My father is 7 years older than my mother. When they met, he was 28, she was 21. Never thought twice about it.
OTOH, when I was 18, I was dating a 32-year-old woman (a very long story). My parents were not happy.
Um…the difference between you and your inamorata was 14 years. Literally TWICE the difference in age between your parents. I can see being concerned.
I saw this type couple a lot when living in New York, strolling a very well-turned-out toddler or two - trophy kids for a trophy wife and status hubby. I assume he’s typically the high-powered executive-type.
Without reading most of the posts, I will say 25% of the older person’s age.
Hmm. Since we’re stipulating that both parties are adults, may I take it that you’d not blink at an 18-year-old dating a 52-year-old?
j66 likely means 25% as the difference; that is, a 52-year-old could only date 39 and up.
Perhaps; that occurred to me after I hit submit. But what s/he wrote was ambiguous, so I’m still asking.
Question:
How great an age difference between lovers (or even people just dating) strikes you as significant?
Answer:
25% of the older person’s age.
But that really only works for adults, I thnk - the younger has to be at least 18.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong, but I don’t thing that age difference is trivial. I’m 27, and I would feel slightly skeevy dating a 22-year-old woman. She’s probably either finishing college or has just graduated, she’s only been drinking legally for a year (assuming she’s American), and so on. I’ve gone to professional school, worked more jobs, spent a couple years in the real world … I’m not saying that I’m some paragon of maturity compared to this woman (I’m almost certainly not), but I’ve just got all of these experiences that she doesn’t have, and I know all this stuff about life after college, and the difference would feel kind of exploitative. Or at least not entirely equal.
Of course, I freely admit that this could just be me being weird.
Your 28-year-old almost certainly has years of experience in the real world, and a job - the 21-year-old may well be a college junior. When I was a junior in college, I had little idea how responsible adult relationships work, had only the vaguest notion of what I wanted to do after graduating, and still relied on my parents for a big chunk of my living expenses and all of my tuition. To say nothing of them schlepping me to and from college every semester, and putting me up at home over the summer. I was a kid, by any reasonable standard. And I’d have certainly thought it was awesome if some 28-year-old professional woman took an interest in me - but looking at it now, I’d wonder why in the world she would have that interest.
ETA: Of course, I’ve known a number of very, very mature undergrads, and I don’t doubt that the above relationship could work very well. All I’m saying is that this doesn’t automatically elicit a reaction of “Eh, that’s obviously acceptable, no doubt about it” from me.
Oh, yes. I can see that now. At the time, well…I’d not had any luck with girls throughout high school, and, then, suddenly, there was this hot divorcee who wanted to jump my bones. As they say, “it seemed like the thing to do at the time”. (And, the nookie was pretty darned good.)
When my parents started dating, at those exact ages, it was 1961. My mother (age 21) had been on her own for nearly 3 years, and working for 2 years as a stewardess. My father (age 28) was a college grad, an Army vet, and had been working for about 3 years as a sales rep. So, from the “experience in the real world” standpoint, they were on not-dissimilar footing. But, that was 50 years ago.
I mentioned earlier that I look close to ten years younger than I am, so dating a girl in her early twenties wouldn’t attract much attention. Factoring in the life experience component, I am also very immature for my age, so I don’t think that would be a problem either.
I am 20 years older than my partner. We were 22/42 when we met, and are now 45/65. We’ve gotten used to the age difference, and don’t even think about it. But it still bothers me that there are people who think it’s ok to flirt with him, right in front of me, thinking that I’m his father.
The funny thing is that he has more gray hair than I do.
My sweet baboo is 6 years older than me. Our problems aren’t age differences, its life experiences. He’s a combat Marine and I work in a warehouse.
Before him, I had a lover who was 22 years older, and was very sucessful at his work. (read…lots of money…the sort of person who could write a check to buy me a car without worrying about balancing his checkbook)
The main problem we had was that I wouldn’t let him pay for a car or home or anything for me. I didn’t want him to think that I was just using him for his money and he hated seeing me count pennies so I could pay my half of dinner at a diner.
Now that I think about it, it was the money difference instead of age that broke us up. He wanted to spoil me because he loved me. I wanted to know that I was independant enough to not need his money. I was 24 when we met and our break up happened when I bought my home 4 years later. So proud and happy. He saw the air mattress on the floor and wanted to buy me a bed.
Maybe it was age and money difference. I’m still friends with him. He wants to help pay for my wedding and I think that’s wrong as well. (he hasn’t asked to put his hands on me since he refused to make love to me on the air mattress)
I personally don’t find disparity in life experience to be as big a deal as some people think. I don’t find it skeevy, just potentially problematic. For instance, with that 19 year old gril who married a 30 year old guy I’ve mentioned before, I was only concerned that the 19 year old was not mature enough for a relationship, and that the 30 year old, who is considered old around here to have not married, rushed into things. Their divorce had nothing to do with what people thought–as most people wouldn’t have been able to tell they weren’t around the same age.
That’s why I posted my experiences with a much older lover. Bill didn’t try to be “daddy”, he tried very hard to not do that. I refused to work for his company because I didn’t want people to think that I had gotten the job because I gave good sex. Pride was probably what broke us up.
If things were different, if I had started our affair now, 10 years later…I’d probably still be totally independant but would allow him to spend money on me.
When we go out together now, I don’t stress about who pays the check. It was my age and experience that was the problem, not his.
I just recently saw something like this when, last night, I saw someone I knew who is 50 with his now 25 year old girlfriend and their toddler. Scandal! But that’s just likely because I don’t like the guy. I did an expose on him a few years ago and likely know more about him than is entirely healthy.
But what do I know? One of my best friends came to me in the mid-90s saying he’d met a girl at work that he really liked and could he bring her around. I said ‘sure’ and he asked me to be prepared as she was 19. He was 30 or 31 at the time and they’ve been married now for years and have two wonderful kids.
Again, what do I know? There’s seven weeks between Lady Chance and I. The fact that we grew up on different coasts is a bigger barrier than our ages.
Divide by two plus 7 eh?
I’m 25 and going on a date with a 20 year old next week (just barely acceptable) and I had some doubts but this mostly arbitrary system makes me feel better.
I agree somewhat, but when I was a teenager most of my female teenage friends dated predominately boys who were 2-6 years older, starting when they were 14 or 15. Seemed to work quite well for them and was generally acceptable to families, etc (more important that the guy wasn’t clearly a sleazeball, than how old he was). But I still thought it was odd… then.