Acceptable Age Difference (marrying, ladies, gorgeous, personal)

[Dport7674]

Male, turn 40 next month...Prefer woman who are within 5 yrs younger or older than me.

[palmtree87]

Originally Posted by AtkinsonDan

I dated a 25 year old when I was 39. Is that fudging creepy? Doesn't how we choose to live our lives have more of an impact on how old we appear or feel than a chronological number?

For some it is creepy, for others it isn't. If you date someone who's much younger or older than you, you have to be prepared that some people will judge you. Personally, I don't find it creepy, but I would wonder if the girl has daddy issues, or if you have an obsession with youth. Not trying to be offensive, just saying what I would think if I saw a 40 years old with a 25 years old.

[AtkinsonDan]

Originally Posted by palmtree87

For some it is creepy, for others it isn't. If you date someone who's much younger or older than you, you have to be prepared that some people will judge you. Personally, I don't find it creepy, but I would wonder if the girl has daddy issues, or if you have an obsession with youth. Not trying to be offensive, just saying what I would think if I saw a 40 years old with a 25 years old.

Rest assured I do not have an obsession with youth. At this point in time I am contemplating asking out a woman at my work (different department and area of the business) who is approximately five years older than me. I can't speak to the motivations of the 25 year old whom I dated, although I believe she was fairly level headed and liked me for the person that I was.

[mishigas73]

Originally Posted by palmtree87

For some it is creepy, for others it isn't. If you date someone who's much younger or older than you, you have to be prepared that some people will judge you. Personally, I don't find it creepy, but I would wonder if the girl has daddy issues, or if you have an obsession with youth. Not trying to be offensive, just saying what I would think if I saw a 40 years old with a 25 years old.

Do you really spend time thinking about and judging the relationships of strangers?

[JerZ]

Originally Posted by mishigas73

Do you really spend time thinking about and judging the relationships of strangers?

I'm not sure this is fair, since the answer came in response to someone else publicly asking the question, and asking us to think about an answer.

When something outside the norm happens (and yes, this is outside the norm/average) we, as a societal species, are programmed to figure it out. I don't think that's being judgmental but that's just my opinion. That doesn't have to result in a negative "judgment," but a questioning of motives maybe comes up for some people.

For me, my lack of interest in much older men isn't anything to do with society. If things turned around tomorrow and the whole entire world of women were screaming that they wanted men double their ages exclusively and couldn't stand men closer to their own ages I'd still get that squicked feeling...it would be internal. So, the society's opinion thing doesn't really influence me here but perhaps it would influence others. Don't know.

[D217]

I think we tend to have preconceived notions as to what an "age" looks like. I've met both younger & older men who have completely changed that picture I had painted in my mind.. ~ Not that I would necessarily want to date them, IJS...

[winrunner]

Assumptions: For the purposes of this post and hopefully clarity, an older man is trying to date a younger woman as per the OP that was merged into an existing thread recently.

Originally Posted by JerZ

The OP's age difference hypothesis here is half one's age plus 7 years. The question is whether a woman would be amenable to that formula of age difference - i.e. you are half the man's age plus 7 years. (Approximately.)

So say you're 42 (I don't know how old you are, just throwing that out there), would you be attracted to a 70 year old...not would you be attracted to a 51 year old. (Just giving an example and am assuming this magic "formula" is just an estimate.)

I'm no math major, and I'm about to channel Captain Obvious here, but one of the flaws in the formula is that the older the man gets the greater the age difference is. So while the numbers don't look that bad when the man is in his early 40s they spiral out of control after hitting 50, 55.

Take my last SO, please I was 43 she was 29, 14 year age difference. According to the formula, which I was NOT aware of, she was 1 year older than the target age (28.5=7+[43/2]) She was technically 29 yrs 6 months when we started dating. Our age difference was never an issue.

Had we stayed together 7 years, at 50 she would have been 36 - still 14 years apart. We didn't stay together and according to the formula at 50 the target age would have been 32, an 18 year difference. At my current age of 52 my magic age should be 33, 19 years younger.

If you must rely on a formula, use a sliding scale or sliding metric (I can almost envision all the math majors cringe at my ignorance) to determine an age. For example after 62 instead of multiplying by .5, multiply by .75 and then add 7. 62 X .75 + 7 = 53.5. Heck dropping the 7 will still get you a young 46.5. The original formula dictates a 38 year old.

Originally Posted by JerZ

But that aside, as I said, it's not just looks or actual physical "youth" that are the only issues here. Some 65-year-old cold approaching me for a "date" is basically just inches from retirement...I have a nine-year-old son, for heaven's sake. Can we say "not the same page"? That suave dude hoping to nail me was doing the worm with all the crazy cool cats and groovy beaded chicks at prom while I was a fetus. There ARE considerations...and not just how society sees us as the considerations. That is nowhere near the big deal that actual, literal generational differences would be, and that's actually only a 17 year difference, BTW, nowhere near the OP's suggestion which, doing the math for me at 48, would put me together with an 82-year-old. (Yeah, no, LOL. NOW we're really getting crazy.)

Thanks for the visuals The age difference... not groovy. That's almost grandpapa territory.

I don't know where this formula came from, but if I were a betting man, I would say that a man came up with this to justify chasing younger women. I would go even further and say that this was a man with low self-esteem, and not because he's chasing younger women, but because he needed to justify his actions with something to which he could deflect blame. "It's not me, it's this formula. Yes, yes. It's the system and I am just a product of it."

Originally Posted by JerZ

No, I'm not everybody. Yes, huge age differences can work out. If you do the math, you'll see it's rare. Ask out whomever you want to ask out. Only they know whether they'll be willing to go out with you. We don't. We can only give our own PsOV. So good luck whatever happens.

Many here have supported the age differences with their SO and others just can't see it. Although the opinions varied, the one thing they have in common is that the posters have owned them. There is no right or wrong, just a right or wrong for you.

In this day and age where we're drowning in political correctness and some seem to think that it's okay to do what you want as long as you're not hurting anyone, needing to use or resort to some arbitrary system to "request permission" or "justify one's behavior" screams to me that maybe that person has a problem with the age difference.

Remember this, the formula will only give you a number, it will not make you more attractive to the other person or guarantee success.

[Chowhound]

Originally Posted by mishigas73

Do you really spend time thinking about and judging the relationships of strangers?

Every time these threads come up you post in them vehemently defending them by asking such questions as what you posted here, No one is sitting around "lamenting and spending time judging" it's just people making split second observations about the world around them, as humans tend to do subconsciously. This is human psychology/behavior 101. I find that you appear to be getting yourself worked up too much about it. You're most likely not going to change people's opinions, see the bolded I quoted by Jerz. The best you can expect is that people don't say or treat you differently because you tend to date much older men. The cold truth is is that most people do judge, just a fact of life, this is a life lesson you should have learned and accepted a long time ago, acceptance doesn't mean "like", it just means that it "is"

Originally Posted by JerZ

I'm not sure this is fair, since the answer came in response to someone else publicly asking the question, and asking us to think about an answer.

When something outside the norm happens (and yes, this is outside the norm/average) we, as a societal species, are programmed to figure it out. I don't think that's being judgmental but that's just my opinion. That doesn't have to result in a negative "judgment," but a questioning of motives maybe comes up for some people.

For me, my lack of interest in much older men isn't anything to do with society. If things turned around tomorrow and the whole entire world of women were screaming that they wanted men double their ages exclusively and couldn't stand men closer to their own ages I'd still get that squicked feeling...it would be internal. So, the society's opinion thing doesn't really influence me here but perhaps it would influence others. Don't know.

[Dewdroplet76]

Originally Posted by mishigas73

Do you really spend time thinking about and judging the relationships of strangers?

When I see a couple in which the man is a good 20-30 years older than the woman and she looks like a model, I assume that the man has some serious money. I don't dislike them, hate them, etc. I'm not jealous or anything. It only takes about 1 second of my time. And it doesn't affect either my life or their lives at all. We make judgements about people all the time. I would never tell anyone what my gut reaction to their relationship was - nor would I expect them to care. But you can't really control things like this.

[Danbo1957]

The "formula" connotes a minimum age, not a target age. And the numbers represent more than a cultural norm, they represent a biological components too. Frankly, a forty year old woman may be in a safer relationship with a fifty year old man than with a man who is forty.