Image is mine.
Personally, for me age is not just a number but a big deal. In the grand scheme of things, age plays a major role in most relationships in terms of finance, appearance and sustainability.
Back then in Uni, during Health Economics, the lecturer talked about gender inequality and age gap.
Words led to words, and then he spoke about his marriage, he said he's 10 years older than his wife but at the time, after several children, the wife's body changed a lot.
While he still maintained his petite frame, his wife grew bigger and older. According to my lecturer, she could pass as his mom. He sighted that to be one of the reasons men should marry younger women especially the ones whose prime interest is beauty, looks and appearance.
You know, there is a saying that women should marry way older men so that by the time they start losing their beauty, the men should be losing their eyesight too. This is another joke passing a message of how faster women age and how important appearance is to some men.
Appearance aside, personally, I could be domineering and overbearing at times and this is one trait a younger partner or one within my age bracket might not tolerate.
We know how we tend to get calmer as we age. While we might be young and hot headed, getting older and going through life's experiences will teach us to overlook certain things and tolerate people more. This is one reason it is dating older for me, as that seemed to be my best relationship experience yet.
Another angle with this age gap thing is for the fact that men are viewed as providers. One major reason men get scared of marriage or commitment is the responsibility involved. I find it quite absurd that an older woman seeking marriage will go for a younger man, who's still trying to get on his feet. It's even more absurd if this older woman is not financially secured.
When my female friends come to me for advice in choosing a partner, I always advice them to to go for older men within the age bracket of 10–20 years older, maybe 5 years older too, that will work. The thing is, most of these older men have seen life, they are financially secured to some extent and are tired of playing games. Thus at that point, they just want a family unlike the younger ones.
One time, I heard a colleague complain of not getting any man to commit to her, at the same time she keeps turning down older men coming for her as she's looking for a man that their age gap is not up to 5 years. She's 26 and she's looking for a 27 or 30 years old man to settle down with under this harsh economic condition we find ourselves in.
Let me share an experience that brought a shift for me with this age thing....
I use to have this mentality that my first relationship will be my last and that my first boyfriend will be my husband. He was a year older, and we dated for five years.
I invested so much into that relationship because I thought I was preparing for marriage. We were teenagers, and it was all fun and games until we became adults.
I started with the marriage talk and by this time, I was 21 and he was 22. I had wanted to be married at 23 and start up a family as early as possible, but then this guy told me he's not ready to settle down.
According to him, even in the next 10 years he still won't be ready.
In the next 10 years I will be 31, my biological clock is already ticking, pressure from family for a woman to settle down tends to be more as we age, especially due to the fear of menopause.
The moment he said that to me, it was like something cleared from my eyes. In his defense, he said he's still young and wants to experience life. He went further to say that he also wouldn't want to be tied down with marriage as he cannot even take care of or finance a family. "He's still trying to find his feet" and honestly, I stopped blaming him.
Coming from a low-income country or a country where wealth is not evenly distributed, dating a younger man can be quite challenging especially when he's financially handicapped. It's even worse if he's the type of man that won't help out around the house.
You find yourself aging faster than your age and having others excelling more than you in the same field of employment because you are all in all at the home front.
Again, there's the paradigm shift of men wanting woman to also contribute financially to the home. Imagine going for a younger girl in her early 20s and asking her to contribute 50% to the upkeep of the home. This is why one vital fix in this age bracket dilemma is communication, as both age, up or down got their challenges.
The same way an upcoming younger woman cannot match the financial strength of a man, is the same way an older financially secured woman cannot invest fully in motherhood as it will not only be detrimental to her health but also to her career. As such, there will always be a limit to the number of children she'd want to have and also to her time for family.
The in-between and the point where we all compromise is to identifying what is most important to us and what we are willing to sacrifice for it.
