Skipping To The Dumpster

There is no telling how much longer I will be an off and on online dater. My hopes are that it will be for a very short time. However, if the past is any indication, this will not be the case. I am a healthy, educated, 35 year old woman. I have friends, a full time job, my own home and a wonderful family. Sounds like a great catch, right? That is what I thought until I entered the world of online dating. Since the breakup of my first long term relationship in my mid-twenties, I have been on and off the three most well known dating sites. I even met and lived with a man (out of wedlock-for SHAME!) I met on one of them. When our relationship ended, I was still quite hopeful that the right guy was out there: someone funny, employed, caring and who wanted children. The standards were completely reasonable, in my opinion. This should not be too hard to find…I am not looking for perfection…just an all around good guy. Simple enough, right? Not so much. Read on.

There are some “interesting” men out there. Granted, I am only writing this from my own female perspective. I have no doubt that some of my fellow females are running the good name of our gender into the ground as online daters as well. But since I am “woman seeking man” I can only share my own experiences in meeting various men. I participate in online dating for what I think are the right reasons: I am genuinely interested in meeting a man to build a relationship with and perhaps marry and have a family with one day. My pictures do look like me and there is not one untrue word in my profile. I have learned that I am in the minority here.

I have met men with sexual fetishes, men who mentioned their ex -wives repeatedly, men who were rude to our restaurant servers, men who didn’t look a thing like their profile pictures and men who asked me to have sex with them on the first date. (No judgment to those out there who do have sex on the first date, that is just not my personal choice). And, then there was “Ben”, a man who I hit it off with. Great phone chats that led up to a wonderful first date. He told me he thought I was beautiful and that he couldn’t wait to see me again. We set a date for three days later. You guessed it-I never heard from him again.

Men have instant messaged (IM’d) me and asked me-a stranger –if they could come to my apartment and have sex with me (um, no). I have had various men IM me asking me about my personal preferences in bed…it went something like this:

Him: Hey…how are ya?
Me: Good…you?
Him: Great…what kinds of things do you like in bed?


Ummmm, hello? Are you kidding me?

And let’s not forget Mickey. Mickey was a man I spotted online one Friday night and something about him caught my attention. So, I requested an IM session with him, and he complied. The fact that he lived on the other side of the country was definitely not working in my favor, but I told myself that I must keep an open mind to find love. You never know where that perfect mate is….

Mickey and I went on to have a terrific phone and IM relationship over the next couple of months. We had long talks deep into the night and our communication became part of our day to day. So, imagine my thrill when Mickey came to my town for a visit. To my delight, it was incredibly comfortable being face to face with him. I was reeling with excitement…until…well; let’s just say he had some difficulties in the bedroom. These were issues that he’d mentioned on the phone, but I either refused to acknowledge them or foolishly thought that I was the woman with who these difficulties would not appear. Boy was I off the mark on that one. After a few days of uncomfortable attempts, Mickey went to visit relatives who lived near my apartment, saying that he’d be back that night. He never returned. Bonus points for you if you saw that one coming---I sure didn’t. I will admit that I cried my eyes out over this one…I could not believe that another man had disappeared on me. But, after many discussions with my girlfriends about this (yes, Mickey, they know every detail now), I realized that this was about HIS fears and shortcomings (sorry about the choice of words here) and that he “ran” out of sheer embarrassment. Funnily enough, Mickey had left some clothes behind at my place. Eventually, off to the trash they went. I actually think I skipped to the dumpster to toss his stuff.

I don’t only rely on online dating, either…I put the word out to all of my friends that I am looking to meet someone special, and try not to decline an invitation anywhere…you never know where that special someone will be. But, being that I am an Elementary School teacher, and not a bar hopping kind of gal, online dating seems like a logical choice at the moment.

I know the old cliché: you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince, and have heard it from every friend and family member I share my dating tales with. At this point, I am going to need some serious lip balm from all this “kissing” I am metaphorically engaging in. Now, where did I put that Chapstick…