Dating Thread 199 - Come on 2021....

[LongtimelurkerL]

The Rules:

1. The first rule about the dating thread is don't talk about it with people you're dating.
2. Develop a thick skin.
3. Do not invest emotionally too soon.
4. It's all BS until it actually happens.
5. Trust your gut instinct.
6. People vanishing, lying & being generally weird is not your fault.
7. Know your worth.
8. If it's not fun, stop.
9. Loo update is mandatory.

10. No dating the thread. 11. Treat others as you'd like to be treated 12. Any relationship you have that could get ruined by having a conversation about your feelings, standards and/or expectations wasn't really stable enough to begin with 13. The things you choose to ignore/ tolerate now are the reasons you will break up in the future 14. OLD can get very time consuming. Keep doing other activities you enjoy.

Optional: Please give your irons (potential dates you are talking to) nicknames like Mr Scottish. Initials are allowed (Mr S) when you are an item

It’ll help you @Heartbeats0708 especially this idea of the right one making you feel something. It doesn’t talk much about a right person, more about the right things being sufficiently present for a relationship to ensue.

@WeWantTheFinestWines This is not the in site advertising, rather fake profiles that make reference to other sites.

@Heartbeats0708 why is not wanting to share some of your life with others a sticking point?

Do you mean meeting kids or finances or something else?

Its good to know what you want out of a partner and just because what you want doesnt suit everyone doesnt mean you wont ever find anyone.

Thanks hairy I'll read it and see what I can learn. @SortingItOut yes meeting kids/merging lives, moving in together etc. They just don't appeal to me at all. Maybe they would with somebody else though. Or maybe I'm just defective!

@Heartbeats0708 I was Miss Unavailable and behaved quite unkindly to a couple of men. I’m wasn’t ready for a relationship. So I got some counselling - just a few weeks - which really helped me identify a couple of long-buried issues that were completely holding me back from letting myself be even a bit vulnerable.

@Heartbeats0708 quite a few of us on here are in the same situation in not wanting to merge lives so you are not alone.

I vowed when I left my husband I would be single forever and just have FWB as I didnt ever want to merge lives or mix finances etc.
I then met Mr K on Fab and we started off as FWB but it developed into more and even though we've been together nearly 17mths I still feel the same.
He is a really great guy, has his life completely together but I don't want to live with him, now or in the future. I wont ever get married again and I certainly won't ever share finances.
He has met my kids but they are adults and live with me. His son is primary school age and I've met him twice as a friend.
Luckily Mr K doesnt want to live with anyone until his son is in his 20's and is settled so thats at least 12 years away.

Our relationship just works, we see each other 2 -3 times a week and stay over.
We dont spend weekends together as he has his son every weekend and I love it because I love my own time and space.

What you want is out there and is becoming more common, it even has a name Living Apart Together.
Sums it up perfectly.

@ThisTooShallBeFantastic I knew there was someone on here that had felt similarly but I couldn't remember who! I was having counseling before covid hit, maybe it's time to pick it back up again if possible. I'll look into it. I don't want to be unkind I'm just so frozen in not knowing what to do.
@SortingItOut sounds ideal. I could have had that set up in the past, however it was starting to get more serious than fwbs and I didn't feel able to reciprocate. Maybe it is just a case of meeting the right person with the kind of lifestyle that aligns with mine.

I’d put myself in the same boat of not wishing to short change anyone (that’s my little nugget of unavailability). The living apart together idea seems like the only thing I could practically commit to. Very rare to see anyone expressing that they want that via OLD though.

But a lot of people when they go into OLD don’t know that Living Together Apart is what they want/can have because social norms push us towards either the nesting pair model, which just doesn’t suit when you’re older with DC and assets to consider, or the lone wolf model. There are so many ways you can create a good partnership in fact, once I realised this I actually felt a lot more relaxed, which helped.

@Heartbeats0708

I wouldn’t get into analysis paralysis here

just be yourself, respect your feelings (even if you think they’re negative). be honest and don’t feel you have to justify yourself or your lifestyle choices to anyone?

You’re allowed to change your mind, you might want something different in a few years when you’ve enjoyed you and your children alone? Or even after this wretched lockdown is over?

I think there’s so many messages to women that we should be “grateful” for successful men validating us and “wanting commitment”

that there’s something unnatural about us if we’re not overwhelmed with wanting to agree with them?

I mean I’m on paper (ok I AM ) a slightly awkward, divorced, broke eccentric ASD type who has no children and who is in their mid thirties.

I’m getting where I want in terms of work but there’s still a lot to be done and I’m way behind my age group.

I’ve never been one of the girls, I don’t have a great family, I spent a lot of my teens and twenties and early thirties feeling awkward and bullied.

Therefore, I “should” be grateful that my two recent irons want commitment.

one is a younger dashing popular guy in a cool career.

and one is (according to women’s mags ) the “holy grail” of a nice attractive single thirty something man with no baggage who takes home a great income.

But I’m not wanting that right now so I don’t have to accept?

There’s not like a man shortage. The god of dating isn’t going to curse me and make me only date Level Dean guys if I turn these ones down.

I might have a really shit couple years and walk past MrC with his hot young wife and gorgeous baby back from an exotic holiday, as I’m struggling with finding a few quid for a coffee from my postgrad Grant. Whilst looking ugly

but that’s not going to mean I’ve made the “wrong decision” about anything.

I too am in the living apart together mindset. I’m a hard working, no children, home owning average woman. I had a long marriage that left me totally blindsided by his leaving. I never (at least not right now) want to be in that vulnerable position again and give up everything to live with a man.

My friend for example met a man OLD in late October he moved in, in January, in reality maybe it’s ok but really she knows nothing much about him.
I suppose I just want a nice slow paced getting to know you relationship with a nice man that isn’t a player or some other weirdo.
Or a decent FWB relationship but I get feelings so I don’t think that would work for me.

It may have been said already but I think we need to remember we are worth more than these men/women that can’t see our worth.
And snip, snippity snip them out of our lives, so we can find ones that do want to date us ....wherever they may be 🤷🏼‍♀️

my Life goals include:

• get a small low maintenance house somewhere by the sea or cheap and hot and be able to work remotely.

I’m frugal and like the minimal look, and don’t need a lot of money to enjoy my life - some of my dream homes on rightmove I could literally pay the mortgage off on a low wage in 10-15 years. I also like the idea of being able to go on retreats and sabbaticals abroad regularly.

• live abroad a few years - I’m developing my language skills now

• do things like meditate and yoga and arty cultural stuff

Of course I like/love men (both as humans beings companions and getting the D )

But I’m mindful trying to BLEND lives with a bloke (especially with kids) with slightly different goals and values to me could completely financially fuck up my life

@HairyArsedMan

I’d put myself in the same boat of not wishing to short change anyone (that’s my little nugget of unavailability). The living apart together idea seems like the only thing I could practically commit to. Very rare to see anyone expressing that they want that via OLD though.

Where would one express this though?

I'm 99% sure I never want to live with anyone again. I like being able to do what I want to and in my own home. Too much history of men trying to tell me what I should be doing/buying/not buying etc. I've made my home how I want it and I do not want someone else's socks on the radiator!

I use Bumble and it seems to have very little space to write anything.

@HairyArsedMan

It’ll help you *@Heartbeats0708* especially this idea of the right one making you feel something. It doesn’t talk much about a right person, more about the right things being sufficiently present for a relationship to ensue.

@WeWantTheFinestWines This is not the in site advertising, rather fake profiles that make reference to other sites.

Ah, gotcha. I don't think I've come across any fake profiles. I imagine if you were going to set one up, your aim would be to attract, rather than repulse, women. So, no.

I'm in two minds about the living together apart thing. I've had that with all my long term relationships, although one of them did move in with me for 4 years. It worked well with my last one as she lived 200+ miles away, so we tended to see each other at weekends and had the rest of the week to ourselves. It does seem to be more and more common too, especially at my age (mid-40's) where quite a few potential partners are divorced and have kids.

Saying that, I would at some point like to move in with someone, get married and have the "happy ever after". I'm hoping I meet someone where we both end up wanting that - but I wouldn't expect that to happen until we'd been together for quite some time. I don't think it would be a dealbreaker either - if it was the right person.

It's interesting that some of you mention giving up everything to live with someone. I used to see it like that - giving up my freedom, and my nice little bachelor pad. But I like to think if it was with the right person, I wouldn't feel that I was giving anything up.

This reminds me of an elderly couple I met a few years ago, and a very sweet story. They had dated when they were young, then met other people, got married/kids etc... and both ended up widowed. Then somehow they got back in touch in their 70's, and ended up seeing each other, although were living in different parts of the country. But instead of moving in together, he sold his house and bought one just down the road from her, and would cycle over to see her every morning.

I would love your set up @SortingItOut personally. I have small children so wouldn't want someone living with them/us. I lived with their dad who refused to leave in the end. I had to move out of my home with the kids, find him somewhere to live etc before he would go. It was so stressful at the time and I can't see myself doing it again. My best friend thinks I'm mad to not want to live with someone because she herself would want the help with her own kids!!! But ultimately the buck stops with me and my children and I can't let any partner change that dynamic.

@Eesha I think as parents we do everything we can to protect our children and that includes preserving their home for them.
Even though my children are 18 and 24 I would never let someone come and live in their home, this is our space and we love it.

How awful for you with your ex, I'm glad you eventually got him out. Although my husband wasnt an alcoholic he was a nightmare and I also had to 'help' with finding him a new place to live.

I want to protect my house and pensions and I also cant be doing with the merging of finances. My husband was a spendaholic and continually ran up debt so he would often have no money to contribute to the bills so it was left to me.

Your best friend sounds mad (in a nice way) to want someone to help with her kids, surely they are ours and ours alone. I wouldn't want any partner trying to parent my children.

I definitely think in years to come Living Apart Together will be more normal although as someone else said the term isnt common knowledge but the theory definitely is. I think some people dont mention it early on as they may have had negative comments in the past about it.

I love @TheCatWithTheHat story of the couple in their 70's - that sounds perfect.
In my mums village there are 2 neighbours who are in a relationship, they visit each others houses and occasionally stay over but mainly go back to their own homes. Its a perfect set up, I think they are 60s and 70s.

💕💕💕

@SleepyBunk that's a really, really helpful post, thank you. Analysis paralysis sums it up perfectly! I worry that although I know deep down it's fine to change my mind about things, I'd end up hurting someone else in the process. I'm always honest, to a fault, but you just can't manage someone else's feelings can you?
This conversation has been enlightening, I appreciate all replies. I understand living apart together, it's just not so popular amongst my age group (early 30s).
@Eesha what you said about not letting someone change the dynamic between you and DC, I feel exactly the same and I'm stubborn, I certainly don't need 'help' with mine and I love our little set up. I would never want someone to disrupt our routine/relationship and I think that's a big thing that holds me back. My barriers are there for my dc really, I'm not afraid of being hurt but I feel fiercely protective when it comes to them.

@SleepyBunk Thank you for sharing your life goals, they all sound fab.
I love an insight into peoples hopes and dreams (I guess I'm nosey really but that doesnt sound as good as inquisitive)

I know my life goals and they dont involve a man in them although I'm sure one could fit in there somewhere 🤣

Happy valentine's days guys!! Any irons spoilt you?

I'm wondering whether to include that line about Living Apart Together in my profiles or is that too much?

I was wondering the same @Eesha but I'm not sure if it's a bit "serious". I could imagine writing it on Match but not Tinder.
Also loved reading your life goals @SleepyBunk and feel inspired to write a list of my own!

@SortingItOut my kids are tiny so I need to be careful really. But I love our dynamic and can't see that changing. My ex was abusive at the time, and wasn't leaving. So we all moved out in the hope this would guilt him into finding somewhere, me with two babies. But no. In the end I ended up trawling gumtree, booked visits etc and finally somewhere too good to be true came up and he went for it. I just think it made me think very differently of letting someone into my home again.

My best friend introduced her kids within a couple of weeks to her last partner. She is all about new families because her kids father is a mess. However these new dads then start disciplining the kids etc and this feels wrong after a few weeks to me.

I was reading someone else's experience on OLD on another thread, how she literally went with no expectations, only really a FWB and it grew from there. I think that approach has worked well for me in the past, with my ex fwb and Mr Yoga too. Might try that.

@havecourage8bekind I am seeing Mr K tonight for a few hours, we are just doing token gifts. I've got him (well us) the karma sutra scratch off poster and a card.

@Eesha I think you should, it will definitely spark conversation. I expect a lot of men want the same but either dont know how to explain it or worry it will put women off.

My children have a good relationship with Mr K and we all have some good conversations about life and stuff. He is very rational and logical. At times of discussion they have asked to ring Mr K or to wait until he comes over before discussions continue because he makes me see a different side to things 🤣

You know my story with Mr K so I think having a FWB and seeing where it goes is a good idea.
Quite a few of us on here have started like that and gone on to more.

Glad to see I'm not on my own in the not wanting to marry to live with anyone again thing. I know for definite id never marry again and don't feel id want to live with anyone certainly not whilst my kids are at home so at least another 10 to 15 years anyway. I don't need a dad for them, they have one, and don't want to be a step parent to anyone else. I have no intention of ever merging finances. I've let irons go early doors because they indicated the wanted the opposite and that's fine. I'm sure there are men out there that want similar in my age bracket (mid 40s) because they too have been there, done that already