I hate dating rn

i (32f) genuinely feel like dating culture right now is so exhausting. everything feels like there are so many unspoken rules that everyone somehow knows except me. how long you should wait before replying, how much interest you are supposed to show, whether you are being too clingy, whether you are being too available. sometimes it feels less like getting to know someone and more like trying to pass some kind of test.

i have this problem where i get attached pretty easily. when i like someone, my natural instinct is to talk to them, check in on them, and actually show that i care. i’m not really someone who can pretend to be uninterested just to seem more attractive. if i enjoy talking to someone, i want to talk to them.

but recently i realised how much i filter myself because of dating culture. i would type out a message that was actually honest, read it again, and immediately think “wait, is this too much?” then i would rewrite it because i didn’t want to sound clingy or make the other person think i was too invested.

like my first thought might be something like “i had a really bad day today and i wish i could talk to you because you always make me feel better”. but then i would change it to something more casual like “today was kinda rough haha, hope your day was good”. the feeling is still there, but i’m hiding it behind a safer version because i’m scared of showing too much.

now i literally have a chat open on acciowork where i dump the message i actually want to send and ask it to make it sound less intense. but the more i do this, the more i question whether this is actually healthy. why are we all so scared of being genuine? why does showing someone you like them feel like you are giving them too much power? why does caring first feel like you are automatically losing?

i understand that there is a balance between being honest and overwhelming someone, but sometimes it feels like everyone is pretending not to care because they are afraid of caring more.

i honestly miss when people could just say “i like talking to you” without analysing whether it makes them look desperate.