Online Dating

After 21 years of marriage I found myself divorced, a single mom to three teenagers and having to date for the first time since college. Now I wasn't a bar person in college and I sure wasn't a bar person now, so how was I going to meet people. Online dating was the only option that I really knew of and so I gave it a try, and by a try I mean I tried a little of everything.

The most recent online dating site or application that I have been testing out is Bumble. Now Bumble has a dating version, a version for finding and meeting BFF's and a business version. Given all those options I was hoping that it might be attracting some quality people to the site for a change. When I say for a change, let me just say that I have tried just about every dating site out there, and I will work my way through giving my comments about them all, but for the most part, I can say that all those ads you see on television about dating sites are the biggest lies I've ever heard.

Now on Bumble once two people "swipe right" on each other saying that they each like the other, the ball is in the woman's court. Women are in charge, they can then look at the profile and decide if they want to message the guy or not. Only caveat is that you only have twenty-four hours to message the guy or he disappears from your matches, or your hive as they call it. This idea that women were in charge appealed to me because I thought maybe it would keep away the scammers and liars.

When I look through these guys, I really take my time, I try to read what they have written and I really think hard about whether or not I think we would have anything in common and be able to form a friendship that might lead to more. I don't just swipe to the right all the time, in fact I rarely swipe to the right. So I am usually pretty excited when I get a match because I am thinking that they are going to be someone I can see in my life. Every now and again I will find that what they have written has changed, and I don't think they will match anymore, but more often than not, I will take that first step and send them a brief but cute little Hello message only to have them never acknowledge it at all.

Is it better to have them never acknowledge you and just disappear out of your matches or to have them say something nasty to you about how they would never be seen with a woman like you? I don't know, personally I think both outcomes hurt, but the nasty comments are the worst. That is the first option of responses or lack of responses you get on a dating site. The other option are the guys looking for a hook-up. It doesn't matter how often I say I want nothing to do with that, they still hit me up, and what is even worse is to read their profiles and they say they aren't looking for a hook-up either. The last option are the scammers, the guys who claim to be a widower living in a foreign country for work, or in the service and that start talking about undying love in the second message and then start asking for money. Ok guys, you know I may be dating again as a middle aged woman but I am not stupid, seriously.

So far Bumble is ranking right up there with all the other sites. I never get a response from anyone that isn't looking for a hook-up or trying to scam money. If I could find another way to meet people, I would be all for it, but since I haven't found anything, I'll keep reviewing these sites and just hoping that one in a million real guy actually happens.