Matt De Groot: The art of 'Stashing'

He's not just Fitzy and Wippa's newsreader or a panelist for The Morning Show, FOX Sports, and the ABC – Matt de Groot is also Be's newest columnist. He'll be taking us on a deep dive into the world of dating and relationships... from a guy's perspective.

"Stashing" has been listed as one of the top words for 2017.

It’s the art of having multiple partners on the go, but refusing to acknowledge any of them on social media, for fear of alerting the others.

It’s an extremely first-world problem, but as we all live in the first-world, a problem it is.

The social media unveiling of a new partner is a big deal, and anyone who’s had to debate about when is the right time understands the weight it carries.

As soon as your ‘facebook official’ your side-game is over, her family is invested and your mum’s best friend Karen is commenting on every photo asking when she will be brought home?

It’s too much pressure if done too early.

I have a good friend who is going through this very issue right now.

For the past few months he’s been sort-of-seeing-sort-of-not-seeing a girl who he’d thought may be girlfriend material.

As time wore on he became sure a full-blown relationship was on the cards, and that would see the natural end to all his other flings and lesser-relationships.

He was happy for this.

But as such he had been delaying including her in any Snapchat story, insta story.

He knew they weren’t at a point where he could be quizzed on why he wouldn’t show her in any videos, because that would be far too keen.

He also knew that the once he was in a relationship it would be a long time before he got to enjoy the thrill of going out and not knowing where, with who or how you ended up.

He was fine for this also.

But you see, it may sound callous, or simplistic, but there is logic in knowing that you will be dating someone soon, and still going about enjoying single life for every last minute.

I’ve heard some say that is bastard behavior, because ‘surely if you like someone enough to date them, then it means you should be with them now?!’

It does not.

It means that while you are both still figuring it out, that grey area is definitely in the ‘single’ field.
Thus, ‘stashing.’

I am certain this goes both ways, but I can only speak from the mind of a male.

Trust me on this, a guy will actually arrive at a relationship fresher and more ready to commit if he feels like he’s been true to his single-self right up until the ‘talk’, or that first #debut shot.

Conversely, think about if he was to just go and start posting photos of himself and every one of his latest flings on Facebook or Insta...

Would you really want that?

Firstly, your mum’s friend Karen is going to start to think you are a man-whore, and then she’ll tell your mum, then mum will tell you, and the whole thing just gets messy and awkward.

But also, as a girl who is about to enter the relationship do you REALLY want to know what’s been happening in that grey area before hand? Or in the months before hand? Or even years?

We don’t want to know what you’ve been up to, and there is genuinely no benefit in knowing ours.

No benefit comes from knowing about it, and certainly no benefit comes from asking about it after you start dating.

The only thing that really matters is that once you both arrive at the point you are ready to upload that first photo, you are committed to each other.

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