Tamsen Butler - Meeting Your Match Online: The Complete Guide to Internet Dating and Dating Services - Including True Life Date Stories

Introduction

What are you looking for in a potential mate? Do you have certain standards that must be met, and other things that are a little more flexible? Maybe your ideal mate is independent and spontaneous, or perhaps you envision falling deeply in love with someone who relies upon you to make decisions and dislikes making decisions without first mulling over every possible outcome.

You search for your potential sweetheart everywhere. Is the person standing in front of you at the grocery store your soul mate? Will your next blind date turn out to be The One? It is exciting to think that you may stumble upon the love of your life at any moment, but it is exhausting when, time and again, it becomes apparent that no one around you is completely compatible with what you are looking for. It would be so much easier if you could just input all your likes and dislikes into the computer and have your ideal mate appear before your eyes, right?

The good news is that it is possible .

Online dating is an amazing resource. Nowhere else can you sift through a massive catalog of single people and contact the ones you like while disregarding the ones you do not. You need not get dressed up to search online for a potential date, and you can do it when it suits your schedule. That means that if the only time you have available to look for love is in the early morning before heading to work, you will still have all the same options available to you if your schedule allows you to search on a Friday night. Online dating allows you to look for someone when it is convenient for you and in a way that also allows you be as selective as you like with who you contact and respond to.

In a hectic world, online dating is the perfect solution to finding the love of your life.

Case study: Melissas Story

Not many people know that my husband and I met online using personal ads at Yahoo! Personals. We have this little joke that we actually met at Dairy Queen since thats where we first met face-to-face.

I was not your typical 21-year-old! Sure, I met guys at bars and through work, but none of them were husband or father material, especially since I was a single mom. I began surfing through personal ads. In 2001, I dont remember having anything like Match.com around or these other online dating sites, but even if they were, I would not have paid for the service back then, being that my money had to stretch pretty far. I met a few guys through personal ads they had posted probably on Yahoo! Personals or something but they were all let downs. Kenny had an ad posted not that I remember the exact wording he used in his ad, but I am sure it had something to do with him being a 27-year-old divorced dad. I responded to his online ad, we exchanged pictures, and talked on the phone for about two weeks before we met. Because it was the middle of summer and he had his girls for visitation, we thought we would just do a big outing with all the kids and meet at Dairy Queen because if we happened to run out of things to talk about, we always had the kids as a distraction.

Ice cream was great and things seemed to be going well, so we each packed up in our cars and headed to the park to continue getting to know each other. Then, something happened: Kennys youngest daughter had to use the restroom, and the park restrooms were closed off. I lived less than a mile away, and while I dont condone anyone going back to a dates house the first time you meet, this circumstance was special. Even though we really didnt know each other, I felt as though he was trustworthy. So we packed up and headed off to my place. The first date was pretty much done by then. The kids played for a short time and we said our goodbyes. I knew from that first date that this was the right man for me.