Really dislike OLD

[clist8511]

I used to be an avid user of online dating and dating apps, but I have no desire to use that medium of meeting anyone, anymore. To me, it just doesn't seem to be 'real'. So you sign up to something, send messages to random people and hope you get on enough to form a relationship? In my experience, this hasn't led to anything lasting more than two years - and often with people who are emotionally/mentally unstable/lonely/just broken up and looking for a rebound.

 

I've had a woman cry immediately after sex because she missed her ex. I never saw her again.

 

I dated a woman who was in a relationship with someone else and who'd just had a baby with him; she pursued me relentlessly with promises of leaving him. She never did. She broke up with me when he found out.

 

I was with another woman for 1.5 years; she had nowhere to live at one point and I suggested that she stay with me until she found somewhere. She ended up staying for the duration of our relationship and did nothing but emotionally abuse me and then left me for someone else.

 

I met another who was psychologically abusive, emotionally abusive, was overly religious and broke up with me every other week. For two and half years.

 

Another I went on a date with said she'd been abused as a child and cried because she danced and flirted with someone else while we were on a date. I never saw her again.

 

Basically from my POV OLD doesn't work, and seems to be full of unstable people. The type of person I would like to date doesn't even seem to exist on these websites; a creative, successful, mature woman. I'd imagine she's out socialising and not on a website trying to meet someone.

 

I mean no disrespect to those that use OLD but it just doesn't work for me. And to top it off someone on here keep putting the same comment into one of my threads, telling me to date to get over my ex - I just don't see how that's the answer at all.

 

Whatever happened to meeting people organically? People you strike up conversations with, or meet through friends? Or meet doing things you like? Why are we all so accustomed to OLD? Feels like an episode of Black Mirror. No-one seems to want to deviate from the norm.

[clist8511]

That's probably why we're all here asking questions about what so-and-so thinks, are they interested? Etc etc. Because we don't know these people. Who are they? They're complete strangers. Sending a few messages doesn't mean we know them.

 

If you end up in a relationship with someone you've known for years or a friend of a friend or whatever, it's more likely you'll know them well enough to know what's going on with your relationship and whether they're interested, etc.

[Fair]

Exactly. I just created a post about this myself and was shot down by someone claiming it was another mindless rant. Well, If there are so many complaints, and yes, I realize these threads are full of them (and no wonder)... maybe people should start coming to the realization that OLD actually doesn't work for many reasons.

 

I don't understand why people are in such hot defense of it. Talk to anyone in real life whose tried it and they'll all say OLD sucks. NOT "I lived happily ever after."

Edited January 18, 2018 by Fair

[CptInsano]

I don't understand why people are in such hot defense of it. Talk to anyone in real life whose tried it and they'll all say OLD sucks. NOT "I lived happily ever after."

 

I found that OLD sucked enough to call it quits after a month. Well, not so much that it sucked, but that going out and meeting peopl IRL seemed far more fun, and OLD felt like a chore.

 

That being said, I have three people in my circle of friends who found their husband/wifes on OLD.

 

Could I have made OLD work for me? Maybe, maybe not. But I know that certain people are indeed successful with it.

[clist8511]

I found that OLD sucked enough to call it quits after a month. Well, not so much that it sucked, but that going out and meeting peopl IRL seemed far more fun, and OLD felt like a chore.

 

That being said, I have three people in my circle of friends who found their husband/wifes on OLD.

 

Could I have made OLD work for me? Maybe, maybe not. But I know that certain people are indeed successful with it.

 

This is such a good point. OLD is a chore, it's a game, it's tiring and mundane. Of course certain people can be successful, but I just think that a lot of people still do just meet people in IRL and OLD isn't for everyone. Seems fake to me.

[clist8511]

Exactly. I just created a post about this myself and was shot down by someone claiming it was another mindless rant. Well, If there are so many complaints, and yes, I realize these threads are full of them (and no wonder)... maybe people should start coming to the realization that OLD actually doesn't work for many reasons.

 

I don't understand why people are in such hot defense of it. Talk to anyone in real life whose tried it and they'll all say OLD sucks. NOT "I lived happily ever after."

 

It's true. Everyone is so accustomed to it that they're used to things failing because they sent two messages in an hour and put someone off, and think things like 'ghosting' is normal - it isn't. I don't think OLD works.

 

You can go online and see the same ten people that were there ten years ago; it's become embarrassing IMO.

 

Don't think your post was a mindless rant at all, I think you're on the nose.

[SevenCity]

I suppose you have to define your success criteria before making a statement that it sucks.

 

It appears to be a good venue to get sex,and meet people you normally would never meet IRL, but thus far that’s it. I too agree that it is riddled with women who are:

- broke

- emotionally unstable

- hung up on an ex

- entitled

- attention seeking (with no intention of ever meeting)

- flakes

 

Perhaps the same can be said about guys on it but I don’t have any first hand experience.

 

Having done it for about a year and a half I can say nothing substantial has resulted.

 

I came to a realization that, although there may be a few rare gems who would make good LTR material, the woman for which I am looking probably doesn’t use OLD. Even if she did I am competing with literally hundreds of guys for attention.

 

Unfortunately my real life consists of working and commuting in a predominantly male dominated field so there are rarely women I see that I would want to ask out.

[Zippy2000]

Basically from my POV OLD doesn't work, and seems to be full of unstable people. The type of person I would like to date doesn't even seem to exist on these websites; a creative, successful, mature woman. I'd imagine she's out socialising and not on a website trying to meet someone.

 

I mean no disrespect to those that use OLD but it just doesn't work for me. .

 

 

 

I totally 100% agree with you! OLD hasn't worked for me BUT there were 2 mini relationships I got out of my 10 years of OLD. Yes, 10 years.

 

 

I had a girl burst into tears on one of my first dates because she thought I would dump her as she was ill on the first date and threw up. I did give her a chance and she cried on the 2nd date but had to let her go when a similar thing happened like the 1st date we had.

 

 

Most OLD dates either had been good on the first date but rarely made it to the 2nd. Either because the women changed their minds or they faded on me.

 

 

Other women I spoke to online either talked for days and deleted their profiles or if we did set up a date. I had who said I hadn't agreed a date or time to meet. When I told her to read the previous messages I had sent she apologised but I lost interest at that point. Other conversations usually ended because you could see them still online talking to toher people.

 

 

I did get 2 mini relationships out of if ,y 10 from OLD but they only lasted for about a year. They both chose to leave for one reason or another.

 

 

People you meet from OLD are very easily disposable. What I mean by that is they don't have that connection with friends and family you have. So its easy to cut ties.

 

 

Out of all the dates I have and that's not many over 10 years. I have had about 25 dates. Not any of them have made it into a proper relationship. I mean don't get me wrong. It can work but it does take 2 to tango. Its hard work alright but I'm now trying to shift to meet people organically in real life.

 

 

Good luck out there if you continue with OLD. You just need to develop a thick skin.

[Maggie4]

I always felt Loveshack should have Online Dating and Regular Dating as separate categories. I really think the dynamics are different enough to warrant a separate forum.

 

I don't do online dating. I find it pretty easy to meet men offline. But maybe it's because I live in a big city. I also think people who do OLD, also tend to go online (eg. here) to search/ask for advice, maybe because their social circle is too small for dating and for support.

[Chilli]

l've only spent a few mths on it all up since divorce.

But yeah it's a bizarre thing. Wasn't around before l was married and it seems everything completely natural back then is all some big complicated charade of do's and don'ts and damn near punishable by death these days.

Add the mentality and everyone being 20yrs older now and all damaged up,oh man what a mess.

But Online does seem to bring them out that's for sure but here l must admit, over all l've been really pleasantly surprised .

l sure see plenty of those , but l didn't bother with them and anyone l have met has been pretty good really.

seems to be almost pot luck though that things might actually come together all up when you do meet though. Sure you can get plenty of dates and crap but the real deal, but of a long shot.

Still see quite a few people and stories around that have married and stuff, so that's something.

Where l am isn't anywhere near as bad as the LS world out there we all keep reading about though too and that makes a helluva difference too.

 

The only reason l dabbled in the first place though was because l'm still working on a social life. lf l actually had one l'd take RL any day for sure though so if ya can ,l'd be going for it.

 

Gotta admit, it does sound like your pickers not running too good though with a list like that your def' getting involved with the wrong women.

[d0nnivain]

Years ago after a break up everybody pressured me to try OLD because that was how "everybody" was dating. So I signed up for a 90 day subscription to e-harmony. It delivered what it said it would -- my inbox was filled with seemingly compatible men. That was as far as it went. I never had much trouble meeting men IRL but this was just an exercise in daily rejection. It was awful & painful. In 90 days I only ever managed to talk to about 5 guys, & only met 2. One was the single worst date I ever had.

 

I got off OLD & tried a Meet Up event. I got a date immediately. That didn't work out but it wasn't soul crushing. I never went back on line

[BaileyB]

Years ago after a break up everybody pressured me to try OLD because that was how "everybody" was dating. So I signed up for a 90 day subscription to e-harmony. It delivered what it said it would -- my inbox was filled with seemingly compatible men. That was as far as it went. I never had much trouble meeting men IRL but this was just an exercise in daily rejection. It was awful & painful.

 

Also my experience. I hate OLD.

 

There was the guy who sent me sexually provocative messages...

 

And the guy who verbally abused me and told me that I was a stuck up ***** who thought I was better than everyone else because I sent him a message that said "thanks for your message. Unfortunately, I don't think we have very much in common but I do wish you well in your search..."

 

No, thank you. I would much rather be single than sign up for OLD again...

[clist8511]

I too agree that it is riddled with women who are:

- broke

- emotionally unstable

- hung up on an ex

- entitled

- attention seeking (with no intention of ever meeting)

- flakes

 

 

 

I came to a realization that, although there may be a few rare gems who would make good LTR material, the woman for which I am looking probably doesn’t use OLD. Even if she did I am competing with literally hundreds of guys for attention.

 

 

Very true - the part in bold is exactly how I feel. Also that list is pretty much spot on for women on there (don't know about men either) - I've met women who are unsure, who never meet up, just stop replying.

 

Another interesting thing was... I was in a cab yesterday and as we drove down a rather busy street with people coming home from work, etc... I thought I bet NONE of these people are doing OLD. Probably if anything, just a fraction. It's not representative of the real world at all.

 

I always felt Loveshack should have Online Dating and Regular Dating as separate categories. I really think the dynamics are different enough to warrant a separate forum.

 

I don't do online dating. I find it pretty easy to meet men offline. But maybe it's because I live in a big city. I also think people who do OLD, also tend to go online (eg. here) to search/ask for advice, maybe because their social circle is too small for dating and for support.

 

Really interesting point - the social circle is quite small which is also why they can't meet anyone IRL. There should be two different categories, it's not the same at all!

 

Years ago after a break up everybody pressured me to try OLD because that was how "everybody" was dating. So I signed up for a 90 day subscription to e-harmony. It delivered what it said it would -- my inbox was filled with seemingly compatible men. That was as far as it went. I never had much trouble meeting men IRL but this was just an exercise in daily rejection. It was awful & painful. In 90 days I only ever managed to talk to about 5 guys, & only met 2. One was the single worst date I ever had.

I got off OLD & tried a Meet Up event. I got a date immediately. That didn't work out but it wasn't soul crushing. I never went back on line

 

It's just too much. It's not fun, and it's like applying for a job; your profile is your CV and with one look it's extremely easy to just reject someone.

[clist8511]

I signed up to a paid website a few days ago (which I've now deleting, despite paying - that's how bad it is!) and I found the profile of a woman who had written quite a lot about herself.

 

Most of what she'd written, 99% of her interests, beliefs, values, future goals etc were in line with mine - I was excited at first, thinking wow, she sounds great, etc. I messaged her - nothing cheesy, I expressed that I found her profile interesting, we have a lot of things in common etc.

 

She came online and didn't even bother to reply. I found that indicative of just how shallow OLD can be; sure, I may not have been her type physically but does personality count for nothing? She wasn't 100% my type either, but, the interests outweighed it for me.

 

I found that experience quite frustrating. If, for example, her and I knew each other through work/friends/whatever, we'd probably chat, discover we were similar, become friends, whatever. But here is a medium in which she just ruled me out completely without even so much as a reply based purely on the one picture I have up and the content of my profile - she isn't obligated to reply, I get that. But if you approach someone in a bar, or a coffee shop and say something pleasant or offer to buy them a drink - it's unlikely that they'll just ignore you. They might turn you down but just ignore you? I just find it rude, I suppose. If someone had messaged me I'd at least engage. I don't know.

 

I must admit that I've only ever done OLD. Being an introvert and having other issues in my life have prevented me from approaching women IRL but I think I'm now ready to say that I quit OLD.

[clist8511]

Also my experience. I hate OLD.

 

There was the guy who sent me sexually provocative messages...

 

And the guy who verbally abused me and told me that I was a stuck up ***** who thought I was better than everyone else because I sent him a message that said "thanks for your message. Unfortunately, I don't think we have very much in common but I do wish you well in your search..."

 

No, thank you. I would much rather be single than sign up for OLD again...

 

 

That's actually quite thoughtful and polite, some people don't even bother to reply. He sounds like a right ***hole.

[Cookiesandough]

I wouldn't take offense if I were a guy and a woman did not respond to me.. Your average woman online gets too many messages to respond to. She probably didn't open it. You can't expect really blame someone's character for feeling overwhelmed and especially when 95% are "hey, what's up", at some point most women just stop opening them/give up/come online and then close their screen

Edited January 19, 2018 by Cookiesandough

[Chilli]

lf it's any consolation l had plenty of women write that to me too, even less , often it's just ahh- Hi.

 

Someone mentioned matches , mine sent dozens of matches every day but l didn't even bother with them they were ridiculous. l wasn't sure if you were suppose to do something with them though, l never did.

[clist8511]

lf it's any consolation l had plenty of women write that to me too, even less , often it's just ahh- Hi.

 

Someone mentioned matches , mine sent dozens of matches every day but l didn't even bother with them they were ridiculous. l wasn't sure if you were suppose to do something with them though, l never did.

 

Or those 'Meet Me' functions they have on some websites; someone clicks that they want to meet you but.... that's it. Erm, OK.

[d0nnivain]

So now that we have established you hate OLD & lots of us agree with you, what are you going to do to meet women?

[MaleIntuition]

It’s just another tool to meet people. I think the experience will be very different for different age groups and for men and women. Where I live most singel girls 23-30 seem to use Tinder so it would be sort of stupid not to put some effort into using it properly. One thing I really like about the dating apps is that they remove some of the vagueness that otherwise might occure; by the context it’s clear that my interest is in a romantic relationship.

 

With that said it has some obvious problems. Girls will complain about players and guys about flakey girls. The obvious reason for this is that girls are to picky and guys are to... ehm horny. When I think maybe, I’ll swipe yes; when girls think maybe they lean towards no. Good looking guys can multidate all day long and really don’t feel any stress towards settling while the average looking guys either have to lower their standards, or get the occasional good match and freak out after the first date. So their you have it; girls meet players and guys get disappointed or flaked on, because she went out with the player instead.

 

It’s a tricky situation to “fix”, but for women I would suggest to be somewhat less picky (increases the odds of finding someone who is interested) and for guys to be a bit more picky (reduce the chance for disappointment). That would help to balance the situation somewhat.

[clist8511]

So now that we have established you hate OLD & lots of us agree with you, what are you going to do to meet women?

I am heading out into the real world. To increase the amount of things I do, socially. Start going to MeetUps, and places I would expect to bump into people with similar interests. Start more conversations. This is to make more friends primarily, though

[d0nnivain]

FWIW -- I had a lot of luck at business events -- business card exchanges, industry educational events. Its like meeting "at work" but not at your company. No awkward how to get through Monday because the EX will be there.

[sdraw108]

I've used OLD a lot in the last 10-15 years, and on the whole I have to agree that it is mostly a waste of time. You can meet someone worthwhile, but the huge amount of effort and frustration you have to put into it is barely worth it I think.

 

I've had one relationship out of it that lasted 4.5 years but she ended up cheating on me so I don't know if that counts as a "success" or not. Plenty of relationships fail after a few years regardless of how you meet, so I don't know if that should be attributed to OLD specifically.

 

This time around, I briefly tried Tinder and POF but got fed up pretty quickly and deleted the apps. When I'm ready to date properly, I will focus on real world methods. I'm already trying to get myself involved in more activities and groups from meetup.com and have met plenty of friendly people. This has a huge advantage over OLD in that even when you're not achieving dates, you're still developing your social circle.

[Zippy2000]

My female friend received a few messages where she was asked if she would like to kick men? Another sent her a dick pic!

 

 

Another female friend received a load of abuse when she said she wasn't interested as distance was a factor. Cowards hide behind screens.

 

 

I'm trying to meet people out in real life now. I still dabble in OLD but it tends to be new users I contact. The problem online is people still speak to others on the web site/app where you meet them.

 

 

People suffer from the grass is greener syndrome thinking the next date is going to be better than the next

 

 

People disappear/ghost on you/fade when they lose interest.

 

 

OLD is just a tool to meet someone but its a huge gamble on your emotions and a numbers game.

[LoverOfDance]

After reading your thread, I am quite positive that OLD is not your problem. Definitely not. I think you need to do a soul search and ask yourself why you would stay with someone who breaks up with you every week. We all have things to work through.

 

That being said, if online dating doesn't work for you, don't use it. We are all different and something that will work for you won't necessarily work for someone else and vice versa. Like the saying goes - "another man's meat is another man's poison".