The truth of the matter is this. I haven’t dated much in my life. If I had to guess, the number of real dates I’ve gone on up until this year was probably less than I could count on two hands. I know the reason for this is pretty simple. When you’re the size of a house, women tend to be less attracted to you. I get that and I was never really bitter about that. I’ve never been in what I would call a real relationship with anyone. It just never happened. Sure I fooled around from time to time but nothing on a commitment level.
Back when I weighed over 400 pounds and I finally decided to make some critical changes to my life, I did it strictly for health reasons. I knew if I didn’t change my eating habits and if I remained stuck in a sedentary lifestyle I was likely sentencing myself to an early death. So the journey to lose weight began and as you probably know, it has been fairly successful to date and my health has improved greatly.
Although it wasn’t my main reason for dropping pounds and getting thinner and healthier, in the back of my mind I thought, “maybe this might also open the door to some romantic possibilities if I become more attractive to women.” It was nice to have women I’ve known for many years tell me how handsome I was or how good I look after lightening my load. It sort of boosted my confidence which in all honesty could use all the boosting it could get. The person I was on the outside that people knew was an act to some extent. When I saw people I was happy, laughing, telling jokes, friendly and putting on a brave face. The real me when I was alone was lonely, depressed, bitter and in need of affection. Oh sure, the happy version of myself is probably who I am or who I want to be all the time but I spend a lot of time alone which leaves me way too much time to dwell on negative thoughts.
But now I figured I had an opportunity to try and change all of that and seek out the female companionship I’ve always longed for. The only problem was finding a woman. Damn, I was back to square one again. In my mid-40s I wasn’t going to start hanging out at the bar again and I’m certainly not the type to hit on random women at Walmart or on the street. I’ve had friends who would hit on anything with a heartbeat but that’s not who I am. So what were my options?
The truth is there aren’t a lot of options left, other than online dating websites which I’ve never been a fan of. Sure they’re interesting to scan over and see who’s on them but to go beyond that really wasn’t something I thought I could do. However, somewhere in my new found confidence I decided to give it a try.
My website of choice is called Plenty of Fish. It was free and surprisingly there are a lot more local women on the site than I expected. I knew going into the process that the odds of finding a woman without kids and baggage was going to be nearly impossible and I was okay with that.
I made the conscious decision from the beginning to stick to my beliefs of being honest and sincere. I refused to lie on my profile and I posted photos of myself that were not misleading anyone. I immediately had some messages from women which I must admit shocked me a little.
One woman from my area contacted me and we decided to meet in a public place which I always prefer. I only had a photo of her face and the way she described herself on her profile to go on so when I walked into the coffee shop and found her I was a little surprised by who was looking back at me. Now let me be completely honest and say I don’t have a problem with women of size. If you’re a larger woman and you embrace it and are a wonderful person with a super personality and brain to match, I won’t discriminate because you’re over weight. I’m not exactly tiny and I was a much larger man at one time so I know that people of size can be loving and beautiful people. I do however have an issue with people who lie and deceive. This woman had described herself as being an “average” body type when clearly she weighed closer to what I used to weigh. Had she been honest from the start I might have given her a chance but she already had a major strike against her. We went for a slow walk and talked a bit and after learning more about her it became very clear that this wasn’t a match for me and I let her know this. I also believe that if you don’t feel something it’s best to not lead someone on or go out on more dates which will only make it tougher later to break it off without hurting someone.
I had another woman pursue me who gave me the impression that she really wanted to see if a relationship could work but for one reason or another that ended up being untrue. I’m not looking for a friend only situation. I have plenty of friends. So we parted as friends and I moved on.
Recently I had another woman contact me. We chatted online for about a week before we finally met. We had a great conversation and both of us were genuinely attracted to each other. I have to think in hindsight that things moved way too quickly which could have been a major warning sign that I should have seen. We dated five times in about a week. I’ll spare you the details, although they are pretty juicy, but needless to say it ended almost as quickly as it had started. On the bright side, I did get a couple of nights of adult fun out of it so it wasn’t all bad. I truly believe I was used for sex, and that my friends was a first for this guy. I will admit that I fell hard and fast for this one and when it ended last weekend I was hurting but it was a good lesson for me and the knowledge I gained will go with me as I move forward.
I was still feeling quite devastated the next morning after things went from feeling amazing to feeling heartbroken in a matter of minutes. But as I was trying to sift through the wreckage I got another message from another woman on POF. Life wasn’t over and there was still hope. This woman is French and lives about an hour away. We decided to meet and go for a walk with her dogs and then we went and sat by the water and talked for a couple of hours on a bench. With there being a bit of a distance between us, there’s no chance of moving too fast with this one and time will tell if anything will come of it or if I’ll continue fishing for someone else. It’s just nice to know that after so many years of swimming in the pond by myself, some other female fish have finally noticed me.
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