THE PSYCHOLOGIST : What does an invisible woman know about passion?

What does an invisible woman know about passion?

Melinda Coxhead, below, is in a sad state. She finds great difficulty in being single in her 50s. She should try being single in her '70s. I have been there. The sad truth is that the older you get the less likely you are to form new intimate partnerships. I have no good news for her. It is only going to get worse. So she should grab even a half-suitable partner if she can.

I practice what I preach. There are epic incompatibilities between my present partner and me but we still have a good interpersonal relationship with lots of laughs during our times together. I look to the good and smile at the incompatibilities

It is no longer possible to deny that I am turning 50. I’m not just turning 50, I’m hurtling unwillingly into its devastating path.

Fifty has taken my once-heaving breasts and tenderised them into schnitzels. Forlorn nipples facing my knees in defeat. Middle age has slackened my jawline, lined my neck and deepened my wrinkles overnight.

I’m trying to love myself whilst dealing with being less attractive. It’s true what they say about becoming invisible as I notice people see me less and less.

Even insensitive algorithms can’t help themselves, with ads on menopause belly, retirement villages, exercising for the middle-aged, bowel cancer checks, embrace the greys. Apparently, even the emojis I use are old.

The disturbing fifty shifts are many but perhaps the most onerous is the shift of love. Being single at 50 has presented a new landscape. It’s barren and desolate but also rife with a few unexpected landmines.

There are two major differences about being single at 50. The first is the shift in popular opinions about what I’m searching for.

According to these opinions, at this age I’m no longer looking for the love of my life. I’m looking for a “companion”, like I want a golden retriever. Does middle age mean I don’t deserve love or passion? Can I no longer expect to meet the love of my life?

My search for love means I still want butterflies, flirting, anticipation and desire. You don’t get that with a “companion” – you get the early-bird special at the RSL.

Which leads me to the next shift. What has happened to the men in my demographic? Collectively they have left me scratching my head. I’ve racked up my fair share of pathetic first date stories, but these most recent experiences have me rattled.

The first is fairly mild. Chatted online, shared some messages then a phone call. He seemed interesting and normal, so we agreed to meet. Now let me remind you, I’ve been single for 15 years and I’m not used to a man in my space. It was a cold Melbourne night and I was all rugged up. I had just greeted him when he said “let me take your coat”.

I wasn’t ready, it was meant to be my security blanket for the first few minutes before I took it off when I felt comfortable. He rips it from my back, one of my arms gets caught and I’m flapping it about in the intimate, dimly lit restaurant. He pulls it free, along with my scarf and runs off to hang it up ... I may as well be naked. I left my hat on to compensate.

We have a polite conversation, there’s not a lot of laughter, but the conversation flows and he is interesting. Until it also becomes apparent that he is quite rich. And refers to it to the point where I become uncomfortable with my poor status. I mean every girl wants to meet a millionaire but, in the end, his big talk is just tedious.

Then we got up to go. He runs to get my coat which he helps me with. But then he positions his arm in a way so I must loop mine through it. It’s so forced and awkward I walk stiffly out of the restaurant. Suddenly, I’m cast back to regency England like we are taking a turn about the room before the men retire to the drawing room for cigars.

I managed to get my hand out as we bought gelati after dinner. He offers his arm again, but I say, “Sorry, no I can’t do that. Um, don’t take it personally.” Insert nervous laughter. I see him grimace. Cue few minutes of discomfort, thank God we are walking back to the car.

Next there was a guy, let’s call him Bob. We shared some lighthearted banter about how we were both on to our second coffee for the morning when he sends a photo of his coffee cup. Suddenly, I’m struck with doubt, confusion and repulsion. Can I reject a man because of a dirty coffee cup? I ran the problem by a friend who is equally repulsed but advises to at least proceed with the phone call. Sadly, it is not a success due to his poorly timed humour. I bring up the coffee cup – he explains he only washes it about once a fortnight to enhance the flavour. Next!

Unfortunately, it gets worse. The next guy sounds genuine and pleasant. Jovial chat ensues. I mentioned to him that I work with a team of podiatrists. He immediately pipes up that he has an injured toe. I remind him I’m not a podiatrist, I just work with them. “That’s ok,” he says, “if I send you a photo you can show them.” I’m half laughing as I think he must be joking.

We bid each other good night and just as I’m considering a date there it is. A photo of an injured, gross-looking toe. I’m exasperated, disappointed and sad. What is going on? I thought he wanted a date, not healthcare. Have men given up? Or is there such a man shortage they think they can get away with this lacklustre behaviour? My hands are in the air. I give in.

So, I’m baffled. I know what you’re thinking, I must be fussy, unrealistic, indecisive. What is wrong with me? I’m not desperate, lonely, or sad. I have a full life. But these experiences have galvanised my resolve to search for nothing less than butterflies, desire and anticipation.

When I do meet my life partner, I know it will feel like coming home. I need it to feel like coming home. We just haven’t found the way home yet.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/what-does-an-invisible-woman-know-about-passion-20221212-p5c5ma.html

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Background

The essence of conservatism is caution. The essence of Leftism is anger

This blog is written solely by John Ray, who has a Ph.D. degree in psychology and 200+ papers published in the academic journals of the social sciences. It does occasionally comment on issues in psychology but is mainly aimed at giving a conservative psychologist's view on a broad range of topics. There are very few conservative psychologists.

The blog originated in Australia and many (but not most) posts discuss Australian matters. Australians have an unusually good awareness of events outside their own country. Australian newspapers feature news from Britain and the USA not as an afterthought but as a major part of their coverage. So Australians do tend to have a truly Western heart, which is the reason behind the old name for this blog. So events in Australia, Britain and the USA all feature frequently here, plus occasional coverage of other places, particularly Israel.

A primer in American politics for non-Americans:

SCOTUS is the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the land

The "GOP" stands for "Grand Old Party" and refers to the Republican party. The GOP is at present center/Right, while the Democrats have been undergoing a steady drift Leftwards and now have policies similar to mainstream European Leftist parties.

The ideological identity of both parties has however been very fluid -- almost reversing itself over time. In the mid 19th century, the GOP was the party of big government and concern for minorities while the Democrats advertised themselves as "The party of the white man" -- an orientation that lasted into the mid 20th century in the South. The Democrats are still obsessed with race but have now flipped into support for discrimination AGAINST whites.

Was Pope Urban VIII the first Warmist? Below we see him refusing to look through Galileo's telescope. People tend to refuse to consider evidence— if what they might discover contradicts what they believe.

Global warming

Calibrated in whole degrees. Larger graph here

Climate scientist Lennart Bengtsson said. “The warming we have had the last 100 years is so small that if we didn’t have meteorologists and climatologists to measure it we wouldn’t have noticed it at all.”

The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here. In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.

Two examples of Leftist racism below (much more here and here):

Beatrice Webb, a founder of the London School of Economics and the Fabian Society, and married to a Labour MP, mused in 1922 on whether when English children were "dying from lack of milk", one should extend "the charitable impulse" to Russian and Chinese children who, if saved this year, might anyway die next. Besides, she continued, there was "the larger question of whether those races are desirable inhabitants" and "obviously" one wouldn't "spend one's available income" on "a Central African negro".

Hugh Dalton, offered the Colonial Office during Attlee's 1945-51 Labour government, turned it down because "I had a horrid vision of pullulating, poverty stricken, diseased nigger communities, for whom one can do nothing in the short run and who, the more one tries to help them, are querulous and ungrateful."

Defensible and indefensible usages of the term "racism"

The book, The authoritarian personality, authored by T.W. Adorno et al. in 1950, has been massively popular among psychologists. It claims that a set of ideas that were popular in the "Progressive"-dominated America of the prewar era were "authoritarian". Leftist regimes always are authoritarian so that claim was not a big problem. What was quite amazing however is that Adorno et al. identified such ideas as "conservative". They were in fact simply popular ideas of the day but ones that had been most heavily promoted by the Left right up until the then-recent WWII. See here for details of prewar "Progressive" thinking.

R.I.P. Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet deposed a law-defying Marxist President at the express and desperate invitation of the Chilean parliament. He pioneered the free-market reforms which Reagan and Thatcher later unleashed to world-changing effect. That he used far-Leftist methods to suppress far-Leftist violence is reasonable if not ideal. The Leftist view that they should have a monopoly of violence and that others should follow the law is a total absurdity which shows only that their hate overcomes their reason

Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a war criminal. Both British and American codebreakers had cracked the Japanese naval code so FDR knew what was coming at Pearl Harbor. But for his own political reasons he warned no-one there. So responsibility for the civilian and military deaths at Pearl Harbor lies with FDR as well as with the Japanese. The huge firepower available at Pearl Harbor, both aboard ship and on land, could have largely neutered the attack. Can you imagine 8 battleships and various lesser craft firing all their AA batteries as the Japanese came in? The Japanese naval airforce would have been annihilated and the war would have been over before it began.

FDR prolonged the Depression. He certainly didn't cure it.

WWII did NOT end the Great Depression. It just concealed it. It in fact made living standards worse

Joe McCarthy was eventually proved right after the fall of the Soviet Union. To accuse anyone of McCarthyism is to accuse them of accuracy!

The KKK was intimately associated with the Democratic party. They ATTACKED Republicans!

People who mention differences in black vs. white IQ are these days almost universally howled down and subjected to the most extreme abuse. I am a psychometrician, however, so I feel obliged to defend the scientific truth of the matter:

The average African adult has about the same IQ as an average white 11-year-old and African Americans (who are partly white in ancestry) average out at a mental age of 14. The American Psychological Association is generally Left-leaning but it is the world's most prestigious body of academic psychologists. And even they have had to concede that sort of gap (one SD) in black vs. white average IQ. 11-year olds can do a lot of things but they also have their limits and there are times when such limits need to be allowed for.

America's uncivil war was caused by trade protectionism. The slavery issue was just camouflage, as Abraham Lincoln himself admitted. See also here

Did William Zantzinger kill poor Hattie Carroll?

Did Bismarck predict where WWI would start or was it just a "free" translation by Churchill?

Leftist psychologists have an amusingly simplistic conception of military organizations and military men. They seem to base it on occasions they have seen troops marching together on parade rather than any real knowledge of military men and the military life. They think that military men are "rigid" -- automatons who are unable to adjust to new challenges or think for themselves. What is incomprehensible to them is that being kadaver gehorsam (to use the extreme Prussian term for following orders) actually requires great flexibility -- enough flexibility to put your own ideas and wishes aside and do something very difficult. Ask any soldier if all commands are easy to obey.

A good article on Leftist hate

The real history of social Darwinism

Some personal memoirs

Memoir highlights

THE PSYCHOLOGIST

What does an invisible woman know about passion?

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