Nine Men Not to Date

The Toy Boy

A lot of women think this would be great fun and assume the sex would be fantastic. They forget that experience really does matter and that the fumbling of an inept lover is not actually that exciting. Still sex is not everything, so what about the rest of the relationship?
She is actually slightly ashamed of him. When they met his age was the reason she didn’t ask him out she liked him a lot, but he was too young. However he asked her weekly until she relented so they stared dating and soon were very much an item. A lot of the time they get on fine, but she is not satisfied. The shame of walking into a room filled with her smartly dressed friends with him, in a baseball cap and jeans, still mortifies her. His idea of treating her to a nice evening out is to let her choose which pub they go to. His friends don’t understand at all; they point out to him that he could have a girl of his own age. Although he is not unfaithful, when she is not around he is tempted. He is too young to seriously consider settling down, and does not yet have the responsible attitude she would want in the father of her children. She knows that if she waits until he is ready she will be too old.

Someone much younger is unlikely to ever be a real partner. They may be fun, but they will not understand you. The chances are you will have completely different sets of friends and then there are always younger and more attractive women.
I do know a couple of women who are with a younger man and who are happy there are always exceptions.

There are young men who say they prefer the older woman and for some their history may prove this. Dig a little deeper and I would be willing to bet you will find he is looking for a mum. If I want to look after and mother someone, I will find a man with whom I can have children. If he was born after you started junior school, he is a bad idea.

The Controlling Man

This is the type who sees the woman in his life as a possession, and who thinks he can educate or change her. Sometimes he believes he is doing it for the woman’s own good. This may be motivated by mere perfectionism, but it can also be an attempt to get the woman to resemble a past lost love, or a sign of low self esteem. Either way, this man is not looking for a relationship in the normal sense.

He tells her when she is allowed to go out, and who she is allowed to see. He reads all her text messages, and more often than not when her friends contact her, the response actually comes from him. Although they both work, he controls all the money. Her wages go into a joint account to which he keeps all the cards, cheque books etc only letting her have money when he deems it necessary. She cannot do anything without asking his permission. At home he likes to do the cooking and he decides what they would like to watch on TV. He expects her to do the cleaning and to tidy up behind him. He buys her clothes for her, and has to approve the colour before she dyes her hair. She is not herself anymore. She is just his wife.

The Older Man

At my age there are not so many of these around, but in my younger days there was an epidemic of them!
This mature male preys on a very young girl, attracted to her looks, and able to take advantage due to her naivety. The chances are this is just about sex, but even where it is not, it won’t be long before they realize they have very little in common.
He tells her constantly she is mature for her age, and she is young enough to still think that flattering. She sees him as a token of her maturity, in her mind the relationship with him proves the point to her over protective parents, who naturally disapprove. He sees her as proof he has still got it’, and brags to his friends that he can still pull a young girl. Now she is a little older than when they first got together and the novelty value of this relationship has started to wear off. She sometimes looks at him and sees an old man, and finds him repulsive. He is starting to see a mature woman who will argue with him, rather than the easily manipulated young girl he first met. She is no longer flattered by him; she has heard it all before. When they are out his eyes have started to wander in the direction of younger women; those around the age she was when they first met.
If you need a father figure, talk to your Dad, or find a substitute father in a good friendship with an older man. There is no need to sleep with him. Your boyfriend or husband should be your equal.. The married man.

The Married Man

We have all heard the cliché, ”My wife doesn’t understand me” and associate the phrase with that particular pathetic brand of married man who tries to blame his infidelity on the person it is hurting most – his wife. If he really did not want to be with her, he would leave. This man is unavailable, he is using you, and he is a very bad idea.

The Closet Homosexual

He is a lovely man, who always looks tidy and who is gentle and kind. She was attracted to his mind more than his body; they had a lot in common and he was one of those people with whom she instantly clicked, and they could talk about anything. He was not like her bullying ex-boyfriend and he didn’t leave her to watch the football or get hopelessly drunk. He had manners; he was the sort mother would have approved of. That is except for the ponytail and the secret boyfriend. When she caught him in bed with another man she realized things were not quite as idyllic as she had thought. She also realized she should have known.

I think my biggest problem with these is the dishonesty. Why not just be open about who they are?

Sometimes they are fooling themselves as much as anyone. Unfortunately many still try to hide behind a wife or a girlfriend in order to fit in with the expectations of society, or because their family would not accept the situation. This is a sure recipe for dissatisfaction, if not utter misery.

The Man who Cannot Take No for an Answer

They seem normal at first, only to become childish, desperate and viscous if they don’t get their own way

She met him as part of a group and he seemed like a nice chap. She admired his moral stance. He reminded her in a way of her best female friend in that he seemed to be the sensible one. He had asked early in the evening if she was single and she had told him she was happy to be so. He said he understood that. So when he asked her out for a drink she didn’t see it as a date. He was after all one of the circle, a friend.

They went out and during the course of the evening he asked again if she was looking for a boyfriend, and again she told him she was happily single. He still tried to kiss her at the end of the evening. She panicked, wondering if somehow she had given the wrong impression, and almost ran from him into the waiting taxi. Having refused to kiss him, she hoped he had got the message, but still made the effort to sit down with him a few days later and make it clear she liked him, as a friend, but was not looking for a relationship.

They stayed friends for a while and then he started getting nasty. He derided everything she said. When she asked him why he denied it at first and then yelled at her that he wanted to get her into bed (only it was put in more graphic terms). Charming.
At Christmas he bought her an expensive present, thinking it would make her change her mind. It didn’t. It just embarrassed her and made her feel obliged to get a return gift.
He said afterwards, shortly before she walked away and never spoke to him again, that he thought she was playing hard to get’ and that she wouldn’t have socialized with him if she wasn’t interested. According to this man’s view of the world a woman would not spend any time with him unless she was willing to have sex, and women who say no can be persuaded to change their mind. He has been acting as if they were together and she callously ditched him ever since.

The Violent Man

They are always very sorry, and there is always an excuse. Usually they say it is something the woman did or said that set them off. The one I lived with for a while used all these excuses. It was always my fault.

At first he seemed nice. He is not the sort of person anyone would think would become violent. When I met him he was always the life and soul of the party. We talked quite a lot before we dated, and when we did he was not pushy; it was two months before we slept together. He told me his last girlfriend had been cheating on him with one of his friends, a fact he only found out after he had asked her to marry him.

After a while I moved in with him, and that is when the problems started. He got jealous of anyone I spoke to including my female friends. However he claimed it was all because he loved me so much and being young and somewhat naive I believed him. He was controlling. He expected me to do everything in the home and paid nothing towards the housekeeping. He went out drinking while I was at work and was often drunk by the time I finished. If I wanted to go out it was always spoiled for me. Either I would end up going up with him because he was drunk, or later, I stayed out and then coped with a barrage of abuse when I got home.

The verbal accusations and name-calling was bad enough, but then perhaps inevitably, one night he thumped me.

Afterwards he was so sorry. He swore he would never do it again and told me over and over how much he loved me. I forgave him, and as soon as I backed down he started to say it had been my fault. The fists started to fly regularly, behind closed doors and I was too scared to tell anyone. He always had a reason why. There was always something I had said or done that he used as an excuse to raise his fists. Afterwards he would cry or sulk like a child until I forgave him.

Eventually I confided in a friend. She didn’t know what to do other than advise me to leave, but I loved him, or thought I did, and I would not go. One day he hit her because we were laughing together and he thought it was about him. It wasn’t he was no laughing matter. Later he forgot to even hide it and hit me in public. The outcry from other people incensed him and made him worse, but gave me the confidence to leave him.
After I moved out, I took great care not to let him know where I was. One day though, I saw him in the street. It was a Sunday lunch time. He followed me and gave me the harshest physical beating I have ever sustained. Later, in hospital, I realized how stupid I had been, an on a friends insistence, eventually involved the police. While I was having my head sewn back together, a little blonde policewoman told me they would make sure he never came anywhere near me again. When they caught up with him he denied everything. The sergeant I saw when I went to make a formal statement said he was shaking like a leaf when they took him in and showed him the photographs of the damage he had done. He begged them not to lock him away. Like all bullies, he was an absolute coward.
This was not love, it was abuse and control. It is impossible to understand until you have been in this situation how hard it is to walk away, but the women who seemingly put up with this are not stupid. They are being abused mentally as well as physically and need help. If you ever find yourself in this situation, leave and call the police. Do not ever think it is your fault.

The Boss

Power may be an aphrodisiac but do you really want your bed to be an extension of the office?

I have seen this happen many times. From the male point of view it is about the temptation of an affair with someone who already does as he tells them, and who respects him. Sometimes it is a genuine attraction. The attraction of someone powerful and knowledgeable is clear. The mere fact that you have chosen the same line of work may mean you have a lot in common. But beware. Find out, before you give any indication of interest, if he has done this before. In my experience male bosses who become involved with female employees often make a habit of it and the women often leave their job when the relationship ends. Some (thankfully few) men even employ women on the basis of their looks. Are you really interested in someone so shallow?

An Employee

Wrong as it may be, a female boss who is seeing a male employee is seen in a much more derogatory light than a male boss who sleeps with most of his female staff. In reality it is exactly the same, and just as much a bad idea. Remember too that all your staff will
be his work buddies, and even the best of men can be a little chauvinistic and indiscreet at times. It will damage your reputation, and lose you respect.
No man is worth compromising your career for, and if this is a serious relationship he should find another job. If he cares about you and wants the best for you he will do so. Yes, if you love him then he is more important than your career, but if you are not more important to him, he is the wrong man