Relationships

Last month we're celebrating fathers everywhere (in honor of Father's Day), so I'd like to give some kudos to all the single dads out there who are looking for love. There are more of you than ever joining online dating sites and putting yourselves out there because you want a new relationship. (And by the way ladies, single dads make great partners.)

But some of you might need some reassurance. If you aren't dating because you think women don't want to date a man with "baggage," it's simply not true.

Sure, there are some women who won't go on a date with a man who has kids. They aren't for you. But there are also women (with or without children themselves) who are open and interested in finding the right man, regardless of his situation. I know, because I was a single woman who married a man with children.

While single Dads do come attached already (to their kids), there are some big pluses that they have over bachelors any day:

He's emotionally mature. Have you been on a lot of dates with men who play games or drop out of the picture before things get too serious? Single dads are different. They aren't into playing games, because they have their kids to think about. They'll want to get to know you before introducing you to the children. And they'll be more expressive about their wants and needs, instead of making you guess.

He can commit. He has children, which is the biggest commitment you can make in life. Likely he also has an ex wife or girlfriend who he committed to when they had the children together, so he's learned a few things about what works and what doesn't.

You can observe him with his kids. When it comes to dating men with children, actions definitely speak louder than words. The warmth and love and environment he provides for them says a lot about who he really is. Observe and decide for yourself.

He's not selfish. Many bachelors are used to living on their own and answering to no one, which means it can be tough for them to form a relationship where there has to be give and take. With single dads, they give a lot of their time to their children, and they understand sacrifice and compromise. They are anything but selfish.

He has a good sense of humor and is more relaxed. You have to have a sense of humor when raising children, because it's a tough endeavor. Chances are he's learned to relax and not let little things bother him so much. He's more focused on the big picture, and in creating a good life for himself and his children.

Happy belated father's day!

Have you seen this video on what it will be like to date with Google Glass yet?

Yes, it's funny. Yes, it's over the top. But you've gotta admit that it makes you wonder...

Will the introduction of Google Glass actually have an impact on your love life? Would you be willing to date someone who wore Google Glass on a date? In a recent NBC News article, Rosa Golijan decided to give it a try.

First, the basics: Google Glass is a head-mounted computer with a camera, microphone, bone-conducting speaker, and a whole bunch of sensors. It connects to the Internet using a Wi-Fi network or by tethering to a smartphone. It's capable of pretty much everything your smartphone is: it can take pictures, record video, initiate video chats, send messages, search Google, and more.

Golijan jumped wholeheartedly into her experiment, wearing Google Glass for most of her waking hours. Her first impressions were positive. "It's difficult to imagine that bringing technology closer - to one's face - could actually help get it out of the way," she writes, "but that's what happens with Glass. It's tempered my smartphone addiction and reduced the amount of time I spend staring at a screen. I've even rediscovered the fine art of making eye contact with people."

So far, so good.

When she started wearing Google Glass in public, Golijan found that the attention it drew meant wider social possibilities. "Glass doesn't break the ice, it completely melts it," Juan Pablo Risso, a 32-year-old Glass owner, told NBC. At the moment, Google Glass is the ultimate conversation starter.

And that's where things got a little trickier for Golijan. One recent date took it well, but the interruptions from curious strangers could easily have sent the date south with a less understanding partner. Another date didn't enjoy the experience, demanding that she not start talking to anyone else until they'd gotten a drink.

Whitney Casey, a relationship expert for Match.com, says the one rule you need to follow when it comes to Glass and dates is simple: "Don't wear it." Sherrie Schneider, dating coach and co-author of "The Rules," agrees, at least on the first date. "You need to treat Google Glass like any special issue on a first date," she says. "You don't eat meat. You're a Republican. You had breast cancer. Google Glass."

Golijan isn't ready to give up on dating with Google Glass yet, though she does think it's important to follow a few guidelines:

• Don't be rude to strangers inquiring about Glass. It's just as bad as being rude to a server at a restaurant.
• Monitor your date's comfort level with Glass and adjust accordingly.
• Consider taking it off at some point - there's no reason to view your whole dating life through Google-colored glasses.

There are a lot of conflicting rules floating around about texting and dating - no wonder people find it so confusing. Do you text right away to show you're interested, or do you wait to show you're not so available? The answer is not always clear, so what should you do?

According to a recent study by Flirt.com, we shouldn't sweat it so much - and we shouldn't stick to the rules! Men and women view texting practices differently. And apparently, the men are much more open to the women they date reaching out to them.

Forty-nine percent of men and 39% of women will text a date the next day to let him/her know they had a nice time. However, 20% of women are still sticking to the old adage of waiting for him to text first (compared to only 5% of the guys).

Even though we don't have to worry about the three-day waiting period to call someone back, the study found it is good to be concerned about how frequently you're texting your date. Texting habits mean different things to each gender. For the women, if a guy sends more than ten texts a day she considers it to be creepy. Men on the other hand are more than happy to have her text - with almost half saying she should text as much as she wants.

Are you worried about looking too available? There's no need, ladies. A whopping 82% of men surveyed said they would be happy if after they suggested a date a woman let him know she was available to go out any night that week. Not so for the ladies. Thirty-eight percent of women said they'd be freaked out if a man made himself too available.

And how do you sign off? Is it too risky to add an "xo" to the end of a text, maybe as a flirtation? According to the study, 48% of men and 41% of women aren't afraid of signing off with a little kiss. But steer clear of being too "cutesy." Almost 25% of men think that smiley faces are childish.

And what about the biggest complication when it comes to texting - whether or not you should break up with someone over text? Apparently women are a little more cold-hearted. Seventeen percent of them would break up with someone over text, compared to just 13% of men.

Flirt.com surveyed over 2,000 of its members for the study.

Looking for new ways to attract men? Well, if you're inked (or thinking about it), a new study finds that men are more than twice as likely to approach a woman with tattoos.

A study from the Université de Bretagne-Sud found that men consider women with tattoos more approachable, but also more promiscuous. They admitted they would be more interested and likely to talk to her if they thought they could have sex with her right away.

For the study, researchers had 31 men identify the 11 "most attractive" participants from a pool of 58 candidates. The chosen participants would then visit area beaches - 10 trips each with a temporary tattoo and 10 without.

The tattoo the women used were the same, based on the typical tattoo of college-aged women: a butterfly on the small of the back.

The women with ink were solicited 23.67 percent of the time, but when the same women didn't have tattoos, that average dropped to 10 percent.

It turns out that how quickly a man approaches a woman was also affected by whether or not she was inked. For women with tattoos, the average time it took for a man to approach was 23 minutes compared to 35 minutes without a tattoo.

As part of the study, a male researcher at the same location would approach young men who were near the female participants in the study. The men were asked to rate the likelihood of the woman agreeing to a first date and having sex on a first date. Researchers agreed the evidence was clear after speaking with them: men see tattooed women as more promiscuous, which was a compelling reason they had to approach.

If you're already inked and aren't interested in hooking up with men, don't fret. While this study might point to potential problems with men hitting on you, you're the one in control here. You put boundaries in place on your dates, not the men you date.

And if you're not sporting any tattoos? Don't get one just so guys will be more willing to approach you.

We all make choices about how to present ourselves when we're dating, so be careful if you might be sending out the wrong message. In the same way tattoos might indicate promiscuity, so can revealing clothing, or being overly flirtatious. You'll have better success in the long run to be true to yourself and your own style, and own it.

If you've been on the Internet in the last week - and seeing as this is 2013, there's no way you haven't - you've probably come across an article proclaiming that online dating has scientifically been proven to be better than traditional dating.

Every feed I follow has been blowing up with the news that 1 in 3 Americans now meet their spouses online, and that a new study has found that marriages born out of online dating are more satisfying and less likely to end in divorce. The study's results were published in a paper called "Marital Satisfaction and Breakups Differ Across Online and Offline Meeting Venues" in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"These data suggest that the Internet may be altering the dynamics and outcomes of marriage itself," said the study's lead author John Cacioppo, the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor in Psychology at the University of Chicago.

Before you vow never to meet people in person again, it's important to note that the study was funded by eHarmony.com and Cacioppo is paid as a scientific advisor for eHarmony. Of course, everyone involved promises that eHarmony's backing did not affect the outcomes of the study in any way, but...

I know I'm not the only one looking at this new data with a healthy dose of skepticism.

I am, however, not so skeptical about a few of Cacioppo's claims. Online dating clearly has changed the face of relationships forever, and there's no going back. Cacioppo's research found that nearly 8% of marriages initiated offline end in breakups, while couples who meet online report divorce and separation rates of only 6%.

I'll be holding firmly onto my grains of salt until further studies - ones that aren't in any way connected to online dating sites - confirm his data, but I'm willing to admit that Cacioppo may have a point. Online dating may indeed lead to greater marriage satisfaction for a few key reasons:

1. The pool of prospective partners is significantly larger online, increasing the chance that you'll meet someone you're highly compatible with.
2. Singles who take the step of joining an online dating site may be more serious about finding a long-term partner than singles encountered offline.
3. Online daters may be more honest and up-front about who they are and what they're looking for (barring those infamous little white lies told in profiles), meaning that the connections they form are more genuine.

"It is possible that individuals who met their spouse online may be different in personality, motivation to form a long-term marital relationship, or some other factor," Cacioppo said in a press release.

That sounds like the perfect opportunity for another study - one that isn't funded by an online dating giant.

Related Article: The Secret To A Happy Marriage Is…Online Dating?

In general, handling “rejection” in online dating is considerably easier than in person. Most of the time, you’ll get a “thanks but no thanks” from someone you’ve never met in person and hopefully haven’t spent too much time thinking about. Maybe you’ll get no response at all, which can be frustrating, but not particularly painful. No one likes rejection, but as far as stings go, these are fairly minor ones.

But alas, the online dating world is no more perfect than the real one, and there are people who are, well, jerks. Maybe someone is hurt about the state of their own romantic life and is lashing out at others; maybe someone is trying to build their own self-esteem by cutting down others, like a schoolyard bully. Almost everyone has encountered at least one cruel message, whether it was in response to a first-contact email, a “thanks but not thanks” rejection, or a message that popped up out of the blue.

“Wow, you must really think you’re pretty. Trust me, you can’t afford to be this picky,” one reads. Another: “Um, try dating someone your own age.” Whether they’re hurtful comments disguised as “helpful advice” or just random hateful words, those are the sort of messages that do sting. If you receive one of these messages yourself, here are a few things to bear in mind:

First, you are, unfortunately, not the first or only one to receive such a message. Just like any random act of spite, you didn’t do anything to bring this upon you; if someone is looking to lash out they’re not paying attention to who it actually is. If someone is heaping vitriol upon you because you let them down nicely, that’s their problem, not yours. And because it is a mostly random act, there’s likely no truth to the message, either, so try to put the content out of your mind, difficult as it may be.

If the message is extremely inflammatory - using abusive language, hate speech, or making threats - check with your online dating site to see how you can go about reporting it. A snide remark is mostly harmless, but most sites take the safety of their customers seriously, and anything beyond the norm should be brought to the attention of the site.

Whatever you do, don’t respond to the message. It can be tempting, especially if, say, something about your appearance is being targeted and they’re no looker themselves. But your reaction only feeds into the negative attention they’re seeking. Even if you had sent the first-contact email and thus feel like you “started it,” don’t reward the troll with an argument, even if it’s scathing and well-thought.

Remember that, just like in the real world, the attention-seekers are in the minority; they’re relatively few and far between. Don’t let a bad apple or two put you off dating altogether. Navigating a few trolls is but a distraction on your quest to find love.