r/dating

I was thinking of putting at the bottom of my bio, along with looking for something serious something like:

"Brand new to dating apps, if we match then you can be sure I won't ghost you. I'll be honest if somethings not working" or something to that effect.

Is this a terrible idea? My thoughts are that I may reassure someone a little who's hoping for something serious, and had had enough of it in the past. And hopefully it might influence whether or not (even just slightly?) they choose to themselves over being honest.

But the downsides is it might sound like I'm taking it too seriously, and I'm putting the idea into existence straight away, but I guess if it puts off any ghosters then that's a plus for me.

What's your thoughts on including this? I can cope with someone saying "I'm talking to someone else sorry" much better than just being randomly ignored for life. Rather get an answer than endless loop of this stuff, which is sadly exactly what I'm expecting. But currently I have no alternative other than to use apps.

Basically, i met this girl, and I asked if she is seeing anyone else. She said yes, that she was seeing this guy consistently for like 3ish months now. She told me before she is dating with serious intent, so I can assume she is dating this guy seriously.

I didn't want to push for more info, but honestly I decided to end things. Feels too much like starting the race when it's on the final lap tbh.

How can I endure being single when all of my friends managed to meet the right guy that significantly improved their lifes?

I tried meeting people but it is not working out for me and it is creating this envy in my heart. In addition, it is really hard to be the only one single and without kids in the friend group. Those changes in their lifes left me kind of alone.

I'm a 38f , and I look better in person. I'm not photogenic. Depending on the angle if the camera I even look like a completely different person and when it's straight on I get nervous or tense and end up making a weird face.

I know I'm okay looking I'm not stunning, experience shows I have a "vibe" that is attractive definitely, but physical looks alone nothing spectacular. And to be honest I also think, I have a nice face, but I'm a little overweight, and they might be it there too.

My problem is I'll talk to men online and basically it's all good until I send a photo then they either stop responding or say they aren't interested. I try to send a mediocre photo , so that when we meet in person it'll be a surprise up, not down.

Bring that I do look so very different in photos I'm afraid if I send a nice one where I look like an 8 or something, we will meet and they'll be disappointed.

So if I send a photo where I look like a 5 , and we meet and I'm a couple steps up from that, then it's okay.

It's a very hard experience though, every time it happens. Sometimes I wish photos weren't so prevalent in life in general today.

Genuine question. Up until recently I was dead set on being with a guy who’s above average in terms of looks. I’ve spent so much time and money improving my looks because I figured attractive men want a pretty girl, but I really don’t know if that’s the case, especially for what I want (longterm monogamous relationship). When I think about this beyond myself, I very rarely see attractive men dating beautiful girls or anyone at all for that matter. I could throw a rock and hit a couple where the girl is way more attractive than the guy. Conventionally attractive men who are all alone seem just as common too though, which I find bizarre.
As I’ve matured and experienced a little more with dating, I’ve decided not to hyper-fixate on looks anymore, but I am still curious about this pattern.

There's this thing where people say that 20s are the best time to meet, hookup, date and have fun with women. Like it is supposed to be your prime. In a way it does make sense since you're young and full of energy and probably the best you'll ever look but what if you're not getting any interests or from any woman in your 20s? Considering I am 26 and have never kissed anyone and still a virgin, this saying has created a big FOMO for me. This sounds so outlandish and something that only happens in movies and shows. Is my experience uncommon or weird? or is it really the experience of most people? If it is then how far from common? I feel it could be a bit uncommon but not that far away.

I have never had any woman find me attractive. I know people say women don't show it explicitly or just give subtle hints but considering my life experience, I am pretty sure I have never had any woman find me attractive after seeing me/meeting me.

Also I do socialize whenever and however much I can and take care of myself and have hobbies. Saying this before anyone suggests that I am a recluse.

(it’s legal in our area, so nothing like that)

it sucks so bad sometimes cuz like, knowing your partner has been with some crazy people before you is like ‘well okay, that’s meh but at least they for sure don’t want anything to do with them anymore’

but with prostitution 9/10 it’s a positive experience, and duly mind blowing

I’ve asked if I was the best sex he ever had and I got a very flat: ‘I don’t like these questions’

eventually he admitted I wasn’t, and that I was pretty far down the list in terms of skill

but apparently ‘in terms of love’ im the best, whatever the fuck that means

i want to be as good as that, and he was like ‘well it’s their full time job to be like that, it would have to be your full time job too’

so im fucked essentially lmfao, cuz I can’t be in the gym 24/7 or taking pole dancing classes or getting non stop beauty appointments

i wish i was as satisfying as they were to him, and not because my metrics got fluffed with ‘love’ ts sucks

makes me never wanna have sex ever again

If you listen, they will tell you exactly how they are going to treat you 😅😅 met on an app, amazing credentials (very successful business owner, custody of kids, home owner, involved with kids sports, etc). We spoke on the phone accumulatively 8 hours and I tell you what! We never ran out of things to talk about. It was so fun! And then bits and pieces started coming out about how he responded to conflict in the past and I listened. I'm talking "I broke up with a girl who went on a girls trip with her sister. Nothing good ever happens on girls trips" ok yikes, that sounds like a you problem. Then "dating but not living together, she had a contractor friend going to her house to do some work for her and I didnt like that so I told her a female friend was coming over to make me dinner, she absolutely showed up and I told her see, how does it feel to know you're entertaining the opposite sex" uhmmmm extra yikes....."I'd have a big problem with you having any male friends". Anyway I just said, I'm calling it, you have things to deal with you're not ready to gently share your life so best of luck to you. But I just already knowwwwww how that would have played out!!! Anyway, listen to your gut! They will tell you how they're going to act and treat you if you become serious. That is absolutely the beginning of some kind of controlling, possibly abusive or DV situation.

Would you be okay with the idea of never being able to hold hands in public because it makes them feel uncomfortable? Or do you need some sort of PDA to feel like they care? Would you break up with someone because they don't like PDA or have you dated someone who didn't like PDA and you ended up breaking it off with them? If you did break it off with them when did you know that it was too much for you even though you respected their boundaries?

Hi all, I have a silly question. I had a great first date with a guy. I felt like there was chemistry and he was super talkative and smiley. After the date, he texted me that same day. We made plans for our next date and chatted a little after.

Beyond that, it’s been radio silence after making plans. For context, he was texting a lot and asking a lot of questions leading up to our first meeting. Now it’s super silent (few days without any texting at all). I initiated once but his answers are disinterested and short, so I’m probably going to leave him alone until our next meet up.

Does anyone have any advice?

M28, it feels weird that I have never had a relationship in the past 6 years, and to be honest never had a real one that made it to bf/gf stage.

Feels like something is wrong with me. Done a lot of self work. Live in nyc and have a solid job, enough that i could live alone. Got a group of friends. Most of them have gf’s or fiances at this point too. Really just feel like something isn’t clicking for me that does for them.

On the apps, try to go out on occasion as well. Just don’t know anymore

I feel like all I have been seeing from my friends and even my own experience is that people meet, talk, one person likes the other person more , it turns into this situationship dynamic until someone gets ghosted or just let go.

I don’t get WHY that’s so common now of day.. maybe people feel they have a lot of options or maybe casual sex has become so normalized that’s ppl are sleeping around w a lot of ppl and i think that does desensitize them to making connections.

Nonetheless , i see so many girls and guys trying to be something they believe the opposite gender values and wants but honestly ive seen girls with some pretty “bad” histories and characteristics get taken and ive seen some guys that i guess in a conventional way dont have much going for themselves but still get into relationships.

I think essentially what it is , is you can’t become something for someone if you don’t have that chemistry. I think ppl stick to the ppl they just somehow for some reason like. The heart will want what it wants and sometimes you just meet someone who really likes you.

I do think it’s actually easier for guys to get into a relationship cause yes it’s easy for girls to get men but not easy for them to keep them around. If the guy isn’t head over heels for you i just don’t think it’ll go anywhere.

You need chemistry ofc and it needs to be MUTUAL. I honestly think a lot of this is luck. Finding someone who ends up just liking you for you.

And that’s what’s hard to find.

I knew I wasn’t the most great looking person, but I know I at least had some decent qualities about myself. And only took me until the middle of last year to realize that I actually have some great physical traits about myself that I didn’t realize it could appeal to others. And I’m more recently I’ve been having people compliment me on my skin tone. It just sucks it took most of my 20s for me to start appreciating myself more.

I decided to give a chance to a friend’s friend. We met in our friend’s birthday and she’s the wife of one of his closest friends. We were both marriage testimonies in their wedding and we started getting closer after 1 year because he confessed to our friends that he liked me.

It never crossed my mind that his goal was to drag me into a casual relationship until I got to know that he never had a long-term relationship at almost 40, would text me minimally, superficial conversations, being emotionally lazy and low effort. I’m much younger than him and virgin, he started losing interest because I don’t want to have sex until our relationship becomes official. I ended things with him because I feel he lead me on and disrespected me because he made it seem that he wanted a monogamic and committed relationship in the beginning.

Now things are weird between us and our friends were excited about us and thought we looked good together because like me, they assumed he wanted something serious. Is this something common to do? Did I miss out something?

I (20M) met this one girl in my engineering class around three weeks ago and developed some feelings for her. We have connected really well in person ever since I started talking to her, conversations have ranged from our travel experiences, our experiences in music from high school (Me in Marching Band, her in Orchestra), my music career (which I'm not promoting here), and even a bit about sports (She used to like baseball and I'm a die hard dodgers fan). In recent times our in class interactions have been sweet and borderline playful, she asks me about my future and tries to whisper things to me when the professor is not looking 😂.However; after we got each other's instagram's, things have felt very awkward on that side of the court. She often lacks the initiation and curiosity I see from our in class interactions and it just makes me feel very confused.
I want to believe deep down we have potential for a deep connection or even relationship down the line but these differences got me feeling lost, I did ask her to hangout outside of the classroom setting and she said yes! (to a specific time that would work with her schedule too!) I’m sorta confused but should I be really that concerned, what do y’all think?

I’ve heard people if you’re not sure, make that a no and move on to someone you can fully say yes to. But what if the answer really should be a yes and you’re just overthinking it all?

For personal context, I recently rejected a female friend I confessed to last year (quick summary, started as friends, over time I thought “yes she’s cute and even though I have seen prettier women I think her personality is great. Lemme see where this goes”). We stayed good friends ever since, though

I rejected her because a few weeks ago she told me she was open to going on a date. After thinking about it for over a week I said I’d rather stay friends. In my head I thought if my physical attraction concern was gonna hold me back then I owe her the respect to say no for both our sakes.

Note that we will remain friends cuz as verbatim she said she’s fine with either path whether we date or not. I assume she isn’t lying to me.

But now I’m wondering if I should have said yes to a date just to see where it goes (we have hung out one on one and I’ve taken her to dinners but I never called them dates)

So this is a mix of a question in general as well as advice. Thoughts?
——————
Edit: I called her a few days ago (after posting this) and told her let’s just stay friends. She’s very happy with that decision and she’s happy I called her and made things clearer. so uh yayyy

I spent most of my life in an unhealthy marriage. Getting into online dating was exciting at first as I had more luck than I expected and went on a number of first and second dates with a lot of different types of women.

However even the two women I had a couple month relationship, I could tell something was off. At least the chemistry was good. But it often felt like an effort or that I had to be “on” to keep things working. I felt valued by these women (and I’ll clarify that I dated them at separate times), but one the moment I needed a couple days to myself and couldn’t keep up with texts, calls etc they took issue with me. The other basically let me show all the initiative and wanted to talk about themselves a lot - at least I got the space and they did nice things for me. But I could tell there were a few other red flags I won’t mention here and both times it sort of felt like more work than an early relationship would be.

Now I’m not saying the person I’m dating now is perfect or even that things will work out long term, though I hope they do. But my god it is SO nice to date a healthy functional adult! Someone who communicates clearly. Carries there end of a conversation without having to try. Is understanding of needing space at times and has their own lives. And talks and behaves like a functional adult. Honestly part of me had to very briefly grieve for a moment that I didn’t spend my life surrounded by people like this, but, I am really happy to have found one now.

So I (32F) am currently residing in the Midwest and do not intend to stay in my current city permanently. I am not in the military but I basically move around every 3-5 years. My issue with traditional dating apps like hinge and bumble is that I match with people who have zero intentions on moving. Are there any dating apps or even fb groups specifically geared toward people who moved around a lot? Next city I plan to move to is Denver.