Love Lives - #24 How to get over a broken heart and is dating too much stopping you finding love?

Episode Date: March 9, 2018

Getting your heart broken sucks, there's no two ways about it. This week on Millennial Love, we're joined by former dating columnist and author of Bad Romance Emily Hill to discuss heartbreak and how to get over it. The past week has also seen relationship experts speaking out about the perils of 'overdating' - ie. dating too much. Could it really be that going on too many dates is stopping us finding love? With Rachel a serial dater and Olivia, well, the opposite, we ponder what the sweet spot might be.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/millenniallove. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Acast powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. will not die hosting the Hills after show. I get thirsty for the hot wiggle. I didn't even know a thirsty man until there was all these headlines. And I get schooled by a tween. Facebook is like, and now that's what my grandma's on. Thank God phone a friend with Jesse Crookshank is not available on Facebook. It's out now wherever you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com. Hello and welcome to Millennial Love, the Independent Lifestyle Desk's weekly podcast on love, dating and relationships. Hosted by me, Rachel Hosey, Assistant Lifestyle Editor.

And me, Olivia Petter, Lifestyle Writer. There's no shortage of podcasts on the subject of love out there. But we felt there weren't any that really reflected our own experiences as two single ladies in our 20s navigating the murky waters of dating today. And that's why we decided to launch Millennial Love. This week we are delighted to be joined by journalist and author Emily Hill. Hello, thank you for having me. Thanks so much for coming on and congratulations on your book. It's your debut book, is that right? Bad

Romance? Yes and I also wrote it because no books out there express the true misery of what it's like to be single in London. I wrote most of it when I was your age. Like I was in my twenties. It took me so long to get published. Now I'm a grand old lady. You're not an old lady. It all seems very long ago. But yes.

Oh, that's so interesting that you think it's sort of tragic. And do you really believe that being single in London? I don't believe it's tragic, but I do believe, I think a lot of I mean we'll probably talk about those later because you're talking about these terrible messages or maybe I'll just start off as we mean to go on but um I was contacted so I used to do a very briefly did a dating column for style at the Sunday Times and I used to get inundated with all these tales from these girls in London saying, I'm so glad you're telling it how it is because we hate dating. We've gone off it. It's just awful.

And this one girl who now follows me on Instagram, who's very, very beautiful, basically said a man had contacted her on Snapchat. And the first message was, by the look of your hair, you look like you do anal. Jesus Christ. But that is what it's like out there. Do you know what? I think that actually really sets the tone for today's podcast, doesn't it, ladies? like you do anal. Jesus Christ. But that is what it's like out there. Do you know what? I think that actually really sets the tone for today's podcast, doesn't it, ladies? I think there's going to be a very clear theme

for this episode. Also, this sets the precedent for what's going on in our own bleak love lives right now. Before we get into that, though, do you want to tell us a bit about the book, Emily? Yes, please explain briefly what it is. Okay, so the book is called Bad Romance and it's essentially short stories, one after the other,

but they're all about women. So I think we're a bit underrepresented in the literature because it's always certain types of girls who get to tell their story, and we're kind of quite gutsy, kind of independent girls, and aren't really satisfied by chick lit i hope to think like a lot of us like i i'm certainly like i read a lot of books like jean reese and uh very old kind of writers like a lot of russian writers as well um who i feel like speak to me whereas what's out there doesn't really so what i wanted to do with bad romance was tell our tales because they don't really end up in a happily ever

after it's just not neat and so each of the tales is kind of i wanted to do all kinds of women so i've got a divorcee in there um a widow uh lots of single girls who are pretty defiant i hope and uh yeah uh quite a few mad sort of interesting takes. And what I love about my heroines, what I wanted to do with my heroines more than anything is not have them be victims, have them to take vicious revenge if necessary. Because in my life, I mean,

they're all kind of takes on my life to a certain extent, like certain things have happened to me and I have never kind of responded in the way that little dark voice in my head was saying you can't put up with this how very dare they um so in the book my girls get their own back I think that was one thing that I really liked about the stories and the short story form obviously lends itself to this but the characters are very they're very exaggerated and the stories themselves can be quite hyperbolic I think like the goddess sequence one it's sort of like a playful take on I think it was was it Julie Birchall who said that it was

like hallucinogenics yeah of romance and these fantasies that you convince yourself into when you're dating you just lose your mind when you yeah like someone and I think it really relays that in a very like surrealistic but also yeah very true way well I'm really glad to hear that that's exactly what I wanted originally I had um I had epigrams to every story um because I read this book once that had epigrams on these short stories I thought they were brilliant and they kind of accessed other works because what I like about works is like you read one work and then there's a reference to another work and you kind of burrow backwards and you can find these amazing women that you're not really aware of.

But the one for goddess sequence is kind of like a coda for the whole book, really, because it was by Pablo Picasso. And he said there are two types of women, goddesses and doormats. And so I think in my life, I have run the risk quite a lot of being a doormat and all my heroines kind of basically say, I'm not going to be a doormat, I'm going to be a goddess and this is how I'm going to do things. They're survivors and they're victors and they're, yeah.

I think one of, somebody who I really, really admire said, I love your work because it gives the kind of the devil on your shoulders kind of what that would, he would, she would say, you know, the things, the thoughts that you can't say out loud, they're all in there. And it's sort of the opposite of the way single women have been, I don't know if you've spoken about this before, betrayed in literature beforehand, like Carrie Bradshaw

and like Bridget Jones. You know, you have these empowering kind of female single figures, but they always end up with the guy at the end of the film or the story. It's like, really, there's no modern... Yeah. I kept banging away again and again and again and again. Like when I was trying to... I failed to get an agent for a very long time,

then failed to get a publisher, then had to crowdfund it. And I kept saying there's more women alive today than at any point in history. And our last iconic single women are Carrie Bradshaw and Bridget Jones. Bridget Jones was 20 years ago. She's married and she has a baby now. And, you know, what they did to Samantha,

who I think is the standout character of Sex and the City, the way they've kind of reduced her to this Falstaffian figure right in the end. It was just like she was the brilliant one who wasn't conforming at all. And all we have is like, OK, it's like when women were, you know, when single women were a new thing, it's like society paid attention and you kind of you you had these particular women but now it's like it was done it's completely over and then you kind of get and then there's fleabag but then i would argue i found fleabag problematic in the extreme i couldn't really get into fleabag i couldn't um no i know everybody did and i was like what's wrong with me why anyone doesn't know by the way fleabag is um phoebe waller bridge had this series on was it

on bbc3 it was on somewhere on the bbc and i think there's a new series coming out soon but If anyone doesn't know, by the way, Fleabag is Phoebe Waller-Bridge had this series on. Was it on BBC Three? It was on somewhere on the BBC. And I think there's a new series coming out soon. But it was quite praised for being this, you know, very modern depiction of life as a single woman because she was very open about wanting sex, etc, etc. But I just found her a bit desperate. Like, I hope like none of my heroines are desperate. They're making valid life choices that, you know, I just get annoyed because it's like you have this,

you still have the cult of the white wedding and like that's celebrated. But if you do anything else, you try publishing a book, you do anything else, it doesn't matter. It's just, it's, and that's so regressive. You know, we will live in so many different ways. And I just think if this was like happening to men we would hear about it we would hear about okay you know for centuries men have

behaved like this and now they're not behaving like this and there would be all this literature but actually like you know my mom got married when she was 21 had me when she was 24 like you know a generation ago women were leading conventional kind kind of Jane Austen-y kind of the most important part of your life is to decide to make sure you marry a certain person. And now, like, we still want to marry the right person, but we're taking longer to do it. And that's quite brave. I mean, Rebecca Traster did this brilliant book in America that was like a, you know, a course action about how revolutionary it is. Like, you know, we used to be not very long ago and people forget this. We used to be economically dependent on men.

And now we're not. Actually, younger women are actually out earning men. And then so that brings in a whole other load of problems. And like marriage isn't necessarily about love. And that's what's so great about your podcast title i think because it's millennial love and it's like and i think we are doing things differently now but nobody's really exploring it and i think it's important that we do completely agree that's what we're doing today guys this week we are going to be talking about

heartbreak and how it affects us um how it can send us into this state of unrelenting and self-inflicted torment, which is something Olivia has been writing about this week. And we're also going to talk about over-dating, which is something I've written about and possibly have experience in. And this is the idea that dating too much could be hindering your chances of finding love. But before we get onto that, let's have a little catch up. Livvy, what's been going on?

My love life is rather flaccid at the moment, to be honest. Flaccid is an excellent choice of word. Thank you very much. I had two dates over the last two weeks and both of them got cancelled the night before. And it was the boys who cancelled. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm just like, you know what?

Fuck it. What reasons did they give? One was ill. One had a work thing. Lame. Totally lame. But you know, man flu, really, in inverted commas, and a work thing, like all this trick in the bloody book. Lame, lame, lame.

So I think I'm going to take a dating sabbatical for a while. Yep. I'm one of those. Yeah, it's interesting you say that because i think i'm i'm fully have got dating fatigue the fuck boy i mentioned last week i wasn't 100 sure if he was a fuck boy i've decided is a 100% fuck boy what a shame and so i've been on on some dating apps this week and i i'm i'm this close and i realize i can't say this close because i'm making a really small distance between my fingers right now and i'm this close because I'm making a really small distance between my fingers

right now and I'm this close to quitting dating apps I've had just some awful exchanges I actually went on tinder for the first time in months I was like you know what maybe tinder's all right these days maybe it's not just you know guys trying to hook up with you and um there's one guy messaged me I replied saying like one thing and then i just had a really busy few days and i i didn't have time to reply and he sent like winky emoji question mark question mark and i genuinely had not had time to reply and then he just goes fancy hooking up tonight i was just like mate no why would you think i would want to do that like how desperate are you and then there was this other guy who this was actually on bumble um i did this is my new favorite opener actually and livy thinks this is ridiculous because i couldn't stop laughing

when she thinks i'm too obsessed you know what she thinks i'm too obsessed with food which may be true but that's not an issue for this podcast um and i find this is actually a very successful opener my reply rate is very high i say um, it's a brunch-related question. I go, pancakes, full English, or avo on toast. That's my opener. Nice. Thank you very much. You get a lot from that.

And this guy just replies with, shag? Question mark. Yeah. And see, I was really like, Jesus fucking Christ. And I replied to him going, like, thank you for your kind offer, but no thank you. I'm going to decline. And then I asked him, how often do you get a positive response rate from that and he hasn't replied but livy said she thought actually this was hilarious from him i mean i think he's obviously a bit of a douchebag

but i just think your question was really funny and he was probably just making fun of the question a bit i think food works i mean they're like megan who i used to write the column with there was some statistic about, like, if you mention guacamole in your profile, you get, like, a massive increase in success. And it's funny because that happened to me on Saturday morning, like this very, very handsome man. I never get handsome.

That handsome man never messaged me. And first thing in the morning on Saturday, he was like, fancy a bagel? And I was thinking, yes, I do fancy a bagel. So I wrote back saying, yeah. And then he was like, oh, you could just come over to mine for coffee. And I was like, I thought that was an original opener. I didn't think it was just an invitation. And then he got really affronted. And then it became one of those nasty exchanges. And you're just like, oh, for God's sake.

They don't like it when you reject them. No, but the thing is, it's like, who does respond positively to that? That's what I don't understand. But I'm just like very, food is so important. There was this other guy, I can tell I spend a lot of my Bumble exchanges talking about food. I said, I was like, what did you have for dinner? And he was like, frozen pizza. And that was my first, oh dear, strike one.

And then he goes, what did you have? And I was like, I made a deconstructed aubergine parmigiana and which was true and then he went deconstructed sorry because it like wasn't in um it wasn't in like a baking tray as it would usually be it was sort of just like layered up and all falling over the place really it was just a messy parmigiana but i called it deconstructed and um and he was like oh i need to google that and i was like, oh, I need to Google that. And I was like, hey, how do you not know what an aubergine parmigiana is? Am I being a food snob? I don't know. If you don't know, you need to eat one.

Exactly. You need to find out as quickly as possible that they don't know their food. Right? Exactly. Anyway, I sort of ranted about that for a little while. Shall we move on to bio of the week? Yeah. So this is from Henry23.

And I really like this bio because it sort of takes elements from a couple of our previous favourite bios of the week. He says, gentlemen in the streets, Theresa May in the wheats. It really makes me laugh. I like that. I like the rhyming. And we actually have an honourable mention to another bio that Olivia found, which was bilingual and ready to mingle. Nice.

I just like anything that rhymes. Rhyming. Yeah, we've got some good rhymes here. And I should note that Rachel has sort of stolen his bio. Well, upgraded it. Yes, well, you know, trilingual over here and ready to mingle. Nice. You know.

Yeah, so thanks for that. I've now updated my bio. Right. How can you get over a broken heart, guys? God. So I actually had no idea really about what heartbreak actually does to the brain until I started writing this article. And I spoke to a psychologist about it.

And he said that there are actual studies of the brain that show that you react to the same way to a broken heart as if you were a cocaine addict going through a withdrawal. And it's like love. You can literally be addicted to love and to that person. So when that person suddenly is cut off from you against your will, you go through those withdrawal symptoms and you can just spiral into this yeah descent is it withdrawal from love or withdrawal from that person i think it's both yeah it's the person i think because

the person is the love object yeah so i suppose as well if you don't see it coming and then suddenly it's taken from you because that can totally happen can't it you can have no clue that someone's about to dump you yeah i mean most of that book is about not realizing when a man was about to dump me no no actually um there aren't many dumpings actually now i think about it but i think it's impossible to get over love actually i don't think you ever get over it i think when you've ever really been in love with someone you're always a bit in love with them like no matter how long i think so like i've only been properly in love i mean like i think there's different kinds of love there's a sexual passion

love that kind of goes off and i'd say the man who inspired the goddess sequence one was this poet he inspired it and he just wrecked my life it was awful it was just an absolute the worst thing ever i used to wake up in my sleep because I was crying it was that bad I've never been that bad before um and I got over him because I'd kind of got over to the end of him and it had been so bad you I couldn't love him anymore because he'd been so unpleasant to me and it's kind of like the Wendy Cope thing like if you understand them like um there's two cures for love she says you know one is don't phone don't write a letter the other way get to know him better like if you

get to know a man that you're in love with and you realize that he's just totally nasty to you then I think you can you can get it's really painful and you get that nasty withdrawal and it's really hard not to text and it's really hard to sleep and you can't eat and all those kind of stereotypical things that you know jazz singers sing about um but uh with when you I think when you're really in love with someone and I just don't I don't think it personally I don't think it ever goes away because I think it's like loving your parents or loving your child if you have a child it's something loving your brother or loving your child if you have a child. It's something, loving your brother or loving your best friend. Like even if you, I mean, like I've got friends that I've, sometimes you fall out with them and you don't really see them,

but there's what they meant to you in that particular time. And I don't fall in, I haven't really fallen in love that much. So I think it depends how often it happens and who the person is. I think it's interesting because maybe there is a sort of everlasting fondness yeah but what if it what if the person cheated on you or something and there's all this anger as well can you still i think that helps to be honest i think if they've done something so wretched to you that they've kind of destroyed your life then you can kind of get over it and i think that's an important thing to do like when you're trying of get over it. And I think that's an important thing to do, like when you're trying to get over someone, is try to realise the bad bits of them

rather than fantasising about how wonderful it was at a certain point. I think that's a real common trap, though, for people who have been dumped, is that they idealise that relationship. And, you know, if they haven't done something obviously hurtful and horrible to you, it's very easy to forget about those bad things. Look back with rose-tinted glasses.

Exactly. And just look back with this idealized view of that person and to the point where your memories become so distorted and far from reality that it's impossible for you to ever really get over. Yeah. Because, I mean, it's not real, but the mind is so powerful. You have to remember that he was actually a dickhead yeah yeah i mean that's why i really wanted to write my book because i

think the best writing that ever is like amy winehouse with that back to black album i listen to that again and again and again and her response is every bad situation is a blues song waiting to happen and i think like so much of what i've read that's really kind of got me like i just reread pride and prejudice that book is just such a killer book it's so great because you know every so much of what I've read that's really kind of got me like I just reread Pride and Prejudice that book is just such a killer book it's so great because you know every time you read it you can read it for someone else and and like it was weird because obviously there's the Lizzie and the Darcy thing but actually if you look at Jane what happens to Jane like it's it's terrible and it's really funny that you know in the 18th century this was going on like it's like timeless and

it's almost like in our society today we don't really pay attention to it it's like the whole tinder thing like if you know i think dating apps that's not how you do things they're not geared to falling in love they're geared towards sex that's what they're geared towards and that's why it works for men and it doesn't really work for us and again i think like if men were as badly satisfied by dating apps as we are there would be a whole new way of doing things it's just like we're kind of complicit in this plot i mean like this i keep saying it's like the machines in terminator 2 like we've outsourced all our like love lives to machines to algorithms that's not how how you do it and yeah especially like

you know when when you're in your 20s maybe I don't know because I didn't have them in my 20s but maybe it's fun but at my age it's just it feels humiliating it's like do I really have to do this anymore it's not fun it feels vapid as hell and I think also it makes it that much harder to to get over someone when you do start seeing someone, because a part of you feels like you can't really legitimize these deep feelings that you were having that're not official, you're hanging out. But obviously, you can still develop very real feelings for someone. And then they dump you. But it's like dumping. Is it a dumping? Is it a breakup? What is it? Because we've never been official. But obviously, that can still take a lot of getting over. Yeah. And it used to be like, you know, you'd caught someone and then it would take a lot of time to get sex. And so men would have to put the effort in. But now there's this universe. There seems to be this universal rule that you sleep with him on the third date, but there's no date where he becomes your boyfriend.

It's like, how is that possible? Like, how do we not how do we have this kind of it's great to have. But I think you should have, you know, if you want to have sex, have sex on any day. Don't uniformly wait for the third but if you're going to agree about a sexual matter then there should be some kind of consensus on emotional matters because you know you as women there's the cuddle drug as well isn't there in addition to yeah and like it's secreted in the semen and so if you start i mean like obviously you'd probably be using condoms hopefully like that that would be wise um but you know, there's this bonding that goes on

and it hits women really hard. Yeah, we discussed this in a previous episode, actually. Did you? The thing is, I think, you know, we can't, like, there's a risk with generalising, because I know there are men who use dating apps who are looking for serious relationships. And there are women who use them who just want something casual.

I don't actually know any of them. No. But I'm sure they exist. We hear they exist. We've heard rumours. And, you know, I'm, like I said, I'm close to giving up dating apps. But I actually, this is slightly off topic, I just don't actually know how I'd meet anyone otherwise.

No. Yeah, well, that's the thing. It's so, so bloody hard to meet people because, you know, we're so busy all of a sudden. It sounds ridiculous. Like my mum will be like, what are you talking about? You're young, you're in London, there are single men everywhere. And I'm like, well, I just, how do you meet them? I did a lot of research into this because I found the data. I was the world's worst dating columnist because I just hated going on dates so much. And I would get all this advice from everybody and these these dating experts who obviously do very very very well I mean I think one thing one thing I want to do is there's this

wonderful woman called Hayley Quinn who's like a feminist dater and she's going to do this like boot camp like this romance boot camp on how you go out and get men because I think that maybe that's our solution maybe we need to kind of own it a bit more and kind of i think it needs to be two ways well yeah but i think i think the real life thing like the whole thing she's kind of teaching you is to not be a wallflower yeah to kind of go up and strike conversations because subconsciously women are still waiting for men exactly yeah i think men need to do it too though they're all chickens they're literally all chickens but it's like they're not chicken they're not chicken to say do you want to shag me oh no like you know like i mean like obviously there's a problem

because they hopefully they wouldn't say that to your face maybe they just need to put more effort in you know like if we didn't have the apps and everybody would have to make a bit more effort and that would be better right so slightly go back to what we were the main topic. Do you guys have a tip for getting over heartbreak? Like if you had one tip. Just don't contact them. Do not contact them. Like every time you want to contact them, don't contact them. Like it's the worst.

I never do it. I'm always like sending them 10,000 messages and every time going, oh, my God, what did you do that for? And they always ignore me. But it's just it's just the worst thing. You have to be very, very disciplined. You have to eat and sleep and exercise and don't just lay about in bed eating Ben and Jerry's. It's not a lasting solution.

I would say two things. First thing is don't be afraid to reach out to friends and be honest about what you've gone through because heartbreak on any level, it's ubiquitousitous everyone has their own experiences to bring to the table everyone has their own stories to share that will make you that will give you something to identify with that will help you to yeah get stronger everyone has their own advice and the second thing i would say is you know it's never really very clear why someone's broken up with you i feel like people always give they pussyfoot around the issues they want to soften the blow exactly so it can be very

easy to come up with these miss solve these mysteries in your head as to why they broke up with you and often that comes down to you looking in it yourself and being like well i clearly i wasn't good enough at this and clearly i was failing and this this and this and the other I think try and avoid that if you can try and avoid creating all of these mysteries in your head about why it ended and just accept whatever reason they said and try and move on if you can yeah I would add one thing though if you're the friend who has who has the heartbreak do not say too much bad stuff about him because there's always the risk that they get back together and then you lose her friendship.

That has been the worst mistake of my life. Like, yeah, a couple of times you say, that guy, he was so... They get back together and you're like, oh, no, it can retard things for years. But at the time, surely that's what the person who's heartbroken wants to hear. Maybe, but they're still in love with them.

That's the ultimate thing. And also the thing thing is is like men can be crappy because they're really bad with their emotions and sometimes they come back and they're better so it's all a bit complicated but anyway you were going to say yours no all i was going to say is i actually have never been heartbroken that's good well no it's not good but well it sort of is but it isn't but i've never been in love properly um hence the lack of heartbreaking because i just tend to end things before they get anywhere um but i'm now just dreading it so great but it might work out it might work out for you some happy people do just meet someone lovely and then fall in love and then get married, have babies. Bish, bash, bosh. Brilliant. I'd be surprised, but I'll keep you posted. Right.

On that disastrous note, let's move on to Dating Disaster of the Week. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. I'm Jessie Kirkshank, and on my podcast, Phone a Friend, I break down the biggest stories in pop culture. Here's a show that we recommend. I didn't even know what thirsty meant until there was all these headlines. And I get schooled by a tween. Facebook is like a no. That's what my grandma's on. Thank God Phone a Friend with Jessie Crookshank is not available on Facebook. It's out now wherever you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts.

Everywhere. Acast.com. monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com This is from one of our lovely listeners. It's quite a long one, so settle in and enjoy. I'm 27, French, and looking for the one,

or at least a guy I can have a good time with and see again. This is where I struggle. I guess being French means I have always been open about sex and don't mind going back to mine on the first date. However, I'm really old fashioned and I like men to show a little bit of respect. Just a little thank you or something never killed anyone, right? So I matched with this guy on Bumble last week. We chatted for a few days and he sounded like a good guy. He was really into Latin culture and he loved it when I said I was French.

sounded like a good guy. He was really into Latin culture and he loved it when I said I was French. We agreed to meet on a Sunday at 3pm. It was a weird time but it was all I had free. I also don't drink alcohol so I thought it would be okay. We went to the pub and chatted for hours. It was all good. I could see he was a nice guy. I was cold at one point so he put his hand on my bottom. I didn't mind that. He didn't seem to mind either. I'm going to interrupt there and say I fully don't understand why being cold put the hand on the bottom. I mean, usually I think you'd go for an arm round. Surely the bottom's the warmest part.

Anyway, we'll move on. Then we were really cold. So he said, should we go somewhere warmer? A smooth transition. I hadn't imagined he'd come back to mind that quickly. I hadn't tidied my room or anything, but I thought, okay, why not? So I got us an Uber and after getting home, I ordered us pizzas. Obviously I paid for it all. We do live in modern times. Within minutes, we were having sex. I told him I wasn't on the pill, so he used a condom,

but then we had an interesting chat. I asked him if he'd skip the condom if the girl didn't insist and he said yes because we are clean. I questioned what he meant by we. He then explained that we meant middle class people were clean and people with illnesses were more likely to be working class. Oh my god.

No. He had assumed I was middle class. I wear a signet ring that I bought last year with my own money, but I'm not middle class. I was shocked. How could anyone think like this in 2018? I should have known then that he was a douche. So he left the house at 10pm and I thought he would text me that night.

I checked my WhatsApp and he was online until half past midnight, but no text, nothing. Call me old fashioned, but if I pay for the Uber, the pizza and I have the condoms and it's my place, I was expecting a little thanks it was nice text on his way back. I told him off the next day saying this wasn't nice of him. He replied saying, sorry, I don't usually text until the next day. A few days after hearing nothing from the guy I messaged him saying I hope your big meeting goes well today.

I was trying to be the nice girl. He replied tar and changed his photos on his Bumble profile. From having sex on Sunday to a tar on Thursday. Class. Oh my god.

I know. I mean there are so many aspects to that that are awful. I mean, there are so many aspects to that that are awful. I mean, it's also like incredibly relatable. Livy and I were actually just discussing recently, we fully don't comprehend how you can sleep with a guy you've been seeing be it the first date, the third date, the fifth date, and then suddenly it can go to nothing.

And I don't like to sit here man bashing, but honestly, this is just, I find it can go to nothing. And I don't like to sit here man bashing. But honestly, this is just I find it so shocking. Yeah. And the thing about STIs and STDs like it's what? It's not a class thing. Never heard that before. I mean, the thing is, the thing is, it's like I really hope there are brilliantly empowered women out there going out and having sex and having a brilliant time. I really hope that is happening, by the way.

Anecdotally, I don't think it, in my kind of experience, it isn't happening. But I think the thing is, like, it's really a bad idea to have sex that early because I bet it was really terrible sex. She doesn't really mention that. There's this thing called the orgasm gap. Have you heard about the orgasm gap indeed i mean like you know none of these exchanges really benefit a woman unless she's a really kind of empowered woman who's gonna say you know this is what you need to do and this is exactly how you need to do it and quite a lot of the time if you try to kind of say you know they just think that you orgasm and you're just thinking, I didn't even make a noise that could have made you think that.

Did I? Or maybe I did. You know, there's this woman, have you seen it on Twitter? About this man who wrote into an agony aunt to ask why his girlfriend went and masturbated in the shower after they had sex. Oh yeah, I did see that. And it's like, oh my god. Yeah, the thing is though, it is easier for men to orgasm, isn't it? Like, if you've got a vagina. But that doesn't make it.

No, it doesn't. No, I'm not saying that. But I'm just saying they can have, like, it can be like a, you know, the first time they've met the person and they'll have a great time. Yeah. Whereas for a woman, like, it's not. Well, the thing is, she paid for the pizza and the Uber. And it's like, I want to know, did he give you an orgasm?

Because he should be shamed if he didn't. I feel like even the orgasm thing aside, like basic manners, like just say things. I know, I know, I know. But like, whether they'd had sex or not, she paid for their pizza. Yeah. Thank you for the meal. Yeah. You know, delivery pizza these days

it's pricey stuff as well anyway yeah um well i mean i will follow up to say this lovely listener said that she did meet a guy at a party since this awful date and she's very happy and excited about the new guy so we hope it works out her, so let's move on to this concept of over dating, which I think is absolutely fascinating. This is what I've written about this week. It's the concept that dating too much actually makes you less likely to find the one if such a thing exists or to end up in a relationship. I spoke to various, you know, dating experts, relationship coaches about this. And they said there are often many problems with going on too many dates, you know, with essentially with various different people, not obviously dating

one person too often. That's a different issue. And they basically told me that it can make you fussier because you're always comparing and you know looking for flaws it can also make you think the grass is always greener because you're on a date with one person and then you go back and have a swipe and think yeah well I might line up the next one there might be someone better it also you run the risk of forgetting things about that person I think it'd be so it's so embarrassing um if you know you go on a date with someone you go to a second date and it's like hey how's your new job and they go i don't have a new job and that was a different date they had a new job and there's also it can

get you stuck in this cycle of just looking for the next rush and the ego boost of the excitement of you know a first date um do you think that's what it is it's going on lots of first dates rather than that's what they mean yeah so as first dates or like the early stages of dating anyway and that it can also lead to dating fatigue and so i am someone who has been on my first share of dates i've i've dated i was thinking about this the other day like I downloaded tinder the day before my 22nd birthday so this is what three and a half years ago now and I've lost track of the amount of guys I've dated not all from dating apps um but these are guys who you know will only last for one two or three dates usually and then it's it's on to the next and I'm wondering if maybe this is what's going wrong for me

do you think it's made you do you think it's made you fussier I think I've always been fussy but maybe I don't know because I personally feel like I don't want to settle I'm going to keep dating and dating and dating until I find someone who ticks all my boxes and you know that I really fancy that the spark is there that i enjoy their company that i really want to see them but you probably get they treat me well as you date more you probably get more and more boxes that need ticking because you're like well he didn't do this and he didn't do that it's possible but what's the solution i think you can i don't know the men that i accept because i mean i think tinder was invented when i was like 29 or something

and i didn't start using it until i was over 30. So I have a totally different perspective, I'm sure. But the men that I've fallen madly in love with, they have never been good looking, really. And I wonder as I'm very quickly swiping past men's faces, if I ever would have had, you know, the two, you know, the two loves of my life, would I have even, would I be in your situation where I'd never fallen in love before? Because I was just, you know, just discarded his face. And also the other thing is, is like, the other thing is, is I actually wonder whether he would have been, either of them would have been on dating apps anyway, because they weren't the kind of men who did that. They're the kind of men who go to pubs.

The thing is, everyone's on dating apps now. Are they? If you're single. I don't know. I think 95 percent of people are i can think of like if i'm thinking about my friends who are single i can think of one guy who's not on dating apps i think i've got more friends that aren't on them because a lot of my friends aren't as into social media or technology and if you if you are they 50 no

i've got i've got some friends that just don't do it. They never got into it. And if you're not someone that has Instagram, you're probably not someone that's on Bumble. Yeah. I reckon. Yeah, that's a red flag. Doesn't have Instagram. Where will they put their food pictures?

I get to this awful kind of stage at the minute where, I mean, because I've been, all my experience of dates really have been just people who've been either so awful that I've cried all the way home or just like no connection at all you just know it as soon as you see them you're just like no my heart's just saying no and you kind of sit there and you don't really know what to do because you're like oh god that's so rude you can't just see a man and go oh no no um you can't do that and then you end up kind of trying and then and so and then so I get to the situation

where I was sort of in this situation where this man he was so lovely and I was like I was absolutely petrified I was like this is going to go terribly wrong because you're nice to me and you're very handsome and you have a job. And, you know, it's just like you end up kind of thinking that these sort of men are unicorns, you know, that they just don't exist. So when you find one, you just I just completely freaked out and messed up the entire thing. Makes you feel insecure. Because I was just like, this can't be happening to me. So within a, you know, a few few text messages it wasn't happening to me but uh yeah that thing is i like dating i think that's good you need that attitude yeah i do i genuinely feel like um with every guy

i go out with i'll only go out with a guy if i genuinely think there's scope for something happening there um whether i've met him irl or on the apps and I always get this like fizzy nervous excitement to be like maybe this is it maybe despite the fact how cynical I am about falling in love I am on some level actually a bit of a hopeless romantic and I really think that you know every guy maybe this is it obviously it's never it but I and I also feel like you know even when I have bad dates it's funny stories I mean even before I had this podcast I thought it was always a funny story and it's a way of you know you meet interesting people you go to you know new bars obviously sometimes you get home you're just like well that was a waste of makeup and like why did

I shave my legs and then um you know you can think of it that way but I try and just think like oh you know with every guy you date you learn more about yourself and about what you're looking for. So that's good. You're going to have success. I know, isn't she? She's so much better at this show than I am. So single though. We had a dating app expert come on and analyse our profiles and they were all over Rachel. They said she was like a star pupil and they said mine was rubbish. But I mean, it's irrelevant because we're in the same situation I know but I'm so I'm just so terrible I really

don't I'm not like you were talking about over dating I was like Christ I'm underdater yeah I never go on dates and the one time I do which was recently it's like two and a half months and I got bloody dumped so I'm dating sabbatical yeah I hate it so much it's so fucking hard yeah me too and when you do find someone you like and it goes badly it sucks you know what sorry you go i completely agree i just like i mean like i'm gonna be 35 soon so i really need to step up my efforts but i just can't there's just something in me that goes no please don't make me do this anymore it's like pe you know like on, are you kidding me? And I was so bad at PE.

Like, I was like the asthmatic, like, overweight kid who was just like, you know, just wanted to roll around on the floor and pretend to be dead. Relatable. That's exactly what it's like. But I think, yeah, I think you really need, I do think it's all about your attitude.

Like, one of the brilliant dating experts that I met is called Nikki Hodgson, and she wrote this brilliant book called The Curious History of Dating, and she's so on it. Like, of the brilliant dating experts that I met is called Nikki Hodgson. And she wrote this brilliant book called The Curious History of Dating. And she's so on it. Like she was dating. She decided she was going to meet a man. So she was like dating five of them at once.

Five at once. Five. How long? I'm not entirely sure. That's confusing. And the one that she liked the most when she started out was not the one she now has the baby plan with.

Really? That's so interesting. You need to check out Nikki Hodgson. The thing is, do you know what I think is absolutely bullshit that everyone says? You'll meet someone when you stop looking. My mother says that. It's just like, mother, just stop it.

It's just the worst thing. You literally cannot put that into practice. If you want to meet someone, you want to meet someone. And then you're like, you'll meet someone when you don't want to meet someone. Well, that doesn't help me. Yeah. I did this, I did this retort, the bad romance retort repertoire for all the things that we get told as single girls again and again and again. Like you're looking in all the wrong places.

Oh, yeah, of course. Because, you know, I checked the fridge. He wasn't in there. You know, like just one after the other. You know, like, you know, it happens when you least expect it. Well there. You know, like, just one after the other. You know, like, you know, it happens when you least expect it. Well, okay, so it's my fault because I expect it. Like, what am I supposed to do?

Just give up all hope and then miraculously he's going to appear. Yeah, and do you know what's I think is really interesting and, like, I very much do feel like personally, I'm going on dates because I am looking for a relationship when it's the right person, but I'm also not desperate and I am looking for a relationship when it's the right person, but I'm also not desperate. And I really do like being single and it's really fun.

But I do think that there's nothing wrong with saying I wanted to be in a relationship. If that's what you want, then that's what you want. And I think, you know, I love that we live in a time where women are empowered and being single is gradually losing its stigma. We've still got a way to go, especially as women. But I think there's nothing wrong with saying I'd like a boyfriend or a girlfriend. It's just like I read this...

Some of the dating articles that I read are absolutely hilarious. I read this one that said, don't chase him, don't play hard to get, and don't message him. And it's like, how on earth? Just sit there like a duck. Like, what are we supposed to do? This is what I like about Hayley Quinn, because it's like, you know, there's all these rules that women have to do. Like, they have to be like this, they have to be

like that. Don't ask him questions. Don't kind of, you know, like, play it cool. Like, you know, like, how are you supposed to do? Like, you should say, like, with this last guy, like, I was really trying to play it cool. And I just went mental because I was like I can't handle it like you know like it was great it's great when they kind of regularly ask you out why should you have to wait for them to ask you out you should just be like in fact there's another thing that Megan wrote in the column like when she was dating a woman like after sleeping with this woman she and

then she was going like near this lady's house and she was like hey do you want to meet for for brunch and she would never have done that to a man but it's like that's normal human behavior you know there's there's this whole kind of text etiquette where you you know you mustn't get too too into it or whatever i mean the best the best and most happy kind of period i've ever been when i was in love with a man was when he just texted me constantly. It was brilliant. But this is the thing. You have to, I mean, we've discussed this as well, text and compatibility.

I just want to sort of end this little segment on the fact that what you say there made me think of what one of my very best friends, Georgie, always says to me. And she is, honestly, she has so much common sense when it comes to dating. She's so wise. She always just says to me, stop playing the game, and thinking about what you should do, if you want to message him, message him, if you want to see him,

ask him, and it really, I think it should be that simple, yeah, it sounds so simple and basic, but you're right, it should be, just be upfront,

and be honest, and if he doesn't want that, then you find out quicker, exactly, anyway, I guess we will keep listeners posted, how Olivia and I get on with our... Oh, every week, guys. Olivia's going on dating sabbatical.

I'm not sure what I'm doing. Right, we've got a few minutes left. So Olivia's going to read a dating dilemma. This is wacky. Okay. I was dating a guy a couple of years back as a result of a Tinder swipe. We shared a lot of interests and he had a great sense of humour. After a couple of dates, we went for a few drinks and ended up staying in a hotel.

Pause that. Quite rogue. Going to a hotel. Continuing. We chatted, started fooling around, blah, blah, blah. We fucked. But whilst we were mid-sex, he randomly inserted his finger into my belly button. No euphemism.

I don't really have any issues with belly buttons, so I sort of went along with it. When I quizzed him about it afterwards, he said he had heard it's an erogenous zone, to which I frankly just laughed. I did a little reading up on it afterwards, though, and this prompted me to do some more experimentation of my own. Sure enough, i did find after a few times it felt kind of good am i just very weird or have either of you heard anything like this i mean thanks for sending that in i love it yeah i've never experienced that myself

i don't know it did make me think when i read that i was like maybe I need to experiment with the belly button I mean I I've never heard of that being no never had a turn on no I get very turned on when uh men kiss my neck yeah I think I love that and um I just did this masturbation piece for Tatler actually and about how we should you know be masturbating because because then you know what you want. Yeah. And OMG Yes, I think, sounds great. Yeah, I mean, I know. No, but apparently, like, there's, like, 12 different methods, like, prior, you know, like, there's ways of manipulating things down that area, which I haven't kind of watched the explicit videos.

But at some point, I would kind of like a man to watch that and then kind of come and see me. Like, you know, I like some knowledge. Required reading ahead of time. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, I just think this is quite a fun story because, hey, you know, you find something new that you're into. Exactly.

Why not? It's great. That's the great thing about sex. You can experiment and you can have it in all sorts of different ways. Yeah, and don't be ashamed. Well, thank you for sending it in. And that it for today it always goes so quickly thank you everyone for listening please subscribe to millennial love give us a rating and review us on apple podcast wherever else you get your podcast because this helps people discover the podcast and it makes livia and i very very happy yes it does also what makes us happy is reading your dating disasters and dilemmas

because they're bloody hilarious. So please do get in touch if you have one and you can send them to millennial.love at independent.co.uk or you can tweet us at Rachel underscore Hosey and Olivia Petter 1. And all your stories will be kept anonymous as always, so do not fear. If you want to contact us in another form, we have many modes of communication you can join our facebook group um this is where we discuss topics from the podcast

news from the dating world we share articles we've written and we ask you guys questions we just really want to hear your feedback and we love it when you guys get in touch so please do and to join all you have to do is go to facebook.com forward slash groups forward slash millennial.love and we will put a link in the show notes as well so that's it for this week thank you so much emily for joining us thank you for having me the other thing you need to be doing is to advertise yourself as available for dates if any hot men are listening yes that's true if anyone would like to date us do get in touch yes hot men we're here every time i do a panel i'm like if any single man happens to be here men, we're here. Every time I do a panel I'm like, if any single men happen to be here and interested, come see me at the end.

Why haven't we thought of that? We're like 24 episodes in and not once have we thought to advertise us. Oh god. We've reached that stage. Yes, listeners, hi. Do you like aubergine parmigiana? Everyone likes aubergine parmigiana. Well, that's what I thought, but anyway. Thanks for listening everyone

and we'll see you next week. Bye. Bye. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. I'm Jessie Cruikshank, and on my podcast, Phone a Friend, I break down the biggest stories in pop culture. But when I have questions, I get to phone a friend.

I phone my old friend, Dan Levy. You will not die hosting the Hills after show. I get thirsty for the hot wiggle. I didn't even know a thirsty man until there was all these headlines. And I get schooled by a tween. Facebook is like a no, that's what my grandma's on. Thank God Phone a Friend with Jesse Crookshank is not available on Facebook. It's out now wherever you get your podcasts.

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