He hasn't said I love you yet?
I know that we all have an idea about when certain relationship milestones are 'supposed' to happen. And when they don't happen, we can end up imagining the worst about the relationship or the person we're seeing, and how they feel towards us. This can be especially the case when you are waiting for the works: I love you.
If you're waiting for a guy to tell you that he loves you, and he still hasn't crossed over that line; you may be starting to freak out about why he hasn't taken this next step.
Believe it or not, there are at least five possible reasons why he may not have taken that step forward with you yet. Read on to decide if it’s still worthwhile for you to continue to get to know him and participate in this relationship.
Relationship milestones
When we're thinking about milestones like the `I Love You’ thing, moving in together or getting engaged, sometimes we can have a very fixed idea when those milestones need to happen. If you feel like you've been with someone long enough, and they still haven't crossed over and done that thing, it can seem like this person is wasting your time.
When you’re focused on the fact you haven’t passed this milestone, it can feel like pressure starts to mount in your relationship. I get that, in the world of dating, you can feel like there's a tremendous amount of time pressure to get to decisions quickly.
From a young age we are surrounded by this need to hurry up, we're taught to fear that we’re going to become less attractive as we get older or our options are going to run out. And so with time pressure weighing on us, it can make us want to get to decision points really quickly.
That's why you may over analyse his messages or spend a lot of time concerned or worried or thinking about the idea of whether he sees a future with you. But, when we allow time to become a bully in our lives, we allow it to drive our decisions.
It often gets us to make poor decisions. It takes us away from the moment, it stops us enjoying the experience of getting to know someone. Instead it makes our whole dating lives very objective focused.
This doesn't work so well for dating. If anything, by offering you five reasons why he may not have made that commitment to you at this stage, I want to reassure you. It doesn't necessarily mean there's anything wrong with your relationship. We all move through relationships, and in fact, through life, on different timelines. We even have different ways of expressing things. So instead of getting caught up on an arbitrary timeline, swap your focus now to the day to day quality of the relationship.
The first reason that he hasn't said I love you yet
Ok, I'm going to go right in there with the horrible one. He's just not that into you. He definitely doesn't love you. And he's just stringing you along. So there you go. That's the big fear, isn't it?
If someone is stringing you along, this is going to be showing up in more ways than him not saying those three words. It may be that he is totally inconsistent in terms of how he's showing up for you. He could be really into you one minute, then you don't hear from him for two weeks. He could be very secretive about his friendship and social circles, or he could be unsupportive in other areas of your life.
The "I Love You" thing is not going to be in isolation if this guy is just wasting your time. Remember, most people don't consciously try to waste our time. It might just mean that they have different expectations and desires in a relationship. And they may be more or less able to communicate that than we are.
Ok, we are done with the bad one. Hopefully, you’ll be able to take that off the list.
The second reason why he may not have said I love you
He takes saying `I love you’ quite seriously. It would be concerning right if someone's on a first date saying they love you. How can we love someone that we've known for a few hours?
We can be attracted to them. We can definitely be infatuated. But could we really say we love them? I don't think so. If someone really cares about the outcome, and they're not looking to impress you, they may be much more considerate and conscientious in terms of how they move forward with communicating themselves.
It might actually mean that he takes that declaration of love more seriously. And he's put more thought into it, which is why he hasn't got there yet. He might even be holding off until he means it 100%.
So this is actually an example of when he may not have reached that milestone but it could be motivated from a very good place.
The reason three why hasn't said I love you yet
People communicate in different ways. Some of us are very much verbal communicators. Some of us like to be complimented and let known we are loved. Other people show their care in different ways. We've all heard the love languages, right?
It could be that he's taking your bins out, or he's giving you lots of cuddles. It could be that he's put some shelves up. He could be demonstrating through his actions what he finds hard to express through his words.
The fourth reason he may not have said I love you
He may be a little bit afraid about how you react. Sometimes we have an expectation that men are all born to be swashbuckling, romantic heroes, and we've forgotten that they're just human beings like us. He might have a lot of his own anxieties and fears around dating.
Now, he may not be taking that step forward, because he's worried about how you'll react. So instead of focusing on over analysing his reasons it would be more empowering for you to think if there is something you want to express here? Are you comfortable with the level of communication or the level of affection in your relationship? It is easy to know your own perspective. But understanding his reasoning is hard.
The fifth reason that he hasn't said I love you yet
The final reason is simply that he needs more time. Remember, although some people might have set that milestone at the three months, it doesn't really make sense in the real world. Everybody is on different timelines.
Just because he's on a different timeline, it doesn't mean that his end destination is different to yours. You do not need to perfectly match up in terms of the pace at which you want to accomplish those milestones. It just has to be comparable enough that you feel comfortable to keep exploring this journey with him.
Try to make this question much less about what's going on in his mind and start to refocus on what is good for you. What would make you feel stable, comfortable, and secure in this relationship?
