There are 15 years between my wife and me. She was 24 when we married eight years ago.
I hope you’re the older one in this relationship. :dubious:
Yeah, like I got married when I was nine.
Oh, everybody does something stupid once, right? I was turning twenty and he was fifty-six. That makes us the same Chinese zodiac sign, by the way. It was summer. I was staying on campus to take a required physics class, working in the library on weekends, and going to a local film festival two evenings a week. After the films we were all supposed to stay after to have a “discussion,” because it would “build a sense of community” and “fight the American insularity” or something. When you’re nineteen, it makes sense. So I stayed for the discussions, and I went to coffee houses with them all afterwards, and for some reason… possibly because I was the only female, and possibly because I was American (green card, you know), I started getting some special attention. First he would cook food for me (and when you live in a dormitory, that’s seductive), then we would take walks, then it progressed to “parking” out by the airport, ostensibly to watch the planes land, but really I don’t remember if we ever saw any. Eventually one thing led to another. We kept it up for about a year and a half, before I grew out of the whole community politics thing and sent him packing.
He is one of those people who is sort of pathological about not being ordinary. We had absolutely nothing to offer each other but sex and occasional help with chores and rides. I am pretty disgusted by him now, five years later–he’s a boy who never grew up. But it was a lovely summer. I made up for all the fun I didn’t have in high school.
When I was 18, I moved in with a guy who was 30.
Icky ensued. What the hell did he see in me?!? Then again, he was an alcoholic, used-to-be-kind-of-famous man-boy looking for someone to overwhelm. Didn’t last too long, thank God. He still lived with his dad at the time…
Straight woman.
Wait, you’re only supposed to do it once? :smack:
Thanks, that’s an interesting story.
Heh. The most serious and long-lasting relationship I ever had was with a women who was thirty when I met her at eighteen. So same sign there, too – but just one cycle off. Both Year of the Dog, and both Scorpio on top of that. By some remarkable coincidence reality lined up perfectly with what astrologers would typically suggest about such a pairing. Zap!
If I might pry just a tiny bit more, can I ask approximately where you were studying? (I’m not sure if I should be picturing a European Peter Pan or one of the Canadian or Antipodean varieties. There is a difference, honestly.)
When I was in high school, we called that activity “Watching the submarine races.”
United States, Midwest. Uh oh, do I know you???
Nobody knows me.
Straight male, 40.
I had my last girlfriend when I was 37. She turned 20 while we were dating, so … 17 years. It was a horrible, horrible experience, but that was because she was severely bipolar/borderline personality disorder, not because of the age difference.
When I was in high school, I dated high school boys, :rolleyes: .
Results were pretty much as you would expect.
Then life unfolded a little and I found myself in SE Asia, where I hooked up with a man who was 46yrs to my 23yrs. It was hardly a ‘relationship’, but it was good.
Very good, and very educational. He was of a different ethnicity than me and gave me a wonderful education.
I came back from that journey (first of many to that part of the world), convinced, and telling anyone who would listen, that I was done with ‘boys’! That’s right, the way I told it I would no longer date anyone under 40. Boys weren’t worth the effort when you could just as easily have a man!
Of course, things rarely, if ever, work out the way we think they will.
Once home I met a man, who had set his own foolish parameter for women. He was 38 and was saying he wasn’t going to date anyone over 26 yrs anymore, strickly girls y’see.
As I was 28, he kept saying I was too old for him, as he was 38, I kept saying he was too young for me.
That was over 21 yrs ago now.
Which is why I always tell people, you plan for dinner parties and school exams, you DON’T plan for life — you LIVE life, as it comes. And it often comes, in an untimely and unruly fashion but that’s what makes it such a fun ride.
Weee!
I’m female and bisexual. My current boyfriend is 14 years older than me.
My parents are both straight (as far as I know). They’ve been married 22 years. My dad is 14 years older than my mom (creepy).
~Tasha
Thirty-one, male, mostly straight.
Probably the biggest difference I know of was the woman I lost my virginity with. She was 29, I was 17. My mentor, who helped me through some of the hardest times in my life when my mother died, was about 8 years older than me. We met when I was 16 and later did some things that were still technically illegal. I certainly didn’t feel molested though. This is one of the reasons why I don’t like age of consent laws. It would have made at least two people who were important to me at that time in my life into criminals if anyone but us had known about our relationship and reported it.
Other than my first real girlfriend, who was a year and a bit younger than me and who had to move away only a few months into the relationship, I was usually with people in their mid- to late-20s for the next few years. If I’d had the social skills and the knowledge of where to look, I would have been trying to date college people when I was in high school since I had little in common with most people my age. I was socially backward, mentally mature. Having older people to be around improved me a lot during my last year or so of high school; I actually had a social life because of that.
Straight male, largest difference of any sort of relationship would be around 3 years, anything resembling a serious relationship would be more like 2 years, I think. I asked my girlfriend, and she said probably just a couple years as well. (We’re 2 months apart.)
Man, I didn’t realize I’d be so low on the pole when I opened this thread. A lot more people than I’d have thought have had a number of years between their age and their significant others’.
If it makes you feel better, Othersider, my biggest gap is probably a smidge over three years for a sexual/romantic relationship, and something like five for romantic relationships in general.
(Straightish woman here, for the demographic check.)
A little, as it’s nice to see I’m not alone (heh), but I didn’t really feel bad about it to begin with - just a bit surprised. Thank you, though.
Amen, brother. People think that age of consent laws were intended to protect “children”. They’re not. They’re intended to control young people.
23, female, bisexual. Currently living with a guy 12 years my senior, who I’ve been with just over a year and knew online (ah, nerd love) for four. This is the first relationship where I can easily see us staying good friends even if it doesn’t work out romantically for the long term, and I’m constantly surprised how many people seem to think it’s great we’re together (my mom would be thrilled if we married) as opposed to focussing on “He’s HOW old?”
At 22, I had a couple-year on-again, off-again relationship with a 36-yr old male, without a doubt the most gorgeous guy I had ever seen up to then and ever since. He had gone prematurely grey, but had a fabulous body, magnetic personality, huge blue eyes, rugged features otherwise, AND he earned a fantastic living for the time, early 80’s in Michigan. He even wanted to marry me! But way too many problems: he clearly drank too much (a fifth of black-label Jack Daniels a day, nearly!), he was lousy in bed (and what a shame, as he was very well-endowed), and possibly the most problematic of all, he had already been married and had two boys, and then got a vasectomy. I had no children yet, and wanted them. Dealbreaker.
Not that I could have lived with the other two major issues, either.
So–14 years. Current b/f is 4 years older, previous was 2 years younger. Current guy was married to his HS sweetheart until about 6 years ago, and previous is just now marrying his HS sweetheart, whom he left me for. What’s with that, huh?
–Beck
Straight male 36 g/f or anything intimate
Younger 8 years( she was 18, I was 26)
Older 15 years (I was 24, she was 39)
My wife is 8 years older than me, but she dosen’t look it.
One first date makeout session that never got to sex that was 22 years older (I was 25 she was 47.
When I was 19 I started seeing a friend that was 29. He and I have been together over a year and he moved to California to follow me. I’ve never had a problem with the age difference, but I think he every once in awhile has pangs of guilt.
I’m female, bi and 20.