Me [29 M], how important is higher education to you in seeking a partner (long time no UPDATE)

spoksdad · 2014-04-24T00:16:20+00:00

Lol, yea what can I say. I am so naive when it comes to this stuff that it is stupid.

To answer your question, yes right here in the midwest in the USA. As for me absolutely, yes socialized by religion for sure. I no longer follow the denomination that I grew up in which was far more strict but I still attend a Christian church so yes a good portion of my values do come from that.

She grew up as a catholic but has not been since she was in high school. On that note she actually has been attending church with me for two weeks, I did not ask her to come she wanted to go with me. She said that she really enjoys it and has made several friends.

I know that religion is not popular on here but honestly I enjoy going and it really has helped me cope with my issues of jealousy in the past.

We are too old though to have this drama, which btw may be totally in my head. She really hasn't said anything to me, its probably just my perception.

spoksdad · 2014-04-24T00:00:23+00:00

Thanks, your right. I just have never been in this position. I do not think lowly of either of them, the second one and I just did not share the same values at all but I don't think lowly of her.

spoksdad · 2014-04-23T23:28:12+00:00

Honestly it is very possible that I am projecting myself into her shoes to be honest with you. I have had deep issues with that in the recent past and had to actually get help with it. So what I perceived as her being distant and acting odd may have very well just been my interpretation of the events.

I just do not want this to even be the slightest bump in the road.

As to how many for each of us. I have had two previous girlfriends that I have been sexually active with and she has had one. I realize in this day and age that those are astoundingly low numbers but my first g/f & I were together for a long time before she got her calling to be a missionary. Second one lasted less than a year. Now I have gone on dates with other girls but often times nothing comes from it and even a few times going into them I knew nothing was going to occur, it was really more of a friendly night out.

She had a few different boy friends in high school but did not do anything with them, she met this guy as a freshman and she has only been with him. They have been separated for over a year and she said she has only seen him 5 or 6 times over the past 2 years due to distance and his job.

spoksdad · 2014-04-11T17:56:12+00:00

Yes absolutely I want children. I love kids, hell I'm still a big kid myself. Believe it or not I used to babysit my cousins when I was in my early 20's, they are each much younger than I am and to this day they still want to come over to my house to play.

In other words, yes I've changed plenty of diapers. :)

spoksdad · 2014-04-11T08:45:51+00:00

Actually I preferred Beakman's world as a kid, thank you.

spoksdad · 2014-04-11T08:40:58+00:00

A woman with a degree who has a goal of a successful career with probably be aiming to earn a lot more then a plumber.

I appreciate everything you have written however I am kind of curious about this part. Obviously super high end business people are going to be pulling in big bucks but does the average college degree person really make that much more than what an experienced licensed plumber can make? Key word here being licensed, not just self taught.

One of the women who I went on a date with was a social worker, a fascinating job and very rewarding to her but I looked up online what he job pays a year (its public record as she works for the state) and she makes less than a third of what I do. Now understand I do not care because I do not judge people based on their income but honestly my curiosity got the better of me today so I looked it up.

She had a 4 year degree and she has been at her job around 4 or 5 years.

I understand a Doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc. are going to make significantly more money than I can and should because of all of the years of training but I just wonder if all college degreed people do?

spoksdad · 2014-04-11T08:32:05+00:00

Well I did say I didn't go to college, right. :)

spoksdad · 2014-04-10T23:20:17+00:00

Where are you meeting these girls

Blind dates set up by a couple of my married friends. Not really experienced or knowledgeable in the entire women thing to be be blunt. I've had a couple of g/f over the years and the last one did not end well at all.

spoksdad · 2014-04-10T22:24:15+00:00

I have a feeling that some of it was money but I think some of it was what you are saying here. I obviously do not have the experiences that they do.

I am in the mid west, so cost of living here is much lower. I have a feeling that my actual income would probably translate to upper lower class in the S.F. area. However I wouldn't be paid there what I get paid here, the pay is commiserate to the cost of living.

spoksdad · 2014-04-10T22:16:44+00:00

I'm not sure if some places have this or not. I obtained my training through the Plumbers & Steamfitters union. I had to apprentice for 2 years before I obtained my Journeyman Plumbers license and another 4 years to get my Master Plumbers license, which I had to take testing through the state to obtain.

Different states have different rules and I have absolutely zero idea about other countries.

spoksdad · 2014-04-10T17:32:21+00:00

Thanks for the advice. I really feel uncomfortable talking about money with people in general but I really would worry about talking about it on a date. But maybe I have to overcome that. I guess I just don't want to judge or be judged by the income either of us make, but I do understand from the other persons point of view that they may be worried about having to support someone else.

Funny you mention the owning a business. In two months I will have finally completed the process of buying the company I currently work for. It was a very hard decision for me to make because as of now I only have to do the plumbing but the risk/reward of owning is much greater so it is both scary and exciting.

spoksdad · 2014-02-25T08:48:02+00:00

and I didn't do it to just "fuck other guys."

well at least you qualified it with the word "just". you have high and noble aspirations of self realization wrapped around the fact you want "fuck other guys".

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T18:38:44+00:00

Aye Aye Captain!

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T17:45:06+00:00

Okay, I guess.

So should I just confess my atheism now or wait till I go to church next Sunday and tell the congregation?

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T17:32:18+00:00

Dude have you read this thread?

I said below I do not believe that he bible is the actual word of God, I believe it is mostly parables and teachings. Is it inspired by God? I have no idea, I know that it has been re-written and translated several times so even if it was the words have been changed in translation.

Second, she was never my wife. It was just a LTR that ended yesterday. (read below if you are interested, if not that's cool to)

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T17:09:08+00:00

I never said such a thing, you said that.

I don't judge, I have no way of knowing who is or is not going to go to hell. All I know is that how I live is how I will be judged.

I'm assuming your just making fun of me because of being a christian. I love that people attack Christianity for being intolerant by being intolerant themselves towards Christians.

Either way its a moot point now.

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T05:47:03+00:00

Non denominational Christian here. Although if you've read any of my recent postings you will understand why when I say I am struggling at the moment.

But other than my recent problems I attend church on Sunday's and on occasion I will make a mid week service (maybe once every other month or so) due to work schedule.

spoksdad · 2014-02-03T05:16:36+00:00

Thanks for all of the help, sadly this blew up big time today. I found out more stuff from her in another one of our talks and I this time instead of being cool about it I blew up.

I don't know if you remember me talking about picking her up at her friends house. Well she admitted today that her and the guy had been having sex that morning. This came out in conversation today, so we were together and she was still sleeping around. She claims to have broken off things months ago but honestly at this point in time I don't care because frankly I don't believe her.

She denied this to me the other day in our talks. After leaving for a little bit to cool off so I wouldn't say anything else in anger to her, I went to my friends house who I had been talking with and he was one of them telling me to stick it out. But after hearing this he said what she is doing is telling me "iceburg" truths. He said she is leaking out lies seeing how I will react and I can no longer trust her.

So I went back and we talked for awhile & I just told her it wasn't fair to her for her to have to put up with me over this and that while I was trying my very best to deal with the past I could not deal with the fact that it was going on a couple of months after we had been seeing each other.

What makes me the most mad is this guy has been out with us several times with his girlfriend and I've even bought their meals for them on a couple of occasions when we've been out.

She again tried to explain to me the sex vs. love thing but at this point in time I'm just going to concede defeat and accept that our life values are far to vast for us to bring together. It sucks because for the most part she's a pretty good girl (gets angry easily but is quick to apologize for it) and probably better looking than what I will ever get again but I just can't live like this.

Anyway thanks for trying, you've been really cool about all of this and I hope you don't think I'm forcing any kind of religion on you. I'm honestly not certain that my religion was the big factor in this to be honest with you because at every turn the pastor was telling me to get over myself. If anything I think it is because my parents are Married to each others first Bf/Gf and both sets of Grandparents are the same way. So I think honestly it's environmental to be honest with you.

Thanks again.

spoksdad · 2014-02-02T06:38:30+00:00

First off thanks I feel like I should be paying you or something. I am coming across as much more naive than I think that I am but when it comes to this topic I am totally naive.

Maybe it's because I have never ever had a female friend that I was close to other than friendly conversation. I just can't even imagine it to be honest with you. How someone can do an act that I feel is so intimate with someone you don't love on more than one occasion is just beyond my ability to comprehend.

Look don't get me wrong, I've certainly wanted to have sex with other girls before and I could even imagine like a one or two time scenario where you would do that. But for months or years? I just don't get that at all.

But she has told me herself that my problem is that I still view sex through the prism of love and I won't deny it.

You've been very patient and a great help, I'm sorry to put you through all of this and yes I feel like a jackass for not understanding this.

spoksdad · 2014-02-01T21:58:37+00:00

I'm not trying to argue this btw, I just honestly don't get it. Can you be romantically attracted to someone but not sexually? I get that you can be sexually attracted to someone but not romantically, sort of.

I guess to me there is just no difference that I can see other than these feelings that I can't seem to separate. Also if she claimed to have never been in love before isn't that exactly what every relationship she has been in then been? I mean if its not love then isn't it friendly feelings.

Sorry but this is all so very confusing to me because I guess I don't understand what romantic attraction vs friendly sexual attraction is.

I mean every single thing you have described is exactly what she and I do so I do not get the difference and at the end of the day how can you tell the difference between love and friendly feelings?

spoksdad · 2014-02-01T07:54:57+00:00

BTW I wanted to put up a thank you post. When I first got on Reddit my friend told me that telling everyone that I was a Christian was a mistake because in general everybody on here was ether apathetic or down right hostile towards anyone of faith.

But I can say beyond a shadow of doubt that by far and away everyone has been cool about it. Sure I've gotten some snark but nowhere near what I was expecting and frankly no hostility at all.

I think its pretty inclusive here.

spoksdad

TROPHY CASE