Lied about his age - sackable offence?

[Crumpet444]

Been seeing a guy for nearly 2 months. Met online, his age was 48 on his profile. I am 36, I generally have no issue with guys being a bit older, in fact have always dated men older than me.

First date was actually on his birthday which I didn’t realise until the day itself, he said he was 48 ON his birthday but the app changed to 49. I asked him about it and he said no, he was 48, so I assumed it was an error on the app. One year, no biggie.

However, I did a google search the other day out of curiosity, given I am getting a bit more invested and wanted to just check everything checks out, everything going well and I really like him - Seems mutual and we both want something serious. He is listed as a director for something on companies house, birth year 1971 which makes him 54!! Definitely him as the company tallies up with what he told me, his name isn’t common and month was correct.

AIBU to be a bit pissed off about this?! I get shaving a few years off for the app, but fess up straight away surely, especially when I asked him directly about it and he lied. I get it may be an insecurity thing but it’s not so much the age that’s an issue but the lying. It also means there is far more of a substantial age gap between us than I realised. FWIW he looks very good for his age!

I guess I’ll have to be the on to bring it up won’t I? And confess I was googling 😂 or is it likely companies house is wrong?!

Has he not responded still? This is quite shocking op.

Ghosting is very common. Don't take it personally, it's all on him.

I really do mean this kindly, but when earlier I said you were being naïve, this is the sort of thing I meant.

You seem to pride yourself on picking up inconsistencies and it's definitely great that you figured out he was lying to you. But your reaction to that lie was to minimise it and say that apart from that he's a wonderful man.

Anyone who lies to your face about something so fundamental by definition can't be a wonderful man. It puts his whole morals, worldview, attitude etc into doubt and so it really shouldn't come as a surprise that he's the type to ghost someone. Taking the cowardly route is what these type of people always do.

You deserve a lot better.

I do think he will respond, I will be very surprised if he doesn’t. It will be something down playing it, like sorry been busy with family and lol been googling, fancy meeting tonight?

I very much hope he slinks off like the weasel he is, but (and I hope I'm wrong here) I suspect he may appear in person with some sort of "grand gesture" gift by way of apology, in which case you need to think about your reaction. You said he had teenage children: if one of them was 19 and female I bet he would be extremely upset were he to discover that she was involved with an almost 40 year old man.

OP - if you really want to get the true measure of him here’s what you do - you tell him (face to face) that there’s something you need to confess - you are actually 5 years older than he thinks you are.

His reaction will tell you EVERYTHING.

That’s a very good point. If the weasel turns up again I’d ask him how he’d feel about a man telling his 18 year old DD he was in his 20s and he turned out to be 36. If it’s not ok for his DD why’s it ok to do it to OP?

I can guarantee there will be some reason why this is not applicable or totes "different" somehow 🤣

Men like him are total hypocrites - they are deluded and chase after much younger women whilst deep down knowing full well if an older man did that with their own daughter they would absolutely hate it and probably be furious about it.

No, no response still. I know he has his kids over this weekend but hardly an excuse to not even send a holding text.

I don’t think I was naive, I think I did trust my intuition and was checking myself to make sure I wasn’t being dismissive out of hand. I want to be sure I’m not the one being avoidant and emotionally unavailable 😅

No, no, no. I've got an even better idea 💡

● Tell him you are 10 years older than your profile age. You're actually 46.

● You've been divorced 3 times and have 7 kids from 5 different relationships

and ......
(if you want to put the cherry on top):

● you used to be a man but you had very successful gender reassignment surgery 20 years ago and have lived the rest of your beautiful life as a woman

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

After all, darling, it doesn't make any difference, does it? Everyone lies on online dating, right?

So you're 54 and I'm 46 with 7 kids and trans ID. (let's not get picky about how the kiddies were born - maybe you "fathered" them).

^^^
That's the response I would have up my arm sleeve if he comes round in person after his kids have gone and tries to charm you.

Soz I'm being a little bit Devilish 😈
But it's the kind of response his behaviour warrants.

He won't respond because I ruined his fantasy. I'm clearly not a real person to him, just someone to play a role with to make himself feel good and now I can no longer perform that function I no longer exist!

My cousin had a Canadian accent. He wasn’t Canadian and had never been outside London. It was fake. It was a family joke. He started it because he was going to take up acting and never did, but the accent stuck. Honestly, take the accent with a pinch of salt.

585 replies, Wow !! Simple solution, go find another candidate to scrutinise, plenty more fish in the sea.

God I’m so sorry that’s utterly shocking. To not even bother responding or sending a holding text

I’m still not convinced he’s not trying to punish you with the silent treatment for having the temerity to bother googling and raising it. I’m sure he will be back on the dating apps, faking his age and trying to find another younger woman to shag.

I think you're right. Massive bullet dodged for you, although you must feel awful right now.
I expect he'll be back on the dating app before the end of the week (if not already) having amended his LinkedIn.

kind of annoyed because I left some things at his house I now won't get back, and I'm not asking for them. He should offer to return them but he won't.

God, how disappointing. Sorry OP. Hugs.

He won't be able to edit LinkedIn - not that much unless he completely removes the education section and removes some of his older jobs. He probably doesn't want to do that. He's probably proud of his degree and accomplishments among his age 50+ chums and people he went to school / uni with.

And he can't ever remove the old Companies House entries. It's too late to alter that.

He lives in a bubble fantasy world where he thinks the women he dates will be so bowled over by his charming personality, his looks, his wealth, etc etc ..... that they will ignore any little red flags and they won't go searching for him online - that they will be so gullible they will accept the version of himself he presents on dates.

Even when he's dating a smart female solicitor with a good professional job and degree of her own. 🙄

There is another reason why he may not have wanted to respond by text.

● He might be fearing that even sending a holding text ("Sorry. I will call you on Sunday evening / I will see you on Monday. I would like to explain in person.")

is because:

● he currently has family / kids with him in the house and he doesn't want one simple "holding" text to lead to a volley of messages from you which he hasn't got time to deal with whilst his kids are there.

He also doesn't want his phone constantly pinging and his kids asking "who are you texting? what is that about?")]

However not sending a holding text to at least acknowledge your previous message is rude.

Yes all true, I can’t quite believe he didn’t think that this wouldn’t all be very easily verifiable. Just makes me think the whole thing was more about the fantasy, more so than sex itself. The fantasy cannot be recovered so no point attempting to repair with me.

oh and I’m a barrister, with two degrees as it happens 😂 he’s been an idiot.

I wouldn’t be so unmeasured as to constantly respond if he had sent a holding text, I’m pretty capable of not losing my shit and I think he knows that. I was measured in my text.

I still think he'll just turn up when he's kid free.

Only if OP is unlucky.

OP - well if he knew you were a barrister - he was really a bit of a Walter Mitty/ fantasy person. He really thought he could get away with the age lie to a barrister?? Dumb is what he seems to me.

I think it was all just a bit of fun for him. I don’t think he had any intention of this becoming a serious relationship. But he knows all too well that 36 year old women on dating apps aren’t really looking for fun. Most are looking for a committed relationship with kids on the early horizon. So he makes declarations about telling his mum all about her and also being open to more kids. But it was all just bullshit.

Hence the no response now. He doesn’t want to have to make excuses or apologise. This was only ever a bit of fun. He’s probably already moved onto his next prey.

So sorry, OP. But best to find out now than in 6 months.

Does the fact that he has freaked out and ghosted not make you realise that it was actually a pretty serious lie that you perhaps shouldn’t have been so open to forgiving in the first place?

I’m not sure exactly what your friends or family mean when they say your standards are too high, but they can’t really be too high when it comes to basic values (like honesty, accountability, respect etc). Do you think you’re prioritising other things that are perhaps not as foundational, eg good looks, financial success (you mentioned he earns a lot), being charming, etc?

I have high standards when it comes to all the important stuff, and as demonstrated I haven’t let it slide and he hasn’t responded so it’s over.

I’m not so fussed about looks. Financial success is important as I earn well and don’t want them relying on me in that sense, I’d rather we were relatively equally aligned - but I don’t want to be the breadwinner. Just don’t like that dynamic, but it’s not about gold digging. I wouldn’t say I care about them being particularly ‘charming’ either. I value honesty and integrity and authenticity. Emotional reciprocity. Consistency and intention.

My family err on the side of being pretty generous when it comes to red flags. With this guy there was actually something early on where he cancelled something he promised he would do with me and didn’t really apologise, so I had mentally binned him off then but I was persuaded to give him another chance. Given everything else seemed good I gave him the benefit of the doubt.

I actually don’t think I am overly fussy I actually think I respond to red flags pretty decisively, family probably think that’s being too harsh I don’t know, and I had kind of hoped I was wrong about him.