# Men in their 40's or above, how do you stay attracted to women your own age? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 19, 2017, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623 "2017-07-19T03:47:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2017, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/81 "2017-07-19T23:47:12Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > What will happen if/when your daughters become wives? Will you devalue them? If they’re harpies like their mom was as his wife what choice does he have? You do you, Shagnasty - there’s no fool quite like an old fool. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2017, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/82 "2017-07-19T23:50:10Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > What will happen if/when your daughters become wives? Will you devalue them? Of course not. I look at it from the man’s perspective for most people but not for family members or close friends. They are already spoiled and I expect their future husbands (if they choose to get married) to carry on the tradition. I already threatened my stepfather for being an asshole to my mother. The stakes go up a lot higher when you are talking about daughters. That is just relationship relativity. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/83 "2017-07-20T00:44:39Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > I don’t know, not married. I was referring to the well-known cliche/stereotype. You mean to tell me you’ve never heard this before? :dubious: He’s just lookin for a “is married and gets blowjobs” high-five. What kind of bro are you anyway? High five, **Sicks Ate**!! ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/84 "2017-07-20T00:51:23Z")
I mean, the thing about getting older is that the observable universe if attractive ladies has done nothing but expand. When I was a teen, probably 30 was my age limit in the “too old” caregory, but that number has only increased as my actual age increased. It’s also helped that people know how to take care of themselves better and many have more money and time to do so. I actually feel sorry for the OP in a bizarre way. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/85 "2017-07-20T00:54:57Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > He’s just lookin for a “is married and gets blowjobs” high-five. What kind of bro are you anyway? > > High five, **Sicks Ate**!! I’ve been told by more than one woman: “If a girl ain’t put’n out for her man, marriage ain’t got nothing to do with it. It’s because the man is selfish and doesn’t really care if she’s getting her needs met.” That explains a lot, because I’ve never had this problem personally. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/86 "2017-07-20T01:18:27Z")
A hot German woman vacationing in NYC (alone???) can’t find any man who’ll keep her company without having to resort to going to an online dating site and finding one in a completely different state (because she’s bad with geography!)? Personally, I’ve never had any attraction for somebody outside my age range. Not saying it couldn’t happen, but it hasn’t yet. I’ve always found it pathetic when older men are in search of women 20 yrs younger, but I guess it is what it is. I’ve also found it pathetic that Shagnasty will never find someone he loves enough to want to share his life with, instead of someone to be his girlfriend-on-call. Of any age. ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/87 "2017-07-20T01:34:23Z")
When I was in my late teens and early twenties I thought women in their late thirties and forties were hot. I still thought so when my wife hit that age. She just hit 50, and I would go upstairs with her now if not for the fact that our 17 and 19 year old sons would be mortified. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/88 "2017-07-20T01:36:01Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > A hot German woman vacationing in NYC (alone???) can’t find any man who’ll keep her company without having to resort to going to an online dating site and finding one in a completely different state (because she’s bad with geography!)? Makes sense to me!! I’m sure she’s told Shag just how badly she _wants_ to see him, too, if not for all the distance between them! It’s expensive getting plane tickets. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/89 "2017-07-20T01:45:02Z")
> [@P-man](#): > > When I was in my late teens and early twenties I thought women in their late thirties and forties were hot. I still thought so when my wife hit that age. She just hit 50, and I would go upstairs with her now if not for the fact that our 17 and 19 year old sons would be mortified. Hey, let them see (to a tasteful extent) that sex is just as valuable to a happy relationship in your 50s as it was 20 years ago; they’ll be more likely to model it and less likely to wind up like our ill-functioning OP. ---
**Author:** ![Sicks\_Ate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/90 "2017-07-20T01:47:24Z")
> [@ZipperJJ](#): > > He’s just lookin for a “is married and gets blowjobs” high-five. What kind of bro are you anyway? > > High five, **Sicks Ate**!! I’ll take it! The main point was, that doesn’t have to be the case. Someday, I may tell my son: “Son…never marry a woman who doesn’t love your d\*\*k.” I think that’s valuable advice. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/91 "2017-07-20T02:01:33Z")
> [@Sicks\_Ate](#): > > I’ll take it! The main point was, that doesn’t have to be the case. > > Someday, I may tell my son: “Son…never marry a woman who doesn’t love your d\*\*k.” > > I think that’s valuable advice. Dude, it was a joke. ---
**Author:** ![Weisshund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ba8739/32.png) [@Weisshund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weisshund)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/92 "2017-07-20T02:44:29Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > OTOH, I see sad old men following their extremely unattractive wives around the supermarket a few days a week and many other couples that just let themselves go in general. Why are they doing that? Being married to a hose-beast on either side is worse than being set free (divorced) in my opinion. They are sad because, HELLO, they are at the supermarket. That isn’t where men want to be, married or not. You see unattractive, he still sees the girl he saw when he came home from WWII or Korea or what ever. Your only looking with your eyes, cause you don’t know her, you haven’t known her for the past 50+ years. and wtf is a hose-beast? Thats usually a word for a woman that sleeps with anything. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/93 "2017-07-20T02:44:59Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Not at all. I am just being the real me. I know there are some attractive older women. I would go out with Lynda Carter in a second if she would have me. I also had an uber-cougar in her 50’s hit on me a couple of years ago. She was pretty hot. I considered going out with her until I realized she had a son a little older than me. Those are the exceptions that prove the rule though at least for me. Did you mean 60s, or did she have a kid when she was 12? ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/94 "2017-07-20T02:52:04Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > Makes sense to me!! I’m sure she’s told Shag just how badly she _wants_ to see him, too, if not for all the distance between them! It’s expensive getting plane tickets. 🆒 It didn’t work like that. I work in IT and work on scams myself. It was through Bumble where only the women can start the conversation and have no control over their location that is determined by GPS. It is a little creepy but it works. She really was on Cape Cod then Nantucket and then back in Manhattan. We never did meet but I can if I ever go to NYC. It just made me realize that I just want an actual hot woman to do something fun with rather than a Boston area harpy that has a list of demands a mile long. I found that in Costa Rica and Florida in less than a day but it seems to be an extinct species here. As to the “life partner” thing, I don’t want that either. I already have plenty of money and my ex-wife does too. She is very attractive but has an even worse personality than I do so that will never work. My daughters are the most important thing to me and I don’t want step-children. I also don’t want someone around all that much. I just want hot activity partners for however as long as it lasts. I don’t want an escort or prostitute but I will pay for most other things. Basically, I am hunting unicorns and they seem to be light on the ground. I have found a few close approximations but there is always some complication that screws it up. The best solution for me may just to have an affair with a coworker but I don’t want to do that either. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/95 "2017-07-20T04:04:22Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I remember being in ninth grade and having a crush on a senior girl. She was beautiful, unattainable, the perfection of womanly attributes, and when she passed me in the halls the angels sung hosanna. All her friends were equally sophisticated, knowing, and serene. > > Now my son is a sophomore, and I see the high school senior girls he interacts with in various school functions. Nice, level-headed kids for the most part, college-bound and not given to crazy behavior that I can see. . . but “kids,” they are, and no question about it. In threads about what you would do if you went back in time to high school, guys will often talk about how they know that this time they could totally bang the cheerleader or whoever. As one poster pointed out, the last thing you really want to do now as a 40-something or older guy is hanging around a kid. They’re fine, but do you really want that for a girlfriend? As far as not seeing older women as attractive, I love this [Doonesbury comic](http://comicsidontunderstand.com/wordpress/2011/07/25/comics-that-made-us/). I’m not 25 anymore. We get older, both men and women and it’s really silly to expect that it’s only women who are going to look less attractive as we age. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/96 "2017-07-20T04:17:19Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > It didn’t work like that. I work in IT and work on scams myself. **It was through Bumble where only the women can start the conversation and have no control over their location that is determined by GPS. It is a little creepy but it works. She really was on Cape Cod then Nantucket and then back in Manhattan.** We never did meet but I can if I ever go to NYC. > > It just made me realize that I just want an actual hot woman to do something fun with rather than a Boston area harpy that has a list of demands a mile long. I found that in Costa Rica and Florida in less than a day but it seems to be an extinct species here. > > As to the “life partner” thing, I don’t want that either. I already have plenty of money and my ex-wife does too. She is very attractive but has an even worse personality than I do so that will never work. My daughters are the most important thing to me and I don’t want step-children. I also don’t want someone around all that much. I just want hot activity partners for however as long as it lasts. I don’t want an escort or prostitute but I will pay for most other things. > > Basically, I am hunting unicorns and they seem to be light on the ground. I have found a few close approximations but there is always some complication that screws it up. The best solution for me may just to have an affair with a coworker but I don’t want to do that either. Bolding mine. [One](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_CzHDVzDSc)of the MANY results one gets Googling ‘how to fake location on Bumble’. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/97 "2017-07-20T04:33:02Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > She is very attractive but has an even worse personality than I do so that will never work. Oh **Shagnasty** , just never stop being **Shagnasty** , OK? Half the time I completely agree with you, half the time I violently don’t and I never know when you are serious and when you are not, but I can’t think of the last time I wasn’t entertained. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/98 "2017-07-20T04:36:20Z")
> [@Nawth\_Chucka](#): > > Bolding mine. [One](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_CzHDVzDSc)of the MANY results one gets Googling ‘how to fake location on Bumble’. Good to know but I still think it was real based on conversations. I cross-checked based on subtle clues and it matched. It is remotely possible that it was an attempted scam but everything matched over the course of two days. I was able to figure out who was sending it in less than 5 minutes and it matched college records, Facebook and Linkedin. I don’t usually do that but it was unusual enough to verify it and it worked. She was a competitive swimmer in college so I asked her about athletic interests and she told me all about swimming with no hesitation. It would have to be a new, really sophisticated scam if it is one at all. The person in question is real and extremely attractive. She just claimed that she didn’t know the area and didn’t have anyone to do something with her a couple of days ago. I should have taken the day off work. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/99 "2017-07-20T04:47:20Z")
> [@Princhester](#): > > Oh **Shagnasty** , just never stop being **Shagnasty** , OK? > > Half the time I completely agree with you, half the time I violently don’t and I never know when you are serious and when you are not, but I can’t think of the last time I wasn’t entertained. Thank you for your endorsement **Princhester**! That is the charm and the reason many people like me and a whole lot of others hate me. I don’t have a choice. That is just me. You can hang out with me any time. I may still be a prick but a fun one. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2017, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623/100 "2017-07-20T04:57:43Z")
I’m happily married. Assuming I became single… I’d probably focus on dating women in their early thirties. That’s currently the age I find the most attractive. I like lively conversation and being challenged. I have more in common with women in that age range. I’d consider having more children. I’m in my late fifties. A 20 plus years age gap means nothing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/men-in-their-40s-or-above-how-do-you-stay-attracted-to-women-your-own-age/791623.md?page=6)