OLD grads thread 1

[BelladiMamma]

Thought I'd kick this off

Yeah yeah I know I said I wanted less screen time ...

Feel free to get chatting and sharing our tales of life on and off the apps

@Clovertoast Nice to see you. Glad things are going well with Mr P.

Did you manage to add extra to your own life so you weren't relying on Mr P for everything?

I’m off to a party later this afternoon/evening with late DH’s family. Mr V is going to his friend’s engagement party. I will miss him being there but also on the flip side I can concentrate on enjoying myself and not feeling I need to check in with him too much- had he been there with me. I’ve felt in a much better headspace since my concerns earlier in the week. I sold some old gold jewellery yesterday and have decided to use the cash towards a couple of trips with my DDs and Mr V- separately. My older DD is home from uni at the end of the month so she can keep younger DD company.
It’s a beautiful day here in the Midlands, hope everyone has got some lovely plans for the weekend.

Just had a lovely night at home with DD, my tree surgeon male BFF and my other old friend, who's got together with him and MrD. MrD cooked for us all, veggies and non veggies, it was delicious.

Walked my dog with his sister this morning and DS is home from Uni tonight!

So all good. Probably seeing MrD Monday

@Isitreallyme0077 please stop talking to Mr Cricket. You sound like a wonderful person and you deserve someone who is going to love you unconditionally and treat you as an equal.

Please don't let yourself get hurt again. We all care about you so much on here ❤️

@Stepcount

I’m off to a party later this afternoon/evening with late DH’s family. Mr V is going to his friend’s engagement party. I will miss him being there but also on the flip side I can concentrate on enjoying myself and not feeling I need to check in with him too much- had he been there with me. I’ve felt in a much better headspace since my concerns earlier in the week. I sold some old gold jewellery yesterday and have decided to use the cash towards a couple of trips with my DDs and Mr V- separately. My older DD is home from uni at the end of the month so she can keep younger DD company. It’s a beautiful day here in the Midlands, hope everyone has got some lovely plans for the weekend.

The need for headspace is real! As much as we love our irons / partners, I absolutely need time alone or time to socialise separately

Hope you have a wonderful evening at the party, @Stepcount 🎉🍾🥂

And lovely to hear from you again @Clovertoast! So glad to hear things are still going well with Mr P ❤️

Two threads to read up on now - love it :)

Stepcount the family party sounds great - and I love the idea of putting your old jewelry to good use for you and Mr V and DD’s , you sound in much better form as we say over here

Bella how is your DD responding to Mr D? Does she know you are in a relationship or sees him as a friend in your group?

I really want my kids to meet Mr L casually and briefly even once to take the whole mystery out of it but DD is still holding firm on her ‘It’s disgusting and don’t mention him to me’ vibe so I fear she will refuse to meet him. I’m going to broach it again over the Easter holidays…I think

Otherwise he is amazing, we are getting on brilliantly without one bad moment between us so far ( this in itself is unheard of when I think of the angst I felt about the other 3 men I ‘dated’) and I’m like a teenager pining this weekend because I won’t see him for another two weeks and it’s too long

OLD .. well I'm back on it again as I was "ended" after 3 months last night. She said it wasn't really working, shift work, distance etc..
I did think it was coming as her messaging was becoming terse..
so I'm moping about.
One thing I learned was how wonderful and warm it felt to be wanted by a lovely woman. Something I never really experienced in about 20 years.
So OLD.. not PoF but is it worth paying?
I'm on eHarmony and a local ( based in Dublin and I'm not ) outfit..
Here goes..

@Stepcount Hope the party goes well.
I'm so pleased to hear you're in a better headspace, do you think its because Mr V reassured you or (dare I blame it on) hormones?
I definitely notice my feelings/moods at certain times of the month.

Who did you sell the jewellery too? I have all my rings from my marriage although they have stones in as well so not sure where best to sell them.

Enjoy your holidays, what a great way to spend the money.

Having a weekend at home sorting my smallholding and out tomorrow night (on a Sunday😱) with Mr K as it was his birthday this past week and although I stayed over the night before and saw him for an hour on the morning of his birthday I couldn't spend the evening with him as his son wanted to spend it with him (and the son's mum went away for a few days) so Sunday night is the compromise.
I'm looking forward to going to a new pub.

@MayEye

Two threads to read up on now - love it :)

Stepcount the family party sounds great - and I love the idea of putting your old jewelry to good use for you and Mr V and DD’s , you sound in much better form as we say over here

Bella how is your DD responding to Mr D? Does she know you are in a relationship or sees him as a friend in your group?

I really want my kids to meet Mr L casually and briefly even once to take the whole mystery out of it but DD is still holding firm on her ‘It’s disgusting and don’t mention him to me’ vibe so I fear she will refuse to meet him. I’m going to broach it again over the Easter holidays…I think

Otherwise he is amazing, we are getting on brilliantly without one bad moment between us so far ( this in itself is unheard of when I think of the angst I felt about the other 3 men I ‘dated’) and I’m like a teenager pining this weekend because I won’t see him for another two weeks and it’s too long

My DD has been great. His two aren't so comfortable with it. I have decided not to worry about it too much and just let it play out ...

@Shunter350 I've never felt it worth paying even though I have paid before. Could you try each site for a month and see what happens? How old are you? Age range?

Not sure whats wrong with me this weekend. I'm not seeing Mr Music due to him being unwell but I feel generally anxious about things. He's been fine but quieter and it's reminiscent of my ex last year who got all stressed about mental illness and faded me out. This is different as there are no signs of this but still.

[quote Eesha]@Shunter350 I've never felt it worth paying even though I have paid before. Could you try each site for a month and see what happens? How old are you? Age range?

Not sure whats wrong with me this weekend. I'm not seeing Mr Music due to him being unwell but I feel generally anxious about things. He's been fine but quieter and it's reminiscent of my ex last year who got all stressed about mental illness and faded me out. This is different as there are no signs of this but still.[/quote]
@Eesha .. I'm mid 50's.. I've taken out a months subscription to the Dublin based one.
Otherwise one can't message each other. They have one over a barrel.

You sound like me in many ways.
Anxiety is caused by historical issues. I keep telling myself that I can't change history. We can't change the future cos it hasn't happened yet.. but we can live in the moment.
Don't let your historical anxiety over your ex influence your feelings on your present partner.
Here's the thing.. some men are difficult and obnoxious.. but most of us are really ok.

@Shunter350 I would try the big ones like Bumble or Tinder purely for volume. But people on the thread have had varying degrees of success with each site so I don't think one is better than the other per se.

Thanks for your advice. Mr Music is a good person but he's not well and becomes distant with this or if he has stuff on his mind. I'm someone who puts a smile on regardless. To me, silence/distance with my children's dad meant a menacing tone as he was abusive. With my previous partner, he faded me out when he felt his autism was getting out of control so he only communicated via text for the last month of our relationship. Mr Music said I couldn't put a plaster and make things OK immediately as sometimes you have to ride it out. I feel like things are affecting me negatively so I'm going to take a step back. I cut short our chat yesterday because he was frustrated that I was overthinking/not understanding how unwell he felt. I just sometimes feel I'm better out of relationships!

@SortingItOut was it you who was linking monthly cycles to mood, or was it @ButterflyOfShay? Could you share the app you used? I'm feeling really anxious these days plus have been diagnosed as peri menopausal so would be good to understand what's going on a bit more

Hi @Eesha it’s an app called Flo. Its brilliant. Tells you when you're ovulating too and I notice I always feel a but crap up until I ovulate. Its so useful.. fascinating too x hope you're ok… I feel anxious even without a boyf so so you think you’re feeling general anxiety which we all do sometimes and you're pinning it on him?

Hope it’s ok to still chat on this thread? Not sure if it’s just for folk in RS 😁

Hey everyone. Im from the OLD thread but from about 18 mo ago? I recognise a few names here. I've been with my fella (Mr A) for well ...18 mo 🤣 we've had our issues with covid over the last 6 mo(me getting it, exes getting it, kids getting it) and a few trials involving exes, mine is an absolute arse (anti vaxxer, utterly self centred) and his while lovely is v dependant financially on him still. The kids met a few months back and we're now spending more time together as families. Still madly in love and want to move in together but given distance and kids schools its probably not practical for another couple of years.

Dating long term at this age can be seriously tricky! The amount of people you have to take into account when making choices. Its not just 'fall in love and run off to build a home'.

@eesha I remeber you! I also remeber your ex last year. I also get anxious if there's distancing, like you its historically been ominous. Also an overthinker. Had a lot of therapy but ultimately in the end it was essential for me that whoever I was with would be happy to help/explain/talk/understand. I think if Mr Music isn't hearing what you're saying and finding ways to reassure you (within reason) it's going to be hard to build trust and intimacy long term

@Eesha, definitely don’t give yourself a hard time over your anxiety, thinking that it’s a bit irrational- or rather Mr Music telling you it’s irrational. I think relationship anxiety is triggered by past experience, knowing that things have been difficult, changed or fallen apart in the past. So your brain is triggered when something happens that previously caused you emotional pain or sadness. This can happen at any point in a relationship but maybe the longer you have been together the more you have seen these times pass and you came through it. For you and Mr Music this is the first test and your response to his perceived distance is a learned reaction. I think you already know this, and maybe Mr Music’s is also based on previous experiences in relationships- you said he took 7 (?) years out to address things. That’s a massive break isn’t it ? He must also have experienced some big life challenges.

@ButterflyOfShay, I have seen one or two posts on here and on the dating thread about ‘am I allowed/ I’ve not graduated from OLD etc’ and I would hope that no one feels excluded from either thread. I originally suggested a shift in the chats we had on the dating thread because it seemed to have gone a little quiet or posters would come on to say ‘ still not dating, just saying hi ‘ We have gathered quite a wide ranging cohort of regular posters who I love hearing from, dating or otherwise so it seemed a good idea to broaden the focus of the thread to allow whoever wanted to chat about relationships, family, work and everything in between.It was happening on the dating thread and it is happening on here so maybe we don’t need 2 threads after all! 🤗

@Stepcount @ButterflyOfShay @supercali77 Mr Music says he was an overthinker before so he sees the signs in me. He's usually really good and reassuring but he's genuinely not well and distant so i feel like im being annoying now. I'm even annoying myself! I also think he's so used to being alone after 8 years out. Yesterday I was all chirpy, making plans, and he was quiet and i felt stupid. Then we had this tense chat where he said how ill he was feeling. He genuinely thought he had explained it before so he couldn't understand why didn't know this. I think I have brain fog as I just didn't remember. I felt dumb and quickly cut short the chat. I'm not sure whether to text this morning as I hate having gone to bed awkwardly. At the same time, I'm not sure whether I was wrong or whether just to pretend it never happened.

Cool @Stepcount, maybe it was the title ‘OLD grads’ which gave me the feeling the thread is for people who have come off of the apps and are now with someone. I wouldn't want to intrude! 🙂

@Eesha I would just try to let all those feelings go, you cant help that you were in a good mood and he couldn't help that he was feeling ill, it was just a little mismatch of energies in that moment, why don’t you go out and enjoy the lovely morning? Take yourself for a walk, coffee? Look at nature? . Maybe send him a friendly but breezy text saying you hope he feels better soon and you're sending him good will wishes but then just leave it dont ask him any questions and go and do your thing for a bit? You’ll feel a lot better x

And if he replies leave it a few hours before replying 🙂🙂

@ButterflyOfShay Yes I think you are right, I have loads to do today anyway. I just wasn't sure whether to message at all or leave things. He usually messages in the evening anyway. It's just I feel like I need to clear the air a bit (but again I'm overthinking!)