Generally speaking, when I am not involving myself in looking for, or thinking of finding a romantic partner, I don’t spend a whole lot of time worrying about whether or not I’m attractive. Although it sounds egotistical or even self-deluding, I think I’m pretty. I’d date me. I’d date me and never let go! Yeah, I would probably support the me I’m dating to continue working toward regaining a healthier lifestyle, but it wouldn’t be a deal breaker that I wasn’t already there. Life, after all, is a journey. We’re all trying to get somewhere. For some, it’s not a big deal if the person they’re seeing is on their way, already there, or been there and ready to stop moving. But whether you agree or not (and I know at least one of my readers will), weight issues and financial distress are probably two of the biggest deal breakers no matter where you are in the journey and it isn’t until I have to consider myself through the eyes of others, in hopes of gaining their attention, that I begin to pick myself apart. When I start picking, it slows down my progress.
So, I have hit a pothole. While I repair the damage, let me talk to you about this a little, okay? Don’t worry, I’m pretty good at multitasking. Our chat won’t slow me down any more than I already am.
Recently I rejoined an online dating site. I’m not totally sure what made me do it. Maybe it was the success story I’d heard from a friend, maybe it was hearing how he was talking about his new girlfriend that made me think, “Awww, I want someone to think about me that way.” I don’t know. As usual, finding sexual activity hasn’t been a problem (unless you consider having to refuse it a problem, which I often do), so that wasn’t it. All I know is that almost as soon as I got started, I wanted to cancel my profile and I’m still debating that option.
Creating a profile is only slightly painful. While I clearly don’t have too much trouble talking about things that interest me, I do feel put out with “packaging” myself for a specific consumer. After all, if I knew how to advertise for the man I’m looking for, I feel certain someone would have bought my line of wares by now. The thing is, I’m a legitimately complicated person, full of all the right contradictions (like being girly but totally able to be one of the guys) and some that might piss a person off (I can be both deeply logical and emotional depending on the topic). The more I divulge, the more I feel each attribute requires definition or at least explanation. That’s bad. Really bad, considering that most men are less apt to read an epic, and I’m disinclined to try to synopsize all the crucial details that someone should know when deciding to hung out with me,much less try to date me. Eventually my description always misrepresents me in some regrettable way.
If I post that I like one thing or the other, these tastes are often the single minded focus of those who contact me and although they virtually never intend it, I end up getting frustrated over this element of their shopping experience and run away from them. Do people really not want to dig that deep before deciding whether or not to enter into a courtship of any kind? Of course, I might be more inclined to be patient if I was being approached by someone I found really, really attractive. That’s where it gets, well, shitty… on both sides.
When it comes to those who wish to pursue me, I do okay until it comes to posting photos; Rather, until I put up a full body shot. When I opened up this muddy can of romantic worms, I was getting pinged every five minutes by men ranging from 23 to 52. As soon as the full body shot was up, suddenly even ones I was chatting with regularly stop responding. So with one perfectly pleasant exception, suddenly the well was dry again. There’s only so often you can have this happen before you stop deciding it must be a coincidence. One man I had found really attractive blocked me mid conversation when the photo was posted. I won’t lie… that stings a bit. It’s happened before. Nowadays when something like that happens, I consider myself to have been spared words of abject disappointment. After all, rejecting is a nasty business. Only the truly despicable find pleasure in dashing someone's hopes of the ultimate hook up.
So, what about that “exception” guy? Isn’t he enough for now?
Ah yes, the one that stuck around. Like I said, this stuff is shitty on both sides and the truth is, based on what I read and what I saw, I wasn’t attracted enough to move forward. That’s not his fault by any stretch. He’s friendly, well spoken in his writing, enthusiastic, involved in his passions. He even sent me a link to some press that referred to him as handsome (my press pointed to my heft!). These are all things I desire and expect in a man. By all accounts he seems like a good guy; that which LA is in short supply. As is often the case, I found myself revisiting his profile in hopes that the last time I’d seen it I was just not open, not in a good mood. But for whatever reason, I just didn’t feel compelled. Feeling like crap over the idea of having to tell him, in any way shape or form, is what makes me want to throw in the towel. More often than not, this is precisely what my dating experience has been… talking to or going out with men whom I should feel lucky to date, feeling lukewarm and hoping that something will develop if I put in enough time. And while I think that some of my past dates deserve to wind up with someone who doesn’t care who they’re with (in the case of those who can’t put forth the most miniscule effort to make themselves desirable, even as a friend), many of them don’t. That is certainly the case for the man who was genuinely interested.
It pains me to feel like there is something wrong with me that is preventing me from connecting. And even though it's always nice to meet good people, I don't really have trouble making friends. I am not on a dating site, splaying my guts out like a sausage squeezed out of it's casing, in hopes of a bigger crop of male buddies.
If anyone had once suggested that I would find myself becoming increasingly closed off to the idea of finding the right man at this point of my life, I would have laughed my guttural, obnoxious laugh and shot some snarky yet playful remark indicating my utter disbelief. But here I am cramming whatever I can into the doorjamb to keep the heavy door to my heart from closing, and finally …the lock from latching. I get more and more closed off every year. And with each woeful attempt at connection, I feel increasingly idiotic for even trying. I honestly never thought I could reach this level of romantic pesimism in my life!
Despite the obvious limitations my flab brings to the table, what I feel doesn’t have anything to do with my body image. It is what I have experienced of dating thus far; the heaviness that weighs on my heart to tell a truly nice man that I don't want to date him, the pain of rejection when someone I am very attracted to feels that way about me, the anxiousness we both feel on that dreaded first date where we're hoping against hope that we won't have to have any more first dates and the deflation of spirit when we realize we are bound for another. It's all too much sometimes. And luckily, I know better than to believe being thin will change what I hate about this process.
So for those of you, my quiet readers, that believe my journey is one where all my effort is spent trying to attract a man and hoping the final destination to be “and they lived happily ever after,” it is most assuredly not. If it… if HE finally comes, I will consider it nothing short of a miracle. Not because I think my being fat makes me less of a catch, but because it is getting harder and harder to meet someone in a more organic way, all we have to go on with these dating sites is a list of ingredients. If I do find love it will be because this brilliant, attractive man figured out what I already know, hot or not, that I am loving and more importantly loveable.
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