What I hoped you’d take away from my attempt at re-writing your profile is to have a little fun with it and take out the parts where you are explaining things that don’t need mentioning and apologizing for things you don’t need to feel apologetic about.
Certainly write it your own voice. But keep in mind you want to provide interesting information about yourself but also mundane things too. However there is no reason you can’t try to make the mundane sound interesting if you can. Everybody cooks and eats. Many people have pets, go through divorce and spend time with their kids. Spin it so that it sounds less like so much baggage. The divorce details you provided are a particularly egregious error that many people make. Avoid that subject entirely in this context.
Putting anything about an ex, up to and including divorce details, is like taking a first day to your parents house for dinner. It’s awkward and uncomfortable, and not something a person wants to think about before they even know you.
Mostly agree, but ‘9 year old son who spends every other weekend with me’ is probably a detail worth mentioning; that may be a deal-breaker for some women, and a big plus for many others.
[Of course I’m not at all the target demographic for the OP’s profile. Not a dog person, you understand]
I know that’s how it’s supposed to be, but writing MINI everywhere makes it look like less of a hobby and more of a nerd-obsession. Like you might love the car more than your SO. As a car guy, I suggest just saying “Mini”.
I have a few things to add. I only looked at the okc profile quickly, so keep that in mind.
I absolutely adore dogs. Anybody that knows me, knows I can go on and on about mine. So, with that, I found it a bit odd that you mention your dog before your child. As a mom that doesn’t know you at all, it makes me confused about importance. Then, I expected to see at least a picture of your dog. Nice to see you had one of your son.
You need more pictures: your dog, the Mini (a manual S, I hope), etc. Not to be cliche, but they are worth a 1,000 words. When I did do online dating, I found the pictures to be more informative about the men than their profiles.
Lastly, since you have asked for an honest opinion, I will go into mom-mode: unless you have a medical condition, stand up straight,shoulders back! In both pictures you seem to be hunched over a bit, giving you a less confident, elderly look.
I actually am not particularly fond of dogs (partially because I’m allergic to them). Were I in a dating state, I’d react to those with:
(a) He has a kid he takes care of on the weekends. Even if I turn out not to like the kid too much, maybe I can deal with that.
(b) He has a dog every day. That’s a deal-breaker.
I can understand your point of view. On such sites, you can’t please everyone so you have to go with what’s important to you personally.
Speaking generally, however, as a 43 year old single mom, loves dogs, former Mini S owner, I think I might be his demographic more than you (but really, I have no idea at all!). IMO (and just that) it’s on the distasteful side to put pets before kids.
One thing I wondered after listening to this: if a picture with a young guy surrounded by a few women sends a subtle message that he is a good catch, would the same go for a woman surrounded by a few men? I tend to think not, but I’m not sure.
Thanks for all the pointers so far! I really do appreciate them!
To address some of the questions about the profile:
My dog is mentioned first I guess, because someone earlier told me to move the portion about my ex further down in the profile. It was originally at the top. I’ll see what I can do to address that.
The reason that I say MINI instead of Mini is, the originals were Mini, the newer models are MINI. Yes, I’m a bit obsessed, but I guess I can see how that might say something negative. But, then again, if I were to find a MINI owner, she might think “He didn’t capitalize it, what an idiot!”
I have a pic of my dog on the Zoosk site, I just haven’t put it on OKC yet.
I know I need better pics of me. I just HATE taking pics of myself. I’m very critical of them and can never seem to take a good one. The pics I’ve posted were taken by others, not myself. I’ll see if someone at work can help me out (and yes, I’ll try to stand straight, Mom!)
