Does it get more difficult to find a companion as you grow older?

Question

I didn't put this question in 'singles' because it seems that category is full of kids. I would appreciate a mature response. Thanks!

Answer 1

If you're looking for the things in a person that you were looking for when you were younger, it could be in the range of difficult to impossible, and even older people I have known who have been fortunate enough to find an attractive much younger companion sometimes found the age gap frustrating. If Elvis were alive today, he still would surely find plenty of companions, but I am sure that even he would find the dating scene different than it was when he was 22 years old.

On the other hand, there are other pitfalls involved in choosing a companion on the basis of just "settling" for whoever seems easily available for companionship, sex or whatever.

First, never, never listen to anybody who urges you to settle for something or someone you don't want, or someone or something that they would not settle for in your shoes! "Practical" advice may be well-intended, it might be a concealed put-down or merely useless. In any event, you are under no obligation to accept someone else's "honest opinion" of your prospects in any matter whatever. Other people simply don't know what you want or need, or is available to you, and their advice is usually based on superficial impressions, or on thinking that might or might not be correct.

But the age gap will be removed by confining the search to people whose ages are within a reasonable range of your own. Rather than respective ages, the focus should be on common interests and viewpoints and/or common attraction. This is not to say that sparks cannot fly and bonds cannot develop among the most surprisingly different people.

At any rate, in a casual friendship or more, you don't have to analyse yourself and others too much in order to have fun and get acquainted. Above all, go out and meet people on your own, groups of them, and focus at first on having fun, enjoying yourself, enjoying the company, and have the patience to wait for stronger bonds to develop.

Dating services that match people up "scientifically" on one basis or another might be okay too, but, maybe for mistaken reasons, the idea completely turns me off. I don't like "singles" services, not only because the category is full of kids, but also because-- well, I feel perfectly capable of meeting women on my own without using a matchmaker!

My intuition, and yours, is a quality inherited from ancestors with millions of years of physical and social evolution. I am confident that my intuition and life experience are more reliable than some "scientific" index of compatibility.

"Difficulty" is hardly a valid criterion for pursuing or not pursuing companionship. Anything worth doing requires some groundwork, perhaps some "drudgery". Few things worth doing are effortless. Efforts might involve false starts and failures, such as, for instance, when I embarked on dance lessons only to find out that I was as pathetic on the dance floor as in my youth.

But, not having any spare money to spend on a good car and money for even inexpensive dates, I am now, at nearly 70, embarking on a second career to get back in the median economic category that will make these things, hopefully helpful in finding suitable companionship, possible of attainment.

If I never find a suitable companion in lieu of my late wife-- never call this process "replacement" because a unique human being can never be "replaced"!-- at least I will have had fun stumbling around on the dance floor, at least doing my best, laughing at myself and giving others laughs. I will have the joy of meeting and befriending other freshman public school teacher interns a third or half my age, all of us tremendously excited about being on the cutting edge of the new wave of new-millenium teachers!

That's some companionship, though, of course, it doesn't compare with the intimate companionship to which I assume you are referring. But there will be tremendous satisfaction in walking into my new classroom, a kind of repeat of the experience of walking into my own editorial office with a publishing company 40 years ago.

Difficulties aside, you will find a companion if you want one. I have always believed we can gain most things that we truly want, and at last you and I are old enough to know or to learn what that is. Good luck! I do understand loneliness, and all lonely people share a bond. "Only the lonely", as my generational peer Roy Orbison sang, "know how i feel tonight."

This is a world of lonely crowds seeking one another but daring not to show their true faces. Instead of truly meeting we collide, we collaborate in mutual loneliness, we view one anothers' blank surfaces with blind eyes and numb hearts.

At least I am your companion in sharing. I am your companion in spirit, in empathy, and in well-wishing. Truer companionship for you than that is my sincere wish.

Answer 2

As I have gotten older, and I am only 25, I have noticed that I have changed a lot. Many areas of my life are now very fleshed out. I now have deeply held political and atheist beliefs. I am in my Master's degree and have done 6 years in the armed forces. I've had many relationships of varying types. I've supported myself since I was 18 and have been through a lot of hardships. But now it's my time. Things are finally paying off and I would be damned if I settled for anything less than what I wanted or what I feel I am worth. So I would have to say "Yes".

Answer 3

If you are talking about finding companion/partner & happy relationship - Most are more set in their ways and less willing to compromise as they have been hurt at some time. Most carry baggage even if they don't admit to it. On the other hand if you are clear about what you are looking for and can find someone else who wants the same things and is also clear then there is a better chance of success.
I've haven't been successful yet LOL. In some ways it can be easier if the children are off yours hands.

Answer 4

I agree with Dfire. The older you get, the less you are willing to put up with certain character traits that you don't agree with. When you are younger, you tend to be more idealistic and think that maybe you can change something that you don't like about someone. When you get older, you are less optimistic about other people being able to change and you are also more firm about your own ideals and values. I may think there are a lot of good looking women out there in their early 20s, but I see them also as too emotionally and idealistically immature. All they seem to care about is partying. This is my honest view of things and I hope you get some insight from it.

Answer 5

There is also the definition of the word "companion". If taken at face value - no probably not. If you mean a person of the opposite sex, then the increasing portion of the population being women as they live longer, then the usual practice of the man being older than the woman when we were younger probably needs to be inverted.

Answer 6

I get more difficult as I get older and therefor finding someone, identifying someone as a correct choice becomes all most impossible as I become increasingly perfectionistic in an unrealistic way. I attribute this decay to the pain of failure, the means to manage the pain and the external conditions that found this conflict in self propertization and self valuation. I guess it's a man thing, but there's women's lib. with similar complaints.

The Will is positive, the Judgment is negative.

Answer 7

well i think no because as a saying goes, "young vines climb old trees" and "old carabaos eat young grass". these sayings are very true especially today, you can a see a lot of people walking arround holding hands together, the other is a little bit to young for the other to be his/her father or mother so i personally think, although i had no experience being with somebody older than me, that you won't have difficulty finding a companion as you grow older.

Answer 8

I agree with Dfire. You know what you want and it is hard to find without compromising or settling for what doesn't meet your standards. Good luck if you are still looking yourself.
My Best Friend for over 10yrs. now is still looking and I think about her everyday and how thankful I am to have found my husband. I hope she gets as lucky someday.

Answer 9

Well for me personally yes! I have less contact now with the opposite sex, I'm dealing with baggage now, EX wife, I have limited time to actually date... Mortgage and bills to pay, must work..I don't party anymore or go to bars. I'm not religious anymore. So if my ex-wife reads this I'm sure she will be happy to know that I'm miserable and alone. It sucks to get older.

Answer 10

Yes, because people are less energetic, less enthusiastic, more set in their ways, and just plain tired, worn out, in aches and pains...
So, of course it is more difficult.