Dating Fears: Giving in and Loving it

Lame, lame lame. Totally lame.  About this time last year I was 100% certain that anyone and everyone who signed up for online dating sites was L-a-m-e.  And to tell you the truth, I had no good reason to think that at all. I had close girlfriends meet their husbands online – I had family members singing up too! Online dating success was all around me, and yet it seemed, well, you know. Lame.

I guess I have to chock-it up to the fact that I was in a relationship. I mean, this was when I had been dating someone steadily for nearly two years. We’d moved in together and shared the same group of friends – and the whole online dating thing seemed like a joke.

Until… I got dumped.

In hindsight, I guess we just weren’t meant to be. It came down to our view of the future: he wanted to settle down and start a family, and I didn’t even want to think about getting preggers. So, we split up, moved out of our apartment, and I found myself in my late 20-s living alone in the city.

My apartment soon became a black hole of loneliness. I don’t know much about black holes, but I can tell you that this one had super-suction.  After falling through what felt like light-years of gloom, I’d had enough. It was time to face my dating fears – face the fact that I was scared (yes scared!) of online dating sites.

I decided to attack the problem head on. I interviewed friends and family, read reviews, scoured the internet for info. Yes, I did my homework. And then I took the plunge and signed up for 3 different sites to get a good feel for each.

I asked friends to help me take a good profile picture; I answered personality questionnaires, character tests and compatibility evaluations thoroughly, honestly and brutally; I threw myself into these online dating sites and found that I actually was starting to enjoy myself.  It came more naturally to me than I’d thought. It was like facebook – for singles! (And I’m, like, a facebook addict. Seriously.)

Each part of building my profile was like building up my self-esteem from square one. It gave me the chance to stop and think about me. About what I wanted and what I was really looking for. And it also gave me the opportunity to open my horizons, meet new people and get back in the dating game with a fun, helpful tool that I found was easy to use.

No, I’m not engaged to someone I met online just yet, (I’m not that easy) and yes, I did end up going on some pretty awful dates and expect to go on more, but I also went on some great dates, met some great people, started dating some pretty good looking guys… and in the end, proved myself wrong about myself!