Dating in your 30’s - Where am I going wrong?!

[sparklychampagne]

I’ve been single since I was 28, I’m now 31 and only really started throwing myself back into dating this year but it just feels like dating is so much more soul destroying in your 30’s. Or at least I don’t remember it being so difficult in my 20’s!

This year I was dating someone in January/February when all of a sudden he just blocked me on everything on a Monday after a seemingly normal date on the Sunday and making plans for the Tuesday.

April-June I was dating someone who decided he was going to travel abroad and quit his job and left all in the space of a fortnight (not suspicious at all!)

July I ended up dating someone who turned out to be married despite saying on his profile that he was single and looking for a relationship

Since the beginning of September I’ve been dating someone who, after saying I wanted to take things slowly, has started being less responsive, not chatting as much so is clearly doing the slow fade

I make sure I only swipe on guys who have on their profile that they are looking for the same things as me e.g. a relationship, wants kids etc… but it just seems that people lie so freely on online dating or then don’t have the decency to be honest and break things off if they aren’t feeling it. I mean I know it’s never nice ending things/rejecting someone but there’s kind ways to do this and surely it’s the more respectful thing to do than to block or ghost someone?!

I just don’t remember having these problems in my 20’s although I could be looking back with rose tinted glasses! Someone please tell me it’s not just me and I’m not undateable?! 😂

Partner not wife, I won't marry her and risk losing my assets, but I love her a lot and would never leave her, unless she betray me.

OP, I’m not beautiful, slim or young and have had quite a few relationships. I met my handsome successful DH in my 40s. We never stop talking or laughing and we’ve been happy together for many years.

Don’t be disheartened, OP. OLD sounds horrible. DH and I met through friends — let your friends know you won’t be offended if they try to find someone for you. Take up activities you enjoy but that aren’t women-only. You still have plenty of time.

This has to be a spoof.

We're different doesn't mean we're not equal.

Women go to war and have done for decades even on the front line. Are you saying the likes of the WRNs in WW2 weren't as important as the men?

Also you do realise some women have more than some men, not all of us need a man to do stuff but we are still feminine. I'm proud of the fact I've survived on my own without a man to prop me up. And the man I was married to didn't bring me anything other than an outdated view that a woman should do as she's told whilst happily taking what was mine because as the man he deserved it!

Thanks! I'm really not saying anything to attack people, I just think it is helpful for single women dating to know what men think about and value when deciding who to date.

I have had this convo with 2 female friends and it went the exact same way so I guess I won't do it again haha.

It probably because you're talking absolute rubbish. What makes you think you have the right to come and act like the spokesperson for all men with this red pill Andrew Tate nonsense? You don't speak for me nor the majority of men, misogynistic incelism of the type you've spent five pages promoting is a niche opinion

You're right I'm sorry. Reading all of the women's views on here has made me realize I am wrong, men don't have any preferences/ only care about personality. Evolution isn't scientific and fact at all, it's just red pill nonsense, and like you say, if men have preferences towards thin women, that's misogynistic and shows they hate women.

Like you say maybe a minority of men prefer young women that look like models, but the majority are indifferent / prefer women that are 50+ and look like Susan Boyle.

Most of the men on OLD look like potatoes

Like you say maybe a minority of men prefer young women that look like models, but the majority are indifferent / prefer women that are 50+ and look like Susan Boyle.

You really struggle with simple concepts, don't you.

Dating, or even just getting anyone to sleep with them is always going to be far more of a challenge for men, as a high proportion of men are ugly, boring, thick or disgusting, or one or more of the above, and at the same time desperate for sex without particularly liking women or able to relate to them.

Whereas a higher proportion of women can take men or leave them and can have a little or as much sex as they like. Some men must find this so infuriating that they need to wander over to Mumsnet to tell women off, when they would do far better working on how to be a decent human being.

Why are we letting this specimen derail this thread, I'm asking myself again.

Op, what other ways could you meet the type of guy you'd like to meet?

I've met guys through courses, sports, even on transport.

I found tennis lessons etc to be quite mixed.

I met a guy at sailing.
Theory Sailing courses - motor and sail are always 95% guys.

A guy at kayaking was interested but I wasn't back.

Maybe language lessons (?) Not sure if more female dominated.

Apparently a lot of guys do bouldering and climbing at climbing walls.

Hiking club?

Coding?

What would the sort of guy you'd like to meet be doing?

If we ignore the troll it’ll get bored and scurry back to its mums box room . .

And I am NOT saying a woman must have all those qualities to get a man, but if you date a man who is 6ft successful and handsome as a single mother... well it is likely he will just be after sex.

What a load of bollocks (including that liking thin women and those with less partners has anything to do with biology. Lol. )

As a single mother in my 30s I dated someone 6ft5 and a millionaire. He proposed. And I declined.. Because his personality turned out to be pretty rotten! Now chew on that, the all knowing man of the biology... 🙄

This is all red pill incel schtick - parroted with all the brainwashed, acoytle originality of Andrew Tate's (rapist pimp) most ardent follower.

I have already admitted I am completely wrong, men have no preference at all, Susan Boyle is just as attractive to men as a supermodel. Ye men don't prefer thin woman, the fatter the better right?

And I see that this happening once to you just shows how stupid I am for believing science. I can't believe I was tricked.

I am agreeing with you, I'm just saying what you say

Isn't it just!

And that old "80% of women swipe the same few men" bit of bro science that I hear more often than my own name...
To be fair, one look at men's Tinder profiles will tell you why it might be : because 80% of men on Tinder look and/or sound unhinged.
That statistic is created by women trying to stay safe whilst meeting strangers via an online app.
In fact, 20% sounds wildly optimistic. I probably swiped right on 5%, not more.

@Honest2afault I guess I'm a defective bloke then. The only item on your list I can relate to is beautiful, however what that is to me isn't connected to anything else on your list. My own list is quite different. I was never interested in having kids, not every man has that drive, although I did end up in a long relationship with a woman who had 2 girls who became step-daughters. That was just something I accepted as part of the package so to speak. If anything, it made me even less interested in having any biologically-connected so to speak. Very low probability they'd be as wonderful as those two. They made being a parent incredibly easy

I've already admitted these women are right, men have no preferences and biology plays no part in attraction. All men are different and a majority of us conform to what women want men to be like.

@GilberMarkham the language class men/women mix depends on the language I find - Italian, Korean and French more women, Chinese, Russian and German more men

@Honest2afault

You don’t speak for all men. What you find desirable regarding physical attributes will be determined by the decade you were born in and by the country and culture you inhabit, your own age, preference and many other factors, nearly none of them related to the actual biology of attraction.
If you want to talk biology, then someone's health and fertility would be of higher importance to all species than "thin" (which is still new and definitely not a universal concept of beauty).

I am a single mum, with many sexual partners, relationships and a marriage behind. I'm also not Incel young at 37 but somehow that hasn't stopped men being very really extremely convincingly biologically attracted to me. Numerous times a night 🤣 They probably have missed out on the latest statistics of an acceptable woman for their biology - I'll quote from this thread and give them a chance to kick me outa' bed. 😁

Anyway, I'm getting silly faced with the professor Ridiculous on here, so I better go and get my recycling sorted or anything else of use.

Can I please see the scientific evidence that is based on please?

You may be very sexually attractive, but with all those past partners, being 37 and having children, you are not what men would choose if they had a choice. So you will only ever now be able to get a relationship from men that have no choice, but don't worry, there are lots of those.

The sad thing is you are trying to debate something that is just not debatable. Biology makes 3ft men less attractive than 6ft men, and you are trying to say that society could change that/ most women see those two heights as the same?

I really think all the women here should just ignore the men who come on here with their MRA/Red Pill/Incel talking points. I see the exact same comments come up time and time again from "a man" on these kinds of threads, sometimes talking about how he is "married but looking to get back into dating" and I suspect it is probably the same poster name changing and making sure women in general know their place and value as determined by men.

Its all designed to make women second guess themselves, erode their boundaries and lower their standards, to expect and accept poor treatment from men, especially if they dare to be anything other than a dehumanised male fantasy of womanhood. Honestly fuck that. Ignore that guy and his posts.

@Honest2afault if women don't want short men, why do they persist in the population? Obviously, anecdotally, it does seem to be popular but clearly not universal.

Biologically driven impulses don't exist in a vacuum, particularly in humans as we operate on several levels that influence one another. While we retain simple instinctive behaviours, they're influenced by our social characteristics and our higher level processing that helps us critically evaluate those. The fact we're even talking about these things should be a clue to complexity and caution when looking to biology for all the answers

I haven't read the full thread but wanted to add my perspective (if it hasn't already been mentioned).

I'm 51 and although the dating pool looks very different, I'm finding that men genuinely want a partner. I've been single for over a decade (not counting a few long term flings) and find the difficulty lies in finding someone who meets my standards.

The main problems I've come across is men not looking after themselves very well, having drinking problems, limited interests and being boring.

As horrid as it sounds I sometimes turn the tables and use them for sex. 😬