I had taken some time away from the blog to work out more about what I want to achieve with it, and getting myself to a point where I have any spark of creativity in me.Since I was here last I have had several setbacks to getting better, several outcomes I could have done without, and am still taking medical advice on my situation. I am currently up to 60mg of prozac and also 2 x dothiepin at night to help me switch off.
I am not going to detail Christmas too much, but I feel it warrants a mention as I find it a time of year difficult to cope with in times of wellness, never mind in an actively depressed state. This year has been both horrible and stressful in brand new ways I wasn't expecting, but also given me fresh perspective on my family, and my relationships with them. I have gained new strength from family members whilst at the same time trying my damnedest to be supportive of them and their needs, offer as much practical help as I could and keep the mask of normality up for the duration. I will probably return to this topic in full at a later date, as it feels quite overwhelming to examine it right now.
- new subject-
It is the first week of the year, and I have had a very turbulent time, experimenting with on-line dating.
The first thing I want to say about it is that I have now removed myself from the site in question, so no point in trying to look for me on there.
The second thing is that I in no way blame the owners of the site for the responses, or my experiences with using it. Please don't go thinking I am slagging off any of the on-line dating facilities/ services, or offering my experience as representitive of what that provider can give. This is not a compare and contrast review, it is just what happened to me.
I signed up on New Years Eve. Possibly a mistake in itself, but I was feeling in need of male company, and the whole new year resolution thing swept me up in the idea that I was going to be brave and try to be more open to talking to people this year.
The next thing that became apparent was that there were a huge number of people looking to make new connections at that point, possibly for the "kiss at midnight" thing that single people are often persuaded to use as a reason to kiss someone for the first time. My phone went crazy with alerts letting me know there were people waiting to chat to me through the medium of text. It being a party night the beeps continued well into the small hours, and didn't stop. I assumed that it would slow down after people had gone back to work and gone back to their usual sleep patterns, but at any hour of the day or night I would be approached by male users of the site.
Oh dear, the men! I should point out that I love men, and have always been fond of male company, and am much more heterosexual than not. With that in mind please understand that I am massively generalising here as I don't mean every single bloke who made contact with me, but a very great number of them.
The approaches were varied. In the main it was a veriation of "hi, how are you?", which was fine, cheesy (or gross) sexual come-ons, which in my opinion weren't fine at all, jokes that came across badly in text, or lengthy preamble to try to get me to engage in "a bit of fun". This translates as biting on their hook lines and playing along with whatever ideas pass for their sexual fantasies, (presumably while they played with themselves), and being ignored when I offered opinions of my own on the topic at hand, (so to speak!).
Some of the guys were open that they wanted their "bit if fun" whilst married, or coupled up. Some I think may have been looking for a more involved version of "fun" of a professional nature, ie where money changes hands. These guys worried me. They were full of their own self importance, and often were open about having little or no respect for women. I quickly learned to delete these ones before they became abusive, and then moved on to block the more persistent ones.
By the end of the week I had blocked 99 men..... the most shocking ones were the 18-20 year olds, who had clearly far too much exposure to porn, and no exposure to real people in the real world. They could barely write in sentences, and often seemed to think I should be persuading them that I was worthy of having sex with, "sell it to me!" being the most memorable quote.
Then there were the night owls, people who clearly thought that the bast time to approach someone to chat was 3 or 4 in the morning,. Now whilst this isn't too much of a problem for me in my current state of recuperation, it sure would be if I was in work right now, I didn't mind the sweet Mexican boy who apologised for waking me when he realised the time difference, but what excuse did the guys in the same county have?
I did swap numbers with a few, but I only agreed dates with four guys. I would have set up a fifth if the guy in question hadn't been so insistent that I would have to drive for 90 mins to pick him up in my car then take him to his house, and that meeting at the pub at the end of his road was too difficult for him! I explained that there was no way I would agree to meet him for the first time out of a public place, and he started to get very cross with me. After a few hours had passed he explained that the reason he didn't want to go anywhere was that he was overweight so any walking gave him posture problems, and that he wasn't a creepy rapist after all! By then I had totally gone off him due to the language he used when cross with me in addition to the creepyness and being overweight.
The first guy I agreed to meet for a coffee in town turned out to have no idea where any cafes were (really!), despite living directly in the city centre, and was surprised that Waterstones had a coffee shop in it. This was the first major sign that things with this chap were not meant to be. We had certain things in common, but it turned out that those things sustained a five minute conversation, and there was nothing more to be gained by revisiting the topics. I drank my beverage, and struggled through for more topics to chat about. His conversational skills were somewhat limited, but out of nowhere he asked me to follow him from the shop directly to his house to be alone. I was totally taken off guard that he was basically asking me home with him within an hour of meeting and some awkward silences during that time. So I tried my best to be gracious, and explain that "its not you, its me" and make a get away as politely but firmly as possible. Two days later he messages me, not to chat and be friendly, but just to ask for sex. Its just not pleasant.
The second date was either a non-event or a lucky escape depending on how suspicious you are. I am very dubious about the motives of "J" allegedly an emergency services worker, who seemed desperate to meet me in person as soon as humanly possible, yet when the prearranged time frame came around, apparently just drove to a car park and did not get out of his vehicle to meet me. I had left my phone on charge at home when I went to that meeting point, and when I returned home after waiting for 20 minutes in the freezing cold I had got several text messages, and dating site messages trying to contact me. The dating site has an option to see how far away another user is, and it is my strong believe that he deliberately didn't get out his car to meet me thinking I would have my phone on me to go meet him. He would then be able to track me via my phone and follow me home. He got binned quickly.
The third date was this afternoon just gone, with "A". I met him at the station, he was polite, seemingly respectful and not creepy. We went for a drink, sadly a major football game was on the same day, so town was full of footie fans and police expecting trouble. He admitted that he had known about the football before setting the date up, and had therefore known that we would be in a pub full of supporters (? and didn't want to walk elsewhere, even though I had indicated I wasn't comfortable in that atmosphere). Its not my idea of a romantic setting but I let it pass. I wasn't convinced that he was single, with several comments he made during the 2 hours we sat together. For my part I did what I could to keep the conversation flowing, even though I didn't think there was any chemistry, and he made no move to flirt with me or make physical contact during the date, which I took to mean hat he realised that we had nothing in common too. The date ended and I legged it up town, being careful to make eye contact with one of the police outside the pub, in the hope that if he had tried to follow me at all, it would be spotted. He didn't follow me, but we ended the date in the traditional brush off "I'll call you" from him, so I was expecting nothing further from him. I certainly didn't expect the flurry of texts several hours later basically asking for feedback on the date, that started off polite, but when it had been made abundantly clear that a second date was not on the cards with me, then turned to creepy sexual suggestions that went on far too long. Another person binned off my phone and blocked from messaging me.
The fourth date hasn't happened yet, and I am toying with the idea of cancelling. He seems rather too similar to date three in the approach and choice of language, and I am suspicious that he is also married. None of the guys deigned to actually phone me. When they had my number, it was text only, which was rather impersonal and not exactly reassuring.
Out of the chats I had with blokes who I didn't arrange to meet, a couple were memorable. The soldier who had apparently done a tour of duty in nine different countries, despite being no older than me, who just wanted to chat all night long, and wouldn't tell me anything personal about himself and would only tell me things about being in the army. That was another hard work conversation where I wittered about inconsequential rubbish for a good hour or more. There was the lad from Yorkshire, who described himself as boring every time I tried to get him to open up. Quite repressed I think, and I wont be surprised to hear from him again asking me if I would listen to him fantasise in the most oblique terms imaginable. And finally there was "T" I am fairly sure that I will never see him, and that if I did he would treat me like a princess, but there is something slightly off-putting about a guy who wont speak on the phone, but instead spends ages constructing cyber roses out of punctuation. He was more of a friend in my eyes, and I have told him so, but he is worshipful nonetheless.
I am still interested in men, but not these men. For the time being I am done with dating.
