How Do I Find Love In My Old Age?
Kumusta Tita,
I'm in my 40s and have never had a relationship last more than six months. I've been in bed recovering from a severe cold, and it's made me have negative thoughts about my body. I haven't had sex in two years, my body isn't what it used to be, and I'm starting to think I'll never find love. No guy wants an old, inexperienced, wrinkly man. How do I get out of this funk?
Sincerely,
Stale Sugar Daddy
Hey SSD,
There isn’t a day that passes by where I don’t feel Death’s cold embrace creeping closer to my mangled cadaver. At my ripe old age of 32 years, I swear I can feel a joint voluntarily dislocate itself from my body whenever I try to pick something up from the floor. Age is a cruel mistress, but she bites harder for the gay man.
Obviously, everyone in the world has a strange relationship with age, but I write from the perspective of a gay man. Gays have a bizarre relationship with ageing. In the gay world, youth and vanity are your currency. For a large portion of us, the permission to live authentically does not come to us until later in life when we come out. So we become stunted adults longing for our missed youth. Old queens are desperately fighting signs of ageing through increasingly complicated cosmetic procedures and have almost predatory-like behaviour for younger boys. To be clear, I’m not shaming anyone for this as I am guilty of falling prey to the octogenarian. I have daddy issues. Sue me. Rather, I’m trying to give an explanation and not an accusation of why gay men are obsessed with youth. However, I also want this to shed light on the fact that even though we think that gay men can “age out of sexiness,” this is a complete fallacy. If my daddy issues have taught me anything, it’s that gay men can be attractive at any age.
My dear SSD, I want you to know that you are still sexy, and nobody can take that away from you. Not even our seemingly impossible beauty standards. Forties in gay years is prime daddy age! Take advantage of that! If you have that Mr. Fantastic salt-and-pepper hair going on, rest assured you will be drowning in dick. These young gays who never had their fathers’ approval will come flocking to you. Maybe they can find daddy’s approval in your cock.
And while you’re wallowing in your deathbed and feeling bad about how your body looks right now, know that body may not be everything. Do you know how many “hot” guys I’ve met with a rockin’ bod and six pack only for them to be a total douche and suck in bed? Your body can only get you so far until somebody actually gets to know you. If you’re a stereotypically hot man with a shit personality, then good fucking luck to you.
Which brings me to my next point.
Do you have a shit personality, SSD? You say that no relationship you’ve ever had has lasted for more than six months. Now, I don’t want to point fingers, but I do want to point fingers. If all your relationships have been brief, this sounds like a pattern, and the common denominator is you. I think some therapy is in order? Self-reflection goes a long way.
I have a friend that told me something that hit me so hard, I’ll never forget it even if it was “severance-d” out of me. She told me, “Are you attracted to the person or the pattern?” Big OOF. Are you dating guys that are exhibiting a common pattern which is what leads to these brief trysts? On the other side of the coin, are you in a behavioural pattern that attracts the same type of guy?
If it’s any consolation, you’re not alone. I’m certain that there are dozens, if not scores, of men that are in the same position as you. You’re all collectively feeling sorry for yourself because you think it’s too late to be loved or attractive. While wallowing in self-pity is not a bad thing, don’t get stuck in it. It’s essential for growth to hit those lows, but what matters is the resilience it takes to come out of it and bounce back. Find your groove again and get back out there. Go to the gym, take an arts class, find a therapist. Get back to feeling confident again.
And if none of that works, you can always pay me a therapist’s rate to fuck you.
Mahal kita,
Tita Slut
