Men might love bitches, but what if I don't want to be one?

On the nonchalance epidemic, dating as a sensitive person and TikTok telling me not to feel

I had not long returned from a first date in a frenzy of flushed cheeks and swollen lips when my dad stumbled out of his bedroom to greet me, evidently bemused.

“I’ll take it you had a good time then?” he said smiling, rolling his eyes affectionately, happy I was happy, I can only assume; a man of few words but a face that often says more than he can muster.

I glanced at myself in the mirror behind him, my head a mosaic of dilated pupils and unbrushed hair, residue from mascara and eyeliner forming half moons that shimmered black under my eyes. I looked a bit of a mess, but undeniably happy; the glow of fresh eyes on mine and good conversation with someone no longer a stranger softly radiating off my skin.

painting by lucia knops

I feel everything in extremes, it’s something I have known about myself from a very young age - something tied to my identity for as long as I can remember and something I imagine will be tightly secured in a double knot to all my edges for the rest of my life. I grew up crying whenever I watched my parents wedding video, sobbing at the theme tune of a children’s television programme I used to watch because I felt so sad for the two characters, saving the universe all alone from the edges of the atmosphere, with nobody up there to keep them company.

One of the first things I said to my parents when my younger brother was born when I was two was that I felt ‘sorry of him’ (not for him - my grammar wasn’t that up to scratch yet) because he was so small and fragile, so vulnerable. I’ve grown up sensitive, the smallest comments from classmates in primary school sticking with me to this day. I feel words and storylines in my stomach, my nose red and skin blotchy from turns of phrase in novels, from actors playing make-believe on a screen.

My mum’s always told me that this is a gift - that all these years of feeling everything so vehemently have made me an empathetic and creative person, a person who can immerse themselves in the lives of others as though it’s an afterthought, something that comes naturally.

image: pinterest

But dating, in turn, is a minefield. Especially now, when we seem to be living in a nonchalance epidemic where nobody wants to care about anyone or anything, instead it seems to be a competition of who can look the least interested. After this date, when I shut myself away in my room to daydream, content in a haze of false ideas and fantasies, I opened TikTok. One of the first videos I saw was a woman, equipped with a full face of pristine make-up and an accusatory tone, telling me everything I should absolutely not be doing on a first date if I want a man to fall in love with me. As she divvied out her unsolicited advice, I mentally checked the boxes in my head and realised I had done basically everything she was telling me not to do. Don’t give too much away, don’t laugh at too many of his jokes, don’t text him first. Wait for him to reach out, always, no exceptions. I read through the comments and was met with a lot of other girls seemingly in the same position as me, a flood of ‘girrrrl why am I seeing this when it’s too late’ and ‘i needed this yesterday not today!!!!’.

Having engaged with the video my For You Page was suddenly infiltrated with an influx of videos following the same vein, videos surrounding a theme I hadn’t seen on the algorithms on my corner of the internet in a long time. Videos instructing me ‘How to get in a man’s head’, ‘How to make MEN worship you like a GODDESS’, ‘The secret to his heart: STAYING UNBOTHERED’ and informing me that ‘learning to be nonchalant will save your dating life’.

image: pinterest

Before I knew it more than an hour had passed, my head hurt and my eyes were fuzzy with sleep; blue light burned into my retinas. I was at once angry and disappointed - disappointed that so many women on the internet were still engaging with and creating these videos and at myself for having spent an hour of my life watching them. I was instantly propelled backwards and found myself in the body of an insecure 20-year-old who was trying to make a boy love her by pretending she was someone she wasn’t. ‘Why men love bitches’ in my Amazon basket and a message from him on my phone I was desperately trying to ignore for longer than he had previously left me on delivered. ‘How to know if he likes you?’ in my Google search history.

After the rise and fall of my last relationship, one where it was often implied I was too much and too sensitive (something I am very much aware of) it made me deeply sad to feel myself reverting back to the girl who tried so hard to bury these things that make me so intrinsically myself. Pretending to be unbothered, desperately clawing at my insides to find something resembling the ‘chill, cool girl’ who doesn’t care if her boyfriend likes other girls pictures and flirts with his female friends in front of her face. A girl that doesn’t feel anything at all, especially not on a first date.

I spent so long in my late teens and early twenties trying to fit into a mould of a ‘toned-down’ version of myself. I feigned nonchalance for many years, and if you are a naturally sensitive person like I am, let me tell you now that it does not work. The feelings that are buried simply become more saturated until they are burning orange and red embers. They will come out at the least opportune moments, pent-up aggression adding fuel to a fire you didn’t realise existed until one day you will be so angry at something and not even know why.

maybe i’m not too sensitive (poster) - king sophie’s world

It’s taken me almost 25 years to realise this, but being sensitive is okay. I would so much rather have felt deeply and been my authentic, messy, human self and have something not work out than pretend to be someone I’m not and end up in a relationship where both parties are putting on false fronts. I don’t want to read a book called ‘Why men love bitches’, I don’t want to take advice from TikTok accounts telling me not to feel. The person I am supposed to be with won’t ever make me feel like I have to act like I don’t care. The person I am supposed to be with will make me feel like I can be completely, unreservedly, unapologetically myself - feelings and all.

I’m almost certain men aren’t reading manifestos on how to act around women and I highly doubt they are racking up their screen time engrossed in TikTok’s teaching them how to act nonchalant in order to save their dating lives. Vulnerability and human connection is vital; who are we without it?

Let yourself feel deeply and let yourself fall - the right person won’t make you second guess it.

All my love,

Char x