Been suggested and he doesn’t want it. He wants her to totally, honestly, and legitimately want him, but not really need him.
Shagnasty has a jaded view of marriage. I don’t think he’d deny that. It doesn’t necessarily constitute a general unfair bias against women. As typically, some of the responses are post modern secular neo-Puritan BS. Not everyone is looking for ‘sharing experiences’ as opposed to sexual gratification. If a woman was criticized for favoring the latter that would be immediately branded ‘sexism’.
Also as much as some people obviously don’t like it, there’s pretty deeply ingrained pattern in most societies (embedded in human DNA? who knows) that younger women are generally more open to relationships with older men than vice versa. Macron doesn’t disprove that, he’s among the exceptions illustrating it. ‘Half your age+7’ is actually somewhat accurate for plausible mutual interest, especially outside the confines of school (a major place for romantic relationships to start) which specifically puts people of the same age together. Again the post/anti-religious neo Puritans seem to have a pretty strong idea your partner should be quite close to your own age. I’ve seen that in ‘Ann Landers’ type threads, ‘put yourself out there to people you own age’. Why your own age particularly? Not decades from your age, OK sure, but the optimum point (on average of course there is variation) for a man would probably be to look for women a bit younger, in terms of success ratio as well as his own natural attraction.
Personally I’m in the same category as Shodan (I think said and perhaps others). My wife and I are nearly the same age near 60 and she looks amazing to me (actually she looks pretty amazing to anybody I believe). And I have no interest in ‘relationships’ with anyone else. But as far as a casual admiring glance, other women her age are rarely attractive to my eye, it’s not common for women >> 1/2+7.
But ‘how do you stay attracted?’ is a strained construct. You either are or you aren’t. I don’t work to stay attracted to my wife I just am. Nor do I scold myself for finding such a small % of other women near her age attractive. Of course I’m older too, but so what? That would only figure in taking extra leaps to somebody saying they were angry at womenkind for not finding them attractive. I’m not, doesn’t seem Shagnasty was saying that either. That kind of comeback, ‘you’re older too’, strikes we as of the straw man bashing, virtue signalling type.
Yes there is more to it than lust, pair bonding is a major factor too. But desiring fertility in a woman is a major factor in attraction. Claiming men finding women less attractive with age is wrong is like saying women are wrong for preferring to be with men who are gainfully employed and educated over men who are high-school dropouts and chronically unemployed.
It is what it is. People who were attracted to traits that resulted in fewer offspring or lower quality offspring ended up being pushed out of the gene pool.
I can totally relate to OP. I’m 44 and find men in their 60s and 70s repulsive. I weep for my future.
Uh, there’s a big difference between these two things, namely that one involves behavior and the other doesn’t.
Although I agree you can’t really control who you find attractive, the judgmental attitude toward women who have the audacity to age is what people find so problematic. And the OP is pretty disparaging of ostensibly happy couples who have devolved into hosebeast status. I find his perspective on relationships equally as incomprehensible as he seems to find committed old people.
Frankly I don’t really care what he does or who he dates or how fucked up his relationships are from my standpoint, as long as all involved parties are happy. But in all honesty it’s hard to conceive of any woman being happy with what he wants, because there doesn’t seem to be anything in it for her. So I don’t think he’s going to find what he’s looking for. He’s not getting it from women his age, but the idea that an even younger girl would be more inclined to meet all of those unrealistic standards for zero payoff is even more baffling. By his own standards, she’s at the peak of her sexual desirability and his is in decline, so I don’t see her putting out for some old guy more enthusiastically than someone her own age. Since he apparently resents spending money on dates, I don’t even see the gold-diggers all that interested.
It looks bleak, is what I’m saying.
Exactly. I mean, what if he dropped dead of a heart attack on top of me? Please tell me I’m not the only one who just got the panicky claustrophobia sweats. I’d have to keep my phone with me in bed so I could call for help. And you just know the cause of death wouldn’t be listed as “Hot Sex With Gladys”. It’d be “coronary” or something lame like that. How am I supposed to move on from something like this?
I can’t.
Tell me what kind of responses would a woman get if she started a thread bemoaning how hard it is to find a fuckable man because all she’s finding are blokes making <$55,000 and driving old cars financed from CarMax.
“Ladies, how do you stay attracted to these broke-ass men who can’t even afford a date night at Ruth’s Chris” she asks, and then scratches her in head in wonderment as poster after poster say such crazy things as “money isn’t everything”, “Its his personality that I love the most”, and “I don’t particularly want to eat at Ruth’s Chris; give me a man who can cook and I’m naked.”
Not sure what the OP is looking for? Assurance that he’s not the only dude who finds women his age repulsive? An opportunity to sneak brag about potentially scoring with a young hottie? Haven’t the foggiest. But to see where some of us are coming from all you have to imagine is that he’s a woman lamenting the absence of six-figure income earners among her dating prospects.
How would that not be equally shallow exactly?
That’s her point, I think. In that situation, some men would take offense.
I would think even the affluent ones would flee from a woman like that.
People are getting hung up on my “hosebeast” comment. It comes from the movie Wayne’s World and, while a real thing, only applies to the small subset of people that really are one. We have all met a few.
I am thrilled for anyone that has a genuinely happy marriage but I also believe those are much more rare than publicly presented. If my family is good at one thing, it is divorce and I grew up surrounded by one after another and they still haven’t stopped. I never planned on getting one myself but sometimes your upbringing affects your attitudes and behavior whether you want it to or not. I know marriage isn’t for me so I just removed myself from that pool after one strike rather than 3 or 7 like some other family members. Sometimes you have to know your own limitations but also how to work around them. I love being single in general except it makes getting sex tedious and attractive, stable activity partners can be hard to find on demand.
That may be true for all I know but they also say there is a lid for every pot. I am pretty plain vanilla in my preferences and people with really bizarre preferences find matches so I don’t see why I can’t. I found a pretty 20-something today with a bucket list that closely matches mine and just wants an activity partner but not a very serious relationship. I have been trying to find one that will go skydiving with me for years with no success but she says she will do that and more. I haven’t written her yet but I might and, if she doesn’t take it, another one like her probably will because it is just a numbers game.
I am good at getting free travel as well and love doing it. Solo is fun but it gets old sometimes. Do you really think there is no attractive woman in the Boston area that would take a free trip to Las Vegas, Florida or the Bahamas for the weekend after getting to know one another a little? That is the type of thing that I am looking for.
Believe it or not, I am a lot more charming in person than I am on the SDMB. I share my deeper feelings here but I know not to say them in real-life. Who knows, we may end up actually liking each other? It has happened before a bunch of times but the ick factor has been blocking my romantic emotions for the latest rounds involving the 40 something set. I am not romantically interested in the equivalent of my elementary school teachers or the Compliance officers at my company.
Oh, yeah, you’re a real charmer alright!
True that. My mother’s on marriage #5. I don’t fault you for knowing what you don’t want. I’m no more going to shove marriage down your throat as I would shove kids down the throat of people who know they would make shitty parents. People just know.
I went a different route. I observed Mom’s series of disastrous relationships, and said, ‘‘I don’t want shitty relationships like that,’’ so I figured out how to make a good one. Fifteen very good years, no small amount of effort, but I still feel like we’re getting away with something because we don’t work that hard. With the exception of one very bad year, it’s been pretty easy. Likewise it’s pretty easy to stay attracted to him as he ages, but I think it’s all oxytocin stuff. He smells like safety. And I think that’s your answer to ‘‘how’’ - a lot of people aging with their partners have enduring bonds with said people, including all the chemical pair-bonding stuff, with special committed-people hormones, and while their partner may not stop traffic at age 50, it doesn’t matter because they are still effectively awash in the same hormones as when that person was 20. It’s an enduring bond not only in the emotional sense but in the physiological sense also. It’s a conditioned response.
I think when people stop being intimate - not just fucking, but being physically close - that’s when the attraction wanes between partners. My theory, anyhow. Yes, the conclusion is that we are all on drugs.
SHE had to quit her job for this reason? What kind of place was this, and why was it anyone else’s business?
I think it’s a good thing that you can’t find women IRL to date, and, let’s face it, screw. Maybe for you, escorts or hookers really are the thing. :dubious:
Your ex-wife must have been a saint to have put up with you for as long as she did. I sure hope you aren’t using your daughters to get to their friends. :eek:
We posted about this last year hen you were waiting till the end of dates to tell them you didn’t want to be exclusive; you aren’t being completely honest w/ women and you aren’t happy. You know the whole truth, they don’t yet you expect things to go well. Do you think women are holding back the full truth from you?
Why do you think you can be successful when you won’t even be your authentic self? You are too old for these games, you know and deserve better.
The answer to your first comment is that people can’t understand that men and women can be really close friends without having an affair. It attracts attention especially from other women coworkers. I know for a fact that isn’t true but the perception still causes problems. There is even a name for it called “work wives” and many are completely innocent but a whole a lot of people don’t view it that way. I had a more essential job than she did (at a New England supermarket headquarters) so she got pressured out (which worked out really well for her) but I got to stay.
I don’t do escorts or hookers. Despite what anybody thinks, I am a harder lay than most women and very picky. I will hang out with anyone but I value quality over quantity. I refuse many subtle and not so subtle offers from people I don’t think are suitable. I was showing one of my coworkers from Nigeria that loves the ladies how to use Bumble today. I swiped for two minutes and he was amazed that I only picked one out of about 100. He told me that he was going to download it and select about 80% of them.
You may want to take back that last comment because that is by far the most offensive thing in this thread. My daughters are a young teen and a pre-teen. They mean the world to me and will always remain the most important thing. You just implied that I am a pedophile and do not appreciate the insinuation. We are talking about late 20’s to early 30’s, not kids and I have no idea why you thought otherwise.
Maybe this is true and maybe it’s not, but I suspect that you have a psychological need for it to be true. Its the only reason that explains you saying this in almost thread about marriage on this board. It reads like a mantra.
At the risk of offending you, it sounds like you’re in as bad of a predicament as all those people you imagine are out there who are married to boring, unattractive spouses. I imagine you have loneliness, hopelessness, and discontent in common. But it doesn’t sound like you’re looking for companionship or even sex. You’re looking for ego-gratification. Without a hot woman on your arm, it’s so much as easier to feel small and unimpressive.
Consider the possibility that men who just fine with women their age don’t view a woman’s youth and appearance as a reflection of their own worth and virility. I’m not a therapist or anything, but what I’m getting from your posts is that you do.
This is it in a nutshell, isn’t it? He’s just looking for a hot woman in order to boost his status. Ultimately, women are used to stroke his ego and impress others: Look at how many times he has mentioned how easy it is for him to get women.
I’ve asked twice what it is he’s bringing to the table but have been pointedly ignored. Is he equally as hot as the women he wants? Is he loaded with cash? He says he’s charming (but not honest, reading through the posts) but I’m thinking he’s not as charming as he thinks. I can’t be the only one thinking that the “I’m just too picky, bro” attitude is a way to mask the truth.
I’m thinking self-image moreso than status, but yeah. Being with an average looking woman would make him see himself as equally average. That is a bothersome idea to him.
He doesn’t want to be like one of those old guys paired up with the hose beasts because in those couples, all he can see is an ugly woman dragging down a man’s social worth, needlessly making him mediocre in comparison to men with trophy girlfriends.
To answer your question about what I am bringing to the table superficially, I am well over 6 feet tall, have a great head of hair, a high income job in a prestigious company with 6 weeks of vacation time spread out throughout the year. I went to a prestigious undergraduate school and an Ivy League grad school. I am also flat out rich from family money. I don’t think I am the best looking person in the world but I get lots of compliments even today from my female coworkers when I dress nicely and I could easily improve on that if I hit the gym. I am a great listener at least for a while and I will spoil somebody that I think deserves it. I give great backrubs as well and I can talk on many different subjects. I have no debt either.
I treat everyone well but romantic relationships are different from others. I have found a few of them in my life but they are very rare. I would treat a new, true match extremely well because it seems like most people my age have no sense of adventure. I do because I don’t have the sense god gave a goose and I truly believe the point of life is to have as much fun as possible.
You aren’t going to do that sitting in front of the TV arguing about which show to watch and what’s for dinner. We are talking about things like Thailand, remote Costa Rica, skydiving and everything that is actually interesting.
I live that myself as a solo traveler because it always works out to meet people from Hawaii to the Virgin Islands. It is much harder when you get back home to the Boston area. I just want somebody to enjoy life with and take risks without stagnating. It is a simple request that is oddly hard to fulfill.