Hi. New here! Dating Sites?

[NarcissistSurvivor]

My username says it all I'm not ready for any sort of relationship but I do enjoy chatting and texting and having a laugh with people online and off.

I don't have endless amounts of money to pay but I would like to use a more reputable site than tinder or pof to try and strike up some sort of friendship with a view to it going further one day if that makes sense!!

Plus my ex is on those sites and I don't really want to come across him ever again

Dating sites from what I hear are difficult no matter what, even the paid ones. A few of my friends have bumble and they like it a lot, you don't get bombarded with messages as the woman has to make the first move, so to speak. It's similar to tinder in the swiping and matches department though.

Bumble is the only one I ever used personally, I liked it because the women had to start the conversations first so a) it cut out some of the potential creeps and b) it made me have to put myself out there and feel more confident which is something I struggled with in the past. I met a few nice people on there who things just fizzled out with for one reason or another and then eventually met my current guy who I've been with for 7 months and who is delightful. We chatted clicked from the start and arranged to meet for a drink within about a week (although I understand obviously meeting people from a site in person isn't on the cards at the moment).

As the other posters said any and every site is equally likely to be good or bad tbh, I was lucky to not have any REAL disasters during my time on one (if anything the worst thing that happened was that some guys were just awful at conversations... oh and I was ghosted for the first time in my life! the guy had a lot going on a bereavement but I just think ghosting is unforgivably rude) but I've heard some absolute horror stories from friends (mostly on Tinder but it can happen anywhere). I think to a certain extent it really is the roll of the die! But good luck whatever you do OP, the first time I ever used a dating site was after I got out of an awful, awful relationship and it did wonders for my confidence in the end.