Dating After 40: Do Any of Us Really Know What We Are Doing?

 So yeah Sawyer and I finally got our practically healthy grown up relationship. I realize how much of an oxymoron that sounds but if you read any of the old blog where he and I were “dating” we were so immature and ridiculous then.  The first night he came over we just hung out for a while and of course he laid one of his trademark knee melting kisses on me right away.   The chemistry between us has always been incredible, definitely unmatched with anyone I’ve been with in my history. We sat on the couch for a while and just talked.   Caught up on the years and how life had been and all that stuff.   He suggested we grab some takeout so we went out and he held the door open for me in his giant ass truck and helped me get it.   As I was sitting in his truck waiting for him to get in, it was totally surreal.   We drove down the road and he started laughing and said exactly what I was thinking – how weird it was after all these years and all history to...

After I got over the “ick” of the ending with the Rock Star, I floundered for a few weeks.  I tried to not do the dating apps but of course I was swiping like it was an Olympic sport.  In the midst of all that I had a little too much to drink one night and ended up texting Sawyer…. Yes the SAWYER (read back on the blog to see the whole details of that relationship) – the cliff notes version is he’s someone I fell for at the end of my relationship with Duckie (the kids dad) and got caught in a toxic cycle of him wanting me to be his girlfriend while I was single and he was not. After our powerful albeit brief and twisted relationship ended, we ran into each other over the years totally innocently.   I was with Peabody and I’d see him at the grocery store or for one fun basketball season Sawyer’s son played on a rival team of Peabody’s son and we had to sit across the gym from each other and not make eye contact.   Peabody knew about Sawyer and had a massive insecu...

During my painful 18 month split from Peabody, I, thanks in part to a tremendous therapist, realized that Peabody was a narcissist.  And in those final days of dating the Rock Star I realized that he too was a narcissist.  And in fact, when I look back over the years, a lot of guys I’ve dated have been various forms of narcissists. WTF! I read so much on narcissism during my Peabody split I could write a dissertation on them at this point.   For Peabody, he was a Vulnerable Narcissist.   Vulnerable narcissists are self-absorbed, entitled, exploitative, unempathetic, manipulative, and aggressive, and they fear criticism so much that they shy away from attention. They lack autonomy, have imposter syndrome, a weak sense of self, are self-alienated and unable to master their environment.   Vulnerable narcissists are insecure and unhappy with their lives and they experience more distress, anxiety, guilt, depression, hypersensitivity, and shame. They’re co...

So after the failure of the relationship with JJ, I got back on the dating apps.  It was the early days of Covid so life was weird and there wasn’t much to do.  In an odd sort of way those early days when the world was literally shut down may have finally been what taught Miranda to be still and be able to just be home.  After a few weeks I started working the dating apps in ernest and was not seeing much out there besides guys who wanted Covid pen pals.   I kept running into guys who were recently separated (like a doctor who works for the same company I work for – awkward), I talked to a veterinarian for a while who didn’t have a cellphone – that’s right he gave me his email address and landline lol, and then I finally expanded my parameters to people up to about 50 or so miles away from where I live.   Still hitting nothing exciting I opted to upgrade my Bumble membership to see people who had already liked me and lightening hit. Enter the Rockstar… The...

 I know I keep saying the words are coming but it’s been a struggle for the first time in my life.  The last two years and especially the last six months have really been transformative for me.  For the first time, maybe ever in my life, I feel very comfortable just being myself.  Weird I know.  But now I want to start catching up on everything that’s happened…. This isn’t the story of Peabody, I’m not ready for that yet, just know it was horribly messy and verbally/emotionally abusive and I literally turned myself inside out to try to save that marriage and thanks to my awesome therapist, I somehow found myself in the middle of the mess and got myself out of it as methodically, intelligently and blunting some, but not all, of the trauma.   But this isn’t that story, this is the story of JJ … on the heels of moving out and into my own house, what did Miranda do?   Signed right up for the dating apps.   Y’all know single Miranda is never not da...