Online Dating While Depressed

One of the fun things I started doing while manic was sign up for online dating sites. This isn’t something I’ve ever done before. To be very clear, I don’t think online dating apps are a bad thing. Rather, I think that using them while on a mental roller coaster is a recipe for disaster.

These apps reinforce everything my depressive inner voice says to me. I got to scroll through countless profiles of people telling me how I wasn’t good enough or just some defective piece of shit. No, I’m not handsome, a giant, bearded, and come home smelling like the nicest parts of the forest while maintaining soft skin and washboard abs. And before anyone interjects, it’s just as unreasonable for people to expect physical perfection from other genders. Life is ugly, and it does ugly things to people.

I also don’t like the unrealistic expectations (I’m talking about the heterosexual ones; I’m sure if you’re involved in a different dating situation, you have your own horror stories to tell). Men are supposed to initiate conversation. They’re supposed to keep it lively. This song and dance routine has to continue for a good while until you and your partner are too lazy or afraid to find someone else.

And the other big problem is that I don’t say no to people I meet. I like meeting people. I don’t like relationships. Sometimes people come along and abuse that. I can’t just be looking for what I need. No, I have to find a soulmate.

I hate to break it to everyone who thinks I’m their soulmate. I don’t have a soul. I fucking sold it for some pocket lint and a half-melted Snickers bar. Or at least I thought it was a Snickers bar.

Over the past month (yes, even right after I started signing up with them), I have been deleting as much of my online dating as I could. I don’t remember or know all of what I signed up for. New sites are sending me spam every day. I wish there was a button I could push that says, “I made a bad decision. It’s not even my fault. I wasn’t able to actually function in my own best interests. Make this shit go away.”

That button doesn’t exist.

So I feel like I’m trapped in a few bad situations. I wish I could tell people exactly what was going on, to let them know that I really have no business talking to them. But even that’s blown up on me in the past (there’s one story in particular from early law school which still gives me anxiety issues). Everything’s a trigger for me at this point.

Eventually I’ll find a way to untangle this mess I’m in. But I got a feeling it’s going to be a while.