Dating after Divorce: Getting Back in the Game, or Learning the Game from Scratch?
May 15, 2012 By Christie Hartman 3 Comments
I met a very cool woman last week. She's (roughly) 40, 2 kids, divorced a couple of years ago. She's JUST getting back into dating and has had NO luck at all so far. She isn't sure how to meet men, and the brief time she spent online resulted in no dates. I asked how long was married. 20 years, she said. She married her high school sweetheart! So, basically, my new friend is not getting back into the dating game after a divorce - she's never been in the game! She married her high school boyfriend. She's never dated multiple guys, met someone at a coffee shop, tried casual sex, flirted with cute men at a party, dated a guy with kids. In terms of dating experience, she's still a teenager! :) And I've met many women just like her. And plenty of men too. Over 40, thrust into the life of a single person, with no map, at an age when most people assume they'll be married or partnered. It can be disorienting, scary, frustrating. But it doesn't have to be. If you find yourself in this demographic - divorced and having little idea how to approach dating - here are a few tips: 1) Know you aren't alone. Many people, especially Baby Boomers, married young, had kids, and stayed in long marriages until they ended. This is a rapidly growing demographic and there people just like you navigating the same waters. 2) Know it's okay to be clueless. When you've been married that long, especially from a young age, you don't know anything about dating. And that's okay. You're … [Read More...]
“Why are You Still Single??”
May 11, 2012 By Christie Hartman 4 Comments
Never ask someone why they're single. Why? It puts them on the spot and, more importantly, it pretty clearly insinuates that being single is a bad thing. Being single is NOT a bad thing. There are plenty of dysfunctional people in relationships and marriages, trust me. If you're single, I'm sure you've had someone ask you this annoying question. How should you handle it? First, never go on the defensive. You have nothing to defend! The more people see that you feel sheepish about being single, the more they'll hassle you. Get comfy in your singleness and recognizes the freedom and independence that come with it. Shrug and say you enjoy being single. Or say confidently that you're dating and hoping to meet the right person. When I was single, I rarely got this question. I feel pretty strongly it was because I truly enjoyed and embraced being single. Did I want to find someone? Sure! But I was comfortable in my own skin and never felt like being single was liability, and people picked up on that fact. If you get this question a lot, especially from people you don't know or don't really like all that much, try responding with humor. The suggestions below come from Julia McCurley, an Austin-based matchmaker who works with single people full time. Numbers 9 and 15 are my LOL favorites! 1. What? And spoil my great sex life? 2. Why aren't YOU dating/divorced yet? 3. It gives my mother/father something to live for. 4. I'm not willing to give up on love just yet. 5. … [Read More...]
Over 40 and Never Been Married: Problem, or Not? Part 2…
May 1, 2012 By Christie Hartman 9 Comments
A few weeks ago, I wrote a post outlining several reasons a man or woman may not have married by the time he/she reaches 40. You can check it out here. A reader and regular commenter asked a good question, which was: "Why is it that once someone reaches their late 30′s (especially male), the status of “never married” is considered to be more of a red flag in dating, than “divorced”?" There is some truth to this. But why? As I discussed in the first post, being never-married at age 40 puts you outside the "norm" - i.e. not on the hump of the bell curve. And anytime you fall outside the norm, people wonder about you (or at least notice you). We all notice the guy with the tattoos on his face at the gym. We all notice the woman who's 6'2". We wonder about those people who have polyamorous relationships. Why? They're different than most people. It's human nature to notice what's different. And, unfortunately, "noticing" can turn into "judging." Yes, a woman may consider a never-married man pushing (or over) 40 a Red Flag. Why? Statistically, it's far less common than a man of the same age who's divorced. She will wonder. However, if you're 25, being never-married is the norm, and being divorced is far more unusual. In this case, being divorced becomes the Red Flag. However, to rule out a guy only because he hasn't been married by the time he's 40 isn't really fair. As I discussed in Part 1, there are many reasons a man may be in this position, especially … [Read More...]
Spreadsheet Guy: Big Single Jerk, or Organized Single Man?
April 24, 2012 By Christie Hartman 6 Comments
If you haven't heard already, the story about the guy whose Match.com spreadsheet went viral has all the social media and dating bloggers commenting away. You can read the story here - but the nutshell version is 20-something guy maintains a spreadsheet of the women he's interested in on Match.com. He meets a woman and decides to share it with her; she distributes it; it goes viral. Media maelstrom ensues. Many have criticized spreadsheet guy for rating his potential women (7.0 vs. 9.5), for his comments ("very jappy"), for even creating a spreadsheet at all. He's been called "creepy," "ridiculously nitpicky," and a "cad" for treating women like "statistics" and for courting so many women at the same time. Seriously? What exactly did Spreadsheet Guy do that warrants this kind of judgment? More importantly, what did he do that most single people don't already do?? Hell, even the worst of his comments ("very jappy" - which, by the way, refers to JAP or Jewish American Princess) wasn't all that bad. I've heard FAR worse from other single men, AND FROM SINGLE WOMEN. Far worse. All he did was use a tool to help him keep track of his dates. And the juggling multiple women. So? Since when is it a crime to have options? When you date online, often you will chat with many people at once, go on a "meet and greet" with a few of those, and then, if you're very lucky, find someone worth seeing for a while. Welcome to dating online. Spreadsheet Guy simply put in Excel what … [Read More...]
Roger Ebert, Dating Books, and Why Some People Should Stick to What They Know
April 20, 2012 By Christie Hartman Leave a Comment
So I got a message on Facebook from a friend in the film business - Roger Ebert had just reviewed the movie Think Like a Man. The movie, which comes out in theaters today, is based on Steve Harvey's dating book. Apparently, "based on" is putting it lightly, as the book is prominently placed and discussed throughout the entire movie. You probably don't want my opinion on comedians giving dating advice. In the end, if the advice works for you (and you like waiting at least 90 days to have sex with someone you're dating), then it works for you. This isn't about Steve Harvey or his book. It's about what Ebert said about dating books. You can read Roger Ebert's review here, but here's the good quote: "Anyone who reads advice books about romance has one problem to begin with: bad taste in literature. The idea that a book can advise a woman how to capture a man is touchingly naive. Books advising men how to capture a woman are far less common, perhaps because few men are willing to admit to such a difficulty. " Ebert also made somewhat similar comments in his review of the movie He's Just Not That Into You, also based on a dating book of the same name (also written by a comedian). To him, the advice for women was startlingly obvious.You can see my comments on this here. Not everyone likes the idea of reading a book with dating advice in it. These are often the same kind of people who ridicule the idea of reading any self-help book and can't bear the thought of going to … [Read More...]
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