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?! 😂

On one hand Gisele and on thebother Susan Boyle. There is nothing in between for you.

This made me laugh 🤣

Sorry OP I'll read the rest of the thread now. OLD sounds terrifying! It's not you, you've just met a few men who were insincere/not interested.

I've been single for a few years now. I'd really like to meet a companion but am not subjecting myself to any horrors again! In the past I've had men ask me to bleach my hair (it's dark blonde) and wear high heels. I thought 'fuck that' and left them.

I did it in my 30s

It was soul destroying

There was a high number who would bail before we even met.

Keep going. Grow a thicker skin

Eventually I met someone i clicked with.

Speaking as a woman who met her DH online when I was 38, divorced and a single parent (sorry for fucking up your stats @Honest2afault) I'd say keep going, but also widen your net beyond OLD.

It can be soul-destroying and there are many, many low-quality men out there who wildly over-estimate their attractiveness and desirability. And that's just the genuinely single ones never mind all the married chancers! There are some decent ones but it's a numbers game really. I would mix up OLD with meeting new people in real life if possible.

And, if you haven't already, develop a very sensitive antennae for red-pill bullshit and kick those basement-dwellers who actually loathe and despise women to the kerb asap...

Dating takes a lot of time these days for many of the reasons you’ve mentioned.

I find going into a potential relationship (whether you meet online or in person) with the mindset of “getting to know” each other helps.

I remember when I was actively dating - I saw some people once and a few multiple times and it was more about how much I connected with them on a conversational level.

The other thing I personally found about online dating (in my 30s) is that I kept meeting men that had the mindset or lifestyle I had in my early 20s.

As most have said - try meet people through friends. Or through clubs.

it’s a long game (sometimes).

Man here - I have to disagree. I’m much more interested in someone I get along with and can genuinely live with easily day to day than ticking the boxes listed.

I’m in my late 30s and happily married to a wonderful woman who doesn’t necessarily tick all the boxes you list. 😊

I’ve done it from the other side - it’s not much different!
Thankfully some can see more than skin deep 😊

Men can want younger women all they like, but there aren't many younger women who want middle aged, bald, pot bellied men 🤣

What about just middle aged and balding? We don't all have pot bellies 🤣 I got the horrors seeing a very slight muffin top around the waist in my late 30s & got rid! I prefer my muffins on a plate in cafes

I know ... That poster just cannot get his head around the fact that whether men are most biologically drawn to early 20s women or not (I think he's actually quoting a study from online dating .... Hardly a well adjusted cross section of the population, many guys are on there for years) that it's totally irrelevant because the vast vast majority of men not much older than early twenty something women - especially above average attractiveness early 20s women - do not have a chance with them.

It's only by paying for them that they can have anything with them. Sugar babies, only fans, prostitutes (who may not even be fully consenting), mail order brides from developing countries etc. The only way they'd get very attractive early 20s women is by paying the ones who choose to be paid for or who have no choice.

Does anyone believe any of the twenty something models that hang around Leo di Caprio, for example, ... A puffy, not aging well (he was at his peak looks really quite young) forties guy.. would be hanging around with him as Joe average; if he wasn't very famous and very wealthy? Nah - me neither.

So it doesn't matter, it's irrelevant.

Also we'll adjusted men go for partners on more than only "biological imperative" ... There are any number of factors in their choice of partner; see the number of billionaires who've chosen not early 20 something partners. And they actually have the choice of early 20s women; the vast majority of ordinary men do not.

@spookehtooth I know, but you get my drift 😂. Even some men in their 30's are not aging well! Even ones with hair are puffy and sagging. I just think that some men (not all) have a right cheek, as some of us in our 40's /50's etc look after ourselves 💁‍♀️💪🏼
My age bracket is 34-50 and I'm just swiping left on most of the 30 somethings because they either aren't aging well, or have baby faces which also isn't a turn on!

@mumsnet
Is there a way of banning the incels?

@bethatgirl I know, I'm playing ;-) I tend to go on about taking care of ourselves being important in the older years too. Older folk everywhere I exercise are inspirational motivation on what's possible

Wow just wow!

I slept around in my 20s but I've had no problems finding nice respectable men, with good jobs, tall, atheltic and intelligent. And younger men at that!

Most people by the time they're in their late 30s and early 40s will have had multiple partners unless they've stayed with the same person since they were teenagers or think sex before marriage is a sin.

Jesus what is with these posts recently.

Evolution has had no impact on what men find sexually desirable. It is women that are sexually selective and fertile women choose which males can potentially pass on their genes and which can’t (evolution). Whether the men they choose wanted commitment or a one off… is insignificant as the outcome is the same!

@Honest2afault is that you? Mate….seriously…get a life 😂😂😂

And how will you know unless she tells you?

LADIES!!!

IGNORE THE INCELS!!!

Just completely ignore them.

Why? They are so ridiculous and make me
laugh 😂😂😂

Geez this thread is going from bad to worse!

Where did I say that I’d slept around? (I haven’t!) or that I’m looking for tall/athletic men (I’m not!)

Even if I had, It shouldn’t matter how many people a woman has slept with because ultimately, a persons sexual past is not what makes them who they are. Respect for a woman shouldn’t come from her decision to have – or not have – sex. It should come from how she is as a person, her successes, ambitions, and life goals.

I’d be willing to put good money on the fact you don’t hold yourself to these kind of standards. Because of course it’s okay for men to sleep with as many people as they want but as soon as woman does it they are “easy” 🙄

Actually no but it was like he was reading my mind (I assume it is a man)

😂 fair enough @Rania78

If it makes you happy.

I just worry that less confident women can't spot them a mile off.