Why I Bring All My Baggage on My First Dates
Welcome to It’s Complicated, stories on the sometimes frustrating, sometimes confusing, always engrossing subject of modern relationships. (Want to share yours? Email pitches to itscomplicated@nymag.com.)
When I first reentered the dating pool after leaving my husband, I made a surprising discovery: Apparently, sometime during the decade-plus that I’d been married, all the single men completely forgot how to read.
At the time, I was feeling, well, like someone who hadn’t been on a first date in more than ten years. I was scared, I lacked confidence, and even though everyone I knew was telling me to “put myself out there,” I had no idea how to do that. So one night after my kids were in bed, I enlisted the help of a friend and some liquid courage, and I made myself a blatantly honest, completely straightforward online dating profile — no spin, no filters. I’m a single mom with a demanding job and not a lot of spare time to waste; I figured the more I shared about who I was, the better.
After a few super-awkward first dates, though, I learned how optimistic it had been to expect the men who contacted me to pay attention to what I’d written. Each and every time, I found myself struggling to keep my anxiety in check as I stumbled through an explanation for something I assumed…
