Hm...

Move over guys, I've decided to focus my energy on one of my Tinder matches (this isn't the sweet Russian guy who got me flowers) and probably no one else. Whoa. I'm getting out of the game and looking to settle down instead of bouncing between random chats with a bunch of different guys.

So far I've gone on two dates with this guy, and tomorrow will mark our third one.

Our first was a breakfast date (his treat) that pretty much put me in a good mood for the rest of the day because of our fun, pleasant conversation.

The second date was a dinner setting (my treat) and a little bit of walking around downtown until we finally reached a coffee shop and decided to station ourselves there and talk 'til a little before 1am.

This guy is really sweet and the amount of times I've caught myself smiling stupidly at the things he says is unfathomable.

He's a francophone and speaks English with me 98% of the time. He sometimes says things in French when he doesn't know how to express himself in English or when I decide to speak French with him.

He's patient with my functional French as I am with his better-than-average-and-omg-that-accent English.

Things seemed to be going smoothly and smart little me decided to maybe push it a little and be slightly more affectionate.

What I mean is, I'd send some sweet texts (can't think of any examples at the moment) a little more frequently just because he made me feel really giddy.

Bad idea. Oops.

We had a little bit of a serious talk for a little while and he told me that things between us were great... And because of that, he was worried he was going to screw things up since he's afraid of commitment.

He asked if we could take things slow since it also seemed like things were in the works of maaaybe starting to move a little fast, which, I mean, was not really that true.

For one thing, we hadn't even held hands yet, we just... Talked. At a distance. I mean, we were walking beside each other and everything on our second date, but his hands were in his pockets the whole time.

Granted, it was cold. I'll give him that.

Anyway, it was true that we were moving a little faster because of the things we said to each other. (No, not dirty things pff, just sweet things like "I like you" and stuff)

He also added something like, "I get the feeling that you really like me and I like you too. I just don't want to hurt you" before he mentioned that commitment scared him I think.

And that was it. Bam. The glass shattered for me.

A switch just flipped in my head and my heart.

I'm in trouble.

No-Flowers, my first ex, had said the exact same thing to me about a month or two before our breakup.

He told me that he couldn't picture us together or getting married (but it's not like I was pressuring him into seeing us getting married or anything). He told me that he didn't want to hurt me and that he always felt really anxious about our impending breakup.

And then he told me he wasn't sure if he loved me anymore.

After two or more months of hearing that from my ex over and over again and experiencing sadness, probably anxiety, and who knows what else that period brought along, my heart turned to stone. I just didn't care anymore.

Every time I heard him tell me about his fears of commitment, I just shut down.

I distanced myself from my sadness and I couldn't take hearing "I don't know if I love you. I think you love me more than I do you. I'm a piece of shit." anymore.

With that in mind, I shut down once again after reading that this new guy had commitment issues.

I'm a patient, loving person. I cater, bend, and conform to and for someone I care about.

But this...I don't know. Something is different. I stopped feeling giddy after reading new guy's text.

It didn't matter that he sent me kiss emojis, I just didn't care anymore.

The weird thing is, I was okay with it when I first read it. I was alright with going at a slow pace for him, it was what I wanted anyway as well. I still am cool with moving at a slow pace.

I guess when it just really sunk into my head, a defense mechanism had awoken in me. I protected my head and my heart from yet another potentially heartbreaking incident.

His sweet words have no affect on me. I'm taking everything he says with a grain of salt and whenever he says something nice, I'm always really surprised to read it.

His affectionate emojis are also confusing me a lot since my brain is interpreting "Don't be sweet/cute too often" as "I don't want to be smothered because I don't really like you all that much."

My mind understands that being smothered with affection can be way too much since, believe it or not, that has also scared and turned me off.

I just...I don't know. On some level, a small part of me fears that what happened with No-flowers will be reproduced with this new guy.

I'm scared that he'll wake up one day and over-analyze his feelings.

I'm scared that he is also as insecure as my ex.

I'm scared that I'll have to take care of his self-loathing and have his emotional breakdown take a toll on my mental sanity as well as my health.

I'm writing this out to make sense of how I'm feeling and why...and I'm really hoping it all goes away. I like this new guy and I feel like maybe things could work out.

I guess we'll see how my third date goes tomorrow. Fingers crossed.