International Dating For The Older Adult

“Fifty percent of the men are already married,” the owner of an international dating site told me.  His answer was in response to a question about those who use sites like his.

Early in my investigation it was made clear to me that Internet dating sites and mail-order bride places are different. The later operates under the International Marriage Broker Regulations and the men are vetted. Additionally many countries have strict laws about it.

Though the lines between the two are sometimes blurred, international dating sites are for people to check out profiles of others. The two businesses are the same in that most of the men are from developed countries and the women are most likely to be from developing nations. However, because you are just communicating on-line there are no rules regarding background checks on either party. This gives cause for caution.

 Most international dating sites ask for the men to pay a monthly fee to place their profile. The women often are free. Basically either party can look over the profiles and write to those they are interested in communicating with. A major difference between international dating sites and national dating places is that translation services are frequently offered; for a fee of course.

My focus in the research was on those in the 35 and older age bracket. This is the group more likely to look for a partner in a different manner. Many have already been in a relationship that ended for one reason or another. But there were also a great number who had focused on their career first and are now finding it difficult to meet potential candidates for a long term relationship.  

Let’s continue with the comment of the web site owner. He pointed out that the majority of men being less than honest about their marital status are American. Seems that it is anyone’s guess as to why American men are more prone to doing such a thing than those from other countries. I could find no one that would be interviewed about why they did it.

The owner asked that I not use his name or web site name as he believed his answers would be bad for business. He elaborated that 15% of the men have psychological problems. Another 15 percent were just looking for someone to take care of them. The last 15 percent are abusive or make for a poor choice in partner for other reasons. A lady on the site basically has a 5 percent chance of finding a man who is really interested in love and someone to spend the rest of their life with.

Interviews with women from around the world pretty much confirmed the web owner’s numbers. One lady saved up her money to visit the man she had been communicating with for a year, only to arrive and find out he was married. Many others told of communicating with the guy for four or five months before he admitted to his marital status. Some women told me that the men were communicating with them in hopes of getting a sex holiday away from their wives.

I spoke with one American woman whose husband was spending much time on the computer for months and then suspiciously had a business meeting in the Philippines. She hired a computer expert who put a keylogger on his computer and found he was telling a younger girl in that country that he was going to marry her.

A lady in her 50’s living in a South American country told me a guy was all set to visit her and then didn’t show up. When she was finally able to connect with someone she discovered that he had been so ill that he died on the way to the airport. Another guy showed with many bottles of different medicines that he was on.

On the other side the statistics and what to watch for are vastly different. Well over 60 percent of the women are honestly looking for that someone special. Many of the women have a marriage in their past. They learned and are now disenchanted with the culture of the men offered in their country. Women are making strides in developing nations, but the men are not accepting it.  A great number of the women in the age bracket that I looked at are professionals such as doctors, lawyers and business executives. In many of the developing countries the culture of the men make them shy away from such women. Do not think that all these ladies are looking for an American man. Many stated that they preferred men from The United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.

There are tricksters out there though. Women will fudge on their age and the number of children they have. One lady told me, “I would never get a man to write if he knew I had three children.” When asked about what she would do if things got serious, she said, “I’ll tell him when the time is right.

I found with some women in the Philippines they are still married. They say that to get a divorce they need to pay their husband somewhere between $3,000 and $5,000 USD. That money they ask the new international boyfriend to pay.

For a few of the women out there it is a business. A lady in her 40’s allowed me to listen in and observe her for a day. She negotiated six men for money. Though the woman did not have a job she gave each guy a different story about the time she would be home from work and could call her. That kept her from having two or more chats or telephone calls at the same time. She played upon their emotions and used cunning to create different situations for them to send her money.

I watched a Colombian blog site. One American posted that his girlfriend in Colombia had been robbed at the ATM and lost the money for her rent. He sent her $300 to pay it. Another guy commented that the same thing had happened to his Colombian girlfriend and he helped her out. Well, to make a long story short, the two guys found out they actually had the same girlfriend.

But it is not all doom and gloom. I have met and interviewed many happy couples. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services reports that marriages like this have a lower divorce rate than the standard for the nation.

I know American men whose wives are from South America, the Philippines, Ukraine, Russia and China. My favorite story is a mid 40’s, shy American computer engineer living in Silicon Valley. He found a lady from the Philippines who is extroverted. After their wedding In the USA the lady would approach single men who came to their church and seemed lonely. The priest now calls her the match maker as she has introduced three men to ladies from the Philippines and they have gotten married also in the church.

I asked all the happy couples what is the main ingredient for finding the right person on an international dating site. Both the men and women agreed that it is honesty from the beginning. If you catch the other person in just one lie then drop that person.