How To Know When You’re Just Being Led On

In a dream world we’d all be brilliant communicators, able to have honest kōrero’s and cultivate happy, healthy relationships of all kinds – whether you’re dating monogamously, best friends with romantic feelings, or in a multi-partnered relationship. 

We should all be able to be clear about our needs… But for some reason many of us can’t quite hack it. 

Instead, you end up waiting for hours for a message from someone who’s forgotten they said they’d hit you up, or you’re stumbling out of a party ready to throw up, 2000s teen drama style, because you walked in full of excitement only to see the person you thought you were exclusive with pashing someone else. 

And, unfortunately for any hopeless romantics, one of the shittiest outcomes of our collective poor ability to be transparent about our relationships is the feeling that we’ve been led on by someone. 

But there are a few signs you can look out for, and boundaries you can set, in the hopes of realising when you’re being ‘led on’ so you don’t end up wasting your precious time – These apply to all and any situationships you might find yourself in. 

NOT KNOWING YOU

This one’s huge: if your partner really has no idea what's important to you, what your hopes and dreams are, what you're working on at the moment, and what you might be finding difficult at the moment… then it’s possible that they’re not invested in you. 

And that might be okay, if that's what you've agreed – it may be that it's casual, or that it's not long-term. But if you’re hoping for something serious or are really into them, then this is a huge sign that you’re not on the same page. 

NOT INVOLVING YOU

Sure, some people take their time opening up, but if you’re “dating” someone and the first few weeks and months go by, and they’re not introducing you to friends, family, or parts of their normal life… then you have a problem. 

In extreme cases this might be because they haven’t told people they’re dating anyone, or that they’re dating multiple people who don’t know. In those instances they may never bring you in.

Look out for their regular IRL behaviour. If they’re out with friends all the time, but never invite you to anything? Bad sign. If they constantly post photos online but never include photos of you? Bad sign. If they’re telling you you’re together but no one else seems to know? Bad sign!

If a happy, healthy relationship for you is one where your life overlaps with your partners, then someone who doesn’t involve you in their life isn’t the person for you. 

IGNORING THINGS YOU’VE AGREED ON

A lot of the time, the feeling of being “led on” comes down to mismatched expectations of your relationship. But if you’ve made agreements, like going on a date once a week or that you’re monogamous, and those agreements aren’t being honoured, it might be time to bounce. 

Unless there’s a damn good reason, like every uncle they have died for 3 weeks in a row, their avoidance to meet your agreed upon needs could be telling you something that they’ve not got the balls to tell you themselves. 

IMBALANCE 

If it's always you that makes the sacrifices or changes to accommodate your partner then your relationship isn’t balanced in the way a healthy one should be. It might be that it’s always you that drives to see them, or changes your plans to work around them, or even more harmful things like pushing your sexual boundaries in order to keep things going.

Either way, if they’re not compromising or putting in an equal amount of effort, then they’re not right for you. 

DISSATISFACTION

People aren’t mind readers. Sadly, a lot of people will take advantage of you if you don’t make your own needs clear. Maybe, in your head, you’re hoping that the direction your relationship is going in with someone is towards exclusively dating – and maybe you haven’t expressed that because it feels obvious to you. But to them, they’re stoked that any time they want company or sex or emotional support you’re always there. And to them that’s just your role in their life, not as a future partner. 

It’s really important to make sure you’ve actually made it clear what you want, before deciding someone has led you on. Because it’s possible, if you’ve just agreed with all of their relationship ideals, that they think you’re happy with how things are going. 

This might really hurt you, especially if you’re getting invested, but we need to recognise the difference between someone unintentionally harming us and someone using abuse tactics – given that abuse usually reflects a very particular power imbalance and methods of threat, manipulation and isolation.

Essentially, if you’re not actually asking for what you want, or are agreeing to certain terms but secretly hoping for something more, you’ll be left feeling angry and dissatisfied. And it can be so tempting to keep our cards close to our chest so as not to get hurt, or so we can see what the other person wants before we open up. But it’s not worth it. 

If the signs above are feeling a bit too close to home, what’s next? VICE spoke to relationship specialist Eleanor Butterworth, who stressed the importance of  “recognising that you have the right to walk away, or to hold a boundary.”

Butterworth says that often, people feel like “they want to make it work or keep trying or they keep telling their partner what they need, even if they've had multiple conversations and nothing's changed.” 

“We may see so much good in a partner, if only, if only, but at the end of the day, if you're not seeing action, then it's really important that you hold your own lines and decide this actually doesn't work for me. Uphold your own self worth by being okay to walk away from something that is really crossing those lines.”

You can’t change someone else, or what they want, but you can change your situation by calling it quits. So forget demanding someone who doesn’t care enough to text you back for 3 days to be the “perfect” partner you want them to be, and move on.

At the end of the day, any time you go into a relationship/situationship you run the risk of being hurt. That comes with the territory of being vulnerable and honest and living your feelings – and those are good things.

But knowing what your own boundaries and bottom lines are, and communicating them, is one of the best ways to minimise how much someone can hurt you. 

Which brings us to a big issue with the term “led on” itself. A lot of the time feeling “led on” comes down to a mismatch of expectations between the people in the relationship. 

Butterworth says setting your expectations in dating is crucial.

“We used to have a whole lot of default settings when it came to relationships, so that they were automatically exclusive or monogamous, particularly if they were heterosexual relationships, but they were heading towards marriage or living together, or long term relationships.” 

“And I think what we've got now, which is really healthy, is a whole bunch of settings, which are basically opt-ins. So figuring out what sort of relationship that you want. And a lot of this starts with knowing ourselves and knowing what it is that we want, so that we can communicate it with other people.” 

Butterworth explains that we can look at different relationships like Venn diagrams. 

“You are one circle and your partner/partners are the other circles. And in your own circles you have the things that you want to keep separate. And then in the overlap you have the things that you share. 

In some couples that overlap is basically a circle. They live together, they go to church together, they hang out together. They do everything together. So there's very little differentiation. Whereas, with other couples, that might be really separate and have hardly any overlap in their work, hobbies, or best friends.”

Figuring out what you want in your overlap and what you want in your own circle can be a helpful way to figure out what you want in your relationships – in areas like monogamy, frequency of contact, or similarity of lifestyle. And your feelings on those things might change over the course of your relationship, which is fine, as long as you communicate that. 

If you start understanding those things about yourself, then you’re in a much better position to have conversations openly with someone else and communicate your expectations. Which doesn't mean that your partner will agree, but it does mean you’re both informed and able to make smarter decisions. 

Own the Feels is brought to you by #LoveBetter, a campaign funded by the Ministry for Social Development.

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Rachel Barker is a writer / producer at VICE NZ in Aotearoa.