I’m thinking you’re right on the money about ten years being the threshold.
And I say this because if I should tell someone that my partner is 10 yrs my senior, he unfailingly corrects me, insisting it is, in fact, not quite 10 yrs.
He’s right, it’s 9 yrs + 9 months! So clearly there is some significance to ‘10 yrs’ that he’s not entirely comfortable with!
(We’ve been together over 25 yrs, and he never admits to the 10yrs age difference, but, then, he’s a little odd!)
I often date younger men. The last person I dated for a few months is seven years younger, but except for different tastes in music, which could be attributed to lots of factors, the age difference was not noticeable. I’ve also dated someone 13 years younger. I have dated men one or two years older, but that’s generally the most I’ve gone up.
When you’re 26 and 22, four years may seem somewhat significant (but not much), but at my age (54), it’s nothing. I would date a 50-year-old man or a 58-year-old man and think nothing of it.
Interesting. When I was in first year at university, I had just turned 18. (I was a year younger than most frosh–in Ontario at the time, university students took an optional extra year of high school, so the bulk of the first-year students were 19.) There was a woman in the class who was 26. I was attracted to her, but from my just-out-of-high-school age, it was a huge and insurmountable barrier.
I don’t remember dating with such an age difference in high school, but then I never really dated at all then.
The age difference was really shorthand for maturity and life-experience difference, and I think that’s what that half-your-age-plus-seven rule tries to encapsulate. Of course, real people vary, and the rule is only as guideline. If you break it and the relationship works, more power to you.
Nothing less than 10 years (as long as the youngest is over 18) will make me raise an eyebrow although for me personally 10 years is too much.
My life has just changed. My used to be sweet baboo sent me an email that he married a fellow Marine. FML. I’ll report back about how it works out with me 33 and Bill who is 57. FML.
I think the Half Plus Seven Rule works pretty well. For older couples, if one party could have given birth to the other at a reasonable age (i.e. not a parent at 12), then the gap starts to get weird.
Especially if the older one is male. 
Do you know my wife?
Our ages matched your friend’s ages within a year when we started dating.
Just celebrated our 20th anniversary two weeks ago.
We are usually 12 years apart, though there is a month between our birthdays when the gap drops to 11 years.
My mom couldn’t have cared less. She was very happy that I had found the right person. My dad was concerned and asked some probing questions.
She is slim, has youthful skin, and has never smoked (an important aging factor); whenever someone we know finds out she’s in her fifties, they do a double take and say “No way! Are you kidding?” or something to that effect. Because of this, very few people who know us would ever suspect that there is such a large gap in our ages.
So, to answer the OP, I define “significant” as anything more than our own age difference 
Actually, I like the half+7 rule, though it seems that we fell on the wrong side of that line for a couple of years.
<stands up> Hi, my name is Brynda and I date younger men.
<all of you> hi, Brynda.
To answer the OP, if the parties involved are over 30 or so, a ten year gap raises my eyebrow. Younger than that, maybe a 5 year difference.
Now for my experience: My late husband was 16 years younger than me. When we met, I was 41 and he was 25 (well, 24, but his birthday was 3 days later and he turned 25). Luckily for me, I look younger and he looks older, so most people were pretty surprised to find out the age gap was so big, and we got lots of shocked looks. So I can testify that a 16 year gap with the woman being older is significant for almost everyone.
And then it gets worse. Currently, I am 50. My sweet baboo is 28. I am still hanging in there, looks wise (bless my skin). He, again, looks older; premature balding is my best friend. Even I am shocked by this age difference and don’t tell people unless I have to. People are nice, but you know that gulp people do when they are really surprised? Let’s just say I have seen it.
In general (always exceptions, blah blah), a four-year difference in age is “greater” for someone in their early 20s than someone in their thirties, greater for someone in their thirties than someone in their 40s, etc.
In particular, there is a hell of a lot of emotional growth and self-discovery / self-defining going on as someone transitions from childhood to adulthood. Four years is HUGE for a 14-year-old and an 18-year-old. In terms of emotional development and maturity, they might as well be on different planets. The difference becomes less huge as both parties make the transition, but that transition is most noticeable and most rapid in the early stages. Most people are in the process of figuring out who they are in their 20s. More of that gets figured out the later in your 20s you get.
There is always self-discovery to be made, of course, but unless you have some screwy denial going on, after a certain point most of it is refining what you already know, not a huge life-altering discovery.
That said, I’m not really in the habit of telling people that they’re too far apart in age to date. If it’s a 20-year-old and a 40-year-old, it’ll give me pause, but I won’t say anything. If it’s 40 and 60, less pause, but still there. There’s no real hard and fast “rule” for me, but over ten years is probably a soft cutoff where I might take notice. For my own personal comfort level, plus-or-minus five years of me, with some flexibility around the 5/6 year mark. Although I’m more likely to go slightly older than slightly younger, I think. If I know someone’s age, even at say three years younger I find myself considering the odds that we’re enough in the same place in life for things to work out well.
Although, oddly, I’m more comfortable considering going younger with women (five years younger than me seems like nothing), than with men. I’m not entirely certain why this is, other than much of my personal experience tends to lend credence to the trope that women mature faster. (Although I have had some – not a lot – of experience contradictory to this, too.)
ETA: Oh – I don’t think it matters which party is older. As far as Daisy and Lance, they’re both a bit neurotic, so I’m not surprised Daisy would freak over something like this. They’re both a little bit emotionally “young” too, despite their big brains and attempts to be older than they are under the guise of being “professionals” or “experts.”
When I was 40, and again when I was 42, I dated a 25-year-old (dated two of them, that is - but not concurrently if you see what I mean). My experiences were similar to Roderick’s above, and I got badly hurt.
My current SO is 32 and I’m 43, and it doesn’t feel that far apart to me - but her mother initially raised an eyebrow about the eleven years between us.
However, I have a friend who’s my age and is just about to marry a 24-year-old, and they are the most rock-solid couple I’ve met: he’s pretty immature and she’s incredibly mature. I am aware, though, that the 19-year age gap is notable to most people.
WTF. ((((Flatlined))))
Accepts hugs gratefully. I don’t know. Long distance relationships are hard. I did my best, but it must have not been good enough. Bill…the 57 year old is telling me that I shouldn’t make any life decisions for a year.
I just don’t know.
le sigh
My range is a 6-year difference. Anybody within a 6-years range is “the same age” for dating purposes. That doesn’t mean I’m going to freak out at bigger differences, but I will be curious about how come they got together.
Flatlined, that sucks 
Remember that running him over with your bike would count as cruelty toward bikes, don’t do it!
Yeah LDR suck, but still. Sheesh. LIsten, if you wanna talk or need to vent, I’m just a PM away.
In the later stages of life, a substantial age discrepancy can make retirement decisions interesting. You’d like to retire at more or less the same time, but to make that happen, either one spouse has to work well past the normal retirement age, or the other quits while well short of Social Security eligibility, or both.
Not to mention that cleaning burnt blood off of the chrome would be a pain. Maybe I’ll use the jeep instead!
How I got together with Bill was kinda different (to me). I store records for the county and he came in with a crew of people to do research on easements. Nice older guy who appreciated me being helpful and bought pizza at the end of the job. I was impressed that they didn’t yell at me because they had been standing outside waiting for me to open at opening time, and he thought that it was great that I came running up 5 minutes early, helmet in hand, fumbling gloves to find keys and open the door. (I don’t get that many visitors, so when I do, I greet them happily)
That was all. We met in again while gaming online. It was a few months before we figured out that we had met offline, and when we finally figured it out, we started getting together for coffee when he was in town. I was the one who put the make on him. I was also the one who was too insecure about the age/money/life experiences. He has always been very supportive and when I met ex baboo, he encouraged me.
He’s now telling me that while he would love to have me move into his empty townhouse, he also doesn’t want me to make any major decisions right away. (there have been discussions about me working for his company and me living in his home, or not working and living in the townhouse and all the other permuntations) The big thing that I appreciate is that while he could have flown out knowing that I’d fall into his arms sobbing and then other things happening, he has just offered to send plane tickets. Everything has been MY choice.
Thank you so much! I don’t know how I feel now. Mad is there. But my ex baboo is in the sandbox, I think that people who are getting shot at all the time might be having a lot of emotional distress. Sad is there. I still love him, but he’s made other choices. I don’t hate him.
Anyhow, to get back to the topic…next weekend, I’m flying to Texas to have dinner with Bill. He’s booked tickets and a motel room. I’m liking that he’s old enough that I don’t need to worry that he’s going to want to boink all weekend. Not that boinking all the time is a bad thing, but I’m now old enough to know that talking is good as well.
RTFirefly the retirement thing is a very good point. Bill is planning on retireing in 2 years. He’s got enough money that I don’t need to work, and he’s the sort of guy who doesn’t want his wife to work. His deceased wife of 32 years never worked after they married. While I think it would be fun to have a couple of months off…I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have a job.
I also don’t know how I’m going to handle it when he’s 77 and old and feeble while I’m still wanting to go out and ride. I understand that riding with a sidecar is a totally different world.
It wasn’t Daisy. I’d have remembered if it had been Daisy. She’s not at all beautiful, but awesomely hot.