Family Forum / Marriage / Divorce / April 2006

I think if some have gone younger, then some must've gone older, yes?

In our case... SO is 10 years older than I am... which is around five
years more of a difference that we both thought we'd prefer.

Sometimes, love just happens despite what we think we want.

Hmmm. Well, my first husband was 11 years older than I was (I was
19 when we met, he was 30.) My husband is 5 years older than I
am (33 when we married, he was 38.) In between, though, now
that I think about it, all but one of the men I dated were all
younger than I was, even if it was just a few months younger.

Huh.

Tracey

No effect on my age perception.  My first wife was 2 years younger than me,
my 2nd wife is 4 years younger.  That's virtually the same.

I've dated men from 3 years younger then me to 25 years older then me.

It's not so much the age difference that would matter as general
compatibility and some emphasis on compatible maturity and energy
levels that seem to count more.

Seems that I get along the best with men whom are 10-18 years older
then me. Much younger, or much older then the above range there are
fewer of them that I find attractive (mentally, emotionally or
physically)

I'm not very hung up on calendar age. I tend to look about 5 years
younger then I am, and act about 10 years older. People IRL usually
have a tough time figuring out my age.

My ex-husband was 8 yrs & 1 mo older than I.
My current husband is 4 yrs & 5 mo older than I.

The biggest age differences i've ever had with dating was 8 yrs younger and 16
yrs older (the latter when i was a teenager, the devil!).  
I usually get along best with people close to my own age though.

Hi MOD,

My ex is 4.5 years younger than I, and my SO is about 3 years younger.
My IDEA when I started dating was the 25-35 year old range (trade in
for a newer model), and I only dated my SO because my goal was to date
a lot of people - but she's too good to miss ;->

When I was playing in a band, I met a real cute (REAL cute) and
charming 19 year old, a pianist (I was told she was very good) who also
spoke decent English and seemed intelligent. I was VERY flattered that
she seemed to be hitting on me, but resisted the temptation to hit on
her because it was almost obscene. I guess I would have had the same
feeling about 25 year olds, but the early 30's ladies that I DID date
seemed like an OK fit.

I personally can't imagine dating anyone older, but that's my hangup.

Ed

MyOwnDoppelganger@comcast.net says...

I'm extremely leary of a big age difference, but that's because of my parents.
Dad was quite a bit older than Mom and it was a disaster. Personally, I don't
think I've considered going out with anybody that was more than a few years
younger than I was. I'm six months older than my X and a year and a half older
than Linda.

My ex was 6 years older than me, my currrent is 2 years younger than me,
and in between I was involved with men 6 years younger, exactly my age,
and 12 years older.

I am finally getting to the point where people significantly younger
than me are--just too young! (And I work on a college campus, so I see
tons of 18-21 yos every day.) This spring I find myself thinking, for
the first time in my life, not "I wish I were skinnier so I could wear
that outfit," but rather "my god, those shorts belong in a strip club. I
wouldn't be caught dead in them."

That's a great question.

I used to stay +/- 2yrs, and that was a hard-n-fast rule all through HS
& college, including my ex. It just seemed appropriate at the time.
Yes, I was a Sr who did not partake in the Freshman haul. Dammit.

Then I got divorced. I just turned 35. I have women from 18-40+ pay
attention to me, and were I single I would pay it back. My gf is
-11.1yrs, about to be 24yo. Would I hit on an 18yo? Heck yeah. 40 yo?
Bring it. 70yo? Gimme another JD & Coke, double, and ask me again.

Thing is, there's either chemistry, or there ain't. And chemistry
doesn't count years.

And never say never, folks, cuz there's someone out there who could
change your mind, guaranteed.

- Saul

Ex was one year older than me. DH is 2 years older than me.

Between the two, I dated a lot of 30-somethings, about 5 years younger
than me. None of those worked out, because all of them had never been
married and had clanging biological clocks, and I don't want anymore
children. I did get asked out by even younger men - college aged - but
I'm not interested in babysitting. :-)

I would've loved to have dated someone older than me (maybe 10 years
older, max), but never had the opportunity. I have a baby face plus I'm
very short, and most men older than me think I look too young to date.
Yep, believe it or not, there are men out there that won't date women
who look young enough to be their daughter (the explanation I was
given... course they could have been lying just to be nice!)

While on vacation recently we were chatting up this fellow traveler, a
young college student traveling the world. As the conversation went on,
we got to ages, and he admitted he thought I was no older than 24. He
thought DH was lucky to have scored himself a 20-something bride....
was imagining it was some "professor and student" romance. Then just
the other day I was buying cigs and the clerk carded me. He was totally
floored to see I was 40. DH was with me, put his arm around me, flashed
our wedding rings, and the clerk just shook his head and said, "I
thought he was your dad." DH was NOT happy with that one - he went back
down the aisle and bought some hair dye. :-)

I think DH looks awesome for his age, but he does look his age (just
turned 43). I don't. So we do get some raised eyebrows. You'd think I'd
be tickled to fool people, and DH would be tickled to have people think
he scored a younger woman... but the truth is, it can get annoying to
both of us. Like recently when we ran into one of DH's old girlfriends,
who'd heard we'd married but never met me, and the first thing out of
her mouth was, "Gee, you robbed the cradle, didn't you?" Do people
really think before they open their mouth?

jen

My ex was 5 years older than me.  I'm 4 years older than my fiance.
I've dated someone 8 years younger than me and someone 10 years older
than me.  It's the age they *feel* that makes the difference.  I have a
24 year old friend who acts 80, it's sad.

Cheryl

My ex was 14 months younger than I. He was the oldest guy I'd been out
with since early high school. My high school/college beaus were 2 years
older (but acted way too much younger), 18 months younger, 23 months
younger.

My dad is a month short of 7 years older than my mom. My sister is
about 11 months younger than her husband (high school sweethearts and
married 23 years this summer). My brother's wife is about 6 1/2 years
older than he is -- first marriage for him, second for her, they've
been married 13 years this summer. She looks terrific, though, and I'd
never suspect her of being a few years older than I.

My ex married a woman 14 years and 2 weeks younger than he that we'd
known since she was a child.

When I think about age difference, I usually am mentally figuring
someone anywhere from a couple of years younger to 5-7 years older. But
as no one is asking, I don't really have any way of testing that out. I
don't look my age (when I keep my gray hair under wraps) -- got good
skin genes, no wrinkles! -- but I also have a problem with folks "out
of my generation". I'm not sure I could deal with someone who didn't
know what Watergate meant or had no clue about generational things that
were important in the formulation of my character or belief system or
personality. I think I have a need to have some sort of generational
common ground to be comfortable. -- Barbara Sz.

75-90% of my age

There are some people younger than I am that act "mentally old".  Additionally
some folks older than I are just on a different plane (different music,
raised in a different era, etc).  For me, it'd be 10 years younger and
possibly 3-5 years older but only if they were "young at mind" and
physically active/attractive.

Most of it (to me) is finding someone I can really identify with and
has similar values.  They there's a mismatch, it doesn't matter what
they are on the outside, it tends to fade away over time.

b.

My former husband was 2 years younger than I.

I have not dated seriously in three years.   I have gone out casually
with a few guys who were younger than myself, some by 15 years :)  Fun
to be around. Like their energy, however...probably not for serious
relationship, although many of the younger guys are more mature than my
husband was.... just taking my time.... waiting to find the right one
;)   I want to be in a better frame of mind than I am right now, to
devote myself to someone and free my mind from what has happened in the
past, ya know?

I thought about this quite a bit back when I was doing the online
dating stuff, and decided that 17 years younger than me was about the
limit, because if she were any younger than that I would be
uncomfortable with the "old enough to be her father" thing. As for
older women, I think I set the cutoff at about 10 years older than me,
because most of the ones older than that just seemed "too old", like
the wrong generation for me - more in common with my parents than with
me, ya know?

My GF is 8 years younger than me, which is still enough of a
difference to give us some funny moments when we talk about childhood,
or I will mention something that happened when I was a teenager and
she was in kindergarten at the time...

Dunno what effect divorce would have on it. For me, it is just
something I never thought about before divorce. The limits I mentioned
above aren't really limits on who I'd find attractive (at least not on
the younger end; I don't mind at all *looking* at girls 18-26, I just
don't think I'd want to date them), just on who I'd want to date. So
that was not even under consideration pre-divorce.

BP

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