No, of course you don’t. You’ve learned that it can be very misleading. The same thing is true for people. Look at the meteoric rise of Susan Boyle, the UK’s Got Talent contestant. She walked on stage and nearly everyone in the theatre judged her by her looks. She said she wanted to sing on stage and you could see and hear the tittering. Then she opened her mouth and sang like an angel. You could see the change in expression on every face and they knew that they’d unjustly judged her because of how she looked.

Too often, people who are seeking partners at an adult dating or really any dating site do the same thing. They browse the photos just like the men who read Playboy. They don’t read the words that go with them. If you were looking for a new relationship and you saw Susan Boyle’s photo, would YOU contact her? My guess is, probably not unless you’re a really special person. She admits to not having dated so if you said no, you’d have a lot of company. Now that she’s a worldwide star, I’ll bet there are any number of people who’d love to get to know her because she’s proven there’s lots more behind the face and body. Now that they know more about her, there’s an attraction that couldn’t have been found before.

Last week we received a note from a guy who’d met a woman in our free chatroom and they talked for months. We’d see them nearly every evening in their favourite room. He had a photo posted on his profile and heaps of photos in his personal gallery but she had none. He kept asking and she kept putting him off. Privately one night she told me that she loved spending time with him but he was really good looking and she knew she wasn’t and didn’t want it to end. I felt sad when she told me that and I encouraged her to post a photo. Nope, she wasn’t interested. She was 100% convinced that once he saw what she looked like that he’d move on to someone she considered to be more attractive.

Finally he said he was coming to her town which was a fair distance from where he lived and he wanted to take her to dinner. Remember they’d been talking for months and had gotten really close, as you do when you chat with someone for that length of time. He said he wouldn’t take no for an answer and it didn’t matter to him what she looked like.

As you can imagine, he meant every word. He thought she was beautiful inside and out and he wrote to tell us he was going to ask her to move in with him just to test the waters and if that worked out ok, he wanted to marry her and stay with her forever.

Personally I’d much rather be with someone who treats me well, respects me in all ways possible, is able to laugh at himself and with others, is intelligent and fun to be around than to be with someone who stepped off a magazine page and treats me like crap.

Since the birth of the world wide web, millions of people have met through dating sites. I remember when I met my husband, before the www was available in Orlando, everyone I knew thought I had taken leave of my senses when I told them I was flying to Australia to meet a man I’d met through a local bulletin board system newsgroup feed (that dates me, doesn’t i?)

The year after we met we started our dating website and we’ve watched how online dating has become a positive alternative for most everyone. It’s certainly not the only way to meet someone but I have to say it beats meeting a drunk in a bar hands down.

Sure there are some creepy people on the net. There are creepy people at the grocery store, the gas station and even at the library. Do they bother you? No, you ignore them and move on to people you feel comfortable around. Same thing works on a dating site. Meeting someone online is safe, practical and it allows you to find out a lot about someone before you get all geared up to meet someone new.

Online dating has become an alternative and practical way to meet people that we can potentially date. Remember when Mom said there were more fish in the sea? It’s true. You can sort through any number of potential mates and refine your choice again and again so you won’t get a lemon. Not only can you find someone to date, most sites give you plenty of ways to interact with friends from all over the world. You don’t have to get dressed to go out – you can laugh and play online every night. For free!

If you haven’t tried online dating – give it a go. Follow all the safety suggestions about meeting in a public place and you won’t have to worry. If you don’t like it, delete yourself from the dating site and go hang out at the pub. Be careful there too.


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D-A-T-E…this is probably one of the words that can cause anxiety, fear and excitement all at the same time from people re-entering the dating market. For many of us, life has been safe and secure with a permanent partner for years and then all of a sudden we’re single and alone. How do we get back into the game without feel (and acting) awkward?

The truth is, it’s not easy. The rules have changed since you first dated 5, 10, or even 20 years ago. No longer do men do all the chasing (and paying), no longer do you have to wait for a phone call — it’s all email and texting now. Fortunately, it’s not difficult to catch up. Tell yourself that your first 3 dates are all about market research. No stress, no strain – it’s not going to work out anyway. It could but that’s not your goal. Your goal is to go out and watch other people as well as your date. See what other people are doing and how they’re doing it.

It’s always exciting to be asked out on a date, especially if it’s someone you’d really like to get to know but what about the person doing the inviting? Every time an invitation is made there is an opportunity for rejection. So how do you cope and not chicken out? Do what salesmen do — chalk each one down to numbers. Every successful sales person knows that for every so many people they make one sale. So it’s all about numbers. If this one doesn’t accept, another will come along. I promise!

I don’t think many people go on a first date without some anxiety. I know I always did. A few butterflies to quiet down. I didn’t want to trip, I didn’t want to slob spaghetti sauce on my blouse and I didn’t want to look stupid. Don’t ask why those are my concerns, they just are. I’m sure you have things that come to mind before a first date too. I learned not to order spaghetti on a first date, not to wear shoes that didn’t fit well and to think before I spoke. And it worked!

You can make the first date anxiety proof. I could say try to keep cool but it’s better to be prepared and then there’s nothing to lose your cool over. If you know you have a date, make sure the clothes you’re going to wear are clean, ironed and ready to put on. Don’t wait til the last minute to find out a button is missing on your favorite shirt. Don’t wait til the last minute to get a reservation at your favorite place only to find out they’re fully booked.

Confidence is sexy — well prepared leaves you confident.


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I’m often asked that question and my answer is always the same.. it depends. If you’ve just met someone, you do not owe them your entire life history before you know anything at all about them. It’s a date, not a confessional. What if you tell someone all about your personal life in addition to the skeletons in your closet and you decide you don’t want date number two? You’ve got all this personal information floating around to whomever this person talks to about it. They’ve got no unwritten contract to be discreet because you’ve let them know you’re not going to see them again. Bad move.

What sorts of things are we talking about? Children. You don’t know this person and do you want them knowing your childrens’ names, ages and where they go to school? I wouldn’t. Where you work? Same thing. Where you live? Same thing. Also, there is no need for them to know you were picked up for drunk driving 5 years ago and they don’t need to know that you had 3 miscarriages. None of this is the business of a stranger and yes, this person is a stranger until you get to know them better.

Why let someone judge you for something that has gone on in your past that has no bearing on the person you are now? Makes no sense to me to put myself in that position of playing cleanup to prove I’m not that person any more. People who tell all right up front are probably the same people who open a book to the last page so they know how it’s all going to end. Stop that.

Unless you plan to drop your drawers and have sex on the first date, they also don’t need to know about any of your past sexual partners. This one really drives me up the wall. People tell me that they go on a date with someone and much of it is spent talking about someone’s past sex life. Too much information. When I go out I want the conversation kept to him and me and nothing more. How else are we going to know if we want to see each other again? Frankly, I’m much more interested in his present and his future plans that might include me than I am in who he dated from high school forward.


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