Are there any decent men out there ?!

[lemonbabe]

I'm in my early 40's and separated. At first I was quite excited by the thought of meeting a normal, loving man and building a future together. Fastforward a couple of years down the line and a trail of failed relationships/dates and I'm becoming more and more disillusioned with men. It seems virtually impossible to meet someone who's not already taken, gay or mentally unstable. Is it the age ? Is is modern life ? Is it men being @rses ? Or all of the above ? It's hard being a single parent, doing everything alone. Friends are great of course but I'd love to meet someone special. I just feel too young to throw in the towel and begin imagining the rest of my life alone. Anyone feeling the same ?

While we're on the subject - a good friend of mine DOES know a nice, single very eligible bachelor. She says she doesn't know him well enough to just give him a call or txt but has known the family for years. if she were to bump into him (at the very well known local business he runs say) he would make a point of chatting with her, having a conversation etc. I half jokingly said she should try and set me up with him. So far she's not said/done anything. Should I ask again or just assume she's not really comfortable with it?

"...but when I ask them to name me some decent single women they know and could introduce me to, blank faces."

Perhaps this is why some men go for younger women; maybe there are more younger women available.

I really can't recommend all single men with dogs. I am reminded of one particularly disastrous online date I had with a man who had dogs...

First date, he suggested we meet in the park to walk our dogs and then go for a coffee if we got on. Seemed reasonable. Except his dogs were a newfoundland called "Baby" and a Jack Russell called "Princess" that wore a pink dog coat with "hot stuff" written on the back of it. He was so boring, he even bored himself telling me about himself - I kid you not, the conversation went "I'm a BT engineer, I work on cabling blah, blah blah"... He actually said "blah, blah, blah".

I was a bit when he started telling me his dogs were his children and any woman dating him would have to respect his dogs came everywhere and that they sat at the table and had dinner when he did, along with sharing a bath with them. I told him I had 2 cats - he then informed me that if I wanted to date him I'd have to "get rid of the cats" because "Princess" (The JRT) didn't like them and neither did he. (What NOT to say to a cat lover on a first date!!)

Suffice to say, at the end of the walk, I said "Thanks very much, nice to meet you, but lets not do it again" - or words to that effect.

Cue the best part of 50 texts within the next 24 hours pestering me for another date, then harassing me and demanding to know I refused to reply to him. It culminated in 3 phone calls (went straight to voice mail, I wasn't going to engage!) with him leaving increasingly hostile and sobbing, hysterical messages demanding to know why I refused to talk to him, why nobody ever had a second date with him and why life was so unfair. I wonder! I still refer to him as "Sobbing dog-boy" and dine out on the story.

With DH, my collie still doesn't listen to him, she's still useless with livestock, but he's kind, considerate and most importantly in the first stages of our relationship, didn't hassle me - he was respectful of the fact I had a life. My "relationship radar" was so finely honed to "twat radar" and avoiding them, rather than "potential relationship", I didn't even realise DH liked me that way for 5 months, so we became good friends first. :)

Beware of men with dogs. they are not all nutters, but a certain BT engineer with a newfoundland and a JRT in South Wales is!!

I would not be sharing a bath with a Jack Russell in a pink coat, whilst my todger is bobbing about amongst the bubbles.

Sobbing dog-boy wins any first date story I've read

week 2 on line dating, and it's only going down hill. I really felt better about myself before I tried looking....

Oh my - dog boy !

I have a lovely male friend, who has been single for ages and ages.
He really wanted kids, likes women, has a very well paid job.
He used to be quite good looking (is mid 40's now)but tbh drinks too much, smokes like a chimney, so looks quite bloated and has quite bad skin at the moment.
Looking at him objectively, I see a kind, intelligent (if with a bit of a "Northern Lad" persona) man who would be a lovely dad (he is fab with my ds) and who needs a woman to sort him out!
Sadly, I think that his lifestyle would put off any prospective decent woman. It would probably put me off, as I wouldn't fancy a man who need "fixing", but knowing him for as long as I have, I reckon he is fixable, so it's a shame.
(I couldn't go there for several reasons unrelated to what I have said btw!)
Having said that, I totally recognize the feeling that all the decent men over 30 have been taken, and what remains....well, it's scary.
My friend, who is a bit older than me, and was single for a decade, ended up aged 39 with a man 12 years younger than her. They have 2 kids now !

I've had proposing on a first date boy, but sobbing dog boy takes the (doggie) biscuit! See now in situations like that I kind of feel it's my moral duty to tell them why they are still single and why they never get a second date but then again would I really want him to put on an act and 'fool' another woman into thinking he is 'normal' only to be shocked and disappointed later on...

I think there definitely needs to be a rating system. One sided of course.

Tonight a nice bloke..who I suspect is v.sensitive...but unlucky..admitted to being returner to site I am on..this is all so much more perilous than I had imagined..

it is perilous glucose - have you been on the dating thread? Lots of folks in the same boat to chat to there.

I just need to be kept off MN tonight...as mortally offending all with my opinions...will go back to on line dating sites ;-)

glucose FWIW I was just reading the other thread you're referring to and I don't think you were being offensive. It was maybe poorly worded but I get what you were trying to say. Just let it blow over - sometimes it all gets a bit heated around here.

Am enjoying this thread much more than the dating thread, which is so busy its difficult to follow.

And OLD dominates.

This thread has encouraged me to be open minded about seeing someone, and I am enjoying it, so far! Thanks

Well there was a very nice looking man at my yoga class tonight. He seemed quite nice - he laughed at himself when he couldn't get the hang of some of the moves. I've emailed the teacher and asked if she knows who he is (tried to be subtle and chatty and oh, by the way... but probably just going to embarrass myself!).

Ok girls, here's another success story just to maintain our will to live here !!

Had dinner with an old friend tonight - haven't seen for ages. After 6 years of singledom she's bagged herself a normal man !!!! Been together almost a year, he worships her and I repeat, is normal. She met him through work and gave him a chance although she wouldn't normally go for this type of man (low key, not that educated, country bumpkinish). He cooks for her, loves her kids, worships her.... they love each others company. Maybe there is hope for us ?!

Ok, have just read that.... is the motto here suffering 6 years of singledom ??!!! Bloody hell, I'll forget what to do !

Well, 2 years down, does that mean I have another 4 to go?

Gawd, I'd like to think we could speed the process up a bit... granted she wasn't looking (that much) in that timespan .... 6 long years- I'll have died from the sheer boredom of waiting.

Ive given up too. 11 years and 2 kids with my ex. Went ODing and met a lovely guy whom I dated for a bit. Even dtd! Really gentle guy and then he just stops contacting me!!
I decided to go back ODing again 2 weeks ago...met a guy, appeared nice so started texting frequently. Seemed he really was into me. Started sending flirtatious texts and told me i was so what he wanted. We arranged to meet this weekend. He suggested chatting on the phone. I text him tonight to ask what time suited and he said he had met a girl for lunch and he would be pursuing that! Is this normal etiquette for dating? I sent him a disappointed type text and then he got personal and nasty about my looks and saying i was a liar, etc. I have been put off for life!!

The thing is, though, that 6 years isn't REALLY that long, when you think about it. 6 years to wait for the right person, as opposed to less time to settle for someone that you will not be happy with? I'd rather wait. I'm in no rush. It would have to be someone pretty impressive (and I don't mean in terms of money or looks, just simply someone that ticks all the boxes for me) before I would even consider going out.

I'd much rather it be someone I've been friends with for a long time, but as I really don't have any single male friends at the moment, I can't see that happening any time soon. I met my STBXH online, so the last thing I'm interested in is online dating.

For me, it would need to be someone in their late 40s, or in their 50s, but yet I have small children, and not a lot of men at that stage of their lives are interested in taking on someone with small children.

I notice that STBXH has flung himself into another relationship right away (one that apparently started while we were still together). Does anyone else think that men tend to weave in and out of relationships much more frequently than women? Perhaps because they're not dealing with children/childcare and such, so have the freedom to do so. Or because their relationships don't have quite so much of an impact on their children as a woman's relationship does.

For a lot of men, they're incapable of being on their own, so rush from a broken marriage into a new relationship quickly. I do know women like this too, who can't end one relationship without another being lined up, or be single for more than a few weeks before bleating about how lonely they are. Bit pathetic, I think.

It took me 5 years of being single to meet a man I saw any potential with. Now that's ended (short of him having a massive change of heart, which I foolishly hope he might) am not optimistic about meeting anyone else. Certainly won't be through work, as the men I work with are the wrong age group, not on my intellectual level, or married. And I don't really like men who sit behind a desk all day. Local pubs are full of the wrong types, likewise my gym. Which doesn't leave many options!

RELAXINRADOX, don't let the experience with that @rseclown put you off-

If you're relatively new to OD you need to wisen up and learn quickly that it provides a forum to some men for free, no-strings sex. A man can weave you yarns about how great you are, etc etc to get you into bed.... then he can move on for more NSAS, with no comeback whatsoever.

There are signs, you need to be aware of them. If a normal guy is interested in you, then he'll want to take things slowly and woo you with dinners, dates together, meeting friends, that type of 'normal' thing.

I've had it myself where a guy's made contact and asked to meet up without any form of communication whatsoever, nothing. I found that bizarre and suggested meeting up at a get together for singles.... never heard from him again !!! Chances are he wanting to meet up alright.... for NSAS. His pussy radar told him I wasn't up for that so he dropped the idea of meeting me like a lead balloon :-/

ALICE it certainly seems that men have this innate need to attach themselves to another woman very quickly. Doesn't necessarily mean that's "the one" or even that they're terribly happy. I just think that's automatic of a lot of men. They don't have the same depth of emotion that we possess and so I guess it's easier in a way to close one door and open another.

VELVETSPOON as an old friend of mine always says "it only takes one". I love that saying because, yeah, just one person is all it takes and that one person could be lurking in your supermarket, bookshop, the bus !!!!! I say, keep an open mind.... always, you just never know.

The thing is, though, that 6 years isn't REALLY that long, when you think about it. 6 years to wait for the right person, as opposed to less time to settle for someone that you will not be happy with? I'd rather wait.

Whilst I absolutely agree with this 100% in theory, in practice I'll be 45 in 6 years time. If my experience of OD and men in general (inc RL male friends) I'll be long past it by then! I'm still the 'right' side of 40 and I'm aware I'm becoming increasingly invisible. I've even noticed that I'm being flirted with by much younger men (say mid/late 20s). That's not because they find me attractive, that's because I'm entering that safe zone for flirting where there are no misunderstandings it's generally understood by everyone that no one will think they genuinely fancy me.

It's no different to when I'm a bit flirty with the 70+yo men I know. No one really thinks I fancy them, it's just a bit of fun.

Sorry started rambling there!

Relaxin OD is hard! I tried it too for a while with some success (ie a quite a lot of dates and one guy who I ended up seeing for couple of months) but ultimately I'm still single and really not sure OD is for me. I think speaking to someone by text and then saying you've met someone else isn't so bad. Until you've actually met and know if there's any real chemistry it's ok to keep your options open. BUT..then being nasty to you about it is horrible. Big red flag and sounds like a lucky miss with that one!

Like Alice I would much rather be with someone that I get to know through other channels and have as a friend first, but having male friends at this stage of life doesn't really seem to happen.

I definitely think there are a lot of men and some women who need to attach themselves to someone else very quickly! The guy I was seeing briefly last year WAS lovely. He was kind, we enjoyed each other's company, he cooked for me, he adored me, he was a good dad to his kids....I could so easily have said, yep, this will do. But, I knew I would never truly fall for him and chose to go back to being single. I think some people in that situation would have happily carried on.