The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?

Maik567
The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?

Age gaps in relationships seems to be a recurring subject of discussion GaG, and questions about these kinds of relationships tend to come up daily. Especially along the lines of "Is this wrong?" "Can it work?" "Is this normal?", etc. So I'm gonna give my take on some of the biggest issues and questions surrounding these relationships.

When is it wrong?

Of course there is never an objective wrong when it comes to things like relationships, as people are different and everyone will make their own choices. However, it is possible for large age gap relationships to be based on the wrong reasons. So what's the distinction? If for example a 20 year old woman just happens to fall in love with a 35 year old man because their personalities match up and they have incredible chemistry, then in my opinion there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

But when a person says that they will only date people who are much younger/older than them that's where the issues start. When you do that you aren't judging people based on what they are like as a person anymore, you are judging them based on some preconception that you have inside your head. So what makes this bad? Well, the reason is that they are pretty much always based on your own issues/insecurities. For example, it is common for girls with daddy issues to seek older men and while it might seem like only a preference to them, it's often linked to seeking a replacement father figure or the kind of attention from an older man they never got from their father. And obviously this isn't a healthy.

Or if an older man/woman only dates much younger people, it usually has to do with their insecurities. It's no secret that a 30 year old man/woman is gonna expect more from a partner in terms of financial stability, maturity and just having your shit together overall. But it's not nearly as hard for a 30 year old to impress a 20 year old who doesn't have nearly as much experience about life. Of course there is the possibility that an older person wants a younger partner just because of their looks, but it should be more than obvious that these kind of relationships never work out well.

The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?

Hypocrisy about "age is just a number"

First, let's clarify what the saying actually means: to most people it means that your age shouldn't define who you are as a person or what you should do. So basically, it means that a 20 year old and a 40 year old could have identical personalities and identical interests. They could be just as mature/immature and you shouldn't let your or someone else's age be an obstacle.

I wanna start by saying that I actually believe that age is definitely more than just a number, I agree that you shouldn't let your age define you as a person but you shouldn't just brush it off completely like it doesn't have any meaning.

The hypocrisy here is that people like to use the saying whenever it benefits them or in situations where they agree. But the moment the subject is something that they don't agree with, usually age becomes a lot more than just a number. I've seen this countless times on GaG, like a girl defending her dating a much older man, but when asked about dating someone younger, suddenly age matters after all. Or when an old guy defends dating someone young enough to be their daughter "age is just a number" but immediately afterwards he says how women her age are too old for him, have bad personalities and are not attractive, etc. So you should really only be using this if you're open to dating both ways younger or older.

What is too big of a gap?

Again there isn't an objectively correct answer when the age gap becomes too large. But a simple rule for finding out when an age gap is or isn't socially acceptable is the "half-your-age-plus-seven" rule. And if your partner is older than you, then simply do that with their age and see if you are older than the answer. But I think that this should be used as more of a guide line than a strict rule on who you should date.

The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?

Biggest issues

There are two major issues with large age gap relationships which cause most of the age related issues these couples face. Conflicts of interest and biological/physical differences.

Conflicts of interest are usually based on the fact that the two people are just at different points in their lives; the younger partner usually still wants to enjoy their youth whereas the older partner might be looking to settle down or just isn't interested in that kind of thing, considering they have already experienced them. This can lead to some huge fights if the other partner wants to get married and start a family but the other just simply isn't ready for that. It can also cause the relationship to get distant if both people want to do different things in their free time, which can end up with both people doing these things separately.

Biological/Physical differences should definitely not be ignored, you should think carefully whether or not you would be fine with your partner possibly dying much before you leaving you as an old widow. Or if you want to have kids is that really gonna work out? When people get older the health risks of your baby rise substantially and at some point it could be either biologically impossible or just not sensible to have kids. Lets say you want to have kids when you are 30 and you are dating someone 20 years older than you. Not only are the health risks going to be significant but even if you have the child your partner will already be 60 years old when your child is 10 years old and they simply won't be able to participate in the child's life in the same way a younger parent could.

The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?

In summary

If you are wondering whether you should get into a relationship with someone much younger/older then here is a pretty simple answer. If this just happened like any other relationship and you have good chemistry, it feels right and you think you can genuinely make it work, then go for it. But if their age is a large defining factor then you probably want to date them for the wrong reasons.

The Age Gap in Relationships: What Are the Major Issues?
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