Ep29: Women Dating Younger Men

Usually, women who date younger men get huge backlash from today's society. This episode delves into this controversial topic. Take a listen to find out my take on the matter!

Episode Transcript

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Hello there and welcome to Casual Fridays by I Read Aloud, the podcast that discusses

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various themes from a personalized lens so that you always end up with my unwarranted
opinion and advice and my own take on matters.
I am your host Dada and I do urge you to look me up on YouTube.
Just search for at I Read Aloud and you'll enter my world of storytelling with the click

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of a button.
Just a reminder before I begin today's episode that this podcast airs on Fridays, actually
every two Fridays.
It's a bi-weekly podcast now on the following platforms, YouTube, Apple podcasts, Amazon
music, Google podcasts, iHeartRadio, Spotify and RSS.com.

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Today's episode is titled Women Dating Younger Men.
And I know this is a very controversial issue and recently there have been several celebrities
dating younger men and they have kind of taken center stage on this matter.
They have been shamed by some people, they have been praised by others.

(01:13):
It's definitely a controversial issue, whereas definitely it's a double standard because
when a man dates a younger woman, even if she's 30 or 50 years younger, we say that
he still has game.
And the worst thing we could say about him would be that he's rich and she's after his
money.

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But even when that is the opinion of the man, he's still out in the bar in society, he's
still respected because he's a man and he doesn't really face much scrutiny.
Whereas when a woman even looks at a younger man, she's automatically a cougar or a man-eater
as if she's some medusa with snakes on her head out to get the younger man, out to ruin

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his life.
About 10 or 12 years ago, I was at a wedding and I met this woman who's a mom of a couple
of young men who were with her.
And I was just talking to the woman, we sat next to each other during the wedding, she
was really lovely, I enjoyed her company and I met her two sons.

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Now because I am older, I was in my mid-30s and I didn't really think of them as anyone
I would look at in a romantic fashion.
Because I used to be a teacher, I would usually see younger men as my students, someone for

(02:42):
me to mentor or whatever.
But apparently one of her sons took a liking to me.
And during the wedding dinner, he came up to me and asked me for a dance.
Now I was bored and I said, fine, I mean, okay, it's a dance.
But as we were dancing, I kind of felt the vibe that he was maybe interested in me, you

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know, in one sense or another.
I kind of like cut it short and went back to my table.
And I saw his parents giving him this hugest lecture about him, you know, hitting on me
and he left the dinner upset and all that because, you know, of course, his parents
want to protect him supposedly from a mistake he would make in his life.

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And you know, he got upset because he wanted to live his life and, you know, experiment
new things and have fun and whatever.
And now that I'm remembering this, you know, I have been in a situation where I've dated
a younger man or two, not on purpose, it just happened.
Like you know, you sometimes meet someone, you don't really ask about the age, you have

(03:54):
an interesting conversation, you start dating them and then you found the age and then,
you know, it's a bit too late because you're already interested and the wheel started rolling.
And, you know, but I always felt when I was dating these younger men that I had to end
it because, you know, I used to think, okay, his parents are not interested in me.

(04:15):
I'm going to like it.
They're going to see him with an older woman and generally I know the reaction, you know,
parents usually have in these situations because I have two brothers and I would know how my
parents would react.
They would probably, you know, really fight against it because they would think first

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and foremost that, you know, she's maybe too old to have kids or if she's older, she's
not going to have an easy pregnancy and would be risky.
And generally this would be the main concern, you know, the children and having children
as a couple.
So I mean, I always had the feeling if I were dating a younger man that it would be something

(05:00):
short-lived, that I would not really be committed to this person long-term because, you know,
of these issues that I'm personally aware of.
And this episode really was triggered and the idea behind this episode came from a TikTok
video I saw of a lady, her name is Ariana Rose, and she was telling her story of how

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she, you know, fell in love with this younger man.
She was definitely more than 10 years older than him.
She had already had children and she didn't want any more children of her own.
And after, you know, this romance, she kind of realized that, oh, okay, it seems he wants

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to have kids.
I don't know if they had a competition about it or I don't know how it happened.
But because of that, she wanted to end things and for him to move on and she didn't want
to kind of, you know, forbid him from the experience of fatherhood if he craved it.

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And they kind of like went back and forth.
They broke up, got back together, broke up and got back together, I guess, several times.
And what she ultimately did was find a younger woman that she felt would, you know, be a
good partner for this young man.
She befriended the woman and she introduced the woman to her ex.

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And they actually did hit it off.
And this lady, Ariana Rose, she didn't contact them for a while.
And then she decided a few years later that she wanted to go and see them.
And when she went to see them, she was greeted by a young girl, maybe five years old, who
looked like her mom, so she recognized that she would be their child.

(07:00):
And this girl walked up to her and told her, are you the fairy?
I just cannot imagine the whirlwind of emotions she must have felt in that moment.
And even though I understand completely why Ariana did this, you know, with her ex lover,

(07:22):
I still got upset.
I really got upset at the idea that because she wasn't at a childbearing age or because
she didn't want to have any more children, she already had two kids of her own, that
she had to give up a relationship that was truly based on love and mutual respect.

(07:45):
And got me thinking about other couples I knew, because I know several couples who have
a huge age difference, you know, where the woman is older.
One of the couples, you know, one of the couples, the woman is 15 years older than her husband.
And really today you don't see the age difference, they're both, I mean, he's 80, she's 95 around

(08:10):
that age.
And truly he looks younger than her husband, believe it or not.
But I started wondering, did this relationship work because, you know, when they met, the
woman was still in her mid 30s, the man was in his early 20s, and she was able to bear
children and relationship worked out because of that.

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And had they met when she was maybe 50 and he was 35, it wouldn't have worked.
That's kind of like really sad to think about, to be honest.
Now I know many couples who have a five year age gap between them, you know, where the
woman is five years older or seven years older.
And I think, you know, when it's five years or so, it's not really that much of a big

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deal.
You're kind of almost the same age.
So maybe you have similar goals in life.
Maybe you both want children or you both don't want children.
And maybe that makes things easier.
And I'm sure that many men don't want to have a family and kids.
And so that won't be an issue for certain couples.
But you're talking about the majority and the way society is rigged and the way that

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people are pushed into relationships to bear children and to have families.
And this brings me back to Ariana's story and how she triggered in me this inner rage
at the idea of, you know, when are we going to stop seeing women as birthing machines?

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When are we going to start seeing women as humans with a brain, intellect, an interesting
mind, interesting personality, someone who is actually someone who's creative, who has
so much to give to society?
When is that going to happen?

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Are we going to just continue seeing women as birthing machines?
And this also brings us to another side point because at least in my culture, I'm not going
to really jump into many cultures because I don't know exactly, you know, in other cultures
how things go, but I know for sure on evidence and fact and things that have been said to

(10:28):
me by very close men to me that most men, at least in my culture in the Middle East,
they get married to have children, but then they continue having extra marital relations.
Now again, this is because they see women as child bearers and this is the job of the

(10:53):
woman.
And I'm sure this is also in Africa because I've also been in Africa and this is also
the case.
You know, many men marry their women, the women bear children, they stay at home and
the men always go out with their girlfriends.
So you see all these African men out with their girlfriends and the ones are at home
raising the kids.

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And I know we live in a patriarchy.
The world is built as a patriarchy, the world we live in.
And I mean, I don't know, do we just accept it?
Do we just accept it's a patriarchy and let's play the game that the patriarchy wants?
Do we not say anything?
Do we shut up and just, you know, put our heads down and go about pretending that nothing

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is wrong?
And it's not like there's anything wrong with bearing children.
That's what I'm saying.
But is this the only function of the woman?
That's what I'm asking.
And are we going to continue seeing women as simply child bearers?
Like, you know, this walking birthing machine?
Well, on that note, I will end my episode today.

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Next week's topic shall be on the sexy man.
I hope you'll tune in then.
For now, I wish you a lovely weekend and I send you all my love.
Till Friday next.