Dating Advice?

cm2owl

General question for everyone:

I was married for about 20 years, have now been single for five and am thinking that I might what to try dating again.

Any suggestions from anyone would be appreciated.

The thought of dating is kind of freaking me out.

AKcanookie

after an 11 year dry spell I ventured out and put up a profile on Relationships.com (now called match.com) :noway:

i got a tonne of duds, and a small handful of diamonds in the rough :frown:

the one who grabbed my heart was the one who forgot to fill out the basic settings .. so he appeared to be a short uneducated unattractive fellow .. as it turned out he was a 6ft blonde, blue eyed, Scottish-Cherokee, with a big handlebar moustache. :huh:

He reset his settings to make him out to be a pot-bellied, pigeon toed, pimply faced, felon - i laughed so hard, i think i fell in love with him before i even met him. :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

because I am a very careful person, i actually talked to him online and on the phone for a year before we decided to meet
we chose to meet at some friends of his in Warner Robbins Georgia - he living in Alaska - me living in Southern Ontario in Canada :flowerforyou:

i selected the cutest outfit and a sexy pair of new boots .. while changing planes in Detroit, the heel of my new boots fell off! :explode: :grumble:

I came walking off the plane and down the ramp, with a terrible limp! We saw each other and laughed out loud, and ran into each others arms. Its been just that way ever since. We will have been married for 13 years this upcoming June.
Somehow i just knew he was the one for me, you see .. his nickname is Rhotten .. so his email address when I met him was
Rhotten@relationships.com LOL :smooched: :flowerforyou:

Good luck to you no matter how you choose to open your heart :drinker:

GabyBaby916

I too was married long term (18yrs), found out my husband forgot HE was married, then divorced his cheating *kitten*.
Fast forward a few years, I jumped back into dating by putting up a profile on Yahoo Personals.

Some tips for you:
1. Know what you want.
If you're not a fan of long distance relationships, don't go out on dates with guys who live 100 miles away.
If you don't want to date a guy with multiple kids by multiple women, dont answer those ads (or respond to those messages).

2. Develop a thick skin.
Online dating can be fun, but it can also be brutal. There are a LOT of *kitten* out there. You have to be prepared to weed through them.

3. Don't be afraid to make the first move.
If you see a profile you like, message him!

4. Satefy
Like the previous poster, I tend to be cautious. I chatted online for weeks, then moved to phone calls for weeks, then when I felt comfortable, did a coffee date (short and in a public place) to which I drove. If I felt rushed into meeting face to face, I cut him off. If I felt the chatting was getting too sexual too fast, I already knew what he was after and cut him off.

5. More Safety
Also, I never ever let dates pick me up at my house. At the time, I had kids at home and never wanted them to feel weird about strange men in THEIR home. I chose to drive to the meeting place. I do not like friends/family "surprising" me by showing up on my doorstep unannounced, let alone a dude I barely know.

6. Kids and Dating
I did not let my casual dates around my kids. When I started dating my current husband more seriously (after about 9 months), I let him come to my home to pick me up or we hung out on nights my kids were at their father's house.
It wasn't until after a year that I let current hubby meet my kids. We got engaged a few months later (and married 2 years after that). I don't believe in the "revolving door" policy when it comes to dating and kids. Kids need stability and shouldn't see mom being used like a hotel, if you know what I mean!

7. Have fun!
Don't take dating too seriously. Get out there, have some fun and enjoy the variety. Don't go looking for Mr. Right. You'll find him when the time is right.

:happy:

wonderwoman234

Go for it! Life's too short not to have fun. I agree with the others - try to figure out what you want. I always think it's a good idea to be in a good place before you start a relationship. Also be safe and be choosy and have fun.

consideritdonemi

So how's the dating game going, OP?

lsgibbs83

That first time out there is hard and scary! As everyone else has said...stay safe! Meet in a public place and be cautious about letting them know where you live until you are sure they're ok.

Also, follow your instinct. If something doesn't feel right, do not hesitate to end things. If something feels right, go for it...but carefully.

And...Canookie...I just LOVE your story!

consideritdonemi

I think even bad dates can be good. You can learn from them and they always make for a good story. A nice lady I liked from an old workplace set me up with her son after I'd recently got out of a LTR. I thought it was weird, but as plans developed, it turned out I had to go pick him up. No real explanation given. Again, nice lady and I had already said sure why not and I had nothing better to do so whatever. Lol Well, he was dressed to the nines in his finest beer shirt, shorts, baseball hat, and dirty sneakers. Yup, he had a DUI he was 'working on' (probably as hard as he had worked on the evening's outfit), a kid (I did not date guys with child support issues), but he paid for a nice dinner and I made a good time of it. Of course, there was no second date. He kept calling afterwards too, poor guy. His mom must've seen fixing potential in me.

I met my current beau on eHarmony in 2009 and we're set to get married here soon. If something happened btw me and him beyond our control (God forbid), I would def go back to the computer. He's good on paper and in person and I seriously couldn't have picked better if I had custom ordered him out of a catalog. ;-) That's not to say all has been perfect, but I am a super bad picker in real life so I would stick to EH and their 29 dimensions vs. mine. I had a lot of fun dating in between though. I really enjoyed being single a lot and probably locked it down with my man a little sooner than I'd've liked due to our long distance connection (Florida & MI), BUT it all worked out.

The short of it is have fun going out, don't take it all so seriously, and let whoever turns out to be special prove himself to you 1ST before taking things to the next level. Not sure if I would be reaching out to dudes online for initial contact. I think that's their job in a metaphysical universal sense.