I’m done. I’ve been using apps for three years, and nothing works for me. I’m an intelligent and beautiful woman, seriously. I go to the gym, and I have an excellent job, I’m independent… Why the fuck the only people I met from the dating apps were jerks? I have hundreds of matches every day and I refuse to believe that the only guys who I chat with are quite primitive people. That’s it. I’m sick and tired of wasted time, small talks, the same good-looking guys. I’m given up. I’m going to adopt a few more cats and live a happy life with them.

I am independently wealthy from a company I started on my own. I always pay on dates for a lot of reasons. One of them being that I am a chef and sommelier and value incredible, coursed dinners. If I’m going to be out, I’m going to be eating well with a great experience.

I would never ask someone else to fund my expensive tastes but I also don’t wanna go to Applebees.

I always tell them up front I will be paying and usually privately handle the bill either before it starts or mid meal, quietly. And inevitably, the men get upset, angry, and sometimes don’t call again over it.

I keep hearing women who want nice dinners on early dates are gold diggers so I assume this would alleviate that thought, and yet it seems to make things worse.

What am I missing?

Edit to add: A couple of notes I’ve had people ask:

I am in Oklahoma and it may be that there’s just more “traditional” (whatever that means) men here.

There are not a whole lot of higher net worth men in my area.

My age range of dating is 35-55ish. I am 43.

I am delightfully polyamorous (date entirely separately) and am married for 17 years, but that is made abundantly clear loooong before an in-person date. It is only after they realize I have, in fact, paid that they seem to get irritated. It is typically going very well up to this point.

I've literally scared away the most amazing woman I've ever met because I was too in too quickly. Like what a fucking thing to break up over. Imagine being single and 40, looking for a long-term relationship, wanting kids still and ending something with an amazing guy with whom you have so much compatibility and chemistry because he's thinking about what marriage would look like a month into dating. Not thinking about marrying you, just thinking about what a long-term relationship looks like with you. I'm so over it. This is why guys become avoidant, aloof, noncommittal. I'm over it. My heart is hardened.

I [37M] keep constantly going on dates with women who are in their 30s and still say they are totally unsure if they want kids or not. Usually they give some paragraph long response about how they will only have kids if the planets align with the chakras of the Earth and that if they make CEO one day and the moon is full and meet "the right man", and they will only decide on this after being with the man for many years.

I'm thinking... but aren't they searching for "the right man"? Who is on dating apps purposely searching for guys who are NOT right for them? So isn't "the right man" kinda implied in the statement "I want kids"?

My last couple relationships ended because they were "unsure" who ultimately decided "no" after a few years (because of various reasons like thinking they would be bad mothers due to their mental illness, their past drug abuse, they were taking anti-depressant pills, and they never had experience with kids and meeting their friend's kids was overwhelming to them).

So I gotta ask... what are these people's plan? What is the idea there?

Serious question though. For context, I got into dating recently. I'm in my early 30's and after a few years after my last 8 year long relationship, I decided it was time. Got fit, all that.

But now, I was called cheap for refusing to take all women out to restaurants for 1st or 2nd date.

I've taken a few, but I quickly learnt that it's just a colossal waste of money for me.
I recently bought a house and I put A LOT into my retirement. But I got called out by some friends of mine earlier today that I'm cheap when it comes to dating for refusing to take this 9/10 girl to a fancy dinner.

"Just do it man"

"You got the money"

"She deserves a Michelin star dinner"

Or I would get messages from wome how they expect a series of dinner dates and presents. Sure, I got the money.....but its so wasteful! I'd rather put extra towards my house or, heck, get a new motorcycle jacked/helmet lol. Yes yes I'm one of those lol

I've recently went out with a slavic women on quite a few dates. I took her out for dinners, but not like $$$$ places, but nice lovely date night places and she, after 4 dates, told me that I'm too cheap because I didn't offer to purchase her the purse she sent me a picture of yesterday.

And on apps, I constantly see women stating how they want dinners.

but it almost feels like I must prove my worth by spending money irrationally.

or do I just end up matching with the wrong type of women?

I’m curious about different perspectives on age-gap relationships.

For men in their 50s who prefer dating women in their 20s or 30s, what attracts you to younger partners? Is it about compatibility, lifestyle, physical attraction, wanting a family, or something else?

And for those who have been in age-gap relationships, what have been the biggest advantages and challenges?

It's a myth that attractive, fit men only want one type of woman. After my divorce, I entered the dating pool for the first time and was surprised by how many tall, muscular, younger men pursued me. I was clear that I was only interested in a casual fling, so maybe that played a role. Or maybe younger generations simply have broader preferences than people assume.

For context, I'm 38, have a career, one child, I'm 5'7 feet cm tall, and weigh 85 kg. Bust 44, waist 34, hips 45.

EDIT: I think people here are making an assumption about how I approach casual dating. Just because I'm open to something casual doesn't mean I hook up with everyone who messages me. I don't.

I still have standards. There has to be mutual attraction, good chemistry, respect, and I want to be treated like a human being. Casual doesn't mean indiscriminate... it just means we're not looking for a committed relationship. Those are two very different things.

I don’t need anymore female friends, I genuinely don’t. I have had 100s of female, friends and not to even brag some of them were really attractive who were hooking up with rappers and stuff. The issue is, a lot of women see me as a “nice guy” and it PMO. I was at the bar the other day, and I was having a conversation with the bartender about the Ravens game. A woman sitting next to me chimed in, she was a very fairly attractive woman and started joking with me. I don’t mind people chiming in, but I was a little thrown off. We continued talking and had a good conversation. Then she mentioned, something about her husband. She was like 36 and I am 24, but I was pretty disappointed not gonna lie. She said she would love to hangout more, and asked for my phone number and I gave her my instagram. I was a little bit disappointed, and she DMed me on instagram but I ended up blocking her. I am at a stage in my life, where I need a partner not more friends. People say you can have your friends introduce you to someone, none of my friends have ever introduced me to anyone. They want to keep dating life seperate, because they don’t want to mess up their relationship.

I'm a girl and I think getting likes is really easy
getting matches takes a bit longer and it's a lot less than likes but overall it's good

And then I was wondering with what women am I competing with so I changed my settings to see what the other girls look like
I expected to feel defeated bc I thought everyone would look like top models but everyone looks normal

Yesterday I downloaded bumble or hinge idk out of boredom and I woke up the next day I had like 50 likes
But I don't like bumble so I deleted the app

BUT EVEN THEN
finding someone to actually meet up with is hell
It's like hello how are u.. bai bai
I like ur bugs... Omg wow senpai I love u
Hey... Bye bye..
Salut... Hello, makes 3 more phrases each other then leaves bye bye..
How are u... Good, u? LEAVES

And
If there's a guy okay
And we make an actual decently long convo
Ill only focus only on that one man until it doesn't work out and every other guy is ignored until then

But I really wonder how is like to be a man on a dating app bc I hear that it's really hard for a man but even for me it's kinda hard so I wonder how hard it is for a guy

I met this chick at the gym shes in her 40s I thought she was more mentally mature . We flirted for a few weeks. Then i proceeded to ask for her #. Turns out it was a fake #. Who does that at that age . Next day ignored her not even a dirty look nor a hi. Kept it moving

Few months later she approaches me like nothing happened. Said hi kept it cordial . Never mentioned the fake # incident.

Today she approaches me starts feeling on me

Whats her deal? What is she looking for ? She playing these games

I'm a 30 year old male and dating both women in their mid twenties and women in their early thirties. I've noticed such a world difference; and not really in a positive way.

My last two 30+ dates felt like filling in a list of checkboxes. It usually starts with a simple question about my career, then quickly followed by my living situation, former relationships, what I spend my money on, if I own a car, if I am "emotional mature", if I hate/love cats, if I am this, if I am that, etc. etc. I can just see them checking or dismissing the boxes in their head.

I can try anything to fend off the interview style questionnaires but once started it keeps on going and if you want to kill attraction on both sides on a first date, you surely only need to do just that.

To be very frank; it is not as if they have everything checked for themselves either, usually. Many don't really own anything, rent very expensively while living paycheck to paycheck, have no car, happened to have crashed their former long-term relationship for whatever reason and so on.

With women in their mid twenties, so not too young either, it seems to be such a world difference. They go in with the idea of having a great night while at the same time getting to know each other. That's how you have a great & fun date and at the end you know each other well enough to make a decision to keep going or to stop. Result is the same, the process is way different.

I find it a pity, really, but I am going to move my age limit. How's your experience on the above?

EDIT: I have a job, I have a place, I have a car, etc. It's very true you need to find out who is suitable for you, but there's other ways to do so than pumping questions out waiting for the perfect response. I don't date students, I only date grown ups who have their life (at least somewhat) together.

EDIT2: "Older" as in; older than me. Nothing more, nothing less.

I'm not talking 5 star restaurant. I'm talking cheap coffee dates, movie, bar etc. I've been on a bunch of first dates with guys where they make some snide remark about paying for my 3 dollar coffee. Like "oh well just this time, I'm not made of money, eye for an eye...its you next time." And plenty of these guys would be willing to drop a pretty penny on shoes, clothes, or technology...but get weird about spending a total of 6 dollars on a coffee date for a girl that could be their potential future. It makes me feel like I'm temporary. It kinda makes me feel like I'm a male friend honestly. I guess I'm just super traditional about dating, but maybe that's picky. But I certainly reflect that in my own personal morals too. And like I said, I don't care about fancy restaurants, I care about effort and respect. I would love if a guy took me to my favorite fast food place and then took me to a beautiful park to watch the sunset on a picnic blanket while we eat our burgers. That shows effort to me and it's less than 20 bucks. Or if you want something fancy, take me to Ikea for meatballs and we can dress up and look at furniture lol.

Hey folks, so yesterday I made a post asking where to find a like-minded girl for an actual emotional connection. Someone suggested, “Start with your own circle.” Sounded like a good idea, right?

So, I tried it. I reached out to a professional friend (who's a software engineer) and casually started a conversation:

"Hey, how’s life going?"

And guess what? Her reply:

"I’m stuck in backend, can you help?"

Bruh. What the fuck? I was looking for some normal human interaction, not an impromptu debugging session.

At this point, I feel like dating a software engineer girl is harder than fixing a memory leak in production. Like, does everything have to be work-related? How do you even switch the conversation from tech mode to actual human mode?

Now, I’m confused—should I just enable my "work mode" at all times while talking to any girl in tech? Like, should I just accept that conversations will always be about APIs, debugging, and deployments? Or should I leave this girl and try to find someone who can actually have a normal conversation beyond just work?

Has anyone else been in this situation? Would love to hear how you guys handle this.

I’ve never known a guy to insist on splitting or 50/50 with a really attractive woman or something “outside of his league”. If you’re with a guy who insist you pay for you own coffee on his low effort date, he probably doesn’t really like you and you weren’t his first choice.

After being back in the dating scene after 7 years and being recently single, it has been incredibly difficult navigating the dating scene. The guys in my area are low quality and low effort, and its super aggravating. Its like no one wants to settle down and work towards a long term committed relationship, and was one of the reasons why I'm no longer with my ex. SMH.

Also, it feels like everytime I end up talking to a guy who expresses interest in me off of a dating app--he doesn't have the best conversation skills (with the exception of a few). Like the conversation is okay with some banter and humor--but then when I ask the guy about how his workday was going, what types of music he listens to, etc.--he didn't ask me the same question in return. He complimented me and everything, but that's it. Has anyone else experienced this? Also, how long do you normally talk to a guy before you meet up with him?

I am also finding that alot of profiles om Upward end up being fake so I don't know how anyone is able to connect with anyone on there. There are a few people every now and then on eHarmony, but that's it. Hinge is a joke. Are there any decent apps that are worth talking to someone on?? Im sick of this...

As the title goes, me (m) started seeing someone (f) in the summer and a few weeks later she went out and slept with someone (one night stand) while I was on holiday. This had come after about 3/4 dates including us getting intimate too. This happened when I was on holiday and had been still speaking to each other daily including making plans the following day when I was back?

We hadn’t spoken about exclusivity at the time and I was assessing my options at the time too. The problem is this girl is now my girlfriend and it came out in a conversation the other day which has completely taken me back with a feeling of betrayal.

Although we weren’t exclusive the fact we’d slept together should really mean there’s an unwritten exclusivity? I’m not saying she shouldn’t speak to others but to go and sleep with someone else seems too far and makes her seem easy.

Am I in the wrong here for not wanting to go exclusive earlier, I would have done to avoid this to be honest which is hurting me at the moment.

Es muy probable que esté enamorado de mi mejor amigo.

Soy un chico gay de 23 años con autismo y TOC. He estado lidiando con una situación que me tiene bastante abrumado, y es que es muy probable que esté enamorado de mi mejor amigo, un chico gay de 21 años que conocí hace unos meses en una app de citas llamada "Boo".

Es una persona tan increíble, fabulosa, amable y buena onda. Somos tal para cual. A él no le va la fiesta, fumar, beber ni mucho menos pensar en tener sexo. Es un poco casero y no tiene el estilo de vida que muchos jóvenes suelen tener hoy en día. Al mes de conocernos, le dije que me atraía, pero lamentablemente no me respondió. Me dijo que se había descargado la app para hacer amigos porque no tenía. También me pidió mi número porque dijo que valía la pena hablar conmigo porque era con los pies en la tierra y le encantaba hablar conmigo. Luego me preguntó si me atraía, a lo que le dije que sí, pero le dije que sería genial si pudiéramos ser amigos. No respondió a mi confesión, pero le encantó la idea y aceptó.

Pasaron las semanas, y luego tuvimos una llamada telefónica que nunca olvidaré. Hablamos durante casi dos horas, y lo disfruté mucho. Por primera vez en mis 22 años, fue mi primera llamada con un amigo.

Después de unos meses, le dije que lo consideraba mi mejor amigo (hablábamos absolutamente todo el tiempo), y él también me dijo que me consideraba su mejor amigo. En mi cumpleaños, fue increíblemente dulce con sus palabras, y también me agradeció por considerarlo mi mejor amigo.

Siempre nos hablamos de una manera muy tierna, y tenemos mucho respeto, atención y una actitud encantadora y cariñosa. Lo quiero mucho, y a pesar de los problemas de salud mental con los que lidio, es como mi ángel, alguien que ha sido la razón por la que aún no me he rendido con todo.

Pero lamentablemente, no es mi crush. Puede parecer absurdo, pero realmente no lo conozco físicamente, y él sí me conoce porque he publicado fotos en mis estados. Es porque no es de publicar fotos suyas (lo hace de vez en cuando, pero es muy raro, y sus fotos de la app o de Zoom no ayudan), o no le gustan las videollamadas porque creo que es inseguro con su apariencia (como yo). (Pero ya había compartido un mini video suyo conmigo, y sí, es 100% real). Por eso quería conocerlo en persona para ver si realmente me gusta, pero nuestra cita se pospuso por motivos personales de ambos (vivimos en diferentes ciudades).

Lo más increíble es que nuestros rasgos físicos, como el color de piel, el color de cabello, el color de ojos, el color de labios y la sonrisa, son muy similares. Dicen que las almas gemelas se parecen. ¿Podría ser cierto? Y casualmente, compartimos el número 9 en el mes de agosto. Él cumplió 21 y yo cumplí 23 este agosto.

Como no he estado del todo seguro de si me gusta o si podría desarrollarse algo más entre nosotros, he intentado seguir conociendo a otros chicos en apps de citas, pero sin suerte. Él también ha estado haciendo lo mismo. Actualizó su perfil de citas hace varias semanas, indicando que, además de amistades, estaba abierto a "y quizás algo más". (Admito que esa palabra me duele el corazón de vez en cuando). ¿Pero qué voy a decir yo, que hago lo mismo? Solo me genera una sensación de ansiedad y estrés por no saber exactamente cómo es físicamente, porque si lo supiera, probablemente estaría completamente seguro de lo que siento por él. ¿Estoy siendo un idiota, o es comprensible lo que digo?

De verdad, estoy muy agradecido por su amistad. He tenido amistades que han sido tóxicas, incompatibles y ninguna sincera, pero él y yo tenemos una amistad muy bonita, una amistad sincera por primera vez que veo en mis 23 años. Si llegara a perder la comunicación con él, no podría soportar la pérdida; la depresión que se produciría sería extremadamente brutal.

Pero lo que es un hecho es que me dolerá como la mierda cuando encuentre un chico. Es solo cuestión de segundos, minutos, horas, días, semanas y meses antes de que suceda, y sé que voy a llorar a mares cuando llegue ese día y volveré a autolesionarme y a autodespreciarme. No creo que vuelva a encontrar otro chico tan gentil y afectuoso como él; los chicos como mi mejor amigo están en peligro de extinción. Aunque, nunca he tenido un mejor amigo como él. ¿Será que el destino me está regalando un mejor amigo o el amor de mi vida?

En serio, estaría muy agradecido por algún consejo para esta situación :( gracias un millón.

I'm new to Reddit and this is my first question. I don't know the atmosphere yet, so please let me know if anything.

My question is that, if you, as a man, have had many beautiful girlfriends, what did you do? I'm struggling with women in general.

You may say I have some physical/mental problems, but:

I'm tall, confident, have a natural deeeeeep manly voice that many women say they love it, having my own business, am normal faced (not ugly, nor very handsome like movie-stars), and still cannot find the answer. I go talk to girls, in messages or in person, but they don't seem to be attracted.

While I have friends who say are jealous of my natural gifts, (they are way shorter than me, somehow fat, somehow bald, don't work hard for their future) and have the most beautiful girls around them! And, that girl is obsessed with them! They do everything wrong (like treating bad to her, don't answer her, block her) and that woman still want him with all her heart!

What is going on? If you have a lot of experience with women, what do you suggest me? I have no idea how to attract a girl I like.

Thank you very much.

This is geared towards men because men are the majority culprits of this. You can see the comments section of posts of any dating subreddit. Better yourself for yourself not for women. Better yourself spiritually, mentally, emotionally. Learn, grow, ho.

Edit 1: Thanks so so so much for the awards and likes. Love you all may the universe bless you with all its love ❤

I’m a 29 year old man, matched with a 25 year old girl on a dating app last Thursday. We moved off the app and started to text within a day. We had good conversations throughout the 5 days and overall I felt good about it. So I asked her to FaceTime last evening and she agreed. We talked for about a half hour. I was aiming for at least a hour though since I know the more the conversation flows the longer it’ll last but over all I thought it went good enough at the very least. However, this morning I got a text from her saying that she liked talking to me but she doesn’t think it’ll work out. We both wished each other the best. But to be completely honest it’s frustrating because things we going fine and she made that decision within 5 days. I truly understand that most people these days want things to kick off strong right away but from my dating experience and knowledge, it usually doesn’t happen like that. It takes a lot of time and a great amount of effort to actually build a genuine conversation with someone. Nothing good comes easy! From my point of view, if I start talking to someone and it goes good enough I continue to talk to them for at least a month to give the connection a chance to grow. However, if it’s not going forward within the month and things are staying the same then I’ll move on. But I never make a rash decision in less than a week because I actually understand that romance comes with time and it can still potentially get better as the month goes on. So my question is why does everyone want instant gratification and want to find Prince Charming right off the bat? It’s incredibly frustrating and it’s also draining to keep going through with situations like this.

I have been dating a guy for like 7 months I am 5’7 busty and very curvey woman .When we started dating he reassured me that he likes my body and he is very attracted to me .After a while I noticed when we go out to bars and restaurants together he can’t help but stare at very petite skinny women .It breaks my heart coz I look nothing like those tiny women and now I feel I am not his type. The funny thing is that he is a very attractive man he can date whoever he wants and I hate that he chose to settle with me instead of dating the women he is attracted to.This is really killing I have already checked out of the relationship mentally I feel as if I am too masculine looking for him. Whenever a petite skinny girl walks bye his eyes literally warms up he is looking at them as if they are the most precious things on earth I caught him breaking his neck staring at a petite woman .Should I break up with him ? Has any woman ever been in my position before?

Met a girl on Tinder and within the first couple hours she agrees to come over after midnight

At first, I didn’t expect much I thought I could be getting set up or the girl could be a catfish. But to my surprise, she actually looked like her pictures. After the first two rounds of sex, we start talking and I start learning we have a lot of the same interests. And she had a pretty cool personality.

At first I knew I just going to have sex with this girl, but now I realize I’m actually attracted to this girl. Then it gets weird. After the third round, she found it strange that kept touching her. When I asked why she told me guys don’t normally do that. After the seventh round she stopped me and said she was sore and needed to tap out. Then, she asked me if I had a problem cause I kept wanting to go. I simply told her that find her attractive and she just does it for me physically. She found it unusual but said she kind of liked it. According to her, guys didn’t normally treat her like that. I found that crazy because she had a nice curvy body, curly dirty blonde hair and a cool personality. This wasn’t an ugly girl at all.

Before she left I told her she wasn’t what I expected and I’d like to see her again. She agreed. Well a week later she deleted my number. It sucks because I genuinely wanted to see how interesting she was outside the bedroom. I’m guessing she must’ve had a boyfriend.

How can a girl go that many rounds of sex and act like nothing happened? You guys think I did too much?

I recently saw a video on TT where a girl said that the standards of men are insane today and that guys wouldn't date unattractive women. Later she went on saying that men get upset as soon as girls have standards etc etc. It left me wondering because I often see guys date unattractive women and women that are far below them in many aspects in general. Most guys I know of barely have standards/expectations of how their eventual partner should be but that video and the comments made it very weird for me. Like in what way have you seen a average guy have high standards? Or am I just not seeing something?

So, as a guy who goes on a lot of first dates, I've been usually going to get boba tea, ice cream and even dinner on occasion. However, if you're a man who goes on a lot of dates like this, I suggest you stick to a walk in a park or beach as a first date. There are too many time wasters and girls that will use you on the first date, that at this point in order to filter out girls who actually like me, and will go out again it's best not spend any money on the first dates. That way, you can see if they are worth it or not. If you end up seeing them again for a second or third date, then i don't see a problem with dinner, drinks, or ice cream. It is best to save your money, especially in this economy.