Jamie Rea is a writer and web-entrepreneur based in Toronto. He specializes in writing about dating, relationships, lifestyle, entertainment, and culture. On top of his own blogs, The Brolog and Thoughts4Men, he also also heads up the writing team for the web-based Toronto company, Park Bench, as well as contributes regularly to the Thought Catalog based out of New York and our "brother-site" AmongMen.com.
We’ve all heard the term side-chick. But for those of you that have been living under a rock, or haven’t been exposed to the dating world recently, a side-chick is a girl that a guy keeps on the side while he waits for something better to come along. Essentially a side-chick is a glorified bang buddy – designed to stifle his sexual and emotional cravings, but not ultimately satisfy them.
Often it’s hard to figure out, or perhaps wrap your mind around the fact that the guy you’re sleeping with will never commit. Women may think they can work this guy into a relationship, or slowly crack away at his non-committal wall. But truth is, once a guy puts you into this category, he’ll never think of you as anything more than the girl he has on the sidelines for a rainy day. So how do you know when you’ve entered side-chick territory?
Here are the top 5 ways to know you’re a side-chick:
You’ve never met any of his friends
If a guy is into you, he’ll want to bring you around his friends. He’ll jump at the opportunity to bring you to the big party where all his friends will be. If he’s into you, he’ll want to show you off, and he’ll want to do it early on in the relationship. You can also count on his friends being aware of your existence if he’s into you– hey, they might even know a lot about you. But when a guy is ashamed, or least not smitten with a girl, he will keep her as his “secret sex toy”. He’ll still continue to sleep with her, but he’ll be sure to keep her far away from the cast of judgment from his peers. So if you feel like he’s trying to hide you, it’s because he is. I’ve had side-chicks in the past that I was sleeping with for months, having sleepovers and the whole bit, that my roommate never met once. Now that’s what you call strategic side-chick planning.
You only ever get the after-hours hangout
This is the obvious one, but if he’s only ever dropping you lines on Friday and Saturday nights, then you know that you’re a direct correlation to the response of alcohol in his body. It’s at this point that you need to understand that he’s out trolling, looking for options he deems better, while you’re nothing more than a faint image in the back of his mind if s**t hits the fan and he doesn’t have a girl by the end of the night. So by continuing to meet up with him post-bar or girl’s night, you’re helping contribute to you becoming his 2AM life raft.
You only ever hangout at his place
If you only ever hangout at his place, it shows he’s lazy and doesn’t like you enough to put in the effort. But if he’s taking you out to dinner, lunch, or other highly public outings, you know that he’s interested in you as a girl he could potentially date. A guy will try and take a side-chick out as little as possible because the chances of running into people he knows is a possibility, which could be disastrous if he runs into other girls he’s sleeping with, or has slept with recently. So it’s important that you make sure he’s taking you on actual dates and not just inviting you over for “sweatpant conversations” and romps in the sack.
He doesn’t message you
If he’s into you, he will message you, plain and simple. If he’s into you, he will text you for no reason when he’s bored at work or hanging out with family and friends. He will want to know what you’re up to, constantly. But if you’re always the one initiating the contact, or the only messages you ever get from him are on the weekend, then you’re definitely a side-chick. Guys only message side-chicks when they need something, most often something sexual.
He won’t commit to you
If a guy is actually into you, he will make time for you, no matter how busy his life is. If a guy is actually into you, he won’t want to lose you. But if you’ve been hooking up for months and he still hasn’t committed to you, you’re probably a side-chick. You know that he’s keeping an eye out for something else, and would have no problem dropping you if the right opportunity presented itself. Guys only make up “I’m really busy at work” and “I’m in a selfish period of my life” excuses when they don’t want to take themselves off the market for a girl they aren’t really that into. So stop convincing yourself that he’ll come around eventually and commit, if he hasn’t already, he probably never will. Why would you want to have to convince somebody to be with you anyways?
Always a side-chick, never the girlfriend – it’s not a desirable place for any girl to be. To stop getting slotted into this territory you have to believe that you deserve to be wanted by guy, instead of something he merely keeps on the side for mindless entertainment. So start carrying yourself with the self-respect that you deserve to be at the center of a guy’s world and settle for nothing less. Or you can continue to stick around on his terms, going against how you really feel, and in that case, you aren’t worth much more than a position on the sidelines anyways. The choice is yours.
