New Normal

It’s been a long, long while. Where do I begin? My ulcerative colitis is in remission (holla!) thanks to medication. I’ve started working in a new office and I’ve given up on dating.

Well, for now. Online dating was just not working out for me. The guys who messaged me were mainly looking for casual sex (that’s not me) or were older men looking for a “companion”. Don’t get me wrong, I think some older men can be attractive. But unless you’re older in a cool, Keanu Reeves or Idris Elba type of way, it’s not happening.

I am still open to meeting someone and dating, but I’m not chasing it. It will happen when it’s supposed to happen. I do still login to my online dating profile from time to time when I’m bored, but I never expect to find anyone decent. I mainly just check it out for kicks.

I’ve also been adjusting to my “new normal”. Yeah, that’s a thing. The first time I heard it was after my diagnosis. I signed up for an ulcerative colitis peer support program that allowed me to communicate one-on-one with someone who has been living with the disease for many years. I was speaking with her about how frustrated I was because all I wanted to do was get back to the way things were before my diagnosis and feel like my old self again. She told me that I won’t ever be the old me again and when I accept that, my new normal will become easier to live with. She was right. Once I accepted that my new normal included daily medication, one more doctor’s appointment each year and the fear of regular colonoscopies, I was able to relax into the new me. Well, for the most part. The new me is still carrying some baggage from the old me and since I’m not dating right now, I decided this would be a great time for a little self-improvement.

I think part of my disappointing dating history  has to do with the fact that I’m very self-conscious and not completely comfortable in my own skin. So I’ve been working on ways I can improve and live my best life. I’ve been exploring more writing projects at work to see if I can obtain the type of job I really want. I’ve also been trying to lose weight to be healthier and feel better about myself.

Although I spent most of last year juggling meds and trying to find one to kick me into remission, I also spent most of last year eating everything in sight. Between my prednisone induced eating binges in 2018, my post-prednisone, crazy cortisol cravings in 2019 and my general I’m-still-single/bored/lonely/depressed/happy/let’s-celebrate-flag-day/emotional eating binges, I gained a lot of weight. I didn’t realize how much weight I gained until I saw a picture of myself from this past Christmas. I looked like Shrek’s wife, Fiona. That’s when I decided to do something about my weight and my health in general. So I joined Noom. I saw a few commercials about the online weight loss program and I decided to try it out. It’s been 11 weeks since I’ve joined and I’ve lost nine pounds. But it hasn’t been easy and it still isn’t easy.

In those 11 weeks, my weight has gone down, then up, plateaued, then gone way down and then back up again. Apparently, this is normal and it’s what real weight loss actually looks like. But damn. It’s hard to stay positive and even sane when you’re working hard and losing weight and then you slip and it feels like you took several steps backwards. But I’ve also been learning more about myself and what causes me to be an emotional eater and more importantly, how to stop being an emotional eater.

Part of the program is also about developing new habits and they recently started talking about my “new normal” as well. Only they are referring to the new lifestyle I’m creating with my healthy eating and exercise habits. So I guess it’s my new, new normal. Yeah…I’d drink, but I can’t mix alcohol with my medication. Also, alcohol has plenty of calories.

So that’s what’s been happening with me. Basically, my new normal is working on myself and making better choices so that I can be a better me. Holla!

A Date with Diarrhea

Well, it’s been a while. I’m going to jump right in and start with a date I had in June. We’ll call him Jay because frankly I don’t remember his name at this point. Jay and I met online of course and he seemed nice and nerdy. Plus he had a tattoo, so naturally he was right up my alley. We exchanged text messages and decided to meet for dinner one evening. Now, he wasn’t smiling in any of the pictures on his profile and I was aware that that was a red flag, but I ignored it because he was nice and I enjoyed our conversations. Worst case scenario, his teeth weren’t straight or he had a gap. I could deal with that. He met me at the restaurant and smiled. I was taken aback because at first it looked like he was missing all of his top teeth. I had to wait until we reached the table to realize that he wasn’t missing any teeth. As it turned out, all of his top teeth were really small with the exception of one of his canine teeth, which was significantly longer than the rest. It wasn’t the only thing that was off-putting about his appearance though. I came to realize that his profile pictures were also quite old. He looked heavier in his pictures. Healthier really. In person, however, he was quite thin and his face looked like he hadn’t eaten in weeks. Funny thing was, he hadn’t been eating that much. He said he was participating in a weight loss challenge at work. 

Before I continue, I need to explain what was happening with my own health at the time. My stomach issues had returned about a week or so before my date with Jay and I was seeing a naturopath and trying to get things under control. Things weren’t as bad as they had been at other times I’d experienced tummy troubles, but I was being careful with what I ate and eating very little. 

Despite being caught off guard by Jay’s appearance, I enjoyed his company and we did seem to have a lot in common, so I agreed to another date with him. We decided to see a movie the following week. Now, anyone who knows me knows that I love horror movies and Hereditary had just been released. When we first started talking, Jay said he also liked horror movies, so naturally I suggested we see Hereditary. Imagine my surprise when he said he had to be “in the right mental state” to see a horror movie. What kind of bullshit is that? Unless you’ve just spent a night in a haunted mansion or escaped a haunted asylum, a horror movie aficionado is always in the mood to see a horror movie. This was the second red flag for me. We decided to see The Avengers: Infinity War, even though he had already seen it. Unfortunately, my stomach issues had become worse by then and I missed about 20 minutes of the movie because I had to rush to the washroom. After the movie I felt like crap and I was hungry so I asked Jay if he wanted to get something to eat. He said no because he was on a water diet that week. A water diet. There I was having the contents of my stomach emptied every few hours and not being able to eat much more than a rice cracker and this idiot was voluntarily eating nothing because he wanted to win some competition at work. I was angry and exhausted and completely turned off. That was the end of Jay.

As I mentioned, I had been seeing a naturopath about my stomach issues and at this point I will dive into the nitty gritty. I had been having bouts of acute diarrhea that lasted two weeks at a time. This had been occurring almost every month since February and each time I saw my family doctor she told me it was a virus, even though a test in March confirmed that there was blood in my stool. I got tired of what seemed like a lazy and inaccurate diagnosis and at that point I was waiting to see a specialist, so I went to a naturopath. My stomach was fine when I went to the naturo, but then another bout of diarrhea started slowly. The naturopath did a test and told me I was sensitive to gluten and dairy and suspected that I had too much yeast in my gut so she put me on a diet to eliminate gluten, dairy, yeast and sugar. In case you’re wondering, it meant I was mainly eating fruit, vegetables and meat. She also suggested I eat chia seeds, nuts and oats. So I did. But after four weeks of diarrhea and one week on this diet, I was going to the washroom almost 10 times a day and I had lost about 20 pounds. I looked and felt like the living dead. Scared and frustrated I went back to my family doctor and basically said, “What the fuck?” Frightened for her career, she called the gastroenterologist and bumped up my appointment to the next week. I saw the GI the next week and my mother went with me. I felt like Dorothy in that episode of The Golden Girls when she was sick and Sophia went to the doctor with her. After an uncomfortable, yet necessary procedure the same day, the GI diagnosed me with ulcerative colitis.

I was relieved to have a diagnosis that wasn’t “a virus”, but I still had diarrhea and was five weeks in by then. It also didn’t help that pretty much everything the naturopath told me to eat aggravated my ulcerative colitis and the things I wasn’t supposed to eat were the foods that brought me some relief. The GI told me to eat a low fiber diet and prescribed a steroid to stop the inflammation in my intestines and ultimately the diarrhea. And that friends, is when the fun really began.

It was a good idea, in theory

So, in my last post I was high off of the idea of breaking my own rules and looking into a less serious relationship with someone. Dare I say, a casual relationship. That was a dumb idea. I mean, I still think it could work. However, it requires specific conditions and I don’t think those conditions exist in our current dating society.

I signed up for Ok Cupid because I am done with PoF and Match is a joke. I matched with Kal* soon after I signed up. His profile caught my attention because right off the bat he said he was looking for a casual relationship that was mature and respectful. He sounded like a nice guy and after a few messages I was confident that we were on the same page and I truly thought that he would be an ideal candidate for my friends with benefits exploration. We exchanged a few text messages daily and he seemed honest and mature and when I mentioned I wasn’t feeling well one day, he was even concerned about my well being. Things took a turn after I suggested meeting up for a drink last Friday. He said he needed to check his schedule and would get back to me on Wednesday. I received a late night text on Wednesday in response to a mildly sexy conversation we had the day before, but no mention of meeting up. I suddenly saw where this was going so I didn’t reply. Thursday there were no messages from him and on Friday more radio silence. I figured that was that until I woke up Saturday morning to find an early morning text advising me how unbelievably horny he was. Um…talk about going from 0 to 100 real quick. I didn’t reply. How could I? Here was a guy who talked about an open, mature, casual relationship who couldn’t find time for an initial meet up, but somehow wanted me to do something about his raging libido. Oh well. So much for that.

I did start chatting with another guy, Denny*, who is the opposite of Kal and is looking for a meaningful relationship with a normal woman. I liked him immediately and as we continued to exchange messages more frequently it seemed like we had more in common and things were looking up. That was until we spoke on the phone and I discovered that he wants children. Turns out he conveniently skipped the top portion of my profile where I mentioned that I don’t want kids. He said something about it not being important, but then reiterated that he wants to have children so that was pretty much a done deal for me. We continued our conversation because he was interesting, but I wasn’t interested in dating him anymore. He messaged me yesterday to see how I was and I replied, but I just kept thinking, what’s the point of this? We’ll see if anything comes of it. 

In the meantime, I’m exploring more profiles on OKC and avoiding Match. There is one guy from there who continues to message me even though I stopped replying to his messages because he took weeks to reply back. Nothing creepy, I just find it annoying. Maybe I’ll reply and put an end to it once and for all. If all else fails, I’ll make sure to tell him I don’t want to have kids. That never fails haha. 

Overall my encounters over the last two weeks did teach me that I should be less intense about dating and just see where things go. Maybe Denny isn’t a lost cause. Maybe the Match guy who can’t take a hint is worth a second look. The point is, I need to be more open minded because you never know. Kal surprised me, maybe one of these guys will too. But in a better, less horny way.

 

*Name has been changed

March Madness and April Aberration

I’m back! I know I was MIA for a while, but it’s been a crazy time. I did take a couple of weeks off to regroup and I just put the whole dating thing on the backburner. I was using all of that time and energy on just focusing on me. Nothing huge, but I made a few tiny lifestyle changes like being more mindful about my eating habits and attempting to get back into a workout routine. I only did it once, but it’s better than nothing. I was doing well and feeling great! But then things took a turn.

At the beginning of March I picked up some kind of virus and was out for two solid weeks. It took nearly two more weeks to fully recover and it was awful and exhausting! According to the doctor, the virus is out of my system, but I am only now starting to feel like myself again. I will spare you the details of my illness, but I’ve learned much from the experience. First off, don’t take anything for granted. The ability to eat food and keep it down, doing things for yourself and going where you want when you want are luxuries we take for granted each day. Be thankful each day your body functions the way it is supposed to. That may sound silly, but if you’ve ever been physically ill for more than a week you will understand what I mean. 

Something else occurred to me while I was sick – I don’t know that I want to share my life with someone anymore. Hear me out. Sometime last year I was 100% certain that I wanted a relationship and that I was completely ready for one. That is what triggered the online dating frenzy. But something changed and I don’t feel the same way anymore. I don’t know whether or not I no longer feel “ready” for a long-term relationship, but I know I don’t want one. At least not right now. Maybe it was reading the dating profiles of ALL of the eligible men within a 30 km radius and realizing that only a handful of them piqued my interest. Or perhaps it was the fact that of that handful of men, none of them were interested in me. Oh wait, there was the vegetarian guy who wanted kids and the guy whose profile I “liked”, which prompted him to “like” my photo, which led me to message him, which resulted in him not replying, but then “liking” my profile three weeks later. I fucking hate Match. But I digress. Those weeks before I was taken down by the evil virus made me realize that I like my life the way it is. I wouldn’t say no to the right dude, but he isn’t necessary. I overcame illness and the albeit dramatic fear that I had some deadly disease without a significant other. That was the first incident that got me thinking. The second happened this past week.

The pipes in my condo needed to be replaced and renovations were done in my suite. Cleaning and preparing for the renovations was a pain, but the cleanup afterwards was a nightmare! With the exception of the bedroom, I had to clean the entire suite from top to bottom because there was dust and dirt everywhere. It took two whole days, but I did it. By myself. The point is that there isn’t part of my life that is on hold until I meet someone special. Well, there might be one part that we’ll discuss in a moment. There may be things I would prefer not to deal with alone, ie. renovations and being so sick that you have go to the doctor three times in two weeks, but I can do them and things like that don’t stop or cease to exist if you are single. I don’t want to have children, I have wonderful friends to travel with, I’ve discovered the thrill of going to the movies by myself and even managed to watch horror movies by myself. So what do I want? Romance? Sure, if it wasn’t dead. Love? Of course. What the hell do you think I’ve been looking fort his whole time? The thing is, as much as I wanted to believe it, love isn’t just going to fall in my lap anytime soon. I’ve come to terms with that now. So what else is there? Companionship? That seems more reasonable. 

I’ve been in casual relationships before; rather reluctantly if I’m being honest. I decided that they weren’t for me, but I think it’s because the guys were just A1 douchebags and that made it a horrible experience. However, I think more of a friends with benefits type situation would be ideal right now. I think that officially falls between finding the one and finding yourself dodging eggplant emojis on Tinder. More like the way Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake did it in the movie, but without meeting the other person’s family because that was a dumb thing to do. I like the idea of not just focusing on finding my soulmate and being more open to dating in general and learning more about what I really want. I’m definitely not a one night stand kind of woman. I tried that once and it resulted in me being asked to rate the guy’s performance two weeks later. True story. But broadening my horizons would be good for me and I definitely need a new approach to dating. Plus…how do I put this? I need some action. I feel like the good china that only sees the light of day on special occasions and there’s been nothing but cookouts lately. That’s me.

The “Ugh” Factor

Back from New Orleans and it was amazing! Great food, great company and great fun! But now it’s back to regular life. Or is it?

Quick recap: I am solely using Match these days for all my dating and self-esteem lowering needs. However, things did pick up just before I left for my trip. Three men messaged me and we were chatting a bit before and a day or so into my trip. First there’s Danny*, who I had messaged a week before. He replied and was nice and upbeat, but left for Costa Rica five days before I left for NOLA and he was supposed to return before me. Before he left we exchanged numbers and he asked to meet up when we both came back. I messaged him yesterday, but I haven’t heard from him and something tells me I won’t hear from him. Then there is…I actually don’t know his name because we didn’t get that far. Let’s call him Questionable Height (QH) because when I first messaged him I was hesitant because his profile said he was 5’5″ and I prefer guys who are taller than me. But I took a chance and he replied and we exchanged a few messages and he told me to have a good time on my trip and to send pics. Today when I checked his profile (it’s not stalking if you can’t see their activities or whereabouts) and it said his height is 5’7″. Now, it is very possible that he made a mistake when he first made his profile, but it’s a bit suspicious. Nevertheless, we were still messaging until last night so we’ll see what happens. Last, but not least we have Randy*. Randy is the only person who was consistently messaging me since last week. He seems nice and I enjoy that he’s consistent with his messages, but the messages are kind of dry. He doesn’t sound upbeat like Danny and I fear that he doesn’t have much of a personality. But he does ask questions to get to know me and it could simply be that he isn’t much of a messaging kind of person. Although his messages have seemed to taper off as well lately so maybe he’s just not that into me. Normally if I had been chatting with a guy and he disappeared I would feel disappointed and upset. But right now with three men simultaneously mimicking Houdini, my reaction is simply…ugh. And that “ugh” is what is troubling me.

I don’t know if it’s because I’m exhausted from my trip or what, but since I came back I just don’t have the same desire to date anymore. I woke up Friday morning and all day I just didn’t care about any of these guys. I mean, I don’t care if they contact me and I don’t care to contact them. I just can’t be bothered. I think I noticed this feeling a couple weeks ago as I was going through my Match searches. Things started off strong as I read profiles and looked at pictures and liked or skipped through them. Then after a while I got tired of reading them and looking through pictures and I finally couldn’t do it anymore. I figured I was just tired, but then it happened the next day and the day after. I wasn’t tired in general, I was just tired of looking through profiles.

My awareness of the ugh factor was heightened during my trip when one of my besties asked me how much time I spend on Match. I told her it was about an hour a week and she asked me if I was serious about dating. That caught me off guard. I thought I was serious and an hour a week seemed decent. But then she said that worked out to about 10 minutes a day and I should be spending at least 30 minutes a day. That seems excessive. After all, I do have a full-time job. As I’m writing this I’m tempted to continue that sentence with “and better things to do”. Hmm…interesting. Just to be clear, there are some days where I do spend 30 minutes or so looking at profiles and sending a message to a new potential mate. It’s just that I have reached this point where looking at one more profile and reading another mundane essay from some guy who enjoys outdoor activities, working out and is family oriented makes me roll my eyes, throw my head back and let out an audible, well, UGH. Not to mention the typical pictures with a dog or baby or standing in front of some picturesque landscape or God help me, the annoying gym selfie. You workout, I get it. I don’t know what has happened, but I can’t take it anymore.

Then there was the dream I had the night before. I was on a train and I was standing at the door at the end of the last car and I was holding the word “love” with dark blue and purple ribbons tied to it and I was about to throw it out the door and essentially give up on love when the door opened and the air hit me and all of a sudden I decided not to throw it and I was tearful and honestly, hopeful. Beautiful, right? What I couldn’t figure out was why after having that dream I woke up and wondered if I was actually meant to be single. Seriously. I literally woke up, remembered my dream, processed it and still felt as though maybe I’m not meant to be in a relationship. Ever. But I still want a relationship, which probably means I’m just tired and jaded at this point. Maybe I’m just not excited enough about any of these guys and that’s why I’m not inclined to message them. Perhaps it’s all of the above and I probably need a break from the whole dating/searching thing. The truth is clicking through these Match profiles and messaging men has actually become somewhat depressing. I find a guy who is intriguing, I message him and nothing. I’ve reached the point where I send a message for the sake of sending it. It’s not even like I’m messaging men who are “out of my league”. I don’t have the balls…er, double D’s for that. But not all hope is lost, the 50+ crowd is still interested. Yup, I’ve still got it. Oh, God…

Yes, I think a break is what I need. Some time to recharge and reassess the situation. I need a fresh perspective and frankly, I feel like a little soul searching is in order. So that is what I will do. I’m going to take a couple of weeks offline and regroup. That seems like the logical thing to do and that’s how I tend to roll. That’s me.

 

*Name has been changed

Oh, Baby

I’ve been trying to write this blog post for over a week now. My first attempt started off strong and then quickly spiraled into confusion and despair and eventually ended with me having an existential meltdown and lying on my couch shaking under a throw. It wasn’t my best moment.

During my second attempt I found myself expressing my thoughts and feelings and then promptly trying to justify and in some cases, apologize for them. Yeah…um…no, that’s not me.

I thought he problem was that I couldn’t seem to organize my thoughts. That’s when I realized my real problem is that on some level, I’m afraid to admit what I want. Or rather, what I don’t want. But before I start spiraling again, let me start at the beginning.

Match profiles have a category for whether or not you want children. You can select your choice and you can also select the options you would accept from your ideal match. The options are: “Definitely”, “Someday”, “Not sure”, “Probably not”, “No” and “No, but it’s okay if my partner has kids”. I have “probably not” listed under the category about wanting children under my own answers. I feel like this is the most accurate option I can select because I don’t have that urge or desire to have children. Sure I smile when I see a baby and just looking at a picture of my godson puts me in a better mood, but it doesn’t make me want to have children. It definitely makes me think about it, but it doesn’t change my mind. However, if despite my Fort Knox style efforts I did end up pregnant, I would have the baby. Hence my “probably not” answer on Match. For my ideal match, I selected “probably not”, “no” and “not sure”. As a result, I’ve been searching for guys on Match who have listed similar answers on their profiles. Do you know what I have discovered? Plenty of men want to have children. Like, A LOT of men. Which means I have significantly reduced my already miniscule dating pool of eligible, intelligent, attractive, kind and sane men ages 32 to 43. 

As if this wasn’t bad enough, cue Joseph*, an eligible, intelligent and kind 34-year-old man who messaged me on Match about two weeks ago. Now, he had “wants children” listed on his profile, but since he didn’t specify that he was also looking for a partner who wanted children AND since he messaged me, I assumed that it must not have been that important to him. I was wrong. After over a week of messaging back and forth he started asking me very specific, yet normal questions that one would ask a potential mate. Among them was a question about how firm I was on my stance about having children. That pissed me off immediately. Obviously if he was asking me a question like that it meant that he was serious about wanting to have children. That wasn’t what pissed me off. What did it was the fact that he messaged me and wasted a week of my time when I had made it quite clear on my profile about where I stood on the matter. I decided not to be rude so instead of replying, “Can you read?” like I wanted to, I stuck to the facts and told him I have no desire to have children and at this point in my life I don’t see children of my own in my future. Joseph never replied. So much for intelligent and kind.

I think the worse thing about my brief online encounter with Joseph was that he made me begin to second-guess my decision on having kids, which is what triggered my meltdown. If you asked me 20 years ago if I wanted to have children in the future, I would have said yes. Over the years I’ve been back and forth on whether or not I want to have children, but in the last few years my decision has been firm. 

It’s not that I haven’t pictured myself with children. It’s that I have pictured myself with children and I don’t like the picture. Allow me to explain. Growing up, within my extended family and my culture in general, the family dynamic that I encountered was usually the same. Particularly for women. You grow up and you live with mom and dad until you find a seemingly nice boy. You date him, you marry him, you move into a house and you have babies. The end. No, seriously. The. End. For you at least. I mean, the cycle just continues after that, but your life essentially freezes there and you are just a mother and a wife and you take a backseat to your children, husband and career IF you still have one. If you’re wondering if I’m being dramatic, sadly, I’m not. I’m not saying that women who experience this are unfulfilled or unhappy; I’m saying that I do not want that type of life. In fact, I’ve spent all this time running from it. I’ve seen a few exceptions to this, of course. Cousins my age who have kids and still manage their careers and look cool while doing it. But I don’t want to juggle that. I want the freedom to travel when and where I want and there are some days when the thought of just up and quitting my job and writing on a beach is enough to get me through the day. You don’t have those luxuries when you have kids. You just can’t.

I think what it comes down to for me is that I grew up with fairly stringent parents and as I got older the goal was to simply gain my freedom and independence. I only achieved that about eight years ago. It doesn’t feel like that much time to me, so it’s not something I’m willing to compromise anytime soon. To each her own, but my freedom is more important to me. I want to travel. I want to get tattoos. I want to find love. I want to sleep in on weekends. I want to stay home from work and watch Netflix in my pyjamas. And having children? Well, they pretty much put the kibosh on those things. Now, in case you’re wondering, yes, I am fully aware of how selfish that is. But as Brock said to Joan in an episode of Girlfriends, “When people know in their heart of hearts that they don’t want to have kids and they have them anyway, that’s stupid, and I’d rather be a little selfish than stupid.”

But it’s not just that I want to travel and do my own thing. I don’t want to have kids because as much as I think that I have my life together, I don’t feel like I have it together enough to make a human being. I am not physically, mentally or emotionally prepared to be completely responsible for a tiny, helpless human being. The idea of it is terrifying! Now, some people might say that this is normal or you’re never completely ready and would encourage me to do it anyway. To those people I say –  that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.  We’re talking about bringing a life into the world, not splurging on a pair of Jimmy Choos you’ve been eyeing for months.

To me it’s simple math. Wanting childless freedom + not being prepared to have a child =  no babies. Unfortunately, based on these Match profiles it looks like it might also equal being single forever. I do want endless freedom, I just want someone to share that freedom with. I’m starting to tremble again.

Although I’m beginning to lose all hope that I will ever find the right guy for me, the good news is that I’m really finding myself in the process. I’m discovering what I want and don’t want and what I’m willing to compromise on and what my deal breakers are. It’s actually pretty awesome, existential meltdown aside. But my Match subscription is still valid for four more months so we’ll see what happens. In the meantime, I’m finally going to put this blog post to bed, pour myself a huge glass of wine and pack for my upcoming girls’ trip to New Orleans. Colourful beads, haunted plantations and beignets? Yes, please! Because that’s me.

 

*Name has been changed

Plenty of Fucktards

I’ll be honest, if it wasn’t free and if my bestie’s boyfriend hadn’t suggested I try it, I probably would not have been on PoF again. It’s one of the more popular free dating apps though and when it comes to online dating you definitely want to be on a popular app otherwise you’re stuck with a dating pool of about five guys, four of whom you’ve probably already dated. I gave it another shot and because I hadn’t used the site for several years, I was pleased to see the initial offering of eligible bachelors when I set-up my profile. That however, was short-lived and I discovered as time went by, that the eligible bachelors I was eager to get to know have transformed into catfishing freaks. Exhibit B: Stan*

Stan was the dude from PoF who I had exchanged messages with in early 2017. I politely ended our conversation at that time, but my mind would wander on to him from time to time as I wondered if I had let a good one go. I messaged him again prior to Christmas as I saw his profile and thought I would take a chance and explore what might have been. Friends, that decision was a poor one. After about a week or so of exchanging lovely messages, I noticed that Stan was a hard one to pin down. He would disappear in the middle of online conversations and wouldn’t reply for days at a time. He was reluctant to tell me details about himself such as what he did for a living or where he grew up and when I mentioned the idea of exchanging numbers and eventually meeting up, he completely ignored it. My decision to tolerate this behaviour for as long as I did was based solely on the fact that I felt bad about being the one who “ended things” previously, so I didn’t want to do that to him again. Until I ran out of patience, that is. About three weeks into our online dealings, Stan became rather flirtatious and our chats became slightly saucy albeit awkward as fuck since he seemed shy about it, yet was the one who initiated it each night. As a matter of fact, we wouldn’t discuss anything else, just some brief and mildly descriptive scenarios. Frankly, all it did for me was waste my time and bore me. I was usually watching episodes of Black-ish while I was chatting with him. After three straight nights of this – because I never heard from him otherwise – I decided it wasn’t worth my time and refrained from going onto the app for a couple of days. But that didn’t stop Stan from messaging me each night asking if I was “around”. I didn’t want to actually go MIA or ghost him because I don’t want or need any bad dating karma. But I also didn’t want to deal with him just yet, so I checked in a couple times, usually when I knew he wouldn’t be online, and sent him a quick message. Last night he messaged me and I decided to deal with Stan once and for all. My plan was simple. I would go online, chat with him for a bit and see if he followed my lead into a normal conversation and out of the gutter. We were less than five minutes into chatting when he entered into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle territory. Exasperated, I tried to change the topic from the suggestion of a massage to a discussion on how I don’t utilize my health benefits enough. He didn’t take the bait. Not only that, but he actually called me out on sounding “very formal”. Formal? Are you fucking kidding me?! I was trying to have a normal adult conversation and he was…I don’t know what the hell he was doing. Reading his messages was like reading erotica written by Judy Blume. I wasn’t having it and I immediately started preparing him for a custom we-aren’t-simpatico-but-I-wish-you-well message. I started off by bringing up the fact that we had been exchanging messages for about a month, which is absolutely absurd now that I think about it. But I didn’t say that to him. I didn’t even get the chance because he immediately replied and said it was “too bad” I was being so formal and suggested we chat another time and after I sent the message about it being a month since we started chatting, he said, “Hmm. I see. Anyways, night!” Now like I said, I didn’t want to ghost this guy for the sake of my own karma; however, since he demonstrated a lack of maturity and no manners, I interpreted that as his disregard for his own karma and I decided that this mothafucker is getting Caspered!

I suppose you can chop this experience up to any number of clichés: a lesson learned, leave well enough alone, everything happens for a reason and always trust your instincts. I don’t regret any of it because I learned never to dismiss people right away. I mean, if I had only chatted with him a little longer last year, I probably would have discovered the real him at that point and wouldn’t have been curious and second-guessing my initial decision. Then again, the guy I spoke to last year could have been a completely different guy. Which brings me back to Tom*.

Remember Tom? He was the fuckboy I chatted with previously who also only wanted to talk about sex, but in more of a R-rated way than Stan. As you recall I didn’t sugar coat a damn thing and told him exactly how I felt. Well, he recently re-emerged in a most unexpected way. It was last weekend and I was just getting home when another dear BF of mine texted me a picture of a guy. I had met my friend for brunch the weekend before and told him all about Tom or “dbag” as he dubbed him and even showed him a picture of Tom. Imagine my surprise a week later when my friend sent me a picture of Tom and asked me if that was in fact dbag. It was. I immediately asked him where he got the photo and that’s when he told me he had just chatted with Tom on a dating app. A gay dating app. As my friend deduced, Tom was either bisexual or using stolen pics. Either way, neither one of us had time, energy or enough dead brain cells to humour that catfishing fool so he threw that fucktard back into the sea as well.

I have now hidden my PoF profile and I would delete it, but I feel like doing so would be giving up completely and I haven’t been knocked down that hard yet. Although I’m even more frustrated mentally, emotionally and sexually (I’m only human, people) the bar is still stocked so the search continues. Drink in one hand, smartphone in the other I will continue my journey to find my one because I refuse accept the idea that I’m meant to be alone the rest of my life. I’m too fabulous for that. Yeah, you’re damn right that’s me!

 

*Name has been changed

 

The Fuckboy

Fuckboy – A guy who doesn’t respect women, yet relies on them heavily. He’s a guy who is distant, doesn’t care about a woman’s time and won’t commit. He’s self-absorbed and is never looking for anything serious relationship-wise.¹

Alright, here is my ultimate confession. I have never really been in a serious relationship. Given my age, that’s pretty embarrassing. But what’s worse is that it is not by choice. I’m looking for a serious, long-term relationship, but I cannot for the life of me find a decent guy who I like who wants the same thing.

The “thing” being a serious relationship where sex is put on the back burner while we get to know each other and find out if there is a real connection between us. I personally don’t think this is weird. I think it is a mature and practical approach to dating. If only the men I encountered agreed with me. For what it’s worth, I have made my intentions clear on both of my dating profiles (oh God, I have more than one dating profile) so there is no secret and no misunderstanding about what I am looking for.

Just so we’re clear, I have nothing against those who want casual relationships, flings or hookups. In fact, I wish I was one of those people. It would make my life so much easier. But that’s a topic for another time. What I do have a problem with is men who know that I am not looking for any of those things and try to convince me they aren’t either when they really are. Exhibit A: Tom*.

If you recall from my last blog post, Tom was the guy from Plenty of Fish with the “very high sex drive” who I was exchanging WhatsApp messages with. I was trying to give it a shot with him because he claimed he was intelligent and looking for a serious relationship and he was also rather attractive. I am also trying to keep an open mind. Well, after the conversation about his libido things took a nosedive. He asked me a great question that I thought would help us learn more about each other and after I answered, he pointed out that I was vague when it came to the part of the question that asked about what my partner would enjoy sexually. Yes, I was vague about it because as optimistic and open-minded as I was trying to be, I knew exactly where he was going or rather, trying to go. I continued to be as vague as possible until I got tired of him prompting me for more details and gave some sexually charged answer that I knew would satisfy him. I asked him to answer the same question and he did and that’s where I reluctantly became a participant in sexting.

Anyone who knows me well knows the few times I have engaged in phone sex or sexting I have said very little and been amused each time by how minimally I had to participate in order to keep the other party enticed. With Tom, it was no different. I finally stopped responding because I was tired, annoyed and bored by the whole thing and I closed WhatsApp. That’s when this idiot sent me two text messages telling me to go back on WhatsApp. I ignored those too. The next day I asked if we could talk about something other than sex and he said okay. He asked me about my work schedule and if I wanted to meet for coffee later in the week and I said yes since I was still a little curious about him and didn’t wasn’t to dismiss him without really giving him a chance. But then, that was it. No further conversation was had until about 1:40am that Sunday when he messaged me with “Up?”. Ah, yes. The fuckboy motto. Speaking from experience, if a guy you haven’t met in person yet, who you have been communicating with for less than two days and have not had a proper conversation with sends you a message at 1:40am asking if you are “up” it only means one thing. He is looking for booty. Frankly, that was the last straw for me. He messaged me the next morning and I replied and told him we weren’t suited for each other and that it wouldn’t work between us. But he didn’t accept that and proceeded to ask me what happened. I explained my distaste for the 1:40am message and he asked me what that had to do with anything. Here’s the thing, in this day and age it is a well-known fact that messaging or phoning someone late at night when you are not in a relationship with that person or do not talk to that person on a daily basis usually means you are looking for some action. While there are always exceptions, keep in mind the topic of our previous and only conversation the day before. I decided not to waste anymore time on Tom and proceeded to ghost him because for someone in his mid-thirties, who prided himself on being intelligent and able to have a conversation about any topic, he should have known better. I mean chances are slim that he was messaging me at that hour to discuss the impact of Oprah’s acceptance speech at the Golden Globes or the Canadian real estate market.

Again, some people may be into that sort of late night debauchery, but a woman who clearly states that she is looking for substance and a connection, is not looking for cheap erotica riddled with typos and semi-colon smiley faces. That’s not me, fuckboy. That’s not me.

Nonetheless, my search continues and although I am mentally frustrated by recent events I will persevere and trust that the universe will send me my soulmate. Because even though it feels like the universe has been kicking my ass and laughing, I am choosing to remain hopeful and optimistic and fully stocked with wine. That’s definitely me.

 

¹Dictionary.com

*Name has been changed.

 

Experiment 2018

I used to be the type of person who made resolutions. But I was not very good at sticking to them, so I stopped doing that. I recently heard a quote…actually if I’m being honest, I read it on some guy’s dating profile. It was, “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. It made me think about my current approach to dating and the results I’ve been getting versus the results I’ve been hoping for. For example, remember the bachelor from PoF I was excited to meet? Well, I met him. We went out for drinks and he seemed nice and very chatty, but quite, how do I put this? Gay. His mannerisms were more feminine than mine and he was a little too excited when he told me that he loved sharing a house with two other men and went on about how great they are and the good times they have. I wasn’t comfortable dating someone under those circumstances, but I had no problem being friends with him. That was, until the alcohol kicked in and he started making googly eyes at me and licking his lips profusely. I mean, unless you’re LL cool J or I am in the mood, licking your lips profusely is a turnoff. He lost me right then and there.

Things with Bachelor #2 have fizzled out. However, I decided to explore something else. Enter – Experiment 2018. There was a guy I had chatted with briefly earlier last year. Let’s call him Stan. Stan was interesting and polite and quite cute. But he mentioned something about wanting to do outdoor activities with his partner and I’m just not about that life. But rather than talk it through, I told him I didn’t think we were simpatico and dismissed him quickly. He was nice about it and the last message he sent me was that it was a shame because I seemed cool. I didn’t reply. I’ve thought about it since. So, I sent him a message just before Christmas and apologized for ending things the way I did. No regrets, right? Well, he replied and we’ve been chatting infrequently since then. He’s still sweet and polite and cute, but very busy and I feel things with Stan probably won’t go anywhere. Unfortunately. But I’m exploring things instead of dismissing potential dates right away.

Which brings me to, Tom (his name is not Tom). He messaged me two days ago and I replied yesterday and we’ve been chatting a bit. Tom’s biggest revelation so far? He has a “very high sex drive”. Now, in the past few years if I had received this kind of information I would have dismissed the guy immediately because I am sick and tired of dealing with men who only want sex with no strings attached. I’ve tried it and it’s not who I am at all. Tom, however, is slightly different because he claims that he is also looking for a relationship and is aware that I am not looking for a casual relationship as I have made that clear to him through our messages and it is also plastered on my dating profile. Seriously. So far I don’t know what he does for a living or his favourite colour, but I know what his turn-ons are and how many times a day he prefers to have sex. Hint: it’s more than once. I’m giving it a go because it doesn’t hurt to keep talking to him and see what happens since I’ve been honest about who I am and what I want. But I’m not optimistic about him either.

Lastly, we have Match. So far I’ve had over 400 profile views and 40 photo likes and I’ve sent about 15 messages…but zero matches. I feel pathetic. Considering I’m getting more action on PoF, I’m inclined to think that the problem is that you have to pay in order to communicate with people on Match and for some reason guys will go so far as to set-up a profile, but not subscribe so that they can actually communicate with anyone. So my experiment is to add my Instagram account to my profile and see if anyone bites. But not literally because I don’t like that. That’s me.

 

Wholesome

Me: I am looking for a real connection mentally, emotionally and spiritually first. If you are looking for an immediate or strictly physical relationship – I am not the one.

Dude on PoF: Hi. Don’t be offended, I have never done this and like your vibe. Anyway, I’m seeking a mature, sane lady to “hook-up” with today for no reason other than fun. If you are feeling adventurous, say hi.

Yes, that is what I have written on my Plenty of Fish dating profile and yes, that is very much an actual message I received. Are you kidding me? I mean, come on! I realize that either the dude didn’t bother to actually read my profile or he just copied and pasted the same thing to virtually every woman on the site. Or possibly both. Either way, it drove me off of the site. After suggestions from friends and family who are lovingly invested in my dating life, I have decided to sign up for what I hope is a more reputable dating site. So, I have joined Match. The idea being that a dating site that requires members to pay for a subscription in order to communicate with each other might weed out the riff-raff and general losers who are solely looking for sex and have nothing more (or nothing period in some cases) to offer. I am 48 hours into my Match adventures and so far I have received much interest from gentlemen 45 years-old and above. Which would be great, if I wasn’t looking for a partner between the ages of 32 and 43. And yes, I did specify that on my profile.

I once asked a guy my age who I met online what it is about me that seems to attract older men. He told me that I look wholesome. Wholesome. I’m not going to lie, I was slightly offended. I know there are certain words that are not likely to be used to describe me such as sexy, stunning and gorgeous – this is not based on low self esteem, it’s based on life experience. But wholesome is not an adjective that I ever thought I would hear. It makes me picture a woman in a boxy, ankle-length dress with a high collar and a bonnet. For the record, I don’t own either of those items.

But it begs the question, how can I come across as wholesome to some and still get messages like the one from dude man asking me for a casual romp because he likes my “vibe”? Does wholesome turn men on? Maybe I seem like a “safe” casual romp. But why? Because I don’t post duckface selfies of me in my underwear posing in front of a bathroom mirror? Or because my profile essay demonstrates that I am an intelligent woman who knows what she wants and makes it clear that she has no time for fuckboys? I don’t know. One thing I know for sure is, most of the men on PoF can’t read.

Here’s hoping that the men on Match are more literate and serious about making a connection with someone and seeking a long-term relationship. Because that’s what I am looking for and I am not willing to compromise or settle for anything else. I’ve come too far for that. But hey, that’s me.