Submarining: the latest mutant hybrid of ghosting that has found its way into the online dating scene. Sexsearch wants to help you avoid being submarined.

Have you or any of your friends ever been ghosted? We're going to guess that you have. It's not nice, but it's a lot nicer than being submarined. What is submarining? Submarining is when you've been dating someone for a little bit, and then all of a sudden (often mid-text conversation), the person seems to fall off the face of the planet. You have no idea where they've gone, or why they stopped talking to you. It makes you understandably feel terrible, and then out of the blue, perhaps three months down the road, you'll receive a text message or e-mail from them, asking "What's up?" or "Wanna go see a movie?" They won't acknowledge their disappearance. They act as though no time has passed. It's awful, and we hope you never have to experience it. It's difficult to prevent, but we've put together a handy guide to dealing with being submarined, and perhaps how to be better prepared if it does happen to you or one of your friends.

There was a time when we thought that ghosting was the worst thing that could happen to us in this modern age of online dating. Oh, how naive were we? We've since seen ghosting evolve into zombieing, where you think you've been ghosted, but then your partner comes back at full force, apologizing, and groveling in an incredibly unattractive way. Now we have another mutation of ghosting that depending on how quickly you're able to get over a ghosting, could be A LOT worse.

With ghosting, you at least have the chance to get over it. With submarining, it's almost as though they know exactly the right moment to pop back into your life. If their disappearance was an open wound, they wait long enough for you to disinfect the cut, go to a hospital for stitches, let the wound heal up, and go back to your doctor to have the stitches removed. Then out of nowhere they slide back into your DMs as if nothing ever happened. It's infuriating! How do you reply to their reappearance? Should you even reply? If you don't reply, they'll wait a day or two, and send you another text asking if you want to hang out, as though their last text didn't even happen. You'll get upset that they're trying to get a rise out of you (and most likely are succeeding), as though the nice times that you shared together meant absolutely nothing to them, and it was all just so that they could upset you now. You'll also get upset at yourself because... you went on multiple dates with a TROLL without being able to identify them as such. You dated a troll, and you liked it.

Of course we all sometimes get a little too eager when we're texting with a new partner, so if you receive a strange text or e-mail that maybe seems a little too much considering how long you've known each other for, don't raise the red flag right away. Just file the messages away for later reference, in case they persist. Submariners will often try to amplify the excitement in their victim by telling them how they haven't had as good a time as you had together in a long time. This makes you feel like things are going incredibly well, and increases the damage done when they pul the rug out from under you by disappearing.

We hope that if you do receive texts or messages about how great you are, and that your date can't wait to spend more time with you, that they're completely sincere, and you have a tremendous relationship ahead of you. We're simply suggesting that in the early stages of dating (perhaps the first 3 to 4 months), stay alert, and trust your gut instincts.

It's hard to tell why certain people are targeted instead of others. Typically submarining victims will be more emotionally open, which makes for an easier target, because their emotions come into play much quicker than someone who has a very serious and no nonsense approach to dating. If you're an emotionally open person, please stay that way. Even if it means you're more susceptible to a submarining, it means you're also more likely to find love in this wild world of online hookups.

We've already described submariners (submarine captains?) as trolls, and we can't really think of a more accurate way to describe them. If you know anything about internet troll culture, you know that trying to psychoanalyze a troll is a fruitless endeavor. Trolls often act the way they do for lack of anything better to do, combined with an immaturity that takes pleasure in the upset of other people. Often trolls won't have many friends, or if they do, they'll be people that you would be able to identify as people you don't want to spend any time with very quickly. It's because of this point, that we suggest that it might be wise in this time of submarining, to try to suggest meeting one or two of their friends at the very least. We know that some people might balk at that suggestion, but if they're enjoying dating you as much as you are, they shouldn't be too against the idea.

If they won't let you meet their friends, look to see if you have any mutual friends on Facebook. In this day and age of internet connectivity, it's very rare to find ourselves dating someone within our city who we don't share at least one Facebook friend with; even if it's just a casual acquaintance or colleague from work. We all know how to cyber stalk, and most of us do it early on in relationships, even if we don't want to admit it. With the rise of submarining, we suggest you make sure to do your due diligence and get at least some background information on everyone you date. If they're a ghost on the internet, that means there's a high probability that they're a submariner in real life.

Some of us aren't very tech savvy. That's no excuse to not cyber stalk your dates before meeting them. You surely have friends who're computer whiz kids, who you trust enough to let into your dating life, so that they can help you get a little background info on your dates. Even if you didn't have to be worried about submarining, this is just common sense. Your friends will gladly help you out. There's few things that friends like more than helping out with their friends' dating life. A friend of ours once was going through a breakup and took out his dating app during a party and asked a bunch of us to help him select who to try to date. There was 8 people huddled around his phone, excitedly giving their opinions.

In a perfect world, we wouldn't care about being submarined, but if our past experience with ghosting has taught us anything, it's that we can't help it. If we didn't care, we'd be robots. The whole point of submarining is to get us emotionally invested in a relationship, and then use it to hurt us. If anyone tells you that they wouldn't care if someone submarined them, just smile and nod. If they ever find themselves submarined, they will care very much, and probably come straight to you and treat you as their confidant. While your instinct may be to say, "I told you so," we ask you to find kindness in your heart and simply lend them your ear, and then pass along some of the info that you've learned from this article.

Ultimately, there's not much you can do to avoid being submarined. If it happens, the best thing you can do is have some responses prepared to send back right away. Don't give them any satisfaction when they reappear. Have your messages on your phone in a notepad file so that you can copy and paste your favorite and hurl it at them within seconds of their message. Their long con will have all been for nothing. Their best laid plans will be set aflame without a moment of hesitation. If their trollish friends ask to see the 'hilarious' texts that you sent back, they'll have nothing to show, because they'll have been rejected.

Here are some replies to get you started on your own list:

-"Get back in your submarine, dork!!"

-"New phone, who dis?" (trust the classics)

-"There you are! That WAS probably the worst sex I've had in the last 5 years, but you didn't have to go into hiding."

Alternately, you can make plans with them, and then not go. Half an hour after you were supposed to meet, send them a text asking where they are. There are lots of fun games you can play with them depending on how they reply, or if they even do. If they don't reply, that's probably for the best. Not much fun though.

Not all phones have the option, but if yours does, it's just a good policy to block the number of anyone who falls off the face of the earth for more than 2 weeks without checking in to let you know that there's been an emergency, or to apologize for being so quiet. Block their e-mail. Block them on Facebook. Ghost them. They weren't as cute as they thought they were anyway!

Another thing that you can do to remove the power of being submarined is as soon as a week or so goes by without hearing back from someone you've been dating, have a standard operating procedure that involves getting right back on the dating horse, and going out with the next cutie who sends you a message. When things don't go as well as you thought they were going to, that's one of the best parts about the age we're living in. We don't have to rely on friends to introduce us to their sad single friends (who nine out of ten times were always single for a very obvious reason) to get a date. There have always been a million other people out there, but it took the internet to bring them all together, with the ability to give you a short version of what they're about, tell you what they're looking for in a date, and a way to send them a message instantly. We all have bad dates, but we also all have a queue of potentially great ones at our fingertips every day.

So if you find yourself at the wrong end of a submarining, don't put on your scuba gear and swim around the bottom of the ocean to try and find them. Boot up your laptop and begin your search for someone to go out dancing with on Friday night. You may be slightly more suspicious of people than you were before, but there's nothing wrong with arching your eyebrow when you're asked an unusual question here and there. You can just be slightly more selective for a while as you wait to find out if you have in fact fallen victim to a submarining, or if it was just a simple ghosting. Everyone's been ghosted before! That's not a big deal at all. Lock down your Saturday night plans, and have a good time!

Did we answer all your questions you needed on this subject? If so, then why not check out our other extensive dating advice guides by CLICKING HERE?

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