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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Single, early turning into mid 40s, obviously never going to have a spouse/kid by this point, pretty much given up on dating. Lived/worked overseas for a long time and moved back just before COVID, and never really managed to make friends outside work. Father has Parkinsons and is declining, mother is also aging. I spend much of my free time helping them out, which means I have no real life outside work and my parents. Which in turn means once they are no longer around, there's not really going to be anyone important in my life save a nephew as my sibling and I do not and have never gotten along.

Career is going extremely well. Otherwise future is going to be a comfortable but likely very quiet life with no real friends and the occasional visit from nephew. But I don't have the personality that thinks in terms of fighting personal battles. I just get on with it. Then eventually I'll die and will be forgotten.

[/quote]

To you, and 21:05, assuming you are both women:  I am a recently divorced guy 10-11-12 years older than you, with launched kids in their 30’s and grandchildren.  I met a woman who fits your (similar) life paths to a T, and we really clicked.  I’m very comfortably retired, constantly enjoying the outdoors with my dogs or hiking/biking, helping a lot with an aged parent, but bored and having a huge antipathy to the apps.  Due to being married, I  haven’t dated in many decades.

But I get a sense that neither I nor the woman I met would want put up with another person’s chronic intrusion into our “places of one’s own,” particularly not wanting our sleep disturbed, bathrooms entered, kitchens disrupted, etc.

Can either of you relate to this, wanting a honey/sweetheart/lover/partner, but wishing it could happen with a lot of intensity while somehow not taking over our space/s?

And how do you feel about being involved with someone who has no children to raise, but who has a bunch of family that you would have the “privilege” of getting to know very well?

Also, would it bug you to be a hard-working woman involved with a retired man?

All my questions are reflective of the personal “battle” I’m currently fighting.[/quote]

I'm one of the posters you responded to. When I allow myself the luxury of thinking about the ideal relationship for a middle aged person, it is something you described. I am quite used to having my own independence and space and control over much of my decision-making and having to learn how to give up some of that and share more of my personal space with someone else would definitely be a learning curve. I'm not opposed to it if that should ever come up, but given that there will be no desire or rush into having children, I also do like the idea of two grown adults who spend a lot of time with each other and are in a relationship, while still maintaining separate residences and separate private spaces. I work but if I was dating someone retired, I could see it becoming a relationship where we spend weekends and holidays with each other and travel with each other, but during the week I'm focused on my job and enjoy the peace of sleeping in my own bed after a long day working. I wouldn't feel the need to do everything together. I also wouldn't be upset or feel left out if hypothetical partner wanted to go off for a weekend golfing or cycling with old friends, likewise I'd expect partner wouldn't mind my doing something similar with an old friend overseas.

It seems like you may have a good thing going and I'd just go with the flow and you can always have little conversations here and there about expectations should you feel it needs to come up. [/quote]

Thanks for the beautifully written encouragement, PP!  And you eminently deserve to (frequently) allow yourself the luxury of thinking about living your best life!  You’ve made fighting my personal battle seem much more winnable — because I think the woman I met has deep fears of losing her autonomy/space in any serious relationship, and you’re affirming that perhaps there are ways that exist for people to have their cakes and eat them too.[/quote]

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