I paid nearly $10,000 on a dating coach and got nothing from it.
Hi everyone, this is my first post here. I’m a big fan of Dr. K, and after seeing the interview with the person who spent $50k on dating coaching, I related to him enough that I wanted to share my own experience. I wanted to make this post because I just wanna move on from this and I hope that people in this community can offer me some support and not judge me for the choices I made.
Just for context I am a 28 male, and have been single for almost two years now. I have had one long term relationship in my life and a few casual hookups. But truthfully I don't have a lot of experience with women. I can't tell you how many people tell me how attractive I am. But when I tell them that my dating life is a struggle they get very surprised and almost dismissive of me thinking that I shouldn't struggle just cause of my looks. I got made fun of it as well.
I too am someone that struggled a lot when I was younger, I didn't have any friends with high school and had terrible social anxiety to the point where I actually could not leave my house. A relationship is something I always wanted but just couldn't seem to get. I remember starting in college and I was very awkward and it was just a terrible experience.
Around my early 20's I discovered the world of coaching and I did something I never did, which was I joined a dating coaching program. Long story short but that program actually really helped me and that's how I met my first and only girlfriend. The breakup was messy but we broke up around 2 years ago. After we broke up I joined another dating program while I was travelling Europe and the program also helped me. At least in terms of getting hook ups and casual flings. But I realized that wasn't my thing and that I as a person and much more inclined to be in a committed relationship than anything casual.
Yet I still never had that normal happy healthy relationship that I always wanted. So last July I hired another dating coach. I knew he was expensive ( he charged $1500 for services) but in my mind I believed this person would offer me so much value that I would never need to hire another dating coach. But yeah I wanted this person to help me find a relationship but I am very single. Long story short I gave this person $9,000 over the span of 6 months and basically got nothing from it....
There are a boat load of reasons why this person didn't help me and i'll get into them. But one of the first things that this person told me was to go out more and talk to more women. At the time I didn't really think that advice was extraordinary for the money he charged. But I did it anyways, and I was ( and still am) was able to get dates. But they just never progressed anywhere.
Looking back, a lot of his advice was terrible which i'll summarize.
- One of the first things he told me is that I should act like a fuck boy ( which I'm not) if I wanted a relationship. So he told me to never be upfront about your intentions ( he knew I was looking for something long term) but he said if a girl asked me what I was looking for tell them I was looking for a hookup. He also told me to always give the girl the impression that you just want to have sex with them even if you first met them lol. He said the reason for this is that women will take you more seriously the less seriously that you take them.
- The coaching he gave me was inconsistent in a sense that early on we talked about not tolerating disrespect and walking away from women if they're being disrespectful. But he encouraged me to pursue women even when there were obvious red flags, disrespect, or lack of interest, and then blamed me when things didn’t work out.
- It also seemed like he didn't really see women as people. It just seemed like he viewed them as objectives. There was this one time around Halloween where there was this super drunk girl and she was all over me, we all know the kind. I did not put my hands on this women she was the one that came onto me. We ended up hanging out a bit after and then I dropped her off. But I swear I did nothing sexual with her. This coach of mine told me I should have gone for it and that I have a "closing" problem. I had to tell him again that she was drunk and he told me if it was easy i should have gone for it....
But I guess the part about it is that's most upsetting is that I trusted this person and was vulnerable with him and he genuinely misguided me and gave me bad advice which further prevented me from getting the relationship I always wanted and I really can't tell if he was trying to help or just milk me for as much money as possible.
I stopped working with him at the beginning of this year and had to unlearn a lot. That was a low point for me and I had a lot of panic attacks when I realized all these things. Since then, I’ve focused on having standards, being authentic, and building a life that isn’t centered around dating.
Yet through it all I STILL didn't get the relationship I wanted and still cannot get a 2nd date. I met someone in June and it's just like the date went to well, our personalities clicked very well, we had great chemistry, and had so much in common, plus I was very attracted to her. I didn't work out with her either I guess cause of timing she was a first year medical resident and was working 10-12 hours a day. I do realize know that dating her probably wouldn't have been the most ideal situation for me cause of that. But still I really cannot remember the last time my personality clicked so well with especially a woman, like that's rare.
At this point I really cannot think of anything that i'm doing wrong that's preventing me from getting a 2nd date. I made a lot of mistakes when this person coached me but I think I largely fixed it. There's still a part of me that wants to hire another dating coach because I still have the same issue. But I just don't think it's worth it anymore.
I told myself that I didn't want to be single for years and it's been almost two years since I really dated anyone. I changed a lot since then and I tell myself that it's not the end of the world. I reached a point in my life where I can actually say i'm happy, i'm happy being single. But I just can't help but think how disappointing this has been for me especially since i've done everything in the past year to not be single.
But yeah that's everything for me, If anyone wants more clarity or can even offer me any insight into my struggles that would be helpful
TL;DR: I spent about $9,000 on a dating coach who gave me a lot of manipulative and genuinely disturbing advice. I trusted him because I was vulnerable and wanted a relationship, and realizing afterward that his guidance may have actually made things worse was really painful. I’ve since unlearned a lot, built a much happier and more authentic life, yet my dating life is still a struggle. I’m trying to stop treating being single as a problem I need to “fix” with another coach.