Now coming to a close is Psychology Today’s three-part Q&A between author/interviewer Bella DePaulo and author/interviewee Jaclyn Geller about the singles stigma. And here’s our final rundown of this quite illuminating discussion.

— I swear I did not know that DePaulo was gonna name-check that same baby-shower “SATC” ep as I linked to in my most recent post. All the same, I will take this opportunity to remind you what great minds do.

— In other tried-but-true cliches (including the use of “tried and true,” shame on me), Geller eloquently discusses how those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. (Translation: She recommends all those entering marriage to read up on its history.)

— If a Mormon can decide to take the Sarandon-Robbins alternate route to happiness, then change is inevitable.

Last we left our whatevs-to-marriage heroines — authors Bella DePaulo and Jaclyn Geller; the former is running a three-part Q&A with the latter on the Psychology Today blogs — the discussion dwelled on the inequities of wedding registries, “single” v.”married” vocab and the notion that spouses trump friends any day of the week (and, I’m guessing, twice on your anniversary).

And now, our teasers for part deux:

— Singles supplementing couples’ life choices via endless streams of showers should basically just start registering for stuff the day they turn 25.

— Earning one’s M.R.S. degree is, sadly, still a popular college-major choice among coeds.

— Something I’ve never said/written before (not even when I actually was, speaking of, in college): ZOMG I have *GOT* to read me some Plato!

— Double ZOMG: They had road trips in the first century?!?

And so is next week, and the week after …

In other words: sorry we missed it! (Again!) But now that folks who are “anything but married” (actually, it’s now called the National Unmarried and Single Americans Week) comprise the majority of households, hey, it’s your year.

(Now somebody tell the folks in charge.  From the San Francisco Chronicle:

“There’s a very heavy focus on marriage as a public-policy matter,”  said Nancy Polikoff, a professor of law at American University’s Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C. “You have it in the Bush administration’s policies that spend three-quarters of a billion dollars to promote marriage, and a really widespread campaign to convince the country that the decline of lifelong heterosexual marriage is responsible for all our social problems.”

She says  there’s a need to define family in a more expansive way, so that close family-like relationships are also defined by affinity or blood, not just by marriage. Such a change would allow people to take family or medical leave or paid sick days to care for family members “however they define them,” she says.

Nicky Grist, executive director of the decade-old New York nonprofit Alternatives to Marriage, says a broader definition of family than “the floor” currently used by the federal Family and Medical Leave Act “would make for a more just system, not a more abused system.”

Unmarried.org, as her group appears on the Web, is most concerned with health insurance access. The United States is “the only country that relies on marital status for access to health care,” says Grist.)

An all-nighter from January 12, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I had been going out with a recently divorced lady with three kids under the age of 12. Long story short, kids love me, she said she did, but never really gave me the attention, and recently told me adios. I am broken totally. I had hoped for the future. I’m 43, work 2 AM – 9:30 AM Monday-Friday. My prospects are nil. I feel totally lost. I just don’t know how to get going again. I am not a bar guy, and am not real aggressive in “hitting on” women. I like myself, think I’m a great catch. I like having a partner; ’tis what helps make life more fun. Give me a road map, if you can. Just some advice that I can really use.

— Peter
Dear Peter,

Okay, here’s some. Start a social group in your community called “People with Weird Schedules and The People Who Love Them.” Breakup Girl is quite serious. There have to be people out there in the same predicament who are dying to attend an event like an “‘E.R.’ Pancake Breakfast.” Advertise in the paper, at the grocery store, on the Web. And keep at it: I just read something about a social group for tall people in NYC whose first meeting had about six people — now they have to rent convention halls. Good luck!

Love,
Breakup Girl

From American Sexuality Magazine, via Alternet: Psychologist Bella DePaulo, author of Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After, takes time out from her busy, fulfilled single life to re-examine the pileup of studies informing the accepted wisdom that married people are happier than unmarrieds. Re-crunching the numbers — such as they are — she finds that while many married people are quite content, it may not be marriage that makes them that way (and vice-versa); at the end of the long, not-so-lonely day, there’s really not much difference in the happy factor between singles and marrieds at at all. To the degree that there is, DePaulo writes, “Single people are not as happy as married people in part because they are targets of stereotyping and discrimination.” Also, zombies.

Dear Breakup Girl,

In an little less than six months, I will be thirty. I have an exciting career, many hobbies, friends and lots of other really cool, ultimate total stuff. I am happier with my life and my self than I ever have been in my entire life. (You can hum “I am Woman” for this letter if you want!! )

(I hope Breakup Mom is proud.)

I do not have a boyfriend, a fiance, a husband. My problem, BG?: I really couldn’t care less. No really, I mean it.

Assorted members of my family are doing that “Your’e getting up there…” routine. Friends are trying to push me out the door with their brothers, the mailman and (I think) the local Blockbuster manager. They are saying man-trap things like “Your standards are too high” — You don’t want to be alone, do you?” — and my personal favorite: “Aren’t you concerned with starting a family?” I’ve also got a couple of friends who are totally freaking out and would marry just about anyone — they make me really really want to yack.

I am planning a solo trip to the City of Lights (Paris) for my birthday & have lots of things to look forward to. In my professional life, I am far too busy to really deal with a boyfriend for now (or the god-awful hunt for one). I’d rather go antiquing, take a yoga class, get a massage or read another travel book in my personal search for the ultimate baguette. My attitude is: if I find him while doing something I like to do — then I have a better chance of meeting someone with common interests than I do of meeting someone at a Saturday night singles dance thing, complete with the Electric Slide and Jello shots.

(more…)

Wanting permission on September 7, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

Hello there, BG. I love your site…it has really helped me put some things into perspective. But, I still have a predicament on my hands that I haven’t been able to shake for quite some time now, and I’ve never really written publicly to ask for answers but here goes:

I am currently living with someone I met on the internet a little over 2 years ago. It all started like so:

I met her on IRC, we emailed and spoke on the phone for about 2 months, I ended up taking a trip out to finally meet her, we hit it off, 1 month later she moved to my city to live with me. Then I moved with her to her city for about 6 months. And finally now we have settled in SF and are living in a decent sized studio apartment (and paying an insane amount for it BTW). Anyways, we have always gotten along great and I really care for her, as I know she does for me. But I almost think she cares about me way more than I do.

(more…)

Another reader response from June 15, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I’ve just got a quick comment on your advice to Sheri (the 42-year-old with 2 kids). You told her to be up front with her 34-year-old potential squeeze/summer fling, and suggested that any guy who is scared off by kids isn’t worth it [Note from Breakup Girl: Whoa! That’s totally not what I said. BG is not in the biz of that kind of flip character call. My actual point: some guys (and gals!) are — legitimately — reluctant to get into a pre-fab family when they’d like to fab one of their own from scratch. And also for the reasons that Jo so eloquently describes below. In some cases, this may mean that — even all other things being lovely — a potential couple may be, practically speaking, incompatible. That’s all.] I just wanted to add something.

It looks like Sheri wants a nice, relaxing, “just for Mom” relationship; she’s not thinking tickets for four to the Spice Girls with hotdogs to follow, she’s thinking candlelit dinners and a suite at the Ritz. It seems to me that she needs to a) let the guy know that she’s got kids, and b) (once she’s sure this guy is going past date #4 or so) let the kids know that she’s got him, but c) let everyone know that the relationship is for fun, not fatherhood. She won’t have to hermetically seal the kids off from the relationship, but she can keep their evenings out for the nights when Dad/her mother/her best friend has the kids. Then, if their relationship lasts past Labor Day, the two of them will have a good relationship, which will help when he gets to know the kids.

(more…)

Desperately single on May 25, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I need to whine, and I think this might be the best (most constructive) place for it. I’m having a really hard time being single at age 35! I feel so isolated lately. I live alone, in a town that’s very popular with 20-somethings. Most of my friends are married, engaged, living or completely involved with their significant others. Ditto for my co-workers, who are also much older than I am, so there’s no social action there. I do belong to a gym, but that’s yet to produce any dates. I join groups, I go to networking events, I get out, but I am BURNED OUT on the search! I even tried the personals. I haven’t had a date since December, and I don’t see any prospects on the horizon. Let me add that I am very attractive, spirited, smart, and warm. I wonder — is there anybody else out there suffering from the 30-something dry spell? What is a girl to do? I’m actually thinking of trying to find a bartending or waitressing job, just so I can meet and flirt with some men again! This situation is crazy! Any insight!?

— Ann

(more…)

Folks, this is getting as old as the people who allegedly lie about their age on the Internet. Are we really still slamming internet dating? It’s kind of like saying cell phones are bad, or “technology.” In the latest crabby smackdown, Rhodri Marsden, writing in The Independent, “reveals” the “truth” about Internet dating: things don’t work out more often than they do. Stop the presses? Because um, that is also true of bricks-and-mortar dating as well — it’s probability, not cynicism — not to mention, well, life. Saying that he has — aha! — found people who’ve been bruised by Internet dating! is like saying he’s found people who have been bruised by…dating. Duh. Everyone said it was handy. No one said it was magic.

To be sure, there are differences, concrete and ineffable, between dating online and IRL. Each has advantages and disadvantages. The fact that you can likely “meet” more people online than off does translate into more rejection: again, that’s math. And the Internet probably makes for more colorful before/after bait/switch experiences, but that’s because of the built-in online -> real-life progression; that’s story structure, folks. (Said it before: you mean all the people you meet on singles hikes tell the truth from day 1?) So to throw the Internet babes out with the bathwater is, to put a fine point on it, just dumb. So, too, is — if you’re single and would like to change that — not making Internet dating part of a diversified meeting-people portfolio.

So, enough. I’m outta here. Because BG spends some of her time online, and some of her time “getting out there.” See?

(h/t The Awl)