An Online Dating Cautionary Tale

[BrettGC]

 

I guess I musta got lucky

 

Curious how many Internet relationships/dates you invested time and money in before you 'got lucky'?  I ask because most luck I am acquainted with is the result of due diligence.

 

Well talked to a heap of ladies until I met one.  Visited her on a couple of occasions, turned out she was better off financially than me.  We ended our relationship amicably and are still friends; mainly due to her wanting kids and I've got enough.

 

Since then I've met someone else, from the same site, I've visited once, she's been here once.  Things are going well.  Incidentally she paid for her own ticket here.  Other than flowers and a new phone for her, which was a gift given without asking, more so we could use Viber and Whatsapp to cut down the cost of texting than anything else, she's asked for nothing.  Planning to move close to her to see how things go in a more realistic setting. 

 

So cost so far:  Subscription to the site for $15/month and the cost of 3 trips there which I would've made scouting out somewhere to live anyway. 

 

Emotional investment?  A fair bit, and was a more than a little disappointed that the first relationship ended but better that than one of us resenting the other in years to come over the issue. 

 

Yes all this was done with due diligence and a very wary eye.  I'm no fool.  There are a few others on here that have had great experiences that have ended well too.  It's not all doom and gloom but yes, you have to be very careful.

 

Basically as I've said in the past, in other posts, I'm moving to PI and a relationship would be just gravy.  If I find something promising before I arrive all the better but not committing to anything until after that date. 

Edited July 19, 2013 by BrettGC

[Bruce]

Basically as I've said in the past, in other posts, I'm moving to PI and a relationship would be just gravy.

 

A good sign of a stable mind and good grasp of reality. :541:

[BrettGC]

Oh I just want to say, stop making broad generalizations about these women.  Your or your friend's bad experience does not mean it's the norm. There is no paradigm and you need to take each experience as it comes, be careful, but don't be a dick.  If you have half a brain you won't be sucked in by a scammer.  I liken it to letters from Nigeria;  you wouldn't send them money so why would you do it on a dating site?  I understand that there's a lot of lonely guys out there for whatever reason though.  Most Filipinas have so much to offer with regards to values that we've lost in the west, both men and women, and I understand the attraction. My personality lends me to being very cautious to the point of paranoia so the dating sites work for me but having said that it may be more appropriate for some to arrive there and search out their love in real life.  It really is a case of different strokes and there is no hard and fast.  At the end of the day guys, look after yourself, you're all you have when it comes to the crunch.  Jake's two hour rule aside, you may be perfectly happy living in the house with Momma or you may want to put some distance between your relationship and her family.  It doesn't matter really, as long as you're happy with the situation.  You will be judged either way whether it's from your family or hers but to quote a former US president:  Those that don't count mind, those that count don't mind.  And to all the nay sayers don't let your experience be the only one.

Edited July 19, 2013 by BrettGC

[Dave Hounddriver]

. . .  It really is a case of different strokes and there is no hard and fast. . . .  

 

I agree.  Good edit btw :-)

Edited July 19, 2013 by Dave Hounddriver

[BrettGC]

Lol good point Dave and I will edit accordingly.  <mutters something about being logical and not opinionated>

[Mike S]

Oh I just want to say, stop making broad generalizations about these women.  Your or your friend's bad experience does not mean it's the norm. There is no paradigm and you need to take each experience as it comes, be careful, but don't be a dick.  If you have half a brain you won't be sucked in by a scammer.  I liken it to letters from Nigeria;  you wouldn't send them money so why would you do it on a dating site?  I understand that there's a lot of lonely guys out there for whatever reason though.  Most Filipinas have so much to offer with regards to values that we've lost in the west, both men and women, and I understand the attraction. My personality lends me to being very cautious to the point of paranoia so the dating sites work for me but having said that it may be more appropriate for some to arrive there and search out their love in real life.  It really is a case of different strokes and there is no hard and fast.  At the end of the day guys, look after yourself, you're all you have when it comes to the crunch.  Jake's two hour rule aside, you may be perfectly happy living in the house with Momma or you may want to put some distance between your relationship and her family.  It doesn't matter really, as long as you're happy with the situation.  You will be judged either way whether it's from your family or hers but to quote a former US president:  Those that don't count mind, those that count don't mind.  And to all the nay sayers don't let your experience be the only one.

 

:th_thbestpost: on developing relationships and the correct attitude to have ........ :AddEmoticons04230:  :thumbs-up-smile: 

:cheersty:

[Dougbert]

I've stayed out of these discussions for the most part, but I guess I should weigh in with my experience.  Is it typical?  How should I know?  It's just a single data point so add it to your database and try not to over-generalize.

 

Last spring, after a failed marriage, divorce, and the "dark tunnel" experience that I'm sure some of you folks have also experienced, I found myself mostly back to normal and not wanting to be alone for the rest of my life.  For whatever reason I am attracted to Asian women.  First wife was Chinese.  I was hoping to find someone within maybe ten years of my age (I'm later mid-forties).  Long story short, I researched the various dating sites and joined AsianDating hoping to find someone local to me (hey, there are lots of Asians here on the west coast of the US).  Of course there are a LOT MORE Asians in Asia as I soon found out--haha.

 

I filled out my profile, being honest and possibly too revealing.  I figured it would be better to start off a possible relationship that way.  Within minutes I had lots of chats from women in the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, etc.  At first it was flattering and an ego boost.  But it got a little creepy after a while.

 

Searching revealed very few members here in the US (other than men like me).  I searched and sent messages to a few women, even chatted with a few of the ones who contacted me.  A couple were obviously scammers--immediately hinting about health issues or similar things--sparse profiles with one or two professional looking pics.  One asked me what I did for a living (I had put engineer in my profile which she obviously didn't have time to read) and when I said I was an engineer she responded with "Oh, I LOVE engineers."  I'll bet you do, baby.

 

I started doing more research on dating site scams and was pretty startled to find out what was going on.  I'm no dummy and have a skeptical streak a mile wide, but I got a lot more observant after that.  After a week of this stuff I was about to quit the site (I had paid for the minimal level one month membership to get some additional features) when I got a chat message from a young woman in Cebu (19 years younger than me).  For some reason I decided to respond and checked out her profile.  We chatted for a while longer and I immediately felt that something was different this time.  I said so and she had the same feeling.

 

We arranged to chat again the next day and things progressed.  Later we moved to Yahoo Messenger video chats.  She would go to an internet cafe because her laptop had been stolen the year before and she didn't have funds to replace it.  This continued for a few weeks and I had bouts of paranoia that she was a scammer.  She also wondered if I was scamming her.  We talked about it a lot.  How do we know the other is really being honest?

 

After a month or so I sent her a laptop via a local Fil-Am shipper so she could chat from home (she works at a call center and often the night shift, so I worried about her being out alone late just to chat with me).  She was floored that I had done that for her and was also "shy" (embarrassed) by my generosity.  She never asked for money.  We continued to chat and she kept asking when I would come to visit her.  Pretty soon I had made reservations to fly to Cebu (she lives on Mactan) for 9 days in July.  I have some Fil-Am friends and one good friend who has been happily married to his Filipina wife for 20+ years.  I got all kinds of advice and opinion (scope out Plan B and C in case it doesn't work out, you're crazy to go there, etc.).  Well, I had Plan A and only Plan A.  I was going to see Marie.

 

She met me at the airport with her uncle in the pouring rain in the middle of the night.  Her smile was radiant, her hugs were strong.  She was real!  Her uncle made sure I was OK before leaving us alone later.  We had a great visit and I've been back two more times since.  I was there late April-early May this year and on the one year anniversary of our first chat I proposed to Marie at Lantaw floating restaurant in Cordova.  She accepted and I filed the I-129F paperwork when I returned home.

 

Was I lucky or careful or both?  I feel lucky, because she really is a wonderful woman.  She had also chatted with a few older white men on the AD site, but didn't like the other ones who seemed to focused on something other than a committed relationship.  As it turns out, she had joined the site within a day or two of when I did (our numerical IDs were almost the same) and she also was about to give up on it.  I was careful, observant, questioning, skeptical, but above all, honest.  She was the same.

 

As my late grandfather would say: put that on your floppy disk.

 

Dougbert

[JJReyes]

Online dating permits both sides to lie like crazy. You can't determine if the other side of the communication link is a man, woman or something else. Even with all the warnings about not to send money, there is a sucker born every minute. It's unfortunate your friend got ripped off. 

[Jake]

She met me at the airport with her uncle in the pouring rain in the middle of the night.  Her smile was radiant, her hugs were strong.  She was real!  Her uncle made sure I was OK before leaving us alone later.  We had a great visit and I've been back two more times since.  I was there late April-early May this year and on the one year anniversary of our first chat I proposed to Marie at Lantaw floating restaurant in Cordova.  She accepted and I filed the I-129F paperwork when I returned home.

 

Was I lucky or careful or both?  I feel lucky, because she really is a wonderful woman.  She had also chatted with a few older white men on the AD site, but didn't like the other ones who seemed to focused on something other than a committed relationship.  As it turns out, she had joined the site within a day or two of when I did (our numerical IDs were almost the same) and she also was about to give up on it.  I was careful, observant, questioning, skeptical, but above all, honest.  She was the same.

 

As my late grandfather would say: put that on your floppy disk.

 

Dougbert

Well Dougbert, looks like you engineered yourself into the open arms of your future wife Marie.  

We really appreciate another successful love story via the internet.  Like you said in how I met

my wife Judy, yours is also truly inspirational!

 

Respectfully -- Jake 

[Dougbert]

 

Well Dougbert, looks like you engineered yourself into the open arms of your future wife Marie.  

We really appreciate another successful love story via the internet.  Like you said in how I met

my wife Judy, yours is also truly inspirational!

 

Respectfully -- Jake 

 

Thank you, kind sir.  I'm not sure how much engineering went on, but so far, so good.  Marie really is something else.