Female Dating Strategy: Placeholder vs. Dreamgirl

[Deleted member 1209]

Placeholder would be 50/50 dates, dating for a long duration of time (2+ years is RED FLAG) if you are both exclusively boyfriend/girlfriend, and if you are a successful well-rounded woman with their shit together or what you bring to them looks really good on paper (in terms of qualities, looks, accomplishments, manners, etc.) to showcase to their family but not actually marry you.
If you are a go-getter person that makes things happen and are successful, IMO you are at risk to be a placeholder girlfriend because the LVM encourages you to take on the Bob-the-Builder-Boyfriend mode to help him advance in his own life, manipulates you into giving more to him than he does to you because he knows you are aMaZiNg but does not want to marry you yet will continue to get consistent sex/therapy until he is done, he will see some mild success from your efforts of building him up because you are hopeful they will marry/see a future with you and will go through the blind motions of halfheartedly doing it with you, then he decides he wants to not marry you because you are now his mommy but he will keep leading you on until there's someone lined up.

I think if the guy talks about the future with you it's a sign he's serious. Like you I've had relationships where I met the family, went on trips with them, etc. and I also always had that feeling that I wasnt the one and ended up getting dumped. Meanwhile my friend who just got engaged after 3 years of dating her fiance said that after about a year he was talking seriously of future marriage, children, buying a house etc. If he never brings those things up and gets quiet/scared if you bring them up, he doesn't see you as his wife.

My gut told me around month 2 that I was just a placeholder, but I didn’t have much to point to as definitive reasons.
Actions not matching words and future faking are big signs. Although at the time, I didn’t realize it was future faking, so that was hard.
Another big sign that encapsulates a lot of the comments here is: not making you feel special.
When my last guy would sing some romantic songs from the radio, I would joke, “aww that’s so sweet, thanks for serenading me.” Then he would protest that he was not serenading me with any song ever. Sounds pretty silly but the fact that he never went along with it made me feel like he was making an effort to make sure I didn’t feel special.
Fast forward to month 7 and he ghosted me. Just gone. I guess I was right - nothing but a placeholder.