Hi everyone!

I am 25 and only recently became single after 5 years with my now ex. I decided to break up for a multitude of reasons, but our deadbedroom, her bad dietary habits, her lack of curiosity for anything and lack of opportunity in the city I was in for me were big factors.

Anyway, I moved in a city where I knew no one for the job I always wanted. I am still in the process of making new friends and covid restrictions in this city are still quite stringent; bars are closed by 11 and operate at 50% capacity. You can only stay seated unless you need to go to the washroom and you must not mingle with strangers.

Which makes Tinder the next best thing to meet new people and maybe get laid. I knew from the get go that the market was skewed favorably for women on that app. I had a couple dates as of now but none of them went anywhere.

The second date I had with that app was with a girl my age that was also new to the area. She was really curvy and I would have swiped left if it was not for her bio that was on point. I thought I was above her league but she was still attractive to me. We met in a bar and both had a blast. At the end of the night, while I was hoping that she would follow me home or kiss, she just hugged me awkwardly before I could do anything else. It was a bit awkward but she said she wanted to meet me again so I was thinking whatever, it will be on the second date then.

We met the next weekend to do an activity we both liked. this is a this moment she told me she only thought of me as a friend. It kind of shattered my expectations as I was really sure she was into me as we had a lot in common and had so much fun last week. But she is a great friend so that is not a total loss.

Lately, we were in a bar and we were talking about everything and anything, we discussed our recent dates ( I had four different dates since meeting her at that point, all going nowhere). This girl is very sexual in nature and that was one the main thing that made her interesting as we shared a lot of beliefs about sex and relationships. I asked her to show me the tinder profiles of the men she slept with as I thought they were roughly like me in terms of attractivess and thought that I had some issues with my body language or the way I come across on a date (which still may be true) but when she showed me the profiles, it was like a bucket of cold water to the face. Theses guys were hot, like real hot. I was no match for these guys. The girl I tought was below my league was actually above.

Before my relationship, when I was 17-21, I was at the peak of my fitness. I was lean and muscular. I had big pecs, very faint abs, a chiseled face. Dating was easy as women were drawn toward me like flies to shit. My relationship should not have lasted 5 years and it took the best out of me, I went from 160 to a top of 230 lbs 2 years ago. I am now down to 168 but gone are the muscles, its all fat. I have a big face, a fat chin, a belly and my pecs are not really manboobs, but they are clearly fat. And I started balding, which is now another insecurity of mine.

So, this conversation made me quite sad about where I was in the online dating food chain since it destroyed my view of the market that I already knew was skewed. Most girls that like my profile now are those that clearly don't take care of themselves and I would rather stay without sex than reducing my standards there.

So, from my recent experiences over the last few months I made these conclusions:

-I am not in great shape and the market is more skewed than I initially thought. I think I am average (maybe above average a little bit?) looking and this play for a lot and it is demoralising as I know what being fit and successful is like.

-It really is my shape because my clothing game is good, I get praised from men and women alike about my style. However, form fitting t-shirt and shirts that are tucked in my pants are less prevalent than before because my belly does not favor those now.

-I am doing something wrong on my dates, but cannot really pinpoint it. It is definetely harder now and most girls (even my dates) probably don't see me as a prize so there is not a big margin for errors on my part.

-I have my self esteem into the ground and while I am confident talking with women and am not an awkward person to be with, I think something inside me prevents me from just jumping on the occasion to escalate and it makes me stay platonic with them.

Thank you for listening to me ranting about my life. That's all I wanted but if someone has tips, stories to corroborate or confront what I lived, I would be glad to hear about those.