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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think women have a best before date

338 replies

Meowmeow202027 · 12/01/2021 01:06

To men that is?
Talking to dh about the fact im turning 30 this year and how since getting married and having 3 kids i feel unattractive and no one cares about my opinions or even looks my way. When men have kids etc there body doesn't change. Pretty much they are the same people as before unlike women.
Sorry for the rambling.

OP posts:
Tehmina23 · 14/01/2021 11:45

My mum is a very pretty 71 and gets quite good looking & quite well off men over approx 60 chatting her up!
She's not interested in finding a partner but I doubt she'd have much trouble if she was.

Bubblebu · 14/01/2021 13:32

Ponoka

"Younger women certainly don't want older men, in the way that younger men want older women"

totally disagree with this. Sad or not, I think there is a very significant cohort of women in their 20s and 30s (and sometimes sadly in their teens) who would very happily date a man anywhere between 10 - 25 years older than them if the man was weathly enough, irrespective of how attractive/healthy/fit/physically or emotionally appealing the man is................

oh yes.

Cam2020 · 14/01/2021 13:34

30?! Shock

unmarkedbythat · 14/01/2021 13:37

Why do you care how someone who is enough of a wanker to think women have a sell by date and are only worth noticing or talking to if they appear young and slim enough thinks of you? People like that aren't worth your spit. I'll be 40 in a few months. My body is not the body I had at 20, my face is not the face I had at 20, so what? I'm more than twice the person I was then.

Oxonlady · 14/01/2021 18:21

There are so many comments on this thread that I would like to 'like' and I wish MN had that feature. You all rock!!

BrainSurgeon · 14/01/2021 19:37

I actually think that biologically, women have a “best before” date, aka menopause, that does in some cases translate in feeling a lot less desirable, accompanied by weight gain, mood swings etc.

In my case that coincided with my exH’s nasty midlife crisis. Nothing like a man who’s chasing younger models to make a peri menopausal woman feel she is “past her best before date”....

BrainSurgeon · 14/01/2021 19:42

So we are designed by nature to “expire” - once we can not produce offspring anymore, which kind of makes sense at a biological level.

What we need to learn, and teach younger generations, is that our value has fuck all to do with how attractive or fertile we are.

NiceGerbil · 15/01/2021 02:07

Well to be totally honest.

I was pretty when young and had a lot of trouble with Street harassment, not getting taken seriously at work etc. Being blonde didn't help.

The first time I lost the eyes on thing was when I was heavily pregnant. The second time was at a women only big meeting thing.

Now I'm mid 40s I find that there is very little of that nasty look up and down, staring, following, all the stuff that blighted my life when I was young.

But I still get flirted with and sometimes by very young men. Which is weird! But whatever.
That was pre covid though.

In covid I'm stuck with my husband who is 5 years younger, he was 27 I was 32 on the big day.

I think this sell by stuff is bollocks.

In my observations on the tube. About 40 the women carry on looking fab and in general the men... Don't.

whoamongstus · 15/01/2021 10:00

@MintyCedric

Dick is in high supply and low value Grin
THIS. Grin

(Only works if you're exclusively into men, of course!)

praepondero · 15/01/2021 10:31

Age difference, yes, agree with @Bubblebu et al on that many young women are happy to date men 15-20yrs their senior.
Some are your Common or Garden gold-diggers, banal, cheap and mostly viewed by said men as low-value accessories to be changed often.
However, if a man - or a woman - in his/her 40s- 50s has been blessed with good genes and has looked after him/herself, they can attract hordes of younger cadre as they have the looks, the wisdom gained through the years and often tend to be more interesting as have had more life experience.

surelynotnever · 15/01/2021 10:37

30? You need to sort you head out!

I am heading towards 50 and still attract men (of similar age). My current FB texted yesterday that I am his ' super hot temptress' - we have a tremendous sexual pull to each other. I get described as beautiful, sexy, engaging by men I date. And I am pretty bloody ordinary to be honest.

30!

surelynotnever · 15/01/2021 10:40

My mum is a very pretty 71 and gets quite good looking & quite well off men over approx 60 chatting her up!

This is encouraging!

Bubblebu · 15/01/2021 12:55

@prape..

"Some are your Common or Garden gold-diggers, banal, cheap and mostly viewed by said men as low-value accessories to be changed often.
However, if a man - or a woman - in his/her 40s- 50s has been blessed with good genes and has looked after him/herself, they can attract hordes of younger cadre as they have the looks, the wisdom gained through the years and often tend to be more interesting as have had more life experience."

except that there is also that third category - men with good sense, intelligence, wealth and "life experience" who are not actively looking out to attract younger (i.e extra marital) female attention but invariably do and in the right frame of mind / circumstances - find themselves binning the whole of their past life for this new found attention.

Just so long as the new found attention lady is fully aware that she will be in a relationship with someone much (sometimes much much) older and having to fit into his "past" life to a greater or lesser degree to the extent that continues once he is in a relationship with her.

GreenlandTheMovie · 15/01/2021 13:02

@praepondero

Age difference, yes, agree with *@Bubblebu* et al on that many young women are happy to date men 15-20yrs their senior. Some are your Common or Garden gold-diggers, banal, cheap and mostly viewed by said men as low-value accessories to be changed often. However, if a man - or a woman - in his/her 40s- 50s has been blessed with good genes and has looked after him/herself, they can attract hordes of younger cadre as they have the looks, the wisdom gained through the years and often tend to be more interesting as have had more life experience.
I've yet to see it. Maybe I move in the wrong circles for it (thankfully). So many older men with so-called wisdom and "interesting" actually come across as a bid sleazy and having been around the block too much The best ones are happily married to a woman you can admire. Single men or men on the pull in later life - best avoided, unless they are looking for women of the same age.

Older men might be able to get a younger girlfriend, but unless they are wealthy enough to be hanging around with models or actresses, its very rarely a really attractive one and one with brains. That sleazy grey haired old goat with his bargain basement younger woman, Paul Hollywood, was it, definately downgraded.

Bubblebu · 15/01/2021 14:15

@GreenlandTheMovie

"Single men or men on the pull in later life "

what do you classify as later life in this context?

GreenlandTheMovie · 15/01/2021 14:18

[quote Bubblebu]@GreenlandTheMovie

"Single men or men on the pull in later life "

what do you classify as later life in this context?[/quote]
Why are you putting me on the spot?

Since the conversation has moved onto older men, it doesn't take a genius to work out that my comment refers to men who are in a different age group to the women they are trying to attract.

So in my case, I would class anyone more than 12 years older than me as being in later life than me.

You really needed that explained?

SpiderGwen · 15/01/2021 14:21

Not read to full thread (sorry) but on the slim chance no one has posted the Last Fuckable Day skit, here’s the link.

GingerNorthernLass · 15/01/2021 14:36

Who cares what men think?

Bubblebu · 15/01/2021 15:48

Green

was not putting you on the spot.
was just curious as the whole thread is premised on subjective views about age.....

unmarkedbythat · 15/01/2021 17:50

There's a really relevant article in the Guardian right noe:
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/jan/15/my-life-in-sex-the-32-year-old-man-who-only-fancies-older-women

DitheringBlidiot · 15/01/2021 18:03

I'm 32 and I've never felt better or more attractive tbh, I think it's a confidence thing more than I am suddenly more attractive all of a sudden.

Crispyturtle · 15/01/2021 18:08

I expect I’m a lot less attractive now I’m 40, but weirdly I’m far more confident and comfortable in my own skin now than I was when I was 20.

I’m also a MUCH better shag Grin

Madamum18 · 16/01/2021 17:57

No they don't. Its a mans problem if they think that!

Whydoesmybackhurt · 16/01/2021 18:58

That sleazy grey haired old goat with his bargain basement younger woman, Paul Hollywood, was it, definately downgraded.

Ugh this is a shite thing to say about another woman. FFS.

'Bargain basement' and a 'downgrade' indeed Hmm

Devora13 · 16/01/2021 21:46

I am 50+ and have laughed off approaches from younger guys on the 'old enough to be your mother' basis (admittedly not since before lockdown-I think I need to drop around 20Ibs to expect any of THAT kind of attention 😁)
As for being taken seriously-don't expect it to happen, make it happen!