I feel like I am too weird to date, but lately I want to start dating. Fellow weirdos of Mefi, how do I approach online dating when I don't feel like I am very similar to almost anyone else in the pool?
This is why I describe myself as weird:
(1) I am a virgin.
(2) It takes me a very long time to get to know people. Like... it takes me years and years. On the plus side this means my real friendships are all decades old. On the minus side it takes me years to decide whether I am actually close to a person. I actively distrust first impressions. Most of the people I've clicked with on first meeting them, I have gone on to realise weren't good for me. The best people in my life are the people whom I would have dismissed upon first meeting them, if I believed in first impressions.
(3) I have a somewhat complicated relationship with my higher power. That's actually one of the reasons I have never had sex. It's gotten less complicated of late and I am ok with having sex in principle, I just have no experience and no idea of how to get there.
(4) This is where I feel like I get very weird. I do not experience sexual attraction the way it is written about in books. For me, when I am attracted to someone I want to be emotionally intimate with them, hold them and cuddle them and have their full attention. I am not actively interested in having sex with them, even though I am open to it in principle. I don't know what it means to want to have sex with a person. This is completely alien to me. It might just be because I am a virgin and don't have any experience of sex. But surely it has to be something you want, right?
(5) I am very put off by overt flirting, especially when it is very sexualised. I am almost repulsed by it. Especially when the person doesn't know you well.
However, I have recently discovered in myself a desire to want to become intimate with a person and so I know that even if I am a little asexual or whatever, I am not aromantic and I actually WANT to be loved and cherished etc. But in real life I keep meeting people who aren't available for whatever reason. So I guess I need to try online dating, but my limited experience of it makes me feel like it's not for people like me who take years to make up their minds about the people they choose to trust and who are not particularly sexually motivated. I know that dating is all about first impressions and chemistry, but I am just not about that life. It's not hard for me to charm people at first meeting, but I know that's not authentic.
I have tried online dating in the past and categorised myself as 'Asexual' and got zero messages. Most women (oh, I'm a cishet woman) talk about having too many messages, but I'm the opposite, I get none. I'm also a POC, which might have something to do with that; I've read studies that POCs get less attention than white women.
I realise I have described myself as very odd but I am actually quite a normal person apart from these things. I don't think anyone who knew me in real life would describe as weird unless they knew me very well - and I haven't spoken about much of the above to people I know in real life. Certainly with regards to the possible asexuality - no one in my life knows about that.
I am clever, empathetic, warm and open, I have no problem attracting new friends (although, as I said, it takes me years to categorise them as friends) but absolutely no luck romantically.
I am looking for some practical advice on how to approach online dating when you don't feel like you're like other people. Maybe I am less weird than I think? That's certainly possible. But although words of encouragement would be nice, even more helpful would be solid advice on how to approach online dating (the profile, the messaging, the dates) when you are like me and just not good at any of that stuff. |
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