I’m a man and I’ve seen dating profiles like “Don’t contact me if your title isn’t Doctor or Lawyer”. Wow, okay, and cool you’re out front with that.
This one caught me:
I grew up on the central coast in a large close-knit family. I’m looking for someone that adores me and my daughter. Please don’t contact me if you are unemployed because you will be wasting yours and my time. Don’t try fooling yourself and me if you have kids and an ex. […]I’d like to find someone down to earth, but with energy and motivation to grow professionally in his personal life. Professionally, emotionally and FINANCIALLY STABLE is an absolute must.
So cool, she’s looking for a wealthy man, I get it. But she’s 55 and requires a man who has never dated or had kids?
I’m pretty sure what’s meant is ex-wife (whom you’re maybe still interacting with multiple times each week, what with arrangements involving the kids and the property and half-a-hundred other bones of contention), not ex-girlfriend (whom you maybe dated for a little while in the ‘90s and haven’t seen since).
I find it a bit gold-digging myself. But hey, it’s dating, why can’t people dream a little? If she’s honest and finds the chump she’s looking for, everybody wins. If not, she learns a lesson (maybe)
It could be parsed as “don’t lie to me and tell me you have no baggage if you do”. In other words, she’d be potentially ok with an ex and kids as long as the guy is up front about it.
It’s hard to tell though, since good grammar and clear writing is clearly not her strong suit (“…you will be wasting yours and my time”).
As a guy who is getting into the dating scene at 54, let me tell you it isn’t easy. I don’t have any kids and I have never been married. In an ideal world I’d find someone else who hasn’t been married or had kids.
If I find someone who meets those criteria, I’ll be sure to order the unicorn steak on our date.
I’m a widow in my late 50’s, no kids. I’m honestly afraid to start dating again. I’d love to be in a caring relationship again, but I’m also comfortable with my own company. I’d rather be alone than in a bad relationship.
So, @Ike_Witt, is “formerly married, widowed, and no kids” OK? I mean, two out of three ain’t bad, right?
Yes, it’s entirely possible that she just means “no kids still at home.” But if I were an empty-nester divorced guy on that dating site, getting to that idea might involve more assuming than I’d be inclined to do. Then I’d think it seems somewhat desperate to be explaining, in a message making initial contact, why I don’t think she has actually ruled out guys like me as candidates when the literal meaning of what she wrote would rule out guys like me.
They may as well post instead, “I’m looking for a rich, handsome prince to sweep me off my feet, pamper the crap out of me, and make sure I live happily ever after.” Even “Egocentric” might not be adequate enough to describe those kind of people. Please note also that those people rarely if ever post anything about what they are willing to GIVE to a relationship. Do yourself a favor and avoid them like a plague.
I always imagine these profiles are written out of frustration after bad prior experiences. Trying to find the right person in the swamp that is online dating is extremely fraught, especially for women, and when things go south you try to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Poorly written, sure. But it doesn’t sound arrogant to me, just hurt.
Can’t really speak as an authority on dating as I’ve been in a monogamous relationship with the same woman for most of my adult life. Although I did have some brief success with online dating under my other username: DrHedgeFundFinanceEsq
These profiles sound very similar to the thought process that goes into online job postings. The idea that if you throw some ridiculous set of requirements and post them on the internet, there is a unicorn out there who a) exists, and b) would actually agree to the shitty offer you propose.
As someone else posted, a lot of it reads as frustration or desperation of having to deal with a bunch of shitty dates where the other person possibly misrepresented themselves.
Am I the only one who’s surprised that someone still thinks it’s prestigious to be a lawyer? That is, super-prestigious, above everything else (except a doctor.)
My guess is, since she’s 55, she set her sights back when LA Law was popular.
Or when she says ‘lawyer’, she really means ‘senior partner in a top firm’. She may be re-writing her ad after a date with Jimmy McGill in his Suzuki Esteem.
To be honest, I prefer the more practical “I am looking for A, B, C and I, myself, am D, E, F” over the profiles that read like new age free form prose.
Things like this reinforce my thought that should anything happen to my husband, there’s no way I’m going out into the dating world. Everyone in my age group is going to have baggage of some sort as well as pretty well established habits, as do I. Nope, too old to train another…
