Search Results: what men want from dating

She won’t butt out. At first I took it as “okay, she means well”, but now I don’t know. I took a long break from dating and was fine just being single, and she says “nope, you’re 40 now and you’ve been single too long. You need a man in your life. Since you’re friends with me you’re getting a man whether you want one or not” (she loves to matchmake). I realize she has a point, so I get on Facebook dating. She saw me on the apps one day at lunchtime (we work together) and she’s telling me who to swipe right on, who to swipe left on, etc and when I didn’t swipe right on a guy she told me too, she literally took my phone out of my hand and swiped on a whole bunch of guys because I (according to her) “clearly don’t know how to pick men”. Eventually I did match with a guy who I really liked, we’ve been dating for almost a year, and she doesn’t like him. Apparently she’s got someone all picked out who she wants to fix me up with (who’s a really nice guy and financially well off but I’m not attracted to him). The guy understands and said it’s fine but she won’t stop and says “this guy’s perfect for you, and your boyfriend’s a loser. Dump him and give this other guy a chance.” (The guy is definitely loaded and my boyfriend supports himself well, but he treats me well and we make each other happy).

she’s gotten to the point where she’s literally taken my phone out of my hand and texted my boyfriend from my phone making really ridiculous demands on him (like demanding he get me a Louis Vuitton bag for my birthday which I know he can’t afford). She’s caused some bad fights between us this way.

I’ve tried telling her to butt out but she doesn’t. She’s dating a guy who is 25 years older than us and is trying to push me to date much older as well. My boyfriend is early 40’s, like me. Nothing wrong with dating older men, but if I’m happy why can’t she just butt out?

There’s a couple that I know that are together for over 3 years now and right from day 1 the guy insists that they spit the bill 50/50…. they’re in a committed relationship way past the casual dating phase.
For the guy to want to split bills is it because he doesn’t trust his partner or is it because he’s inexperienced?
(this is his very first serious girlfriend that he’s ever had and he lives on his own).

Or is it because these days both people chip in their half because the cost of living has gotten expensive?

30f and I really can’t tell if I’m inevitably single because I don’t want a relationship or it’s a case of self sabotage. Within the past few years, the only attention I’ve gotten from attractive guys were on dating apps. But that should be taken with a grain of salt, I feel like compared to the average woman, I don’t get attention from quality guys in person. I’m pretty shy and tend to speak when spoken to, on top of bad anxiety, I’ll say I question if women can relate to my lack of sex drive. I haven’t had sex since my early twenties/don’t masturbate and couldn’t care less if I died a virgin, will feel some kind of way if I’ve never found love though.

It’s as if I want the reassurance I’m desirable (from what seems like decent men) vs actually going out on dates, I’m insecure but wouldn’t just go for anyone that gives me the time of day. I just don’t get why it can’t ever go my way w/ the OLD apps, it’s likely bad luck but a pattern of: ghosting, fizzling out, the convo not flowing to my expectations & I dip out, just lack of interest (can go both ways) etc. I’m attracted to men, I really don’t think id date a woman but something about men at the same time turns me off (physically & personality wise). Like almost every woman I've known has been boy crazy since they were pre-teens and I never got it, I thought they were exaggerating or I was a late bloomer. Well here I am 2 decades later, my closest thing to boy crazy were celebrity crushes.

Am I looking for excuses to justify being single? Is it simply a case of being unlucky? Is there more to unpack here? Or is the right guy all it takes for it to fall into place?