said a prayer for her in my heart and went on my way.

Now I realize not everyone is going to be my friend, and no one owes me anything. If that’s the way she’s going to be that’s her prerogative and I don’t want to be friends with anyone who doesn’t want to be friends with me. But it still hurts my feelings a bit, and I feel a bit used for having worked hard on a couple of projects that she asked me to work on where she acted friendly when she wanted something.

Why do people do this? Is it because I’m a married man and she’s a single female? Because I’m older? Or is it just that ultimately it doesn’t make sense so I should just forget it? Other people don’t do this to me, and I didn’t do anything different with her than I do with anyone else, with the exception of working on an important project with her. What are your thoughts?

I think she is not responding to your desire for friendship because of societal norms. When you were working on the same project, you had a reason to collaborate. When the project was finished, that reason was gone. Thus, continuing to collaboration between someone in your position and her position is frowned on by society for scores of reasons, many of which have been covered in this thread.

So if you want to be friends with someone half your age you are going to have to keep it in the boundaries of what society says is proper e.g. working on the same project in a location where other people are around, coaching a team etc.

Corresponding outside of that sort of structure will just draw flak for one or both of you. She realized this before you did. Thus, there may not have been any offense or improper feelings . She is just doing what is socially proper. Maybe she thinks interacting with you would hurt your marriage, and she is trying to keep you out of trouble.

Its a little surreal but you can be criticized for almost any interaction with people of the opposite sex outside of the structure of common project / team etc. However inside that structure, almost any mutually agreed on interaction – joking or whatever is fine.

I have wrestled scores of people of both sexes, when we were on the same team at the same school. However, if you so much as follow the wrong person’s public social media, someone may take a shot at you and start to weave innuendo.

That is just the way the world works.

 

[mdleagedguy]

Update:

I ran into my friend at an event this week and it was 180 degrees from a while back. She reacted with happy surprise at running into me, gave me a big, genuine smile and a spontaneous hug when she saw me. We spoke briefly and she acted like a friend again. I think whatever was going on was not related to our friendship. I feel better about things. I hate being wrong, but in this case I’m glad I was.

Lessons: Don’t jump to conclusions. It’s not about me. Be more positive and charitable.

 

[aTraditionalist]

Over the years I’ve summed it up in one thought. People are weird creatures. Move on and think nothing more of it.

Posted from Catholic.com App for Android

 

[SuperLuigi]

I am a happily married man with a large family. I met a nice young lady through some volunteer work. She is a fellow parishioner. She asked me to take on some projects, which I did. I worked hard at them and we had some successes. One of the projects was quite involved and lasted over a year. I made a lot of personal sacrifices for this project. We worked together on it, and I thought she had become my friend. Not a close friend because I will only have my wife as a close female friend, but a friend. A friend like the friends I have at work. We got a lot of stuff done and I enjoyed working with her.

When the project ended, she began to give me the cold shoulder. Shortly before it ended she backed out of it without explanation. I invited her to have dessert with my family and she looked very uncomfortable that I asked this. She declined with a lame excuse. She won’t say “Hi” back if we run into each other after Mass and I say “hello”, and acts as if she dislikes me. It’s very confusing to me, and I have no idea why she’s doing this. At any rate, since she seems to have developed a dislike for me and is uncomfortable I resolved not to try to initiate a conversation if we run into each other. But on Sunday I ran into her again, and without thinking I gave her a wave. I’m a personable guy and I wave and say hi whenever I run into someone I know. I got a scowl back, without her even making eye contact. I said a prayer for her in my heart and went on my way.

Now I realize not everyone is going to be my friend, and no one owes me anything. If that’s the way she’s going to be that’s her prerogative and I don’t want to be friends with anyone who doesn’t want to be friends with me. But it still hurts my feelings a bit, and I feel a bit used for having worked hard on a couple of projects that she asked me to work on where she acted friendly when she wanted something.

Why do people do this? Is it because I’m a married man and she’s a single female? Because I’m older? Or is it just that ultimately it doesn’t make sense so I should just forget it? Other people don’t do this to me, and I didn’t do anything different with her than I do with anyone else, with the exception of working on an important project with her. What are your thoughts?

In situations like these, you may never get a satisfactory answer. Even if you were more or less rude and confronted her on the issue, you may not get a straight answer.

I tend to agree with the theories that maybe she was interested in you or she’s not comfortable around a family like that. Believe me, I would not be comfortable hanging out with someone else’s family by myself.

I think at my uni there were a couple of undergraduate who had a crush on me, but didn’t know I was married. I don’t know that for a fact because I’m not a mind reader, but keeping the situation in mind, I do small things like start conversations with them when appropriate just so they don’t feel awkward because we do work together on certain things and it has to be done, and the LAST thing our mutual organizations need is awkwardness and drama.

It can be difficult to like someone and then find out they are not available. And it’s quite hard for some people to go out of the way to be friends.

The bottom line is when you’re getting the cold shoulder from someone who is a non-close friend or a prospective friend, just back off and don’t worry about it. They have their reasons for better or worse.