When to Hold 'em and When to Fold 'em

When he ogles other women, it's a deal breaker

Steve Santagati, author of The Manual: A True Bad Boy Explains How Men Think, Date and Mate – and What Women Can Do to Come Out on Top (Crown, 2007), is getting a lot of press, and rightly so. This is a topic of concern to all us daters.

If you read my column or are one of my dating coach clients, you know that I suggest a slow period of getting to know the man or woman you're dating, and that you watch for certain signs carefully early on. One of them is ogling other women.

From today's mailbag:

I've had a couple of dates with this doctor who really rings my bells. He's a handsome Italian guy, owns a yacht, has a great profession, can talk about anything. The only thing that bothers me is the other day we went to the shore and he just got mesmerized over the teenagers in their bathing suits. I don't mean just a glance or two, I mean he was in another zone. In fact I got up and left at one point. Now am I over-reacting to this, like he said I was??? In all my dating years I've never had it happen, so I don't know where to put it. Can you help?

Yes, it's something you should be worried about. In fact to me, it's a deal-breaker. If this is how he is behaving early-on, imagine what it will be like later on. A GENTLEMAN simply does not do this. Yes, we know men are visual and they all like to look, but like you say, it's never happened to you before. Serious men, with serious intent, who are seriously interested YOU, give you their undivied attention.

Do we need confirmation from Santagati? Well here it is:

From the article about Santagati's book, "6 Reasons Why Men Cheat," written by Haynes on lifescript:

[Santagati] suggests you can find out more about a man's dating history by watching how he acts in a room full of gorgeous women....If you can't rein him in when the romance is new, you'll never control him down the road when your life together is more settled. "The first three months are critical," he says.