Dating Apps

Before we jumped into today's topic, I have two things to say: Eric Bellinger's pandora station is the best thing ever and Outshine Fruit Bars are the best in margaritas!

​Oh, I also have updates!

My office is fully functional again!
I am not the teacher of the year, not officially anyway! We all know I'm a good teacher!
I'm saving money, yall!

Umm that's all I can think of right now. 

So today's topic is about dating apps. Back in 2014, I used Soul Swipe and met one guy. We'll call him, Max because idk anyone named Max lol Max said he was 26 and at the time, I was 22. Yall know I love me an older man, YUM! So we matched and we talked. We exchanged numbers and then he made some confessions. One of which was that he was actually 20...I was so pissed. He immediately became annoying and super clingy. I had to tell him I was uncomfortable with how reliant he had become on me for his mood. If I didn't talk to him, he was depressed. I guess I didn't like him enough to want to talk to him all day. We eventually stopped talking after a few months. Fast forward a few years and somehow we reconnected. It was then that I realized he had some mental health issues. 

The weekend of June 21, we all went Cincinnati to celebrate my best friend's engagement. It was a combination of new and old friends. I caught up with an old friend who was using Bumble, which is a dating app if you don't know. I didn't know anything about it before she showed it to me. She was detailing some of her experiences using it and I was just so amazed!! She convinced me to try it myself, so I made a profile for the weekend. It was nice to have conversations with different people and I guess since I wasn't at home, it felt a little less risky. I matched with a few guys pretty quickly and the conversations just took off. I was drinking, so I was a little less inhibited and more comfortable being myself. I was encouraged to try to link up at some of the bars we went to, but I was nervous about that. I have such an incredible fear of strangers online. I blew off a couple of them, but one guy was very persistent. He kept trying to meet up with me in cinci and I was okay with that because I don't live there and I had friends around. It didn't work out for us to meet so I said screw it and gave up on that. I didn't think we would talk anymore, but like I said, he was persistent. When he found out I was back in Dayton, he told me his mom lived there and that he was coming to visit her. Again, I was encouraged to meet up with him. Ultimately, I couldn't do it. I gave up on the app entirely. Deleted that shit. It didn't work out for me, but the experts told me I didn't give it enough of a chance. And that I can agree with. I was half-assing my efforts. We'll talk about why later.

The experts are two friends of mine who have had great experiences using dating apps. They put the effort in, weeded through some garbage, and found some people on there who are worth their time. I asked these two ladies what they would tell people before using dating apps. Here is what they said:

• Know what you want to get out of using the dating app
• Openly communicate that to avoid wasting anyone's time
• Be open minded, its a different, non traditional way of dating but that doesn't mean it's wrong or that it can't work
• Give it an honest shot
• Don't be afraid to be assertive
• Stay true to your standards
• Don't get caught up in talk, focus on actions
• And at least get food or drinks

Maybe one day I'll be ready to really put the effort into dating apps, but today isn't that day! Third time's the charm though, right? 

Here's a cool assignment, how would you describe yourself in your dating profile? I'll anonymously post them on IG! If you're not following my blog, you should! @nicolenaturallyblog on IG :)
I'll be posting my description on my blog page soon!