Online dating in your middle age feels like praying for a miracle | Shanti Nelson
I need an online dating intervention. Or a miracle.
It’s 2am and I’m wide awake – weary, wired and spun out.
I’ve been swiping for seven hours non-stop with nothing to show for it but an empty bottle of Pinot Grigio, a dull headache, massively dehydrated skin and most likely a trigger thumb. Thanks, Bumble.
“Just one more profile and I’ll quit,” I tell myself. Yeah, right, who am I kidding?
I lied about my age on Tinder to date a younger man. Now I regret it
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I’m in a mad swiping frenzy, bug-eyed and blurry, eyes wide shut.
I rounded marathon mode a few hours ago and I’m deep in the flow state, swiping through midlife profiles like an Olympic skier hitting the slalom gates – right, left, right, left.
“Keep the pace, Shanti, you got this,” I say, trying to stay positive while blindly coaching myself through the ominous obstacle course of finding love online.
My adrenaline is pumping and I’m barreling through profiles at warp speed when bam, I’m hit by a wall of hard-nos – an avalanche of bad eggs coming at me in rapid-fire succession.
“Oh God, no!” Next.
“Absolutely not!” Yikes.
“What on earth?” Eek.
“‘BunInUrOven69,’ not you again!” Once was more than enough.
Am I hallucinating or is Bumble sending me profiles I rejected five hours ago?
As if I changed my mind about scaling Half Dome with the ethical non-monogamist (and his wife), or grabbing a green juice with the polyamorous Peter Pan from Never Never Land. Believe me, I haven’t.
And call me old-fashioned (or just plain lazy) but I just can’t wrap my head around midlife polyamory. For starters, who has that kind of time?
“DramaFreeDudeDad,” really? You’re 63, with a freakin’ toddler, four dogs, and a sailboat. Do you really have the energy for multiple partners – or the sexual chutzpah, for that matter? If so, “I’ll have what he’s having.”
All the power to them, but isn’t there a separate app for “multitasking,” or a galaxy far, far away, somewhere between Burning Man and Bikram Yoga?
It would make my online dating life a hell of a lot easier, that’s for sure. I wouldn’t have to decipher the small (but very crucial) print, and considering I mistook ENM (ethical non-monogamy) for an affinity for electronic dance music (EDM), I could use all the help I can get. Good grief.
Now I have to learn a bunch of dating acronyms that essentially all mean the same thing. “CNM” (consensual non-monogamy), “GGG” (good, giving, and game), “SWT” (sex without troubles) – I get it, you don’t want to commit, just spell it out! I’m already up to my midlife-ears in business acronyms and corporate psychobabble. Are there no more sacred spaces?
Despite having only exerted my right thumb for the last seven hours, I’m getting hangry.
“For the love of God, not another blurry bathroom selfie!” I groan. “You’re telling me you’re a 59-year-old ‘Engineer at Tech’ with a degree from Stanford and you can’t figure out how to use an iPhone?” Give me a break. “It’s called a ‘timer’ and you don’t need a PhD to figure it out. Nobody wants to see your messy vanity!” Next.
Having just sent two dozen profiles down the bad egg chute (more like the rotten egg chute), I’m growing increasingly disillusioned, desperately swiping through heaps of rubbish looking for something edible. Uh oh. Is this Bumble purgatory?
What happened?
Seven hours ago, I was hopeful, excited, confident (and sober). I was riding an epic wave and feeling pretty good about my plan to go back online to find a partner, in earnest this time. “No more mucking around,” I told myself. “It’s time to put on your big girl soft pants” – I was already wearing them, the soft part anyway – “swap out the rose-colored glasses for progressives” – I’ve been resisting them with all my Gen-X heart – “and get down to business.”
Less talk and more texting, no more hiding behind the digital curtain. I’d be more discerning, more decisive, and more honest with myself about I want in a partner – less “Oh, he’s cute, maybe I’ll learn to love skydiving and jam bands,” and more “I’m 54, there’s no way in hell I’m leaping out of an airplane or listening to the Grateful Dead, no matter what he looks like. Next.”
And most importantly, no more lying about my age.
It was time to embrace midlife, menopause and online dating in all its glory. Full throttle.
Well, that was the plan anyway. In a moment of weakness, I knocked four years off my age. Don’t judge me; baby steps.
And to make matters worse, my only promising match was seductively too good to be true, and for the two hours we were texting I was convinced that his messages were being generated by AI (and yet I still imbibed). Was AI a Bumble premium add-on I missed?
What’s next? Am I going to get a “clutch pic” from a self-driving vehicle?
With my head firmly planted on the pillow and my glasses akimbo, I’m half-asleep and swiping with one eye (which might account for some of the more questionable matches), and truth be told, I might have even nodded off there for a moment (but I’m pretty sure I didn’t miss anything). Good Lord, was I just sleep-swiping?
I’m like an online dating heavyweight champ – battered, beaten, bewildered and down for the count, but refusing to give up the title.
If only I had this kind of fortitude for other areas in my life – like doing cardio, starting my Substack, meditating, or alphabetizing the spice rack. I’d be so damn fulfilled I wouldn’t be bothered with online dating.
Maybe I should learn to love skydiving, this would be the time to jump.
Shanti L Nelson is a writer and photographer