I've been stood up or ghosted by enough potential dates that I've learned to expect people to not follow through. Even when someone says yes and they seem excited about it, I still proceed with the mentality that it's just going to fall through between now and the actual date. Before I gave up on dating entirely, I stopped even marking my calendar because it seemed like there was no point. I might as well double-book myself because something's gonna fall through anyway, if not both things. And it usually holds true.
At some point it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. I stopped getting excited about dates. I started having the worst nerves on the morning of, because like "should I start getting ready or is she about to text me to cancel?" Sometimes I would feel relief when the text finally came, because at least then I could stop worrying about it.
At some point I started texting to confirm whether we were still on, but apparently that screams insecurity and they'd end up being like "You know what no, if you really feel the need to check in with me then we're not going to waste each other's time. I don't need to mommy you."
Even in the rare case when the date actually happened, I'd be nervous up until the moment we meet, when my relief usually was so palpable that they found it off-putting. Like "Why are you so surprised that I actually showed up?" Plus, I wouldn't be able to think about much other than self-doubt leading up to that moment, so it was hard to enter it with a good headspace. That usually set the tone for an underwhelming if not disastrous date.
And even if I tried to explain where I'm coming from, they'd just think I'm a misogynist because apparently learning from my experience and worrying about a repeating pattern is an affront to all womankind. I get it, women aren't a monolith. But also, I have trauma, and whenever anyone else's trauma informs their perceptions and defense mechanisms then it seems to be okay. Not me though, cause men aren't supposed to have feelings I guess. We're just supposed to take it on the chin without losing confidence.
Eventually I stopped planning anything or even trying to meet people, because loneliness and isolation aren't as painful and confusing as abandonment. I can handle rejection, I'm certainly used to it, but abandonment triggers deep insecurities from my childhood and can send me spiralling. It's not worth my inner peace.
Now it's just me and my cat, and I try not to think of my patheticness or my prospect of dying alone, which is all but guaranteed at this point. I just try to distract myself each day, enough to maintain a semblance of stability and peace. I'm doing a lot better mentally than I was before, when I still hadn't accepted my fate, and still strove to overcome it.