Utah woman starts seeing man. Then she takes care of him when he breaks his back, only for him to pull the rug from under her: ‘What did I do wrong?’
Modern dating is already a minefield in and of itself. However, this one somehow escalated from a hot tub first date to a full-on hospital caregiver… to being ghosted without a trace.
In a TikTok that has viewers equal parts stunned and secondhand exhausted, one Utah woman recounts her whirlwind situationship. It starts with meeting the entire extended family before date number two. Then, playing nurse after a catastrophic ski accident.
Lastly, she drives four hours to a wedding where her “date” barely acknowledges her existence. She showed up, stepped up, and stuck around, right up until he disappeared. Now she’s left asking, “What did I do wrong?” and the internet, predictably, has many opinions about it.
‘What’s Going On Inside the Mind of Men?’
Tess (@tess_samantha) begins her eight-minute debrief asking what’s on the mind of many TikTokers. So far, it has 204,000 viewers shaking their heads in either disbelief or sympathy. The story begins as many do, with the couple meeting on a dating app.
The first date itself is a little strange, as he invites her to go ‘hot tubbing’ at his brother’s and sister-in-law’s house. There, she meets his other brother and fiancée as well. She says the date went well, and the night ended with a kiss. Apparently, they’re both “super into” each other. Then the second date rolls along.
As if wanting to one-up the first date, on the second, he asks Tess to meet him at his family cabin. She goes, and she says that it seemed like a family reunion, as she met all his siblings, parents, and even cousins. Again, she stresses that it was a great time. They meet one more time at her place after that.
Then, he invites her to the cabin again, but before she can get there, he tells her that he got into a snowboarding accident. He broke his back and needs surgery.
‘You Should Come to the Hospital’
After the accident, Tess says the man got understandably hard to reach. She doesn’t hear from him for two days and she just sends a supportive text message saying she would help if needed. The very next day, after his surgery, he asked her to visit him at the hospital.
She drives 30 minutes to the hospital and sees his mom again, and meets all his friends on FaceTime. When she leaves the hospital, she still doesn’t hear much from him. Then Valentine’s Day rolls around. He asks her to visit again. Tess spends her entire Valentine’s Day evening at the hospital, basically only to take care of him.
She shares how she washed his hair, his upper body that still had “stuff” left over from the surgery, and even walked him around the hospital. “I was out here doing the most,” she says, “meanwhile, he is giving me the most mixed signals.”
Tess emphasizes that they weren’t dating officially yet, but when one of the nurses asks him what he got his “girlfriend,” meaning Tess, for Valentine’s Day, he replies that he didn’t have a girlfriend. Despite saying this, Tess says he would still kiss her, hold her, and just be affectionate on a whole.
He gets discharged from the hospital and they meet a couple of times at his place. She meets even more of his friends. Then he arranges their next date to be at his brother’s wedding.
The Wedding Debacle
As if things couldn’t get any more confusing, Tess commits herself to driving four hours to go to the wedding. However, she says, “at this point, he starts being completely dry with me.”
She inwardly questions it, but still chooses to attend the wedding. Was it a good idea? Tess answers that when she says, “he basically did not communicate with me the entire day of the wedding.” She gets to the wedding, knows no one there, and he doesn’t even acknowledge her. She greets his parents and sits alone.
Later, he comes to sit next to her, but still doesn’t talk to her. Instead, he talks to his uncle and other friends. She also says he would disappear from time to time, which she understands since he was a groomsman. However, he never told her where he was going or what he was doing.
“I think his friends talked to me more than he did,” she says.
After ignoring her for the full day, when the wedding comes to a close, he instructs Tess to meet his grandmother. She is confused but goes along with it, saying she was a lovely woman. When he walks Tess to her car, and she invites him to do something that night, he declines because he is tired.
However, he suggests meeting the next day at noon. Tess can’t because she has a prior commitment, but suggests the evening instead. His answer was “sweet,” and Tess asked him to let her know what he decides.
He never messages her again
She is absolutely baffled at being ghosted when she had already met his entire family.
“I’m like, were you just using me for the hair wash and the sponge bath in the hospital?” Tess rants to the camera. She explains that this just happened a month ago. Tess still feels affected by it because she really liked him. She says prior to his accident, he was “obsessed” with her, too. Tess just wants to know what went wrong.
@tess_samantha Like what did I do wrong #girls #relatable #storytime #single ♬ original sound – tess?
Viewers Have Ideas
As for what might have happened, some viewers have their speculations. A viewer with over 1,300 likes says, “Definitely just wanted a date for the wedding.” Another goes further and says, “He reconnected with someone from his past after his accident. He doesn’t know how to communicate that.”
A third viewer shares, “He knew it wasn’t going to work, but didn’t know how to end it. That said, you get half credit for going along on such a messed up ride.”
Others are candid with their opinions on the relationship as a whole. One viewer says, “Genuinely though, why would you agree to a SECOND DATE at a CABIN where he explicitly said his family would be there? That’s wayyy too much too fast???”
Similarly, another says, “Both of these situations are not appropriate for initial dates.”
A comment with over 500 likes says, “The fact that you stayed for the entire wedding, you’re better than me. I would have dipped so fast lmaooo.” Another says, “Let’s normalize getting in our cars and going home.”
Lastly, one viewer asks Tess, “Is your middle name doormat?” Tess responds, “You may be right.”
The Mary Sue reached out to Tess via TikTok comment.
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