I wasn’t training them. I was hiding.

Oh but you were training them you stupid hag. It just wasn't training them to do what you wanted. You were teaching them that "anyone else" would be a better prospect. You and millions upon millions of the other crones and crones-to-be, all of you marching in lockstep for decades, meaningfully differentiated only by the increasing wrinkles of age etched upon you like serial numbers for slags.

And now you have your just rewards. Solitude, desperation, and the indifference of men that realized they can do better than you.

We treat them mean because we think kindness reads as desperation in a woman our age. And the deeply annoying part is: it works. Beautifully. Just in the wrong direction. Treat ‘em mean is a filtration system for avoidants.

Oh look, a split second of clarity...

When you perform unavailability, you don’t attract secure men. Secure men don’t want a puzzle. They want a person. They want to know if you’re free on Friday so they can book a table. Play the game, and you attract the hunters – men who love the chase because the chase requires no intimacy. Men addicted to voltage. To uncertainty. To the spike.

There it is, the cope and blame redirection. Instead of admitting she was chasing men too far above her station in life; instead of settling for a mere mortal on the same level as herself. Bitch-Icarus chose to fly too close to the Chad-sun and of course her wings melted, but somehow that's all his fault.

Drown in the sea alone you cunt.

Brevity is often valued in writing, so I've decided to help her out. Free edits, you're welcome ma'am.

In my 20s, this felt like power. (It was mostly fear in better lighting but I didn’t know that yet.) I mastered breezy indifference. I timed my texts to the minute: double the time he took, plus 10 for mystery. I thought I was teaching men my value. I thought I was training them to love me. I was attractive.

But I am 51 now. Looking back on that first year of dating after divorce at 50 – the apps, the profiles, the quiet violence of being matched and discarded by an algorithm – I realise something uncomfortable: I wasn’t training them. I was hiding. and am no longer attractive.

Men get rejected in the front end, women in the back end, no pun intended.

We are convinced our real selves are simply … too heavy. We have lived. We come with stretch marks and opinions.

Exactly what I'm looking for. A needy post-wall hag with opinions.

Wonderful title. They want "no games" just when they start to lose them. I don't think she's being authentic because she's had a change of heart: She knows she's beat.

This ties into this one: https://www.forums.red/p/whereareallthegoodmen/325242/why_can_t_the_man_just_do_it

The "play hard to get" game got her left alone wondering whether she's going to die alone so she approaches Chad and Chad rejects her! "Why can't Chads do the approaching again! I'll even do coffee dates now!"

Too late! Luther! Too late! https://www.youtube.com/shorts/PZ4lmw2oQIM

She feels this way as of the writing of the article. This is an expression of temporary emotion for her.

Let her get her hands on a truly nice man. We all have a friend who is a seriously good person. She will chew him up and spit him out and laugh about it on r/twoxcrhomosomes for the lulz

"the quiet violence of being matched and discarded by an algorithm"

Ah, yes, those pesky algorithms - the violent part of mathematics.

Yep, she looks like plenty of girls that didn't think I was worthy early on.

Men build, women collect gifts.

So it took me a while to build, and now I'm able to do whatever I want. I smile to myself about the girls that passed, they'd shit themselves if they knew what resources I have now. But of course, they all have stretch marks and opinions like the author, and really aren't any fun to be around.

No thanks, I'll keep living my stress-free life.

She calls herself a "woman of substance." Is this woman-code for "fat"?

So I am retiring the strategy. I am done auditioning for the role of Cool Girl. She was exhausting to play – and frankly, the reviews were mixed. I’m replacing her with a woman who texts back. Who says what she means. Who admits she wants to be held. It is a terrifying bet. It goes against 30 years of training. But I’m betting on this: The right man won’t want a challenge to conquer. He’ll want a partner to rest with. And God knows – I am ready to rest.

One tiny problem there... that right man was 30 years in her past. Your average 50-year old man has too much experience with women and not enough attraction for aged hags for her to have a realistic chance.

Almost gets it. She played the dread game. It worked but most dread game players -men and women are needy and hiding it. I bet she was really needy and that drove them away. Dread doesn't really make you love anyone, just fear losing them. It has its uses but as a day to day strategy it is retarded.

She is right to drop it now though. Now she is not the 20 something prize with working ovaries and no brats. Now she is a charity case. Better ask for what you want. Would have been better from the start but never mind. Bet you did OK anyway when you took Beta's shit and ran at menopause. It worked out till now. Now it gets harder. happily we can just say "Manout"

It goes against 30 years of training.

So you made no choices about your own behavior in those years, eh? It was all reading-out a script that was fed to you. Stimulus-response. Action without thinking. Pavlovian knee-jerking. Or puppeteers pulling on your control-wires. And at the same time, you excelled at school, made all the right moves, saw through all bullshit, made mincemeat of the dopes around you. Because you were just so brilliant when you needed to be.

Thank god you've clawed back some control over your own actions now, eh? Now it's your turn to shine!