How can I find a connection with a man I’m actually attracted to?
April 7, 2017 7:13 AM Subscribe
I’m sick of my dating problems, particularly after they’ve come to a head with this most recent guy. The main problem: My dating history has never included a man I am actually attracted to.
Background: I’m a straight woman, 28 years old. My primary social environment is other graduate students at my university. Yes, before you ask, I am in therapy for a number of the issues I’ve listed below.
My standards, such as they are:
- I must actually be attracted to him and want to have sex with him, like I do with This Guy, who has actually made me understand what actual physical attraction is after my messed-up relationship history.
- I really, really want him to be a fellow PhD student, in large part because I want someone I feel I can relate to who will be doing similar things to me and who can relate to the fact that I am a grad student because they are also a grad student and we have weird schedules. My ideal relationship is ‘two-PhD power couple’. Doesn’t have to be another professor-wannabe; I would actually kind of prefer they weren't so we don't have to deal with the two-body problem. I have mostly tended to gravitate toward fellow STEM people, mostly because of relatability and similarity in interests and outlook; for whatever reason, most of the ones I have gravitated toward have been engineers. This most recent guy is an engineer. I am not an engineer, I am a scientist. It is probably worth mentioning that a quarter of the grad students here are engineers, though.
- I really, really want him to be not graduating in the next two years. My heart cannot do long distance. I am done with that until a relationship has had years to develop.
- Shares basic values with me like being kind, decent (which includes things like being able to talk out conflict calmly and not being physically or emotionally abusive, and not being physically or emotionally abusive includes not being abusive in the ways my parents have been), and generally liberal/lefty/feminist/not racist/not LGBTphobic/etc. There is wiggle room on economic opinions, of course, but socially they’ve got to share my liberal/lefty values.
- I am probably not going to be attracted to him if I learn he’s not got the same beliefs I do, which are basically atheist/secular humanist. I may have a little wiggle room with agnostics.
- Has his shit together re: his psychological baggage (with any illnesses being treated), or at least has baggage compatible with mine. (I’m not baggage-free, obviously, but my shit’s pretty together compared to most people I’m acquainted with.)
- Preferably doesn’t want kids. I may be persuaded to have ONE but with SIGNIFICANT compromises on his part, including but not limited to requiring him to take paternity leave and making goddamn sure he does his half of the childcare, to preserve my career. Related: I really don’t want to date a man who’s older than me. This is to compensate in large part for any gender-related imbalances. I will never play second fiddle. This is a duet with equal scores.
- Similar (enough) sense of humor and compatible personality. Is adventurous, including in bed.
- Is nerdy and appreciates my nerdiness and will get nerdy with me.
- Optional-ish: Is kinky and perhaps a bit on the subby side in bed.
My relationship problems:
- I have had two serious relationships, each lasting two years, and a smattering of dates. I have never been physically attracted to any of them. The serious relationships I entered into because I had seriously low self-esteem at those times and thought that I had to take what I could get instead of what I actually wanted. I had to sort of ‘talk myself’ or ‘fool myself’ into believing for any length of time they were attractive enough to have sex with. Both of these relationships were also, for the most part, long-distance, which compounded this problem. I will never do long-distance again unless I have been with the person for YEARS.
-My parents’ relationship is massively dysfunctional, and is all sorts of screwed up, including the getting engaged after six weeks of dating, Mom’s comments about Dad’s poor endowment/skills in the sack, their abuse (including physical) of each other, their lack of sex, and their obvious lack of attraction/love. Dad was pretty distant and unemotional when I was a child (and is a messed-up human being) and Mom was alternately loving and EXTREMELY SCARY due to her anxiety issues and what I am certain is undiagnosed ADD (and is also a messed-up human being). I am almost certain I developed some kind of fearful-avoidant attachment style from these people. I cannot remember a large chunk of my childhood and it is mostly because of them.
- I am painfully oblivious to male flirting. I do not know how to tell when I am being flirted with. It’s not that I’m never flirted with, because thank goodness I have friends who tell me when I’m being flirted with. This is probably because of my past history of thinking that I was not fuckable/lovable because of getting a lot of rejection and thinking I was hideous/otherwise undateable, which led me to assume that every positive overture from a man was just friendly. I was an ugly duckling when I was younger, which has made this a problem.
- The men I KNOW have been attracted to me have never been men I’ve found attractive, and have sometimes been outright repulsive to me. I think someone will tell me ‘these are the men you should be dating!’ or 'lower your standards!' or 'settle!' and it seriously makes me want to cry because I do not want a repeat of my last two relationships ever again. I will never, ever date a man I’m not physically attracted to again. Please don’t tell me to ‘get interested’ in men I don’t find attractive; I can’t force myself to do this, and you would be mad if someone told yourself to try to force yourself to. You can't force being attracted to other people. I’m rather visually-oriented, too, for a woman.
- I don’t actually know how many men I’ve actually found physically attractive, save one (current guy). It feels a lot less easy to ‘access’ this very visceral feeling than I think it probably is for the average person, probably due to my abnormal dating history.
My not-specifically-relationship issues and things to consider:
- I have recently-diagnosed ADD. It’s medicated.
- I tend to be very cerebral and in-my-head. I am doing better at getting out of my head when I need to.
- I have some social anxiety as a result of general social issues when I was a kid. I seem to be reasonably well-liked due to doing my damnedest to be friendly and generous and kind to everyone (within reasonable extents), but perceive myself as pretty awkward.
- I hate to bring this up, but I think it might be relevant: My IQ is well above the ‘socially optimal’ range of 125-155 as defined by Leta Hollingworth. A friend of mine suspected this even before I divulged this to him in a moment of vulnerability and seeking help. A cursory Google search of ‘profoundly gifted dating’ turns up results that suggest people in this range tend to be dissatisfied with their relationships or die alone. To pre-empt any knee-jerk responses of 'you filthy humble-bragger', I feel bad even bringing this up and it feels like I’m being some sort of arrogant asshole even mentioning this, but really I mostly feel vulnerable and like anything seemingly relevant might be worth mentioning and the best metaphor I can ever think of to describe its impact on my life is that it is the sharpest double-edged sword in the world and if any of you have insights taking this into account I would be grateful.
- I have the worst case of the unfortunately-named Resting Bitch Face that I’ve ever seen. I am trying to remedy this. I’m told I look unfriendly and cold when I am anything but.
- I am average-looking without makeup. With it, I have been told I can manage an ‘8’ (in quotes because this is so subjective), and am pretty sure I’m on the cute side of average.
- I’m within normal BMI range and am trying to get down to my calculated ‘ideal weight’, which is about 10 pounds away. I work out. I bulge out in the middle a bit and my rear end needs help. Everything else is good.
- My teeth are white, but I have a noticeable open bite due to having a tongue that is too big for my mouth. It is mild, but it is not overlookable. I cannot afford braces. Literally everyone else I know has perfect teeth. I do not smile with my mouth open, or show my bottom teeth, for this reason.
This guy I am (maybe was at this point) currently extremely attracted to:
- I don’t have to ‘fool myself’ into thinking he’s attractive. To me he’s drop-dead beautiful. He’s not a ‘10’, although he is generally regarded by most of my female/gay friends as good-looking (he is probably at least on the cute side of average. If I did not know that leagues are, according to published research, not a thing, I would be highly inclined to think him out of mine, though that may be the attraction and my self-esteem issues talking).
- He’s the only guy I’ve found physically attractive to any degree here that as far as I’m aware ticks all my boxes. The others were all undergrads or upper-year grad students (he and I are both first-years).
- He’s five years younger than me (23). Most likely the main problem, because straight men in their early twenties are generally problematic. I actually thought he was 25 when I first met him, and didn’t find out until much later that he wasn’t. I adjusted my age limits down for this dude.
- He said no the first time I asked him out. This was seven months ago. I started suspecting he had changed his mind, seven months later, armed with new knowledge of Male Flirting Body Language after copious research on the internet to make sure I wasn’t just being a bit dumb and a few months of observation, inquired as to whether he wanted to add a few benefits to the old friendship. My hunch was way off. I no longer trust my ability to read body language in these situations. Was actually reasonably friendly when I ran into him in the garage in the apartments where we both live not long after Incident #2, but after Tuesday he got cold for reasons I can’t discern. At least it seemed so.
- At this point, I am incredibly sick of being attracted to him, likely more so than he is (at least, I think he's sick of it - I have been known to massively underestimate how people around me actually view me, and this happens more often than the reverse), and I want it to stop without having to end my friendship with him, partially because I value the friendship way the hell too much to do that and partially because he is an integrated part of my social network (just going by Facebook mutual friends, he's tied with another person for the most among those of them that are grad students here) and if I lost him I would probably lose the network that I have worked so, so hard to build over months now. Everyone else is on easy mode because they have huge cohorts that they socialize with. I’m in a six-person cohort, half of which is made up of people who do not really socialize. I do not want to lose what I have. My social anxiety causes me pain on a consistent basis already about my social life, and this only compounds it.
- We seemed to be alike enough, not just in interests (this is really not so special in this particular situation because we're grad students and most of our mutual friends/acquaintances are STEM people, so we're ALL nerds to an appreciable extent), but in some underlying personality traits. I have been weirded out, actually, by seeing him exhibit a good number of my *flaws*.
I am not sure what to do in addition to just meeting a ton of other grad students, and I already know a lot of them because there are only 2800 of them total at my university, and after running the numbers and looking at the statistics on how many there are, I know and am not attracted to probably about a third of the ones in my dating pool already. Help me fix my problems, and help me find one.
Background: I’m a straight woman, 28 years old. My primary social environment is other graduate students at my university. Yes, before you ask, I am in therapy for a number of the issues I’ve listed below.
My standards, such as they are:
- I must actually be attracted to him and want to have sex with him, like I do with This Guy, who has actually made me understand what actual physical attraction is after my messed-up relationship history.
- I really, really want him to be a fellow PhD student, in large part because I want someone I feel I can relate to who will be doing similar things to me and who can relate to the fact that I am a grad student because they are also a grad student and we have weird schedules. My ideal relationship is ‘two-PhD power couple’. Doesn’t have to be another professor-wannabe; I would actually kind of prefer they weren't so we don't have to deal with the two-body problem. I have mostly tended to gravitate toward fellow STEM people, mostly because of relatability and similarity in interests and outlook; for whatever reason, most of the ones I have gravitated toward have been engineers. This most recent guy is an engineer. I am not an engineer, I am a scientist. It is probably worth mentioning that a quarter of the grad students here are engineers, though.
- I really, really want him to be not graduating in the next two years. My heart cannot do long distance. I am done with that until a relationship has had years to develop.
- Shares basic values with me like being kind, decent (which includes things like being able to talk out conflict calmly and not being physically or emotionally abusive, and not being physically or emotionally abusive includes not being abusive in the ways my parents have been), and generally liberal/lefty/feminist/not racist/not LGBTphobic/etc. There is wiggle room on economic opinions, of course, but socially they’ve got to share my liberal/lefty values.
- I am probably not going to be attracted to him if I learn he’s not got the same beliefs I do, which are basically atheist/secular humanist. I may have a little wiggle room with agnostics.
- Has his shit together re: his psychological baggage (with any illnesses being treated), or at least has baggage compatible with mine. (I’m not baggage-free, obviously, but my shit’s pretty together compared to most people I’m acquainted with.)
- Preferably doesn’t want kids. I may be persuaded to have ONE but with SIGNIFICANT compromises on his part, including but not limited to requiring him to take paternity leave and making goddamn sure he does his half of the childcare, to preserve my career. Related: I really don’t want to date a man who’s older than me. This is to compensate in large part for any gender-related imbalances. I will never play second fiddle. This is a duet with equal scores.
- Similar (enough) sense of humor and compatible personality. Is adventurous, including in bed.
- Is nerdy and appreciates my nerdiness and will get nerdy with me.
- Optional-ish: Is kinky and perhaps a bit on the subby side in bed.
My relationship problems:
- I have had two serious relationships, each lasting two years, and a smattering of dates. I have never been physically attracted to any of them. The serious relationships I entered into because I had seriously low self-esteem at those times and thought that I had to take what I could get instead of what I actually wanted. I had to sort of ‘talk myself’ or ‘fool myself’ into believing for any length of time they were attractive enough to have sex with. Both of these relationships were also, for the most part, long-distance, which compounded this problem. I will never do long-distance again unless I have been with the person for YEARS.
-My parents’ relationship is massively dysfunctional, and is all sorts of screwed up, including the getting engaged after six weeks of dating, Mom’s comments about Dad’s poor endowment/skills in the sack, their abuse (including physical) of each other, their lack of sex, and their obvious lack of attraction/love. Dad was pretty distant and unemotional when I was a child (and is a messed-up human being) and Mom was alternately loving and EXTREMELY SCARY due to her anxiety issues and what I am certain is undiagnosed ADD (and is also a messed-up human being). I am almost certain I developed some kind of fearful-avoidant attachment style from these people. I cannot remember a large chunk of my childhood and it is mostly because of them.
- I am painfully oblivious to male flirting. I do not know how to tell when I am being flirted with. It’s not that I’m never flirted with, because thank goodness I have friends who tell me when I’m being flirted with. This is probably because of my past history of thinking that I was not fuckable/lovable because of getting a lot of rejection and thinking I was hideous/otherwise undateable, which led me to assume that every positive overture from a man was just friendly. I was an ugly duckling when I was younger, which has made this a problem.
- The men I KNOW have been attracted to me have never been men I’ve found attractive, and have sometimes been outright repulsive to me. I think someone will tell me ‘these are the men you should be dating!’ or 'lower your standards!' or 'settle!' and it seriously makes me want to cry because I do not want a repeat of my last two relationships ever again. I will never, ever date a man I’m not physically attracted to again. Please don’t tell me to ‘get interested’ in men I don’t find attractive; I can’t force myself to do this, and you would be mad if someone told yourself to try to force yourself to. You can't force being attracted to other people. I’m rather visually-oriented, too, for a woman.
- I don’t actually know how many men I’ve actually found physically attractive, save one (current guy). It feels a lot less easy to ‘access’ this very visceral feeling than I think it probably is for the average person, probably due to my abnormal dating history.
My not-specifically-relationship issues and things to consider:
- I have recently-diagnosed ADD. It’s medicated.
- I tend to be very cerebral and in-my-head. I am doing better at getting out of my head when I need to.
- I have some social anxiety as a result of general social issues when I was a kid. I seem to be reasonably well-liked due to doing my damnedest to be friendly and generous and kind to everyone (within reasonable extents), but perceive myself as pretty awkward.
- I hate to bring this up, but I think it might be relevant: My IQ is well above the ‘socially optimal’ range of 125-155 as defined by Leta Hollingworth. A friend of mine suspected this even before I divulged this to him in a moment of vulnerability and seeking help. A cursory Google search of ‘profoundly gifted dating’ turns up results that suggest people in this range tend to be dissatisfied with their relationships or die alone. To pre-empt any knee-jerk responses of 'you filthy humble-bragger', I feel bad even bringing this up and it feels like I’m being some sort of arrogant asshole even mentioning this, but really I mostly feel vulnerable and like anything seemingly relevant might be worth mentioning and the best metaphor I can ever think of to describe its impact on my life is that it is the sharpest double-edged sword in the world and if any of you have insights taking this into account I would be grateful.
- I have the worst case of the unfortunately-named Resting Bitch Face that I’ve ever seen. I am trying to remedy this. I’m told I look unfriendly and cold when I am anything but.
- I am average-looking without makeup. With it, I have been told I can manage an ‘8’ (in quotes because this is so subjective), and am pretty sure I’m on the cute side of average.
- I’m within normal BMI range and am trying to get down to my calculated ‘ideal weight’, which is about 10 pounds away. I work out. I bulge out in the middle a bit and my rear end needs help. Everything else is good.
- My teeth are white, but I have a noticeable open bite due to having a tongue that is too big for my mouth. It is mild, but it is not overlookable. I cannot afford braces. Literally everyone else I know has perfect teeth. I do not smile with my mouth open, or show my bottom teeth, for this reason.
This guy I am (maybe was at this point) currently extremely attracted to:
- I don’t have to ‘fool myself’ into thinking he’s attractive. To me he’s drop-dead beautiful. He’s not a ‘10’, although he is generally regarded by most of my female/gay friends as good-looking (he is probably at least on the cute side of average. If I did not know that leagues are, according to published research, not a thing, I would be highly inclined to think him out of mine, though that may be the attraction and my self-esteem issues talking).
- He’s the only guy I’ve found physically attractive to any degree here that as far as I’m aware ticks all my boxes. The others were all undergrads or upper-year grad students (he and I are both first-years).
- He’s five years younger than me (23). Most likely the main problem, because straight men in their early twenties are generally problematic. I actually thought he was 25 when I first met him, and didn’t find out until much later that he wasn’t. I adjusted my age limits down for this dude.
- He said no the first time I asked him out. This was seven months ago. I started suspecting he had changed his mind, seven months later, armed with new knowledge of Male Flirting Body Language after copious research on the internet to make sure I wasn’t just being a bit dumb and a few months of observation, inquired as to whether he wanted to add a few benefits to the old friendship. My hunch was way off. I no longer trust my ability to read body language in these situations. Was actually reasonably friendly when I ran into him in the garage in the apartments where we both live not long after Incident #2, but after Tuesday he got cold for reasons I can’t discern. At least it seemed so.
- At this point, I am incredibly sick of being attracted to him, likely more so than he is (at least, I think he's sick of it - I have been known to massively underestimate how people around me actually view me, and this happens more often than the reverse), and I want it to stop without having to end my friendship with him, partially because I value the friendship way the hell too much to do that and partially because he is an integrated part of my social network (just going by Facebook mutual friends, he's tied with another person for the most among those of them that are grad students here) and if I lost him I would probably lose the network that I have worked so, so hard to build over months now. Everyone else is on easy mode because they have huge cohorts that they socialize with. I’m in a six-person cohort, half of which is made up of people who do not really socialize. I do not want to lose what I have. My social anxiety causes me pain on a consistent basis already about my social life, and this only compounds it.
- We seemed to be alike enough, not just in interests (this is really not so special in this particular situation because we're grad students and most of our mutual friends/acquaintances are STEM people, so we're ALL nerds to an appreciable extent), but in some underlying personality traits. I have been weirded out, actually, by seeing him exhibit a good number of my *flaws*.
I am not sure what to do in addition to just meeting a ton of other grad students, and I already know a lot of them because there are only 2800 of them total at my university, and after running the numbers and looking at the statistics on how many there are, I know and am not attracted to probably about a third of the ones in my dating pool already. Help me fix my problems, and help me find one.
Some tough love: you need to get your ass into therapy right quick. There's a whole mess of stuff going on here that you should at least begin to work through before you consider being in a serious relationship. That you not only dated men you're completely unattracted to, but actually find some of the men attracted to you as downright repulsive (just for contrast: I can't think of even one person I've ever met that I would describe that way), indicates to me that you have many deep, unexamined negative beliefs and behaviors that are shaping how you approach romantic relationships. For yourself and for your future partners, you really, really should begin to get a handle on addressing those issues before you jump into a relationship.
posted by scantee at 7:50 AM on April 7, 2017 [17 favorites]
posted by scantee at 7:50 AM on April 7, 2017 [17 favorites]
Since you're a scientist, let's approach this scientifically. One way to think of dating is as a funnel, where people you find attractive goes into the top, and each of your requirements eliminates some candidates. The people who pass through the whole funnel are your "actual dating candidates".
The issue is that you only have 1 person going into the funnel. (You said "I don’t actually know how many men I’ve actually found physically attractive, save one (current guy).") I'd try to figure out why that is.
Do you find actors / fictional movie characters attractive?
What I've seen happen (and what I've personally felt) is a protective mechanism, where people think "Sure, actor X is hot, especially in that one movie. But the people I see in real life who are that physically attractive probably have nothing in common with me, and they'd laugh if I tried to date them. The people I can actually date are [limited pool of people], none of whom I find attractive."
If that's the case, you could try actually talking to the people in real life who are physically attractive. They might be more interesting than you think, and nicer to you than you expect.
What sometimes happens is a person thinks that way until they actually get flirtation / attention from one of these "hot but surely boring" people in real life. Suddenly they decide that person is not boring!
Also, if you are trying to filter for an issue (equality in relationship), don't use other measures as shorthand (only dating younger people). Someone a few years younger than you can be just as sexist / patriarchal as someone a bit older than you. Suss out their feelings on equality instead of using another measure that's not actually necessarily correlated.
posted by cheesecake at 7:53 AM on April 7, 2017 [3 favorites]
The issue is that you only have 1 person going into the funnel. (You said "I don’t actually know how many men I’ve actually found physically attractive, save one (current guy).") I'd try to figure out why that is.
Do you find actors / fictional movie characters attractive?
What I've seen happen (and what I've personally felt) is a protective mechanism, where people think "Sure, actor X is hot, especially in that one movie. But the people I see in real life who are that physically attractive probably have nothing in common with me, and they'd laugh if I tried to date them. The people I can actually date are [limited pool of people], none of whom I find attractive."
If that's the case, you could try actually talking to the people in real life who are physically attractive. They might be more interesting than you think, and nicer to you than you expect.
What sometimes happens is a person thinks that way until they actually get flirtation / attention from one of these "hot but surely boring" people in real life. Suddenly they decide that person is not boring!
Also, if you are trying to filter for an issue (equality in relationship), don't use other measures as shorthand (only dating younger people). Someone a few years younger than you can be just as sexist / patriarchal as someone a bit older than you. Suss out their feelings on equality instead of using another measure that's not actually necessarily correlated.
posted by cheesecake at 7:53 AM on April 7, 2017 [3 favorites]
Look, I was also once a mid-late 20s straight woman nursing various dating grievances, and carrying around a dissertation on what I was looking for. All of that flew out the window when I started living in the real world. You've written a novel about your perfect man, but the set of men you're potentially considering won't spring forth from your imagination, they have already been born and are out there in the world in living flesh and all of them are imperfect and none of them are going to meet all of your criteria because there is a limited set.
Consider that you don't know everything, have failed to predict some factors, and what you think you want may not actually be what you want. I know you're imagining that a fellow PhD will really GET you but believe it or not it's just as possible you're wrong about that and you may not experience that "getting" with a fellow PhD and may experience it very strongly with a guy who works at a bank or something.
This is meant with sugar, but to get straight to the point if it's not clear enough yet, you're overthinking, you're living too much on paper/in your head and you're not experiencing real people in the real world. Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and say you're probably too picky. The real world contains multitudes you have failed to account for and the only way to broaden your horizons and be proven wrong is to gain experience, give people a chance, and put yourself out there.
I'm not telling you anything that didn't work for me- I was once like you and I just happened to run into a guy I never expected on paper.
posted by stockpuppet at 7:56 AM on April 7, 2017 [49 favorites]
Consider that you don't know everything, have failed to predict some factors, and what you think you want may not actually be what you want. I know you're imagining that a fellow PhD will really GET you but believe it or not it's just as possible you're wrong about that and you may not experience that "getting" with a fellow PhD and may experience it very strongly with a guy who works at a bank or something.
This is meant with sugar, but to get straight to the point if it's not clear enough yet, you're overthinking, you're living too much on paper/in your head and you're not experiencing real people in the real world. Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and say you're probably too picky. The real world contains multitudes you have failed to account for and the only way to broaden your horizons and be proven wrong is to gain experience, give people a chance, and put yourself out there.
I'm not telling you anything that didn't work for me- I was once like you and I just happened to run into a guy I never expected on paper.
posted by stockpuppet at 7:56 AM on April 7, 2017 [49 favorites]
It's sounds like maybe this guy was the first actual crush you've ever had? And you didn't realize that that's how it is when you're attracted to someone and now you don't want to date anyone else who you don't feel the same way about because you hadn't actually crushed on any of your previous dates/partners. That feeling, the crush feeling, doesn't necessarily come strictly from physical attraction. It's a mixture of things to do with someone and you can't always predict who will trigger it in you. It's kind of the exact same dating problem every single person has who dates. There's no quick and easy way to do it, you just have to keep meeting people and getting to know them until you find one you like.
posted by Polychrome at 8:08 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Polychrome at 8:08 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
A lot of people who don't have PhDs are very smart. And there are quite a few who would probably like a lot of the same things you do. But you'll never know that if you only date the ones who tick all your boxes.
Most of my couples friends have varying educational backgrounds. Some have two graduate degrees, some have only one, one couple even has a high school graduate and a PhD. My husband has a graduate degree while I "only" have a BS. We've been married for 23 years this November and we've always been stupidly happy together; he thinks I'm really smart, I think he's really funny, and it all works.
Release some of your standards and actually meet real people. You'll be surprised, I bet.
posted by cooker girl at 8:08 AM on April 7, 2017 [8 favorites]
Most of my couples friends have varying educational backgrounds. Some have two graduate degrees, some have only one, one couple even has a high school graduate and a PhD. My husband has a graduate degree while I "only" have a BS. We've been married for 23 years this November and we've always been stupidly happy together; he thinks I'm really smart, I think he's really funny, and it all works.
Release some of your standards and actually meet real people. You'll be surprised, I bet.
posted by cooker girl at 8:08 AM on April 7, 2017 [8 favorites]
I can see glints of myself in certain anxieties you've expressed, but (for me) after some therapy and some real life, most of them went away/changed.
Re: IQ. Mine is high. Almost certainly higher than Mr. Sazerac. But ya know what? Mr. Sazerac is a better person than me. He's kinder, more empathetic, more spontaneous and less judgemental. After living some life, I realized how much better he is than some fuckface who wants to talk about Derrida late into the night. I value the things he brings to our partnership that I lack. He expands my world. An academically minded person in my field would likely not have done the same.
Your priorities change as you collect more data. I think time spent actively seeking shorter and more varied dating experiences might help you out with that.
Wishing you luck and love.
posted by sazerac at 8:11 AM on April 7, 2017 [35 favorites]
Re: IQ. Mine is high. Almost certainly higher than Mr. Sazerac. But ya know what? Mr. Sazerac is a better person than me. He's kinder, more empathetic, more spontaneous and less judgemental. After living some life, I realized how much better he is than some fuckface who wants to talk about Derrida late into the night. I value the things he brings to our partnership that I lack. He expands my world. An academically minded person in my field would likely not have done the same.
Your priorities change as you collect more data. I think time spent actively seeking shorter and more varied dating experiences might help you out with that.
Wishing you luck and love.
posted by sazerac at 8:11 AM on April 7, 2017 [35 favorites]
I am not the best person to advise on this problem, but on the other hand, I did read the whole question including the parts where you explained that you're already in therapy and have thought a lot about the reasons for all of your beliefs.
I’m rather visually-oriented, too, for a woman.
A of all, you are not unusual among women because you have eyeballs. The first step into feminist awareness is realizing that the garbage people tell you about yourself is garbage, and you're already there, but the second step is realizing that it's no more true about all other women than it is about you. I do not say this to criticize but rather, I hope, to encourage.
two of all, you are holding yourself back in a way that pains me to see and to say, but I will say it: all your criteria are good and fair but limiting yourself to STEM guys and engineers in particular is just the worst way to fulfill any of them except the common interests and grad student lifestyle ones. (I know I know I know I know. some engineers are terrific people. but not enough of them.) Consider grad students in other departments and at neighboring schools, if there are any close to you. Consider adjunct professors who are your own age (there ought to be some around.) Consider nontraditional older undergrads, if there are any who aren't in your own department. consider, god help you, the internet. You would have to discard a lot of people after first meetings because of physical chemistry, but you have a lot of rule-out criteria (that, again, I think are probably good ones) that can be more easily discerned in that venue.
lastly, do not rate people, including yourself, out of 10 even with disclaimers, and do not research up whether someone is flirting unless your research consists of asking them. and if you already asked them before, don't ask them again. I think you now know this but I'm not sure.
posted by queenofbithynia at 8:15 AM on April 7, 2017 [36 favorites]
I’m rather visually-oriented, too, for a woman.
A of all, you are not unusual among women because you have eyeballs. The first step into feminist awareness is realizing that the garbage people tell you about yourself is garbage, and you're already there, but the second step is realizing that it's no more true about all other women than it is about you. I do not say this to criticize but rather, I hope, to encourage.
two of all, you are holding yourself back in a way that pains me to see and to say, but I will say it: all your criteria are good and fair but limiting yourself to STEM guys and engineers in particular is just the worst way to fulfill any of them except the common interests and grad student lifestyle ones. (I know I know I know I know. some engineers are terrific people. but not enough of them.) Consider grad students in other departments and at neighboring schools, if there are any close to you. Consider adjunct professors who are your own age (there ought to be some around.) Consider nontraditional older undergrads, if there are any who aren't in your own department. consider, god help you, the internet. You would have to discard a lot of people after first meetings because of physical chemistry, but you have a lot of rule-out criteria (that, again, I think are probably good ones) that can be more easily discerned in that venue.
lastly, do not rate people, including yourself, out of 10 even with disclaimers, and do not research up whether someone is flirting unless your research consists of asking them. and if you already asked them before, don't ask them again. I think you now know this but I'm not sure.
posted by queenofbithynia at 8:15 AM on April 7, 2017 [36 favorites]
I really, really want him to be a fellow PhD student, in large part because I want someone I feel I can relate to who will be doing similar things to me and who can relate to the fact that I am a grad student because they are also a grad student and we have weird schedules. I really, really want him to be not graduating in the next two years.
This is so, so literal and so, so limiting. I feel like you're saying - you need someone who has the same number of years left in school as you so they have the same courseload and the same deadlines and the same lab schedule, is close enough in physicality AND academic coursework timeline so there is never a distance to overcome etc etc - because the more absolutely identical he is to you, the less likely there will be frictions that damage your relationship. This seems like a really clenched and defensive crouch.
Maybe instead you need someone who is compassionate and understanding of what it's like to have an unconventional schedule in the service of a reaching a big looming important ambitious goal - empathetic and flexible and mature enough to talk things through with you when they're challenging. I would bet this is a much larger group of men to date, and full of more generous possibilities for a relationship that truly nourishes you and makes you bloom over the years.
posted by sestaaak at 8:30 AM on April 7, 2017 [37 favorites]
This is so, so literal and so, so limiting. I feel like you're saying - you need someone who has the same number of years left in school as you so they have the same courseload and the same deadlines and the same lab schedule, is close enough in physicality AND academic coursework timeline so there is never a distance to overcome etc etc - because the more absolutely identical he is to you, the less likely there will be frictions that damage your relationship. This seems like a really clenched and defensive crouch.
Maybe instead you need someone who is compassionate and understanding of what it's like to have an unconventional schedule in the service of a reaching a big looming important ambitious goal - empathetic and flexible and mature enough to talk things through with you when they're challenging. I would bet this is a much larger group of men to date, and full of more generous possibilities for a relationship that truly nourishes you and makes you bloom over the years.
posted by sestaaak at 8:30 AM on April 7, 2017 [37 favorites]
Hey, OP, I wrote a similar post a few years ago and while I still haven't met the man of my dreams, I don't contort myself trying to figure out men or dating anymore.
One thing I observed in your post, and I did it too as a fellow heady-type scientist. You exhibit what I've heard called the "paralysis of analysis". It's like overthinking on steroids. When I was going through this, I had a fantasy about the kind of man I wanted in my life complete with all of the accompanying expectations of what this guy would be like and what our life would be like. Well, honestly, that guy still hasn't appeared yet.
Now I'm not saying that anyone should date people their not attracted to, or are jerks, etc. The point is that I had to let go of how, when, where, and with whom I would make a special connection. For me, the need to have certain expectations of the process was really about my need to control the situation because I have so much fear about finding/not finding a great guy and the possibility of being hurt. But, at the end of the day, needing to have such rigid standards only served to frustrate me and keep me away from meeting people I might like.
So, like others have mentioned, maybe just getting out and meeting people more casually to see if you like spending time with them might be worth trying. You don't need to put so much pressure on yourself. And you might actually fall for someone who doesn't check all of your boxes. You never know. Have fun!
posted by strelitzia at 8:52 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
One thing I observed in your post, and I did it too as a fellow heady-type scientist. You exhibit what I've heard called the "paralysis of analysis". It's like overthinking on steroids. When I was going through this, I had a fantasy about the kind of man I wanted in my life complete with all of the accompanying expectations of what this guy would be like and what our life would be like. Well, honestly, that guy still hasn't appeared yet.
Now I'm not saying that anyone should date people their not attracted to, or are jerks, etc. The point is that I had to let go of how, when, where, and with whom I would make a special connection. For me, the need to have certain expectations of the process was really about my need to control the situation because I have so much fear about finding/not finding a great guy and the possibility of being hurt. But, at the end of the day, needing to have such rigid standards only served to frustrate me and keep me away from meeting people I might like.
So, like others have mentioned, maybe just getting out and meeting people more casually to see if you like spending time with them might be worth trying. You don't need to put so much pressure on yourself. And you might actually fall for someone who doesn't check all of your boxes. You never know. Have fun!
posted by strelitzia at 8:52 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
As someone who dated as a PhD student and married a non-academic, I will tell you that the grad student/professor life isn't so special that no outsider can understand or be respectful of. I actually really enjoyed dating outside of the PhD world. Timing lifelines in academia sucks.
When I dated another fellow cohort member, it was good- we studied together, vented about issues together and stressed a lot together. When I dated a law grad student, it was also good-we studied together, I learned about how similar yet weirdly different the law world was. And when I dated someone who worked in the tech industry, it was still good-I studied, he read/worked, and we amused each other with different stories about tech vs academia. He understood my weird and demanding schedule because he also has a demanding work life, and because I share about what I'm going through and he believes me and supports me.
While I can't address your other issues, I do suggest stepping out of the engineering PhD dating pool. Maybe use online dating/apps, meet other people, explore more what's attractive to you (in looks/personality/careers/etc).
posted by inevitability at 9:12 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
When I dated another fellow cohort member, it was good- we studied together, vented about issues together and stressed a lot together. When I dated a law grad student, it was also good-we studied together, I learned about how similar yet weirdly different the law world was. And when I dated someone who worked in the tech industry, it was still good-I studied, he read/worked, and we amused each other with different stories about tech vs academia. He understood my weird and demanding schedule because he also has a demanding work life, and because I share about what I'm going through and he believes me and supports me.
While I can't address your other issues, I do suggest stepping out of the engineering PhD dating pool. Maybe use online dating/apps, meet other people, explore more what's attractive to you (in looks/personality/careers/etc).
posted by inevitability at 9:12 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
One thing to think about, since you seem to like data and research, is how (deliberately?) limiting your criteria are in a numerical sense. Even if we assume you are going to do your dating within your university (so bypassing the issue that only a very small percentage of people overall have PhDs), think of how few men are going to meet your very specific criteria of being in exactly the right stage of a doctoral program, never mind being the right age, single, etc.
In contrast, I can guarantee that there are many more men at your school who are the right age and right level of smartness who are finishing their BA as a non-traditional student, in a professional master's program, or who finished their PhD faster and are now in a post-doc kind of role, just to pick some random examples.
The same holds true for some of your other criteria, and it is worth thinking about why you are creating a situation where it is almost impossible to find a solution given the starting criteria. I'm not saying you are wrong to have those criteria or need to give them up -- but you should be self-aware about the criteria and their implications.
posted by Dip Flash at 9:16 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
In contrast, I can guarantee that there are many more men at your school who are the right age and right level of smartness who are finishing their BA as a non-traditional student, in a professional master's program, or who finished their PhD faster and are now in a post-doc kind of role, just to pick some random examples.
The same holds true for some of your other criteria, and it is worth thinking about why you are creating a situation where it is almost impossible to find a solution given the starting criteria. I'm not saying you are wrong to have those criteria or need to give them up -- but you should be self-aware about the criteria and their implications.
posted by Dip Flash at 9:16 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: Several answers so far have mentioned overthinking. I have received the feedback that I overthink things many, many times from people in my life, and I have tried to give this some serious attention as a result because if that many people are telling me 'You're overthinking it!', I'm probably overthinking it. I have historically used overthinking as a defense against underthinking, and have some difficulty finding the sweet spot that is an appropriate amount of thinking. If you all could perhaps contribute what works for you to help you not overthink things, especially in situations like these, I would be very thankful, because I don't know what not overthinking feels like.
posted by actionpotential at 9:26 AM on April 7, 2017
posted by actionpotential at 9:26 AM on April 7, 2017
I married my grad school office mate. After 17 years of marriage, we're now divorced. It turns out my naive theorems about compatibility, some of which are echoed by yours, were utterly wrong. Don't be me.
posted by star fruit at 9:28 AM on April 7, 2017 [4 favorites]
posted by star fruit at 9:28 AM on April 7, 2017 [4 favorites]
Best answer: It's good to have standards and an understanding about yourself to where you know there are some things you're not willing to budge on when it comes to a partner. That said, the list of what you are seeking in a partner is so incredibly super specific to the point where I'm not actually convinced such a person exists in the universe.
I think you are going to be happiest if you just start dating some guys you are immediately physically attracted to. I agree with the suggestion to start using some dating apps and proactively contacting men who you find attractive. If there are nearly 3000 grad students in your immediate area chances are there will be some on there too. After a date or two you can determine if the guy checks off enough other boxes to where you are willing to overlook some of your other criteria to pursue things further or if there are deal breakers you can simply move on.
posted by The Gooch at 9:28 AM on April 7, 2017 [7 favorites]
I think you are going to be happiest if you just start dating some guys you are immediately physically attracted to. I agree with the suggestion to start using some dating apps and proactively contacting men who you find attractive. If there are nearly 3000 grad students in your immediate area chances are there will be some on there too. After a date or two you can determine if the guy checks off enough other boxes to where you are willing to overlook some of your other criteria to pursue things further or if there are deal breakers you can simply move on.
posted by The Gooch at 9:28 AM on April 7, 2017 [7 favorites]
Response by poster: Also re: dating apps: I have been kind of obsessively using Tinder, OkCupid, and Bumble for the last half a year in an effort to find another guy to unseat this guy. It has not been working.
posted by actionpotential at 9:30 AM on April 7, 2017
posted by actionpotential at 9:30 AM on April 7, 2017
Hi, I am currently working toward a PhD, so I understand how much graduate school can narrow your horizons - and how it can be such a big part of your world that you can't even imagine that other people will understand you, without understanding what you are going through. But (a) that's not true, and (b) you're not going to be a PhD student forever, anyway.
I think you're being a little ridiculous, to be honest. I went through your list of requirements, and by the end, wondered if there were any men left in your town that could meet all of them. Some of your criteria are perfectly reasonable (e.g. shared progressive values), but then others are at best imperfect proxies for the actual things that you value (e.g. PhD in STEM).
This is especially an issue when you come to your most important criteria:
- You don't want to date someone you're not attracted to (completely reasonable)
- But you are only sure you have been attracted to one man
I think you've spent so much time thinking about what you want that you've forgotten the importance of that ineffable spark. What I mean is, our most important relationships (whether friends OR lovers) aren't necessarily with people who check all of the boxes - but are with people who are compatible with us in a much more personal and difficult to define way. You need to find someone you are attracted to!
No, I'm not suggesting that standards are bad. Some of the things you list are in fact quite important. But I suggest that you think of them less in terms of requirements and think more in terms of deal-breakers - and to be stingy with the deal-breakers by whittling them down to what they accomplish. For example, it may be that what you value in a potential partner is intellectual curiosity, rather than a specific career. It may be that you value a respect for scientific methods of understanding the world, rather than a lack of religious faith.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 9:30 AM on April 7, 2017 [7 favorites]
I think you're being a little ridiculous, to be honest. I went through your list of requirements, and by the end, wondered if there were any men left in your town that could meet all of them. Some of your criteria are perfectly reasonable (e.g. shared progressive values), but then others are at best imperfect proxies for the actual things that you value (e.g. PhD in STEM).
This is especially an issue when you come to your most important criteria:
- You don't want to date someone you're not attracted to (completely reasonable)
- But you are only sure you have been attracted to one man
I think you've spent so much time thinking about what you want that you've forgotten the importance of that ineffable spark. What I mean is, our most important relationships (whether friends OR lovers) aren't necessarily with people who check all of the boxes - but are with people who are compatible with us in a much more personal and difficult to define way. You need to find someone you are attracted to!
No, I'm not suggesting that standards are bad. Some of the things you list are in fact quite important. But I suggest that you think of them less in terms of requirements and think more in terms of deal-breakers - and to be stingy with the deal-breakers by whittling them down to what they accomplish. For example, it may be that what you value in a potential partner is intellectual curiosity, rather than a specific career. It may be that you value a respect for scientific methods of understanding the world, rather than a lack of religious faith.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 9:30 AM on April 7, 2017 [7 favorites]
And now I see your follow-up comment:
> If you all could perhaps contribute what works for you to help you not overthink things
Managing my anxiety. For me, overthinking is a way to try to gain control; if I understand a situation perfectly, then I can protect myself from making the wrong choices, right? But in the long run, it just makes the anxiety worse because you can never really understand a situation perfectly, or protect yourself from making the wrong choices.
As far as how to manage anxiety, I'm not sure about that. The typical suggestions of therapy and medication never worked for me. What worked as actually just working on going with the flow a bit more, and letting go of self-blame when things don't go to plan.
You should just get out there and date and recognize that part of the process is failure. That is, you're going to end up on dates that are awkward with men who don't "fit." And almost everyone has failed* relationships, before finding the right one.
Another thing that sometimes works for me is to imagine how a friend who doesn't overthink things or behave anxiously would proceed. For example, I might imagine how one of my friends would have worded this question:
"Hi, I'm a graduate student, 28 years old, and interested in a relationship. What are some suggestions about how to meet people? I'm really interested in lefty, intelligent men. I don't feel attracted to men very often, so I don't want to just 'passively' wait to meet just the right one. I also don't want to 'settle' for a man I'm not really attracted to, because I did that before and it didn't work out for anyone. I'm trying X and Y. What else am I missing?"
Sometimes imitation of this sort works for me. It's almost overthinking in a way - it's consciously practicing a mode of thinking, but it does get easier the more I do it.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 9:44 AM on April 7, 2017 [6 favorites]
> If you all could perhaps contribute what works for you to help you not overthink things
Managing my anxiety. For me, overthinking is a way to try to gain control; if I understand a situation perfectly, then I can protect myself from making the wrong choices, right? But in the long run, it just makes the anxiety worse because you can never really understand a situation perfectly, or protect yourself from making the wrong choices.
As far as how to manage anxiety, I'm not sure about that. The typical suggestions of therapy and medication never worked for me. What worked as actually just working on going with the flow a bit more, and letting go of self-blame when things don't go to plan.
You should just get out there and date and recognize that part of the process is failure. That is, you're going to end up on dates that are awkward with men who don't "fit." And almost everyone has failed* relationships, before finding the right one.
Another thing that sometimes works for me is to imagine how a friend who doesn't overthink things or behave anxiously would proceed. For example, I might imagine how one of my friends would have worded this question:
"Hi, I'm a graduate student, 28 years old, and interested in a relationship. What are some suggestions about how to meet people? I'm really interested in lefty, intelligent men. I don't feel attracted to men very often, so I don't want to just 'passively' wait to meet just the right one. I also don't want to 'settle' for a man I'm not really attracted to, because I did that before and it didn't work out for anyone. I'm trying X and Y. What else am I missing?"
Sometimes imitation of this sort works for me. It's almost overthinking in a way - it's consciously practicing a mode of thinking, but it does get easier the more I do it.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 9:44 AM on April 7, 2017 [6 favorites]
In re "overthinking versus underthinking": I think (!) that "overthinking" is a bad word for this, because "overthinking" is really more "under-acting" and "under-feeling" than merely "thinking too much".
Honestly, not to be too direct here, but I would suggest that you incorporate some porn, detailed sexual fantasy and looking at random men on the street. IME, women (and this AFAB person) often find it difficult to integrate basic physical sexual desire into our ways of thinking about relationships, so we end up with....I dunno, weird and counterproductive ways of feeling desire that none the less feel "natural" and "authentic" and that we then use to set the parameters on our sexuality*.
Also, if it works for you, maybe casually date around a little and see if you can't hook up with a few non-STEM attractive dudes purely for the benefits.
I think that more physical and social stuff may help unknot the overthinking problem.
Also, while it's certainly possible that you are someone who is only really attracted to one person because your unique chemistry is just that way, my bet is that you have a big old snarl of feelings, repression, experiences, fear, etc under the surface and these are what are really hanging you up on this one guy. This has very much been my experience - once I was able to address some of my early bad experiences, I found it easier to stop getting super hung up one one person and easier to notice my own physical attraction to people.
Also, "the people who are attracted to me are repulsive to me" has always seemed to me to be a half-truth. I'm not a particularly attractive person - I'm definitely not in the "top half" or whatever, and I am also talky and weird, so it's not like I can attract Adonis through my dulcet tones and charm. The people who are attracted to me are sometimes people who think "well, clearly Frowner can't do any better, so here goes!" In short, yeah, some of the people who are attracted to me are, like, very not. But back when I found that all of them were really unsuitable, well, that turned out to be because of my emotional and sexual hang-ups, not because they were all schlubbier versions of Steve Bannon.
*I'm not saying that if you get your head right you'll start finding every fellow on the street physically attractive; I'm saying that underlying feelings about sexual desire can manifest in really strange ways. For instance, although there are some people who are markedly physically unattractive to me, there are also some people that I initially respond to with an "ew" when it's really a protective mechanism and I'm actually super-attracted to them. This is probably not your particular issue - it's just a way that actual sexual desire can appear in a distorted form due to social conditioning. It took me years to figure out why I had almost no conscious physical attraction to, like, almost everyone. Like most people, I'm not attracted to everyone in the world, but I am attracted to people more and differently than I could access before.
I did not get to this realization through thinking about it, is all I'm saying.
posted by Frowner at 9:47 AM on April 7, 2017 [6 favorites]
Honestly, not to be too direct here, but I would suggest that you incorporate some porn, detailed sexual fantasy and looking at random men on the street. IME, women (and this AFAB person) often find it difficult to integrate basic physical sexual desire into our ways of thinking about relationships, so we end up with....I dunno, weird and counterproductive ways of feeling desire that none the less feel "natural" and "authentic" and that we then use to set the parameters on our sexuality*.
Also, if it works for you, maybe casually date around a little and see if you can't hook up with a few non-STEM attractive dudes purely for the benefits.
I think that more physical and social stuff may help unknot the overthinking problem.
Also, while it's certainly possible that you are someone who is only really attracted to one person because your unique chemistry is just that way, my bet is that you have a big old snarl of feelings, repression, experiences, fear, etc under the surface and these are what are really hanging you up on this one guy. This has very much been my experience - once I was able to address some of my early bad experiences, I found it easier to stop getting super hung up one one person and easier to notice my own physical attraction to people.
Also, "the people who are attracted to me are repulsive to me" has always seemed to me to be a half-truth. I'm not a particularly attractive person - I'm definitely not in the "top half" or whatever, and I am also talky and weird, so it's not like I can attract Adonis through my dulcet tones and charm. The people who are attracted to me are sometimes people who think "well, clearly Frowner can't do any better, so here goes!" In short, yeah, some of the people who are attracted to me are, like, very not. But back when I found that all of them were really unsuitable, well, that turned out to be because of my emotional and sexual hang-ups, not because they were all schlubbier versions of Steve Bannon.
*I'm not saying that if you get your head right you'll start finding every fellow on the street physically attractive; I'm saying that underlying feelings about sexual desire can manifest in really strange ways. For instance, although there are some people who are markedly physically unattractive to me, there are also some people that I initially respond to with an "ew" when it's really a protective mechanism and I'm actually super-attracted to them. This is probably not your particular issue - it's just a way that actual sexual desire can appear in a distorted form due to social conditioning. It took me years to figure out why I had almost no conscious physical attraction to, like, almost everyone. Like most people, I'm not attracted to everyone in the world, but I am attracted to people more and differently than I could access before.
I did not get to this realization through thinking about it, is all I'm saying.
posted by Frowner at 9:47 AM on April 7, 2017 [6 favorites]
Response by poster: *I'm not saying that if you get your head right you'll start finding every fellow on the street physically attractive; I'm saying that underlying feelings about sexual desire can manifest in really strange ways. For instance, although there are some people who are markedly physically unattractive to me, there are also some people that I initially respond to with an "ew" when it's really a protective mechanism and I'm actually super-attracted to them. This is probably not your particular issue - it's just a way that actual sexual desire can appear in a distorted form due to social conditioning. It took me years to figure out why I had almost no conscious physical attraction to, like, almost everyone. Like most people, I'm not attracted to everyone in the world, but I am attracted to people more and differently than I could access before.
I don't know how to tell the difference between 'markedly physically unattractive' and 'protective mechanism', though.
Basically I'd like to not feel like I'd have to close my eyes and imagine it was someone else when having sex.
posted by actionpotential at 9:51 AM on April 7, 2017
I don't know how to tell the difference between 'markedly physically unattractive' and 'protective mechanism', though.
Basically I'd like to not feel like I'd have to close my eyes and imagine it was someone else when having sex.
posted by actionpotential at 9:51 AM on April 7, 2017
I don't know what not overthinking feels like.
I bet that other posters will come along and offer their opinions about this, but IME, I wasn't able to see my overthinking until I decided to take a break from dating for a while to look at my thinking and behavior around finding a guy.
I realized (and read here on the green) that having a great connection and an awesome relationship is not one of those things that I can make happen. It's either gonna happen or not. And it will be okay regardless. However, by letting go of the outcome, the overthinking (for me) took care of itself. YMMV.
posted by strelitzia at 10:04 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
I bet that other posters will come along and offer their opinions about this, but IME, I wasn't able to see my overthinking until I decided to take a break from dating for a while to look at my thinking and behavior around finding a guy.
I realized (and read here on the green) that having a great connection and an awesome relationship is not one of those things that I can make happen. It's either gonna happen or not. And it will be okay regardless. However, by letting go of the outcome, the overthinking (for me) took care of itself. YMMV.
posted by strelitzia at 10:04 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
I could have written this question 10 years ago. I had gotten out of a long-term relationship and was stuck on somebody who was ~so perfect~ and thought I'd never find anyone like him again and if it didn't work out I was going to be single forever because how could I stand to be with someone whose intellect and credentials do not match mine. To make a long story short, I'm married now, and not to that guy, but to someone who is MUCH better for me in retrospect. All of this is to say: it gets better. I'm not going to tell you how we met or whether he met all the predefined criteria I had set because those are really red herrings.
I think you should really seek therapy. You're focused on minute details (your BMI, resting bitch face, makeup, etc), some of which are outside your control, and none of which really matter. For example, do you not know anyone overweight who had success dating? Or do you really want to date guys who are so shallow that 10 lbs is the difference between them being attracted to you or not? My point is that even if you were to find the perfect partner today, that would just be wallpaper over the cracks (insecurities) which are pretty clear from this question. You have to heal the structural damage yourself. Best of luck. You can do this.
posted by karbonokapi at 10:13 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
I think you should really seek therapy. You're focused on minute details (your BMI, resting bitch face, makeup, etc), some of which are outside your control, and none of which really matter. For example, do you not know anyone overweight who had success dating? Or do you really want to date guys who are so shallow that 10 lbs is the difference between them being attracted to you or not? My point is that even if you were to find the perfect partner today, that would just be wallpaper over the cracks (insecurities) which are pretty clear from this question. You have to heal the structural damage yourself. Best of luck. You can do this.
posted by karbonokapi at 10:13 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
I have been where you are! What helped me move beyond this impasse? I did more casual dating and I got older. What seemed essential at 21 didn't seem so at 27, to say nothing of the difference between 25 and 35. 12-year relationship with someone who meets many, though certainly not all, of my needs. Date more, by any means necessary, that's my advice. Someone might surprise you if you let them.
posted by 8603 at 11:12 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by 8603 at 11:12 AM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
Best answer: Also re: dating apps: I have been kind of obsessively using Tinder, OkCupid, and Bumble for the last half a year in an effort to find another guy to unseat this guy. It has not been working.
I think your question boils down to, am I hot (mentally, emotionally, physically) enough to get the kind of person I like? Go and meet more attractive guys and find out! Only go after the ones who you're attracted to. The fact that it's taking a while to find one is completely normal.
To be completely realistic, once you've found the guy you like in that head-over-heels way, they really may not like you back. That's ok too! Also very common. I would say most people report this to be more commonly the case than not.
Really consider putting yourself out there, despite the risks! It can be scary but there is no more honorable way.
posted by benadryl at 11:31 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
I think your question boils down to, am I hot (mentally, emotionally, physically) enough to get the kind of person I like? Go and meet more attractive guys and find out! Only go after the ones who you're attracted to. The fact that it's taking a while to find one is completely normal.
To be completely realistic, once you've found the guy you like in that head-over-heels way, they really may not like you back. That's ok too! Also very common. I would say most people report this to be more commonly the case than not.
Really consider putting yourself out there, despite the risks! It can be scary but there is no more honorable way.
posted by benadryl at 11:31 AM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
P.S. (Not to disparage your question - just pointing out these are completely normal and realistic challenges, and a better strategy for overcoming them would be feeling empowered to go after what you want).
posted by benadryl at 11:41 AM on April 7, 2017
posted by benadryl at 11:41 AM on April 7, 2017
Here's the thing, you do not have a dating problem. You have a big ol' crush that went wonky and you are super-sad problem.
The English-major translation of your question is:
"I am way head over heels with this guy, and I have never felt this way before, but he does not love me, and I am terrified to actually face the terrible sadness of this reality. Everything was very sad before him, and I can't go back. Please give me the magic key that will erase him from my mind and make things unsad forever, for I cannot bear it. Or if you cannot, please confirm my hunch that he is definitely the only one who could ever, ever love me, and I am doomed, so that I feel justified in being so terribly sad."
The bad news is that this sucks and there's nothing really for it; being heartbroken in unrequited love just totally sucks donkey balls, and everyone pretty much has to go through it sometimes.
The good news is that it does eventually end. Really, truly. I mean who knows, maybe you'll always feel a little twinge about this guy but it won't always feel like this horrible swirling abyss of NOPE that you're trying to ward off with math and stats and Rules About Who Will Love You. One thing that will make the whole process work itself out much more quickly, though, would definitely be getting your anxiety under control, maybe with the help a trained professional.
Oh and real talk? A lot of what you are experiencing is just "everyone's late 20s" but possibly turned up to 11 because you have anxiety or because PhD programs make everyone completely unhinged. We have all been to there. Benadryl has it - You are fine, and you will likely find love, one or more times. You are not a number, and even a "good" number like 8 is a bad number, because people aren't numbers. You are smart, and the right people will not hate you for it, but also, you are not too smart for the world. You are a hurting person who wants to prevent the hurt, like all of us. You're fine.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 2:51 PM on April 7, 2017 [26 favorites]
The English-major translation of your question is:
"I am way head over heels with this guy, and I have never felt this way before, but he does not love me, and I am terrified to actually face the terrible sadness of this reality. Everything was very sad before him, and I can't go back. Please give me the magic key that will erase him from my mind and make things unsad forever, for I cannot bear it. Or if you cannot, please confirm my hunch that he is definitely the only one who could ever, ever love me, and I am doomed, so that I feel justified in being so terribly sad."
The bad news is that this sucks and there's nothing really for it; being heartbroken in unrequited love just totally sucks donkey balls, and everyone pretty much has to go through it sometimes.
The good news is that it does eventually end. Really, truly. I mean who knows, maybe you'll always feel a little twinge about this guy but it won't always feel like this horrible swirling abyss of NOPE that you're trying to ward off with math and stats and Rules About Who Will Love You. One thing that will make the whole process work itself out much more quickly, though, would definitely be getting your anxiety under control, maybe with the help a trained professional.
Oh and real talk? A lot of what you are experiencing is just "everyone's late 20s" but possibly turned up to 11 because you have anxiety or because PhD programs make everyone completely unhinged. We have all been to there. Benadryl has it - You are fine, and you will likely find love, one or more times. You are not a number, and even a "good" number like 8 is a bad number, because people aren't numbers. You are smart, and the right people will not hate you for it, but also, you are not too smart for the world. You are a hurting person who wants to prevent the hurt, like all of us. You're fine.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 2:51 PM on April 7, 2017 [26 favorites]
You are really overthinking things. You are into someone who is not into you. It sucks and it's part of the human condition and you will get past it. Try setting aside the enormous mental checklist as to "suitability" and simply engaging socially with people you find attractive. The more the better. Then see where it goes from there.
posted by killdevil at 4:12 PM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by killdevil at 4:12 PM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
Feeling an attraction to somebody is the least amount of thinking you will ever do. You will meet a guy and four hours later you'll still be talking to each other. It won't even feel like an effort. I think you need to stop trying to meet somebody. Get off Tindr and all the other apps for at least six months. More like a year.
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 4:27 PM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 4:27 PM on April 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Just to let y'all know, even the most abrasive-sounding replies here have been weirdly comforting, in that I am clearly a lot less romantically-impaired than I think.
posted by actionpotential at 4:32 PM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by actionpotential at 4:32 PM on April 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
You are, yeah. I'd also say - you've got a lot of ideas about what kind of qualities it will take to create the perfect relationship to make you happy. You've sketched this whole architecture. But you've skipped over an essential and important step, and others have pointed this out - the step of moving out of abstract-land and spending more time with more people who make you feel good to be around in a romantic/sexual way. You don't create ideal relationships by designing them and then filtering the world to identify the few candidates. There is a lot more give and take in relationships than that - we don't just get to fill our orders. So, know which of these things reflect real personal values and what those values are (egalitarianism, seriousness about work/ideas, mutual respect) and then notice that those are really not so hard to fulfill, nor are they limited to the particular shape you have imagined for them (PhD candidate who is already totally educated and down with how egalitarian values play out in a household, etc.) Some of your ideas are real non-negotiables, but some are projections that get oddly specific and reveal a lot of unsupported assumption. You're an analytical person, and surely you can perceive the difference there.
It's possible for you to be happy in ways you don't now think you can be happy. Get involved with people. Stop creating such a fine-mesh filter that no one gets through - which is what you've done, and it's great protection from having to deal with real people who you're attracted to in all their real, messy, non-ideal complication and challenge. I think you're up to it. Tear up your list of specific criteria, and try opening your heart a little and taking a risk and letting yourself feel feelings.
posted by Miko at 8:19 PM on April 7, 2017 [3 favorites]
It's possible for you to be happy in ways you don't now think you can be happy. Get involved with people. Stop creating such a fine-mesh filter that no one gets through - which is what you've done, and it's great protection from having to deal with real people who you're attracted to in all their real, messy, non-ideal complication and challenge. I think you're up to it. Tear up your list of specific criteria, and try opening your heart a little and taking a risk and letting yourself feel feelings.
posted by Miko at 8:19 PM on April 7, 2017 [3 favorites]
You need to get on OK Cupid, ignore that stupid match% and message anyone you think is hot. I have several degrees and had no luck in the dating world. I ended up with my husband because he was the hottest guy on ok cupid. We had like a 20% match. No shame! His picture was him hauling traps on his lobster boat and unfggf he looked like marlon brando. We ended up marrying because he is the smartest person I've ever met, he challenges me to be better, he thinks I am Gods gift and I love to have sex with him. Do yourself a favor and pay attention to what you are physically attracted to.
posted by pintapicasso at 1:04 AM on April 8, 2017 [11 favorites]
posted by pintapicasso at 1:04 AM on April 8, 2017 [11 favorites]
I think a crush on someone who's not into you is the body's way of protecting you from another mindnumbingly stupid and heartbreaking entanglement that will waste years of your life when you're trying to get through school and can least afford it.
Just concentrate on work and quit worrying about love and lTRs. Have some fun for a while, with or without other people. Want to know if you're overthinking things? Are you asking questions more complicated than "Do I want to bone this guy, yes___, no___?" Then you are overthinking things. It should be like "Do I have to go to the bathroom right now, yes___, no___?" Just about that complicated.
posted by Don Pepino at 7:48 AM on April 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
Just concentrate on work and quit worrying about love and lTRs. Have some fun for a while, with or without other people. Want to know if you're overthinking things? Are you asking questions more complicated than "Do I want to bone this guy, yes___, no___?" Then you are overthinking things. It should be like "Do I have to go to the bathroom right now, yes___, no___?" Just about that complicated.
posted by Don Pepino at 7:48 AM on April 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
Tear up your list of specific criteria, and try opening your heart a little and taking a risk and letting yourself feel feelings.
This. 10,000,000,000 times.
posted by Kwadeng at 7:53 AM on April 8, 2017 [2 favorites]
This. 10,000,000,000 times.
posted by Kwadeng at 7:53 AM on April 8, 2017 [2 favorites]
I'm very similar to you in a lot of ways, and went through life thinking that I'd never find a man physically attractive. Turns out, that 'optionally kinky and subby bit' was WAY MORE IMPORTANT than I had realized. The way most men assumed that they were in charge completely killed my libido. I hadn't realized how important this was to me until I sat down and started thinking about it, so you might not have realized either.
Sometimes, power dynamics really are the key to getting turned on. This might be true for you too. It's worth thinking about, and possibly reading up on relationships that involve power dynamics, or going to lowkey BDSM events where people aren't actively having BDSM scenes to get a feel for if this important to your sexuality.
Also, expanding out beyond other PhD students is probably a good idea. It's usually good to try and cast as wide a net as practical in terms of jobs and socioeconomic setups so you can focus on the looks and personality fit.
posted by Ahniya at 12:51 PM on April 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
Sometimes, power dynamics really are the key to getting turned on. This might be true for you too. It's worth thinking about, and possibly reading up on relationships that involve power dynamics, or going to lowkey BDSM events where people aren't actively having BDSM scenes to get a feel for if this important to your sexuality.
Also, expanding out beyond other PhD students is probably a good idea. It's usually good to try and cast as wide a net as practical in terms of jobs and socioeconomic setups so you can focus on the looks and personality fit.
posted by Ahniya at 12:51 PM on April 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: I think a crush on someone who's not into you is the body's way of protecting you from another mindnumbingly stupid and heartbreaking entanglement that will waste years of your life when you're trying to get through school and can least afford it.
Maybe. Just to update the thread, I just had casual sex with a guy off OkCupid for the first time in my life. I was wondering if my three-year dry spell had anything to do with it.
It didn't. The sex was mediocre. The guy was much less attractive than his picture; in fact, I had to close my eyes and think of Engineer Guy to orgasm.
I don't think casual sex was the answer, at least, but I suppose the one thing I know from this is that I can emotionally deal with casual sex, I have learned more about what I like and dislike in bed, and that I really, really, really get off when I'm (thinking about) banging someone that I'm actually into, a la Engineer Guy.
The funny thing is, upon reflection, that the criteria do make up a chunk of the feelings, and they separate the 'ooh, cute!' in my head from the 'DO WANT'.
Sometimes, power dynamics really are the key to getting turned on. This might be true for you too. It's worth thinking about, and possibly reading up on relationships that involve power dynamics, or going to lowkey BDSM events where people aren't actively having BDSM scenes to get a feel for if this important to your sexuality.
Probably not a good idea in my situation. The guy I just had casual sex with is also in the local BDSM scene. Weirdly enough, he was also a dom just like I am. That was one of the things we talked about, actually. In retrospect, I really should not even have vanilla sex with other doms, because that came through and it irritated me.
I definitely need something where the power dynamic is either balanced or I am dominant.
Also, expanding out beyond other PhD students is probably a good idea. It's usually good to try and cast as wide a net as practical in terms of jobs and socioeconomic setups so you can focus on the looks and personality fit.
I'm not sure what's likely to produce the best fit, though.
posted by actionpotential at 3:00 PM on April 8, 2017
Maybe. Just to update the thread, I just had casual sex with a guy off OkCupid for the first time in my life. I was wondering if my three-year dry spell had anything to do with it.
It didn't. The sex was mediocre. The guy was much less attractive than his picture; in fact, I had to close my eyes and think of Engineer Guy to orgasm.
I don't think casual sex was the answer, at least, but I suppose the one thing I know from this is that I can emotionally deal with casual sex, I have learned more about what I like and dislike in bed, and that I really, really, really get off when I'm (thinking about) banging someone that I'm actually into, a la Engineer Guy.
The funny thing is, upon reflection, that the criteria do make up a chunk of the feelings, and they separate the 'ooh, cute!' in my head from the 'DO WANT'.
Sometimes, power dynamics really are the key to getting turned on. This might be true for you too. It's worth thinking about, and possibly reading up on relationships that involve power dynamics, or going to lowkey BDSM events where people aren't actively having BDSM scenes to get a feel for if this important to your sexuality.
Probably not a good idea in my situation. The guy I just had casual sex with is also in the local BDSM scene. Weirdly enough, he was also a dom just like I am. That was one of the things we talked about, actually. In retrospect, I really should not even have vanilla sex with other doms, because that came through and it irritated me.
I definitely need something where the power dynamic is either balanced or I am dominant.
Also, expanding out beyond other PhD students is probably a good idea. It's usually good to try and cast as wide a net as practical in terms of jobs and socioeconomic setups so you can focus on the looks and personality fit.
I'm not sure what's likely to produce the best fit, though.
posted by actionpotential at 3:00 PM on April 8, 2017
I'm not sure what's likely to produce the best fit, though.
You're trying to solve the problem in advance through planning. Instead, solve the problem through trial and error. Don't worry about what factors are "likely" to be a good fit between you and a hypothetical person with hypothetical qualities. Spend time getting to know actual people with actual qualities, and then assess whether those actual people are an actual fit with your romantic desires and your life choices and your emotional needs. Relationships are not something you can logic out in advance and then plug a human being with the right parameters into the partner-sized hole you've carved out in your life. You need to meet real people, and then you and your life will change to make room for them if it's right.
posted by decathecting at 4:44 PM on April 8, 2017 [7 favorites]
You're trying to solve the problem in advance through planning. Instead, solve the problem through trial and error. Don't worry about what factors are "likely" to be a good fit between you and a hypothetical person with hypothetical qualities. Spend time getting to know actual people with actual qualities, and then assess whether those actual people are an actual fit with your romantic desires and your life choices and your emotional needs. Relationships are not something you can logic out in advance and then plug a human being with the right parameters into the partner-sized hole you've carved out in your life. You need to meet real people, and then you and your life will change to make room for them if it's right.
posted by decathecting at 4:44 PM on April 8, 2017 [7 favorites]
I definitely need something where the power dynamic is either balanced or I am dominant.
It sounds like looking for men who are subs/like you being in charge is important and should be a factor in where you start looking.
I'm not sure why having slept with someone in the BDSM scene is a reason for you to avoid it? Unless he's super petty or something I can't see why that would be a problem. If there's some other reason to avoid it that's understandable, but I'm not following your logic here.
You've clearly spent a lot of time thinking about this and are at the point where that won't help any more. It's scary to put yourself out there, but it really sounds like you're at the point where you need to embrace what turns you on and start meeting lots of new people to test your theories.
posted by Ahniya at 9:38 PM on April 8, 2017
It sounds like looking for men who are subs/like you being in charge is important and should be a factor in where you start looking.
I'm not sure why having slept with someone in the BDSM scene is a reason for you to avoid it? Unless he's super petty or something I can't see why that would be a problem. If there's some other reason to avoid it that's understandable, but I'm not following your logic here.
You've clearly spent a lot of time thinking about this and are at the point where that won't help any more. It's scary to put yourself out there, but it really sounds like you're at the point where you need to embrace what turns you on and start meeting lots of new people to test your theories.
posted by Ahniya at 9:38 PM on April 8, 2017
Response by poster: I'm not sure why having slept with someone in the BDSM scene is a reason for you to avoid it? Unless he's super petty or something I can't see why that would be a problem. If there's some other reason to avoid it that's understandable, but I'm not following your logic here.
Right now I'm just feeling uncomfortable with what happened. The BDSM guy did a lot of things that were offputting and I'd rather not bother with him.
For reference, there is another engineer I know (incidentally in Engineer Guy's cohort; they hang out from time to time with a subset of their cohort) who I just spent about two hours with walking around and sitting down and chatting. I'm not into him, but he was mirroring me hard for a good hour when we were at his apartment so I wouldn't be SURPRISED if the guy ended up asking me out. If he did, and from what I know of him he seems to be the respectful, considerate type, I am positive I would not be uncomfortable still hanging around Other Engineer if he did so.
posted by actionpotential at 10:02 PM on April 8, 2017
Right now I'm just feeling uncomfortable with what happened. The BDSM guy did a lot of things that were offputting and I'd rather not bother with him.
For reference, there is another engineer I know (incidentally in Engineer Guy's cohort; they hang out from time to time with a subset of their cohort) who I just spent about two hours with walking around and sitting down and chatting. I'm not into him, but he was mirroring me hard for a good hour when we were at his apartment so I wouldn't be SURPRISED if the guy ended up asking me out. If he did, and from what I know of him he seems to be the respectful, considerate type, I am positive I would not be uncomfortable still hanging around Other Engineer if he did so.
posted by actionpotential at 10:02 PM on April 8, 2017
I wish I had good advice to give. Instead I'll just suggest a book, if you haven't read The Rosie Project you definitely should! I really, really enjoyed it and one of my best friends (iq 170+ since even though in many ways it means nothing it also means a lot) also loved it and he has a longstanding policy against reading any fiction books. The main character has a very similar approach to you where he has a set of criteria to finding a wife and tries to solve the problem scientifically. It's a good book overall but I loved it because of how much I related to the main character, which I suspect you might as well.
I'm also crushing hard on one particular uninterested person and likely as a result have had zero success in the dating world where I try distract myself from this. Let me know if you figure out the secret, as it's certainly a terrible feeling :)
posted by aaabbbccc at 12:00 AM on April 9, 2017
I'm also crushing hard on one particular uninterested person and likely as a result have had zero success in the dating world where I try distract myself from this. Let me know if you figure out the secret, as it's certainly a terrible feeling :)
posted by aaabbbccc at 12:00 AM on April 9, 2017
Smart people are used to being able to solve problems, to make things come around. But chemistry is something you can't solve.
I'll tell you the advice I got: no dating people you aren't attracted to. No kissing people you aren't into. Consider attraction a baseline requirement for any further romantic interaction or even consideration.
I would also add your notes around abuse to the "requirements" list. Having a demeanor and approach dissimilar to that of abusive people in your life is a bare minimum expectation and if that's not in place, consider the guy to be living on the moon, because that's how far you should (relationally) be from him.
I'd rank your list by importance and likelihood of contributing to a fab relationship.
Attraction and zero abusive tendency = non-negotiables
Wants to date you = pre-requisite
Intellect and appreciation of/flexibility with your schedule and goals = very important.
Other character stuff which you can't know till you know the person = important
Grad student status and field of study = not really important; these don't correlate with maturity, intelligence, or wanting to date you; you can imagine it'd help to have these in common, but don't require it; dwell in the fact it's possible for someone outside these blocks to suit you
posted by ramenopres at 6:50 AM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
I'll tell you the advice I got: no dating people you aren't attracted to. No kissing people you aren't into. Consider attraction a baseline requirement for any further romantic interaction or even consideration.
I would also add your notes around abuse to the "requirements" list. Having a demeanor and approach dissimilar to that of abusive people in your life is a bare minimum expectation and if that's not in place, consider the guy to be living on the moon, because that's how far you should (relationally) be from him.
I'd rank your list by importance and likelihood of contributing to a fab relationship.
Attraction and zero abusive tendency = non-negotiables
Wants to date you = pre-requisite
Intellect and appreciation of/flexibility with your schedule and goals = very important.
Other character stuff which you can't know till you know the person = important
Grad student status and field of study = not really important; these don't correlate with maturity, intelligence, or wanting to date you; you can imagine it'd help to have these in common, but don't require it; dwell in the fact it's possible for someone outside these blocks to suit you
posted by ramenopres at 6:50 AM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: I think part of the problem is that I am aware of a few things in sex research literature:
1) There is no such thing as 'league' - but this is contingent on how well and how long you know someone.
2) People tend to sort sexually by attractiveness, and there is a certain set of things that cross-culturally appear to determine this.
3) People don't actually necessarily seek mates who are similar in attractiveness.
Attractiveness is to a large extent subjective but on some level I am not actually sufficiently certain I am hot enough for the people I think are hot, which is why I obsessed a little in my original question about a couple of (perceived? People tend to not be into slightly odd teeth or a bit of pudge or a somewhat lumpy butt) physical issues.
I don't actually know how attractive I am, to be honest. Men make eye contact with me, sometimes for longer than seems comfortable, some of them reasonably good-looking, and on average my female acquaintances are doing pretty ok in the looks department, so I know I'm at least average. Which would be fine except I have the sinking feeling sometimes that maybe I'm shooting above my belt with men (and I know this is definitely about my perception of my OWN attractiveness), particularly in light of the general observation that men have a distinct tendency to be the less attractive one of a pair, which is a terrible deal for women, and this is possibly part of why my dating history is full of men I was never attracted to - because the ones I'm really, truly attracted to could potentially be too attractive to ever want me in return.
posted by actionpotential at 10:57 AM on April 9, 2017 [1 favorite]
1) There is no such thing as 'league' - but this is contingent on how well and how long you know someone.
2) People tend to sort sexually by attractiveness, and there is a certain set of things that cross-culturally appear to determine this.
3) People don't actually necessarily seek mates who are similar in attractiveness.
Attractiveness is to a large extent subjective but on some level I am not actually sufficiently certain I am hot enough for the people I think are hot, which is why I obsessed a little in my original question about a couple of (perceived? People tend to not be into slightly odd teeth or a bit of pudge or a somewhat lumpy butt) physical issues.
I don't actually know how attractive I am, to be honest. Men make eye contact with me, sometimes for longer than seems comfortable, some of them reasonably good-looking, and on average my female acquaintances are doing pretty ok in the looks department, so I know I'm at least average. Which would be fine except I have the sinking feeling sometimes that maybe I'm shooting above my belt with men (and I know this is definitely about my perception of my OWN attractiveness), particularly in light of the general observation that men have a distinct tendency to be the less attractive one of a pair, which is a terrible deal for women, and this is possibly part of why my dating history is full of men I was never attracted to - because the ones I'm really, truly attracted to could potentially be too attractive to ever want me in return.
posted by actionpotential at 10:57 AM on April 9, 2017 [1 favorite]
Maybe you need to get clearer on your research question here. And start with the constraints and assumptions. Is it true that there is a fixed set of partnership possibilities based on attractiveness, or is there a trend within which are hidden a range of experiences? If the former, is your assssment correct that you are in the wrong bracket for this time and society, to get the result you want (a big assumption since your perception is indeed subjective)? If that's the case, your options are to change your attractiveness (work out, change your nutrition; express joy through your smile; whatever; there are many things people can do to align more closely with current generic beauty standards) or figure out how to gracefully cope with the sad, hard, reality that neither you nor other people will deviate from.
I propose there's actually a trend, though, made of a range of realities. And you can decide you're probably an outlier. You know better than to think we're all beholden to whatever the research says about us. You already contradict "what tends to be true" in many ways, I think, e.g., your role as a woman in the sciences, your wealth and opportunity relative to most of the world, etc. The kind of person you're looking for isn't really the typical package, either, at least according to some research. So the science is interesting but not the determinant of your experience.
Stop thinking in terms of trends and tendencies and people. You are a person and you want to find one person. One man. Not the aggregate of what dating research says men should do and be. You must do this personal research several times over, qualitatively, with an N of one man at a time.
posted by ramenopres at 2:30 PM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
I propose there's actually a trend, though, made of a range of realities. And you can decide you're probably an outlier. You know better than to think we're all beholden to whatever the research says about us. You already contradict "what tends to be true" in many ways, I think, e.g., your role as a woman in the sciences, your wealth and opportunity relative to most of the world, etc. The kind of person you're looking for isn't really the typical package, either, at least according to some research. So the science is interesting but not the determinant of your experience.
Stop thinking in terms of trends and tendencies and people. You are a person and you want to find one person. One man. Not the aggregate of what dating research says men should do and be. You must do this personal research several times over, qualitatively, with an N of one man at a time.
posted by ramenopres at 2:30 PM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
Agree with ramenopres. You have to ignore that research.
Research is about a population. You are an N of 1.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 3:46 PM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
Research is about a population. You are an N of 1.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 3:46 PM on April 9, 2017 [2 favorites]
- You are overthinking things, to echo others. It seems to me that the more uncertainty or anxiety you have, the more you reflexively double down on dissecting and analyzing every little thing (for example - your teeth) -- as if your thoughts are trying to hack several paths in the hopes that one of them leads to the (non-existent) answer. From your responses, one gets a strong sense of your self-talk and rationalization process. It might be helpful to stand back and re-read some of what you've written here with the eye of an observer. The narrative you're telling us probably closely reflects the voice in your head. And you're an unreliable narrator wading around in a swirl of thoughts, judgments, assessments that may or may not be accurate and useful. We all are. I tend to overthink things too. What helps is first, simply noticing it and distancing yourself from it. "I notice that I'm [having this thought that...]." Just pause, acknowledge, and let that inner voice quiet down for a moment, instead of rushing after it trying to catch all your thoughts, and falling into a rabbit hole.
- Falling in love is not a science experiment. (Assuming you want to fall in love? You never actually state that you do. You reportedly want to form a "connection" with a man, but discuss it in a way that sounds almost business-like/transactional.) The more you date around in "the real world" and the more experience you have, the more clarity you'll hopefully have about your standards, preferences, etc. Sure, you can try a systematic approach and it sounds like you have some clear deal-breakers (e.g. w/r/t physical attractiveness). But I often think back to what Netflix's chief content officer Ted Sarandos once said about their programming algorithms: “Seventy [percent] is the data, and thirty is judgment... But the thirty needs to be on top, if that makes sense.” I think of this quote often because I feel it applies to many things. In the end, you should not be rationalizing your way into or out of a relationship (not if it's a healthy one). Allow yourself the possibility of being pleasantly surprised. A lot of rewarding things are outside your comfort zone or even outside your current circle of awareness, and relationships are no different.
There is not going to be a person who checks EVERY box. And just because your rational brain came up with that list of boxes doesn't mean that every item is in reality what's right for you, or what's true. (See: "I really don’t want to date a man who’s older than me. This is to compensate in large part for any gender-related imbalances. I will never play second fiddle. This is a duet with equal scores." -- Could this be a faulty premise you're extrapolating from? One could easily assume the exact opposite -- that a younger man is more itchy to prove himself and prioritize his fledgling ambitions, while an older man might feel secure, mature and established enough in his career to accommodate prioritizing yours. Either way, I would be wary of letting possibly faulty assumptions about entire groups of individuals narrow your options.) Additionally, some of the things on your list will realistically be at the center of ongoing negotiation, communication and MUTUAL compromise throughout the life of a relationship where both people will be growing and evolving, not something that is set in stone forever at the outset and that can be safely culled for.
- Related to both the overthinking bit and the extrapolating bit -- don't read too much into any one thing. Any one crush, interaction, date, person, incident, population group ("PhD students", what "guys" on average may or may not find attractive). You're relentlessly seeking patterns but the sample size of your one life is too small for that.
posted by amillionbillion at 4:10 PM on April 9, 2017 [3 favorites]
- Falling in love is not a science experiment. (Assuming you want to fall in love? You never actually state that you do. You reportedly want to form a "connection" with a man, but discuss it in a way that sounds almost business-like/transactional.) The more you date around in "the real world" and the more experience you have, the more clarity you'll hopefully have about your standards, preferences, etc. Sure, you can try a systematic approach and it sounds like you have some clear deal-breakers (e.g. w/r/t physical attractiveness). But I often think back to what Netflix's chief content officer Ted Sarandos once said about their programming algorithms: “Seventy [percent] is the data, and thirty is judgment... But the thirty needs to be on top, if that makes sense.” I think of this quote often because I feel it applies to many things. In the end, you should not be rationalizing your way into or out of a relationship (not if it's a healthy one). Allow yourself the possibility of being pleasantly surprised. A lot of rewarding things are outside your comfort zone or even outside your current circle of awareness, and relationships are no different.
There is not going to be a person who checks EVERY box. And just because your rational brain came up with that list of boxes doesn't mean that every item is in reality what's right for you, or what's true. (See: "I really don’t want to date a man who’s older than me. This is to compensate in large part for any gender-related imbalances. I will never play second fiddle. This is a duet with equal scores." -- Could this be a faulty premise you're extrapolating from? One could easily assume the exact opposite -- that a younger man is more itchy to prove himself and prioritize his fledgling ambitions, while an older man might feel secure, mature and established enough in his career to accommodate prioritizing yours. Either way, I would be wary of letting possibly faulty assumptions about entire groups of individuals narrow your options.) Additionally, some of the things on your list will realistically be at the center of ongoing negotiation, communication and MUTUAL compromise throughout the life of a relationship where both people will be growing and evolving, not something that is set in stone forever at the outset and that can be safely culled for.
- Related to both the overthinking bit and the extrapolating bit -- don't read too much into any one thing. Any one crush, interaction, date, person, incident, population group ("PhD students", what "guys" on average may or may not find attractive). You're relentlessly seeking patterns but the sample size of your one life is too small for that.
posted by amillionbillion at 4:10 PM on April 9, 2017 [3 favorites]
the thing about monitoring that guy's mirroring, and the sex research and attractiveness tiers -- if you only think about this privately, it won't matter, but you want a generally feminist guy, this kind of perspective may scare the thoughtful ones away. You are (clearly) not an MRA and also not a man, but a nice cute feminist sexually submissive man who is worth your time is likely to see these kind of ideas and ways of categorizing people as a red flag, if he becomes aware of them, because even if there is nothing alarming in the way you assess and cite sources, the way you (even the fact that you) refer to them in this context calls to mind things that alarming and unfeminist people believe. so I will not tell you to change your opinions, but they may stand in your way if you make them known.
Plus, even if you disregard the previous and choose to trust published science over internet busybodies, consider this: plenty of people who like to get pushed around in bed a little bit are not the type to do the kind of stare-down dominance display show-off flirting that most sources will recommend to you as masculine attraction indicators. like I would be way more likely to suspect someone had a crush on me if he blushed and couldn't quite meet my eyes than if he always did.
men have a distinct tendency to be the less attractive one of a pair
I completely do not accept this as obviously true, but in those cases where it is true, those men are compensating for their inferior looks with something else - sexual skills, overconfidence, attractive ways of moving and speaking and entertaining their partners. This is all stuff you can do every bit as well as they can. You may say: but men don't reliably value these human qualities in their partners the way women do. and we live in a terrible world so perhaps you are right. BUT: even if many of them don't, the particular kind of guy you want is exactly the kind of guy who can be seduced and attracted by these kinds of qualities, so you should be set.
posted by queenofbithynia at 4:54 PM on April 9, 2017 [3 favorites]
Plus, even if you disregard the previous and choose to trust published science over internet busybodies, consider this: plenty of people who like to get pushed around in bed a little bit are not the type to do the kind of stare-down dominance display show-off flirting that most sources will recommend to you as masculine attraction indicators. like I would be way more likely to suspect someone had a crush on me if he blushed and couldn't quite meet my eyes than if he always did.
men have a distinct tendency to be the less attractive one of a pair
I completely do not accept this as obviously true, but in those cases where it is true, those men are compensating for their inferior looks with something else - sexual skills, overconfidence, attractive ways of moving and speaking and entertaining their partners. This is all stuff you can do every bit as well as they can. You may say: but men don't reliably value these human qualities in their partners the way women do. and we live in a terrible world so perhaps you are right. BUT: even if many of them don't, the particular kind of guy you want is exactly the kind of guy who can be seduced and attracted by these kinds of qualities, so you should be set.
posted by queenofbithynia at 4:54 PM on April 9, 2017 [3 favorites]
I think part of the problem is that I am aware of a few things in sex research literature:
Stop reading that crap. If you are a scientist, you presumably also understand a thing or two about the social construction of science.
posted by Miko at 5:48 PM on April 9, 2017 [4 favorites]
Stop reading that crap. If you are a scientist, you presumably also understand a thing or two about the social construction of science.
posted by Miko at 5:48 PM on April 9, 2017 [4 favorites]
Mod note: A couple deleted. Actionpotential, sorry, but Ask Metafilter isn't for having extended discussions or back-and-forth about the question. Basically, you should just comment briefly to clarify if something is unclear, and perhaps at the end if the situation is resolved.
posted by taz (staff) at 11:05 PM on April 9, 2017
posted by taz (staff) at 11:05 PM on April 9, 2017
RE your attractiveness to men who are hotter than you: I am 41, average looks at best, a bit overweight, and don't do the typical hair/ shaving/ makeup stuff that most women do. And I still sleep with objectively hot twentysomething men. (I'm not that interesting in bed either!) I'm not looking for relationships with them, but clearly there are plenty of attractive men who are turned on by me despite our mismatched "leagues." Statistics don't matter in this case.
posted by metasarah at 5:13 AM on April 10, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by metasarah at 5:13 AM on April 10, 2017 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
This may not immediately net you a life partner, but the experiences you will have are likely to make you better prepared for a life partner down the line. I think you're looking to maximize efficiency in this, and I don't think that's possible.
Have you considered dating outside of the grad student world, since long distance is a no-go for you? The two-body problem is often tricky even when one person is working outside of academia, and a lot of people are able to understand the demands of school even if they're not actually in it. Dating someone less career-focused could complement your situation well.
posted by metasarah at 7:48 AM on April 7, 2017 [4 favorites]