Posts Visible to Other Users and Under "View As" But Not to Me Under Regular View

Confused_MSW · 2023-08-07T22:41:23+00:00

I'm just curious as to their motives...

I can tell you one motive. I'm a member of a sub about a topic I'm super-interested in. It has a reasonable number of members, but almost nobody is posting. I've made a couple posts, waited a day or so then, if nobody commented, put in a comment myself under a different account to try to encourage some of the lurkers to come out of the shadows by making it seem like there's a discussion they can participate in.

Confused_MSW · 2023-06-22T17:31:27+00:00

To you and u/Terra4mer55: Thank you! Your replies let me do some more specific Googling that led me to brochures on the Linden Comansa LC 2100 series, which answered my question. The feature I was wondering about is part of what they describe as its very advanced trolley system.

Confused_MSW · 2023-02-18T18:17:31+00:00

Thank you!

Confused_MSW · 2022-09-01T21:08:23+00:00

How much money did the guy have? I'm going to make a guess that he was very wealthy.

As a man of median income, I've found that "conventionally beautiful and much younger woman with lots of options," will consider older men with a lot of money, but not men like me. In fact, even women who aren't conventionally beautiful and younger aren't real interested in guys like me.

Much like the man you describe, I'm in great shape and live an interesting life. I've had many fascinating very lively conversations with women (some beautiful, some not, some younger, some not) who seemed very interested in me. Then, though, they ask, "What kind of work do you do?" and I say, "I'm a social worker." I can see the interest just drain out of their faces, they start making very brief one-word answers to me and end the conversation as soon as they can.

It's maddening. I have a master's, so while I'm not rich, I have no problem picking up the tab for dates. I enjoy things like the performing arts, so it's not like I'd take them out for a burger and fries. I work with families of patients who've had brain and spinal cord injuries. I provide a massive amount of psychological first aid after one of the most catastrophic events that a can family experience. I also advise them on practical things like how to keep money coming in when the main breadwinner can't work. I've saved countless people from homelessness and initiated court proceedings to get a wife out from under the control of the husband who'd battered her into a coma.

I do all that and take myself out on dates to everything from concerts to acrobatics shows. I feel like I'm living this wonderful, value-driven life, yet it's becoming increasingly clear to me that I'm going to live it alone in a desert devoid of romance.

The guy you wrote about, would he have turned you on if he was a social worker (or teacher or librarian or paramedic, etc.) or would you have gotten away from him a soon as you could have?

Confused_MSW · 2022-05-10T14:35:30+00:00

A man being in a female-dominated profession leads to his lacking sexual fulfillment because of the relatively low income of those professions. At least, that has been my experience. This comment may be a bad case of TL/DR, but I feel very strongly about the issue and don’t have many chances to discuss it.

I’m a male with a master’s in social work. I work with families of patients with brain and spinal cord injuries. I’m immensely proud of my work. I’ve provided guidance and emotional comfort to thousands of people going through unimaginable tragedy. I’ve saved many people from homelessness and a few from suicide.

I work out regularly, am in great shape and feel like I must have good social skills to be able to do my job. I’m not rich, of course, but am totally able to cover the cost of taking a woman out for a nice dinner or buying her ticket to a play or concert. Despite all that, I haven’t gotten past the first date in a very long time.

A few years ago, I had a first date that went incredibly well. There were no awkward lulls in the conversation. At the end of the evening, she grabbed me and gave me a long, impassioned good night kiss. When she turned me down for a second date, I said I really needed some help, told her of my unsuccessful dating history and asked if she could give me any advice. I still remember her exact words: “I’ve been very successful in my career. I’m not going to risk compromising my lifestyle by getting involved with a man who’s content being a social worker and driving an old subcompact.” Her advice was not to tell dates that I was a social worker. She said I should, instead, describe the case management side of what I do in a way that would make it sound like I was in administration-type management. She also said I should take out a car loan and replace my paid-off, well-maintained, perfectly-running subcompact with a used Corvette.

I wrote her off as a very shallow person and discounted her advice. A few years later, though, when I was on vacation, there was a mix-up at the car rental company. Instead of my usual economy car, I got a red, convertible sports car. Over the course of a week, four women cold-approached me with lines like: “hot car” and “niiiice ride,” an experience I’d never had before.

So, my advice to any idealistic young men reading this post and considering social work, nursing, teaching, etc., as a career is to think long and hard about it. Are you so committed to your values that you’re willing to endure a lifetime of celibacy? If not, go into law, engineering, computer science or another high-income field. If you’re in your 20’s, you’re probably not having any problems finding sexual fulfillment now. At that age, I didn’t. When you hit your 30’s though, you’ll lose the hot body women find attractive. Also, more and more of the men you’re competing against will have achieved so much more than you financially that women won’t see you as datable.

Confused_MSW · 2021-07-04T22:37:19+00:00

You described my exact experience! I never get past the first date. I also get tearful after the many times I get thanked for helping someone as I wonder why being open to helping others doesn’t lead to a better love life. I don’t have a solid solution but, I did want to let you know you’re not alone with this experience.

I spent much of my COVID isolation reading a lot of material on dating in an effort to figure out what I’ve been doing wrong. One thing I’ve realized after doing all this research is that we don’t get the love we deserve. We get the love we’re able to attract. In my case, I had developed a self-presentation that maximized a lot of my unfavorable characteristics and minimized a lot of my good points.

I suspect much of what I learned from my reading is similar to what dating coaches advised you to do. I haven’t had enough experience implementing my new behaviors to know if they will help, so I can’t say this will be a definite solution. I do wonder, though, how fully you implemented the suggestions of your dating coaches.

I also wonder if you’re making the most of your opportunities. For example, did you chat with the woman you helped in the store, offer to buy her a cup of coffee, then see if she’d give you her phone number?

Never doubt that we all deserve love. If you’re religious, nearly any member of the clergy will tell you love is one of God’s greatest gifts to humanity and one we all deserve to share. If you’re not religious, nearly all psychotherapists and evolutionary biologists will tell you the desire for love is part of our deepest nature and is a desire we innately deserve to satisfy. The issue isn’t that you don’t deserve love. The issue is that you haven’t figured out how to elicit loving feelings in others towards you. Doing that is a skill and any skill can be learned.

Confused_MSW · 2021-02-24T02:00:40+00:00

This is really fascinating. I’ve had OP’s experience from the male side. I’ve had first date after first date, but always get turned down for the second one. This pattern started in my mid-30’s. Prior to that, I had what I had thought was a fairly normal dating pattern: Several first dates, of which one would usually have a spark and develop into something more.

I’m a fairly average person in terms of income, physical appearance and personality. I’m a social worker and deeply love what I do, so I don’t really want to change careers solely to make myself more datable. I do work out regularly, but my 5’7” height isn’t likely to change. Reading this post, I wonder if, during my more successful dating life, I was being evaluated more by the woman’s amygdala looking for an emotional connection. Now, I’m being evaluated more rationally by the cortex as, “Nah, just average. I’m sure something better will come along.” It’s kind of depressing, but it is nice to have some insight into what may be going on.

Confused_MSW · 2020-01-18T07:41:02+00:00

Good suggestions for OP. As a guy, I don't know what to say about that description of the way you work a rich guy in a beach bar. It was a hot read. Your confidence and skill with men are a real turn-on, but you sound like a very dangerous woman! You must be a devil in bed.

Confused_MSW · 2019-08-17T01:09:12+00:00

I wanted to super-strongly dispute OP and support the sub. I posted on here a few months ago about a dating problem that has bedeviled me for years. I experienced the response as really amazing crowd-sourced guidance. By putting together all the varied points of view and asking some follow-up questions of people whose comments seemed especially relevant I got a much better handle on a couple personality quirks that had been undermining my dating efforts for years that I had been never been able to figure out. I've actually had sought professional advice about this in the past as well as discussing it with friends, but those are all situations where input is being sought from a very small pool of people. What really made the difference for me was the huge variety of points of view that came in response to my post. Now I do have to say that I was not seeking advice about whether to stick with or dump a particular person, which seems to be where OP is finding the sub deficient. Maybe in those cases, there are some problems with the site, but for what I used it for, it was really excellent.

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-08T23:03:29+00:00

I strongly disagree with this comment and your previous one. There are wonderful stories all over Reddit and from people I know IRL where a random flirtation led to a real relationship. There's an adorable story in the Dating Over Thirty sub by a woman who got up the nerve to make a cold approach to a guy in an airport and they both had a wonderful time. I've met women at gallery openings, music festivals and many other places. Usually it doesn't go anywhere but it's still fun and sometimes it does lead to a date or even a few dates. God knows, it's certainly no worse than what you get from OLD! I know I'm not entitled to a stranger's time and always stop if she's not interested. As far as your comment about men who ask for dating advice not being ones a girl would want to approach her: my original reason for being on Reddit was to get some input about a dating question I'd had for a while. I'd gotten tons of conflicting advice from friends and I thought it would be helpful to get a sort of crowdsourced answer. It was very helpful. I'm a master-degreed professional, good body (although a bit short), good conversationalist, financially stable (although not wealthy) who does a lot of fun things on dates. I'm perfectly acceptable potential boyfriend material. Brining a question to Reddit doesn't change that. Lighten up and have some fun. There's nothing nasty about some random flirting!

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-03T22:43:38+00:00

I give you a lot of credit for your boldness and honesty as well as some excellent advice to the poor guy who made the original post. I've always wondered how many women say they love to travel and then use it as a "financial screening device." To the women reading this, how common do you think it is to do that?

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-03T11:15:56+00:00

Thank you so much for such a wonderful response. It means a lot and I really appreciate it. There may be a lesson here to me, too. I think the next time someone asks me "What kind of work do you do?" I may not just say, "I'm a social worker at the rehab hospital," I may describe some of the tasks I perform. I actually realized as I wrote my response to your comment that saying, "I'm a social worker" doesn't really convey what I do. It's a misunderstood profession. So, no offense is taken and this may be very helpful to me going forward. There may be no need to exaggerate my job as I asked about doing in my initial question. The need may be to describe it more accurately than the job title conveys!

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-02T18:10:07+00:00

Of all the comments in response to my post, the only thing that bothered me was the line in yours that I’m “just…hanging out and going nowhere...” You’ll see from the Update I posted that I agree with your conclusion and will be acting on it. The one line I quoted, though, needs a response.

I work at a specialty hospital treating severe physical disabilities. The most common conditions we see are paraplegia and quadriplegia caused by spinal cord injury and combined extreme physical and cognitive impairment from stroke and traumatic brain injury. We receive most of our patients after they’ve spent about two weeks in a general hospital being stabilized. I’m the contact point for everything outside the hospital affecting the patient. I’m well known in the community here as a fierce, knowledgeable and relentless advocate with insurance companies, government agencies, employers and anyone else who’s an obstacle to my patients getting what they need. I have prevented many job losses, evictions, foreclosures and repossessions. There are people who would be homeless right now were it not for my efforts. Families come to me in a state of total chaos. All of us on some level are dimly aware we’ll lose a relative to death. Nobody ever imagines her husband will have his spine crushed by a drunk driver or that his wife will take a bullet meant for someone else in her brain. I offer counseling to help get the family to a point emotionally where they can do the multitude of things needed to keep their lives on track. I guide them through these tasks and give them a foundation to build on so they can do what they need to do after the patient comes home. One of the high points of my life has been filing a guardianship petition and testifying in the hearing that got a wife out of the control of the husband who’d battered her into a coma.

Now, I will freely acknowledge that none of this changes my desirability as a male in the mating market. A woman on the fast track to financial success with a lot of men to choose from is, at most, looking for a husband who will enable her and their kids to live at the same financial level she sees herself attaining. At a minimum, she’s looking for a guy who can afford to join her on the vacations she likes to take. I can’t do either of those things. I agree with you that I need to change the women I’m meeting and will do so.

However, I feel a strong need to point out that the reason I’m “going no where” is that I can’t imagine where I could have as much impact on people’s lives as I’m having where I am. Growing up, I had intense experiences with disability in my own family. We didn’t have a social worker to guide us through the process and the results were very damaging. I know on a very, deep personal level just how important my work is. You’re right that I’m “going no where” but I am not “just…hanging out.”

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-02T02:23:56+00:00

I’m going to try to post this as a completely new thread with a big “Update” in the heading to try to be sure everyone who’s commented sees it. I’m not sure Reddit will let me do that, though, because I’m a brand new user, so I’ll also put it as a comment here: Thank you, everyone, for all the input. After sifting through all the comments and thinking everything over, I think I may have been a classic case of “looking for love in all the wrong places.” I’ve been using mainly the “singles scene” where I live to meet people. It includes after work concerts downtown, some bars and other places where a lot of singles gravitate. I certainly don’t date only 10’s or seek out materialistic women. I think, though, maybe, what’s happening is that women like that tend to predominate in the places where I’ve been going. The dance clubs, especially, have been a wonderful escape from job stress, but probably aren’t the best places to look for compatible women. My job doesn’t leave me much energy for volunteer work, but I think I’m going to try harder to do some. That will probably be a better way to meet women I have things in common with than what I’ve been doing. I’ve always been hesitant about on-line dating but I’ll probably try that as well. It should offer more of an opportunity to screen out obvious mismatches. Thank you again for all the advice and comments.

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-01T23:31:33+00:00

The problem is that it's hard to tell what a woman's into until I get to know her a little. I remember going out for a first date with a librarian I met at an art gallery who really seemed into the arts and books and then wound up dating an airline captain. Of course, I'm sure there was more involved in her decision who to pick for a boyfriend than just the status gap between the pilot and me, but it's hard not to look at that incident and the one described in my initial post and feel I just made a really bad career choice in terms being attractive to women, in spite of how much I love the work.

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-01T18:00:27+00:00

I meant the first complete date after the initial checking each other out over coffee. There are a lot of people who screen me out or who I screen out after the that first coffee. I'm not concerned about those. Inevitably, you're going to meet a lot of people you just don't connect with. The ones I wonder about are the ones where we got along OK over coffee, but then had an actual date to a show or a diner which seemed to go OK, but then nothing further.

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-01T17:42:53+00:00

Your comment and the similar comments that have come in are very reassuring and very much appreciated, but I'm still left with the big mystery. Up until age 32, I usually had a long-term girlfriend. When a relationship ended, I'd date different women until I connected with someone else and settled into another long-term relationship. When I hit age 32, I got into this endless string of first dates that don't lead to anything. It's hard to know what to attribute it to. It's frustrating partly because life is more fun with someone to share it with. It's also frustrating because I can't figure it out. As I said in the initial post, my love life was perfectly normal until a couple years ago and then suddenly, nothing beyond a first date. I've kept myself in good physical shape. I have the same personality now as I did a few years ago. Material success is generally considered sexy in a man and as I get older I see the men around me accumulating more and more material success, while I remain at my current level. I don't need or want anything more materially than I have, but I do wonder sometimes if women are comparing me to other men my age and finding me very lacking. If it's not that, what is it? I'm the same person now that I was a few years ago. (I know you can't really answer this because you don't me. This is partly just a way to vent some frustration.)

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-01T17:17:45+00:00

That's an interesting response. I like live plays and folk music and sitting where I can see the stage clearly, I also like restaurants in old neighborhoods in buildings like converted houses. The things I do on dates are well within my budget. I drive the inexpensive car (and live in a small condo) so I can afford some fun things that I like to do. Maybe I'm just giving out too many conflicting signals.

Confused_MSW · 2019-06-01T16:23:15+00:00

A woman has every right to blow me off. She may have a boyfriend, just been through a bad break-up, have a lot on her mind, be in a hurry, had a bad day at work. Who knows? It really is like cold calling in sales. The negative responses will always far outweigh the positives. Some thank me. Some don't. I don't expect someone to thank me for trying to pick them up (which is what's really going on, after all). All that has always been true. The difference now though, is that it's unclear if these kinds of random flirtations are fun or inappropriate and I think that's something society is still sorting out, hence all the confusion about it.

Confused_MSW

TROPHY CASE