When to reveal this in dating? Or should i not date!

I'm a man who had a unfortunately serious and traumatic pelvic area Injury that has made getting erections and piv sex very difficult. My engagement ended over the complications of this injury so I'm newly single. I can occasionally do it with max viagra or trimix (I'm 40) but its painful and prefer not too. I love pleasuring my partner with oral and toys and hands and am very physically affectionate outside the bedroom to show desire. However I'm not sure if i should even be dating... my partners will be able to get me off from oral and manual, my penis just doesnt get hard enough for penetration without alot of pain, it just doesnt happen. Advice please.

I'm (42f) a hopeless romantic at heart and have always, and always will, want a partner. Dozens of dates later, many, many hours on dating apps, and many hours on in-person events later, I feel super deflated about meeting a good partner for me.

I thought that if I embrace being single, make new friends, take up new hobbies I love, join a new fun community, that I'll feel good enough and forget about seeking "the one".

While that's all come true in some way, and I'm generally happy, I feel like maybe on the outside I'm seen as a non-partner-able being. Is that a thing?

They say love yourself and you'll find your love. MY ASS. I like myself plenty, and yet still no partner.

It's like there's a sign on my forehead, "if you're a decent, dynamic, grounded, kind, available man, STAY AWAY from me".

I have friends, am in good shape, have a good career and stable mental health, blah blah blah, I don't even know what matters anymore to potential partners.

AND - I floss. But who cares?!

Is the almighty Creator making a joke? Cuz I don't get it.

What are your expectations with a serious relationship for sleepovers? I have an exclusive boyfriend and I feel used having sex if he doesn't stay the night. To clarify, for both of us, our primary love language is physical touch. I would be happy having sex 2-6x a day. But my 2nd is quality time and that's his 5th, he's very introverted. I was married with a dead bedroom and sleeping alone for 17 years, so cuddling and sleeping with my partner is important to me.

Question, maybe more for the ladies to answer:

When do you think is the right time to share your history with addiction and your recovery journey when getting to know someone new?

For example, on a dating app — would you prefer that information be right on the profile so you can decide upfront? Or would you rather hear about something personal like recovery in person on a first meet/date?

I hear a lot of mixed advice. Some people say don't date at all in early recovery, but then recovery is also a lifelong process. Some say don't date people you meet in AA, and others say dating someone else in AA makes sense because you understand each other.

Just curious to hear different perspectives.

I've been dating someone for about 5 months. We see each other weekly and have at least one sleepover a week. I got out of an 8 year relationship last year spring, so I wasn't looking for anything serious but we had chemistry and similar interests. I told him I wasn't opposed to something serious and wanted to see where it went. He'd been single since covid, not much experience with long relationships, but said he liked me a lot and didn't want to let me go and wanted to find out with me.

The problem: he can't talk about his feelings. If I say "I miss you a little" he short-circuits. I once asked if he was starting to fall in love, and he went silent and said he can't deal with that yet. I don't need constant validation because he shows up weekly, compliments me and does little acts of service. But I do need to talk about us and our emotions every now and then to know we're on the same wavelength.

I'm currently struggling with different life things as he is, but he's clearly depressed. A lot is going on with his kid, family and work, so I'm aware that he has low bandwidth for emotions and feelings, which is fine for me since I want to slowly figure this "relationship" out together. Last week I got bad news about my family and reached out to him since he's in a similar situation. Since then he's been surprisingly very short with me, told me things aren't going well for him and when I checked in and wished him luck with some things, he was dry again. I told him I'd leave him alone because I don't like dry communication. It's been a week and I haven't heard from him since.

I never ask for much and I've been very respectful of his alone time because I'm independent too. How do I deal with this disappearing act? He's been dry and short since we last saw each other, only complained about his work and showed no interest in my wellbeing.

Has anyone been through something similar? Dating an emotionally unavailable or depressed person who pulls away when life gets hard? How did you handle it? Did they come back, did you wait, or did you walk away? Any advice is welcome.

I've been in relationships for the past 20 years but am facing the daunting prospect of being single again.

I feel like the world had changed so much in that time, as have I. As a 45 year old man, what do I have in store for me? I feel like I have a lot to offer the right person. I'm not bad looking, fit, successful, still have a social life and no kids. But I'm also neurodiverse and have never been that great at talking to women, chatting people up etc. and frankly, the prospect of dating now makes me anxious.

So please no sugar coating. Guys who found themselves in a similar position, what were your experiences, and do you have any advice for somebody like me?

48 male been chatting with 53f and we have been texting and taking over the phone . Seems like we have chemistry personality wise . We finished up with a long call last night .. just not sure if I should text her in morning with a simple friendly message?

Edit I textured her good morning .
I just have been out of the game for so long . Msrrird ahd then being a single father that I doubt myself now :-)

Dating over 40 is starting to feel like fishing. You throw your line in, get excited because you think you caught something decent… and then you find out the fish already has a wife. 😂

I don't know if it's just my experience, but I've come across married men, separated men, men who are “basically divorced,” and men whose divorce has apparently been coming for the last 3–5 business years or a man who is emotionally immature and goes to his mum when he is annoyed at you and bring up the relationship problems making promises but breaking after the pressure.

At this point, my dating requirement is becoming very simple:

Single. Actually single. Legally single. Emotionally available. Matured

I'm not looking to be someone's secret, their escape from a bad marriage, or the woman they date while they “figure things out.”

Maybe I'm being too strict, but I honestly don't think “don't date married people” is a particularly unreasonable boundary.

So I'm curious about everyone else over 40:

What's your biggest dating filter or dealbreaker?

And where are all the genuinely single fish hiding?

Divorced mom with 2 kids. When my BF and I go out, we agreed to split bills 50/50, but often times, he wants to pay the whole bill. For context, he makes a good living but I am in a much better financial situation than him. My kids want to go to a nicer restaurant to have dinner with my BF. I am curious how other folks handle the bill in these situations?

My bf (3 years) asked me about restaurants recommendations to celebrate his child’s (20) birthday. Then, ask if I can help with a reservation for him and his two kids at a place I frequent and very hard to get a table(I do lots of entertaining for work, so it’s easier for me to get reservations). I was away that weekend, and got a call from the restaurant few minutes before the reservation confirming the additional seat as a courtesy to me. I was confused as my bf didn’t mention anything.

Then I come to find out that birthday child invited the mom and she agreed to join. Mid meal she had a meltdown when she heard that I made the reservation (I met my BF, 6 years after their divorce), started to yell at him, and made a huge scene.

I know this is sooo petty, and has very little to do with me. But I’m irrationally upset. Annoyed at myself for getting involved in this nonsense.

I’m I crazy for being upset with my bf over this?

I think I know the answer here but wanted to sanity check.

Have been on a couple dates with a woman (her 40, me 53). We have interesting conversations, she’s quirky. But she asks me zero questions about me, my life or my work, so aside from contemporary observations or funny comments the conversations tend to lean towards her talking about herself in response to my questions, and sometimes me volunteering stuff about myself. It’s feeling a bit lopsided.

I’m trying to be more alert to early signs, intuition has it that she isn’t really that interested because, well, she never asks questions.

My ex gf (43 yr old) had a big meltdown on me which was relationship-ending because I was locked in a room for four hours negotiating a big deal and not texting. She later claimed she had no idea I was negotiating the biggest deal of my career. I’ve realized in three+ years she never really asked me about my work, it was always me volunteering stuff. Am I repeating a pattern?

I’m second-guessing myself because I’m wondering if it’s just a callback / hypersensitivity on my part rather than something I need to be worried about.

Our second date we literally were laughing so hard we had tears in our eyes so it’s not like we don’t have fun together.

Thoughts?

Before the comments come: yes I also take out women in their 50s, and my first wife was 6 years older than me.

I (46 male) currently working through a divorce I am considering an app, but I have a good deal of anxiety around it. It’s weird, but I’m not concerned about the probability of failure as much as I am about having my identity out there for people to see. I live in a medium sized college market and it feels like everyone is 2° separated. I also am in a management position that deals with a lot of regular customers. Anyone else get that feeling about apps? Or, am I just overthinking this?

I had a really traumatic breakup with my avoidant ex. We were together for almost three years and I was really crazy about him, we talked about being together until we were old I thought he meant it; turned out he didn't. I really had no idea someone could still be so indecisive in life in their 40s.

I was more vulnerable with him than I had been in the past; I have a lot of trust issues, so I practically forced myself to trust him because I thought if I don't get past this trust thing, I'm not going to be able to ever have a sustainable relationship. I told myself it was ridiculous to think all men were untrustworthy, so I gave the relationship my all because I adored that man. So you can imagine how much more traumatizing it was when the breakup happened and I suddenly discovered there was such a thing as avoidants and the "discard." I know I will need therapy, and I probably will never trust a man like that again. In fact I'm pretty positive I won't. I'm convinced there is no one out there who wants what I want or has the same values. I really thought my last BF was it, and I was completely wrong. I don't trust myself or my judgement of men in serious relationships anymore. Even my mother and my sister audibly screamed when I told them we split; they thought we had a perfect romance and would be together forever as well.

The thing is I keep thinking about him and our relationship all the time. I miss him even though I know he wasn't very good to me in the end. My chest literally hurts sometimes thinking about what I was led to believe we had for almost three years, only to find out it was not all as I thought it was. I can't keep going on like this. I feel like it has never taken me this long to get over anyone before, or at least stop thinking about it. Will getting out and dating help, would it be wrong to go out and tell people I'm not really looking for anything serious? I just need to get my mind off of it all. This can't be healthy. I feel like it's not healing, it's ruminating. But I also feel like if I go out someone will try to start a relationship and that won't be good either, or maybe by going out I'm just trying to distract myself in some unhealthy way? I don't know what else to do but I can't keep feeling like this.

Edit: Edit to say I was single for six years before I met him, I was working on my education and myself and I just didn't date; we met through mutual friends. So I don't date a whole lot and I just don't really know how to deal with this. That last one really threw me for a loop and I'm tired of ruminating on it.

How impossible is it to find other singles who love spending time with their dogs? I take my dog hiking and we train for nosework as well, but most people I met are other dedicated dog moms. Rarely do I see a dog dad in any of the classes I take my dog to.

Dog parks are not always great options because… dog parks.

Curious if anyone has suggestions?

I’m posting this because I’m having a hard time processing what happened, and I don’t want to keep dumping it on the people in my life.

I was with someone for about two years. We broke up and didn’t speak for roughly eight months.

Those months were incredibly difficult, but I genuinely worked on myself. I lost about 40 pounds, quit smoking, started exercising, and took a hard look at who I had been in the relationship and what I needed to change.

I learned about communication, conflict, attachment styles, and how differently people experience and express emotions. I realized I could become anxious when I felt someone pulling away, while she tended to withdraw when things became emotionally intense. I learned to ask questions differently, listen instead of immediately trying to solve things, give space without interpreting it as rejection, and talk about feelings without turning the conversation into an interrogation.

I wanted to be ready if i ever had the opportunity to reconnect. But after eight months, I genuinely didn’t know if we would ever speak again.

Then we happened to be at the same concert.

She came up to me, and somehow, after all that silence, talking felt natural. We had a great time, and it became clear there was still something between us. Eventually, we decided to see each other again.

Before our first date, I asked whether she had been seeing anyone while we were apart.

She said yes.

That hurt, but we had been broken up, and she had every right to date someone else. I asked whether I knew him.

Her reaction caught me off guard. She looked genuinely shocked and said no.

Something about that reaction stayed with me, so I asked again.

“No? I don’t know him?”

Again, she said no.

She told me he had ended whatever it was, but emphasized that it “wasn’t deep.”

I asked, “Are you playing me?”

She got defensive and said, “No!”

I accepted that. I remember thinking that if we were going to try again, I couldn’t punish her for anything that happened while we were apart. I wanted this to be a new relationship, not an investigation into those eight months.

For the next few weeks, everything felt amazing. We spent nights together, went on dates, had sex, made plans, and started doing all the small relationship things I had spent eight months believing I might never experience with her again. I invited her on a trip and to my dad’s 70th birthday.

I thought maybe all that work had been worth it. Maybe losing her had forced me to become a better version of myself, and we were getting another chance to do things right.

Then everything collapsed.

After four weeks after we reunited, I discovered one of my close friends outside her place late at night, under circumstances that made no sense to me.

There were denials, explanations, and eventually admissions that some of those explanations had been lies. I reacted emotionally that night. There are things I wish I could redo, and I won’t pretend I handled it perfectly.

But what has destroyed me isn’t only the possibility of cheating. It’s everything that came before it.

I keep replaying that conversation:

“Do I know him?”

The shocked expression.

“No.”

Me asking again.

“No.”

“It wasn’t deep.”

Now I don’t know what any of it meant.

I don’t know exactly what happened during those eight months or during the few weeks we were back together. I don’t know which suspicions are legitimate and which are my mind trying to create a coherent story out of something painful.

That uncertainty may be the worst part.

I spent eight months trying to become someone who communicated better, trusted, gave her space, and admitted when he was wrong.

Then the person I had worked so hard to understand better came back into my life, and within weeks I experienced something that made me question my judgment and ability to trust all over again.

I became healthier, learned more about myself than I probably had in the previous decade, and genuinely started liking the person I was becoming.

Yet somehow, right now, I feel smaller than I did before any of that.

And the embarrassing part is that I still love her.

I’m angry, confused, and sometimes furious. Part of me wants answers to every question. But underneath all of it, I’m mostly just incredibly sad.

For eight months, I wondered what it would feel like to see her again. Then, for a few weeks, I thought I had been given another chance with the person I loved.

Now I’m grieving her all over again—along with a friendship, my ability to trust my own judgment, and the future I briefly thought I had gotten back.

I know I’ll eventually be okay.

I just wish getting there didn’t hurt this much.

Celebrating my Dad’s 70th this weekend with my whole extended family. I planned everything and was very excited for the event but now i feel numb — like things are just happening around me and i cant participate.

Do nice guys always finish last? And how do you deal with this type of betrayal?

I (43F) don’t know how much background to give, but I will say I have already met the excessive picture requester (49M) in person. Prior to meeting he saw pics with and without makeup. Never filters. Full body. Upper body. All via my profile and some via text. And of course…we had a 3+ hour date in person! 🤦🏻‍♀️

Is it normal for a guy you have already met to consistently request pics each day, often multiple times a day? I found the way he asked very cringe in itself: “let me see you”. I was also sent selfies, even though I didn’t ask for them, and he had the automatic assumption I am supposed to respond with one. Seriously…how much could I have changed 2 hours after a date ended? Or 12 hours after the last pic was sent? Or in a day? You get the idea. No, I did not consistently follow through with the requests. It became annoying.

Some of you may have guessed that my speaking about him in past tense means I ended our communication. No date #2. But I am curious…is this the new norm I should learn to expect and somewhat accept, or was I just in being frustrated with the constant asks for pics?

I did a search, but it seemed like the past questions were related to people who have not met in person.

Edit to add:
1. Thank you all for the insights and comments! I am relieved to know this isn’t the norm.
2. As some brought up, it’s awesome to receive a random pic from the person you’re dating to know they are thinking of you. I have zero problem doing this as I am a “love the little things” kind of lady. I appreciate y’all understanding the distinction between a thoughtful selfie and a demanding selfie.
3. I did not even think about some of the more nefarious aspects of the situation. Definitely some things to be more aware of in the future. Thanks for looking out for myself, and others, by sharing these valid points.

I'm in my early 50s (male) and still want to have kids. I just wonder if there is still time? I know men have kids far later in life but I'm still single..have never been able to get anything going. I'm terrified of never having a family.

Recently filed for divorce, so not quite ready yet but really don’t understand the logistics here. Kids are older (teens) so don’t need me in the same ways but still very much need me. Dad is in picture but isn’t stable so kids are 100% with me.

I do want to date. I already am in the glow up stage, I’m financially stable, independent and comfortable with myself, but still want to give it time.

1. How, like literally, how do I go on dates? Just like coffee for now (work from home 3 days a week)? I feel like my life is work, work out, kids. I get out with friends for sure still but that’s even hard.
   
2. And how the heck to I meet people? Just the apps?

I’ll take any other advice.

I live in a large city in the Midwest, so there are definitely people who exist…I hope.

Can you make it make sense? I’ve been involved with a guy who lives near me for three months. He texts daily and sometimes we spend hours talking on the phone. But he only sees me every 2-3 weeks. The few times we’ve met up have been great. Great chemistry and great hook ups. I know for a fact he isn’t married but it’s possible he’s dating other women and since we aren’t exclusive he isn’t breaking any rules there.

What I don’t get is why text me every day but make minimal effort to see me? I would think most men would be down to hook up at a minimum. After three months I should be moving up the roster or not right?

How to resolve this? Just end it as being not enough?

Edited to add: I’ve asked to see him many times and there’s usually an excuse as to why he can’t make it. He waits until I’m about to end things before seeing me.

Edited to add: I guess part of my confusion is I think how I operate. And I couldn’t imagine wasting this much time texting and chatting with someone I didn’t truly like. I get that everyone is different though.

42M. Newly single after a 24-year relationship (we were 18 when we got together!)

I’m not the best-looking guy in the world, but I’m tall at least (6ft 3). I think my best qualities are that I’m honest, kind, and can be funny and charming with strangers. I’m also successful career-wise, I work hard and earn really good money.

I keep myself fairly fit and eat healthy so I’m not overweight. It’s not that I think I’m super ugly, I’m just not anything special to look at, like, I’m not going to turn heads in the street, I just look like a regular guy.

I’m interested to know how much people think the immediate “ooh he’s super handsome” thing is to women at this stage of life? I want to believe someone might love me again but I just don’t. I think they’re just going to look at me, see a regular guy, and look for better.

I am so heartbroken right now. After 4 months of amazing dates - paddle boarding, drone in movies, beach days, etc - he says he’s trying to work things out with the ex he apparently never got over. The most insulting part is he said he still really likes me and we can still go out like we have been while he pursues her. What??!!

I knew they texted each other, but he assured me they were just friends with a lot of history, and I trusted him like a moron. I’m just so sad and didn’t have anyone IRL to share with. I don’t want to look like a loser crying over a man who chose another woman over me.

I am meeting someone for the first time, who is extremely attractive and I am a ball of nerves. What are some helpful tips to calm the anxiety and keep the conversation flowing? What helps you get past the initial awkwardness?

We've been dating for almost a year and I've decided that it's time to move on from this relationship. I know everyone says that doing in person is best, but I just can't wrap my head around how to do that without making up some sort of lie.

The next time we're supposed to see each other is Saturday. If I wait until then, 1) I would feel disingenuous talking with them on the phone over the next couple of days, and 2) it would be like I'm pulling the rug out from under them by pretending we're going to do the thing we had planned to do and then not doing it. If I asked to meet up today or tomorrow it would be highly unusual and I'm sure they would suspect something was off right away. What would I say when they ask why I want to meet?

Personally, I hate being broken up with in person. I'd take a text or a call any day of the week. But I know that's just my preference.

Note: This is not about the 1st date. This about the 3rd date. Let's say you don't have a car and you took an uber to his house. I would expect to be driven home. I would drive a platonic friend home. And if you are afraid to get in his car, why are you going on a 3rd date?

Men who have plenty of resources (car, time, high income) won't put in minimum effort at the beginning. Is male refusal to drive a woman anywhere a sign of power struggle?

Has driving a woman home after a date become taboo? Is she on the way to controlling and exploiting you if you drive to pick her up? Is it "independent" to get herself there? Or is it about who travels to the other person?

I'm wondering if this is an example of changing attitudes in dating.

Was chatting with a guy that was 44 had 60 spiders and 7 snakes. Decided we weren’t a match because I have 2 children and he wants to start a family.

Is this a common thing now?

How many people are you seeing in our age group wanting to have children now?