Dawn Of The Dad

I'm a 36-year-old woman. I've had my share of men who shy away from commitment, so it's a bit of a surprise that the guy I've been seeing for a few months really wants to settle down. He's already talking about kids. While I really like him a lot, I worry that his rush to settle down is a red flag.

--Uneasy

When a guy yells something out in bed, it's a little disturbing if it's, "You make me want to put up wallpaper in a house in the suburbs!" It's possible the guy suddenly had enough of the Tinder rando-lympics and began longing for a lasting bond with a woman. Clinical psychologist Judith Sills believes feeling this way causes a shift in one's approach to dating. The push to find the perfect "right person" gets cast aside for finding a right enough person at the right time. What makes it the right time is "readiness," which Sills calls "an internal process that acts as a psychological catalyst for commitment." This is readiness for true partnership -- for intimacy (and the vulnerability it requires). It "does not mean being without anxiety or ambivalence," Sills explains. But "readiness is a state of mind, an attitude of approach that helps you to push past the barriers created by these feelings." Whatever the reason for the guy's rush to put up picket fencing, it's important to take things slowly. (You might give it a year or more before you make any big moves together.) Research by psychologist Michael I. Norton and his colleagues suggests that the more budding romantic partners learn about each other, the more they see dissimilarities -- clashes between them -- and the less satisfied they can become with each other and the relationship. Do something people newly in love (or at least newly in hots) typically don't do: Seek out the clashes between you -- all the areas in which you glaringly don't want the same things, have habits that grate on each other, etc. If that stuff isn't enough to break you up, tell him you two might have a reasonable chance of going the distance together -- though not if he keeps talking to your womb on dates: "I'd like you to give me a male heir. How's Friday?" ... For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.