Given the complaints I received after ambushing my readers the last time with pictures of the delightful Ms. Berry, I feel compelled to offer fair warning that there is another picture of her linked from this post. Be sure to take appropriate precautions.
Following my original post on Lorraine Berry, I found another entry by her at Talking Writing titled Smells Like Regret. It turns out there is more to her story of marital angst. From very early on in her marriage she was pining away for an alpha who had hit it and quit it when she was 19:
He was a disc jockey at the U-Dub’s KCMU…
One night, he asked me out. We split a bottle of Irish whisky and ended up lying on an outdoor basketball court—red and white in the floodlights—after midnight, making love.
For a while, we were lovers. And then, suddenly, we were not.
This guy went on to co-found the record label which signed Nirvana. Since he once rogered her while drunk on a basketball court she knew his secret dream had always been to marry her, but she had somehow let him slip away. Then her husband came along and trapped her in marriage, forcing her to pine away (while nursing their daughter) for the man who once nailed her when she was 19:
I was a new mom. A graduate student. And an unhappily married woman.
Every time I heard “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” I’d think back to what had been. Wonder what my life would be like if I hadn’t drifted out of that relationship.
ok. Time to put the hoods down. Here is what appears to be a much younger Lorraine Berry.
Information on welding mask image available at wikipedia commons.
My dude. Stop it lol. This ish is too much.
Wow. The Nile must be her home address now.
Well…that explains it…the whiskey, I mean.
I’d have to have about 6 shots in me to even look at her twice, even with this ostensibly younger version.
Plain G.I. Jane if there ever was one.
Ick.
Any chance of a photo of Mrs Dalrock? Just to compare, like.
Nooooooarrgghhhh@#%$^$#@#!!!!!!
Just Say No!
How come her head is always tilted sideways?
Wow, I must be one classy 19 year old.
I don’t even know what whiskey smells like! […bums on the street?]
Anyway, doesn’t she realize how stupid she sounds? A married woman pining away for a long lost inebriated f^ck buddy?
I get the feeling Berry is a gold digger/fame whore. If she had been with the record label founder, who’s to say she wouldn’t have used his connections to flirt with the band members Nirvana?
It sounded more like she was crushing on Nirvana than that record label guy.
*breaks down laughing* …she could have been Courtney Love!
@sdaedalus
Any chance of a photo of Mrs Dalrock? Just to compare, like.
I’m confused. Why are you comparing my wife with this wretched woman?
I think this also shows the ridiculousness of so much feminism–we women tell ourselves that women’s and men’s libidos are exactly the same, and we should all just jump into bed at the drop of a hat and everything will be great. Then she lets some guy use her, and forevermore she thinks he might actually have LIKED her. He just wanted her in bed; that’s all. But she romanticizes it, without realizing how ridiculous she is. Women don’t want to admit that we were just used, so we make up fairy stories, kind of like orphans who think their parents are coming back one day. It’s really quite pathetic.
In the article, she states:
“Every time I heard “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” I’d think back to what had been. Wonder what my life would be like if I hadn’t drifted out of that relationship.”
In her bio she declares:
“By night, she …….., loves her partner, Rob, ”
Can you just hear the conversation with her current beau? “That’s how I used to feel! You’re different than the stupid man I used to be married to!” But if her old casual fuck showed up and professed his love for her? How fast do you think she’d pack?
I’m confused. Why are you comparing my wife with this wretched woman?
I thought you might welcome the opportunity to show the physical benefits of marriage over cougardom.
Also, if you’re marketing an idea to women, a picture of an attractive woman enjoying the benefits of the service you’re trying to sell, always helps.
[D: When have I sold marriage to women?]
Correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re trying to counteract the Eat Pray Love mentality – what you’re selling (I use this in the broadest sense) is not marriage per se but the idea that staying in marriage is better for women than being divorced – a picture of a happy wife would be a nice illustration of that.
All quite predictable.
Maybe a textbook Roissy case.
Yep – what Righteous Mom said. Totally, um, righteous.
The Hamster is strong with this one.
@sdaedalus
Correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re trying to counteract the Eat Pray Love mentality – what you’re selling (I use this in the broadest sense) is not marriage per se but the idea that staying in marriage is better for women than being divorced – a picture of a happy wife would be a nice illustration of that.
I think you have this backwards. She is selling divorce as empowerment. She says it made her sexy. Separately she posted the pictures I have shared on the web. I simply brought the two together, so my readers can see the full extent of her delusion.
My wife happens to be quite beautiful, but I’m not selling staying married to me. I do agree that women are almost always better off staying married, excepting cases where the husband breaches his own vows. The fact that every single true life story sold to women like this where a woman divorces and trades up turns out to be effortlessly easy to demolish would seem to prove my point. But I think you know this and are just being catty.
The real reason women shouldn’t divorce frivolously is because it is immoral. Doubly so if children are involved. The whole gathering everyone you know in a church so they can witness you swearing to stay together for life should be the tip off there.
Saying women (or men) shouldn’t abuse the system after making a solemn vow isn’t selling marriage. My advice to women is to take their husband hunt seriously if they want to marry, and to take their vows seriously if they make them. But again, you aren’t new to the blog so I presume you already know that.
My impression was that your blog argument (which I don’t disagree with, incidentally) went beyond morality to include the practical disadvantages of divorce for women.
I assumed that the pictures you posted were posted to emphasize the dissonance between reality & fantasy, not in terms of beauty necessarily (she’d still have the same SMV even if she were married) but in terms of personal contentment, this lady doesn’t look happy, she looks like she’s trying to look happy.
It would be nice by way of comparison to see a photo of a genuinely happy married woman – just to underline the benefits of staying in marriage from a positive point of view (marriage is fun rather than divorce is bad).
That’s the context of my suggestion that you include a photo (it doesn’t have to be identifiable, necessarily)
but obviously it’s up to you whether to put up a photo or not – just a suggestion.
I think that even when I was 20-something I would not have trusted her very much, look at her eyes. The eyes tell a lot, and Berry’s eyes look, oh, somewhat squinty and shifty in all the images of her.
This is indeed a classic case, worthy of Roissy. A few minutes of drunken Alpha on a basketball court is better than years of beta? My, my, my. How…empowering that must be. Is Helen Reddy still around? Maybe she can rewrite her 70’s tune, with an updated title, “I Am Woman, Hear Me Whine”…
@ sdaedalus
I understand what you’re asking for in a photo, but how do we determine if someones really happy or fake happy?
Why does it matter what Mrs. Dalrock looks like?
@Dalrock, You discredit this woman’s descriptive essays by pointing out that she is old and ugly. Your readers comment in agreement about her appearance.
Are you satisfied with that line of reasoning?
Is the reciprocal also true?………that a young and beautiful author should be credited with wisdom or veracity?
@jz
@Dalrock, You discredit this woman’s descriptive essays by pointing out that she is old and ugly. Your readers comment in agreement about her appearance.
Are you satisfied with that line of reasoning?
Is the reciprocal also true?………that a young and beautiful author should be credited with wisdom or veracity?
Unfortunately, this is how the world works. Package is more important than message.
To be clear: I am not evaluating her essays, I have not read them, I have just pointed out that people tend to evaluate acts via actor’s looks.
Yeah, she “drifted” out of the relationship.
Or…the DJ recognized her as an easy pump-and-dump, fucked her, and moved on. She was the cheap slut he used for what she was good for at 19—a fuck—and moved on.
These two sentences are so telling: For a while, we were lovers. And then, suddenly, we were not.
Yeah, honey, you really drifted out of that one. It wasn’t that he found someone hotter to bang. It “just happened.”
How depressing… I can’t really imagine her pretty, but this really is the example of “5 Minutes of Alpha is worth WAY more than 5 years of Beta.” She had not even a full night with some passionate DJ jockey who went only to form a little musical empire and she is basically ruined forever. No matter who she met, she’ll always have that night dancing in her head. That guy who she married, it’s possible that he never even knew about him and it may be possible that was only time before him (I was assuming that she lost her virginity that night, thinking about it now, she may have been running it up and then met the DJ alpha that meeting the finishing blow that will make a memory that will dance in her mind forever).
Basically, a single night with an Alpha is all that is needed to ruin her woman for any decent connection with any mate (especially a beta) forever.
Such a great fear in my mind that I might take a girl in the future, and inside her head will have a memory that always dance in her mind and I might not know about it at all. I will not kid myself that I’m so Alpha that any of that said don’t apply to me. Hell, looking at myself honestly and as I am about to finish my 4 years of undergrad, there no other assessment that to conclude I’m a beta. Someone have said to me, in the past, that Alpha is a state of mind, not a demographic, but I would be kidding myself if I had ever left a girl with memories of me dancing in her head.
@jz
…”this woman’s descriptive essays” aren’t about flowers or landscapes, but about her, her, her… and people “staring”(???) at her, she staring at her, etc. And “wisdom” is one of the words that definitely can’t be used in connection with her writings and doings, she does a very good job at self-discrediting, don’t point to Dalrock, please… If we hadn’t seen her, maybe we were tempted to think she looks close to Liz Burton.
… or maybe she seduced him, dropped him, and then years later realised (and remember he was only a D.J. – what a loser) now that he is successful that she might have been a bit less hasty – but we can all say that about anybody. I smell Hypergamous pretentions here (and a Hamster).
Leave his wife out of this. Either you take his writings to heart, or you don’t.
Bill Simmons (ESPN’s The Sports Guy) is pretty full of crap but he’s got a good handle on pop culture and he observes that women in the adult entertainment business – and women who live that lifestyle – age fast and take on a really hard edge pretty quickly. He came up w/t a formula that ties it in to number of sex partner and basically says for every 10, there’s a noticeable difference. What is it – wear & tear? Cynicism? The burning out of some inner emotional & spiritual candle? In the earlier photo of Ms. Berry one sees an okay looking, somewhat cute party girl. There are a few wrinkles, but there’s a bit of spirit showing through. In the more recent photos, one sees a hard-eyed old bitch, not much different in the face & posture than an aging stripper or prostitute. I’ve seen that look before… Fooling around a bit, having several partners over one’s life doesn’t do it; but there is something about wanton promiscuity that wears on a person; the loss of self-respect that comes with it seems to breed a cynicism that is reflected in the face and eyes. The acidic effects really show on a woman’s face. Men’s moral rot doesn’t normally show up as profoundly, maybe because the cost of casual sex isn’t quite as high for men. I’m sure it eats away at us just as badly though.
This isn’t funny, Dalrock….
Many have observed that a woman’s count has a negative impact on her beauty and disposition. Could it be a biological thing? Possibly the multiple “strange” make her less healthy. Most women use some type of Artificial Birth Control (which aslo has an impact on her healthiness). Each man’s biology is different and therefore each man’s ejaculate is different. Bodies combat foreign organisms. With a long term partner, a woman’s immune system adjusts and accepts a certain specific foreign organism intrusion. This process takes about 6 months. Having many men requires her body to attempt to make this adjustment many times. If the carousal turns faster than this interval, then her body never fully adjusts. If there is a new rider every 6 months or every year, then her body is constantly adjusting.
Is it hard to believe that all this frequent adjusting to “strange” has a impact on her health? Male attraction to beauty is an assessment of her health and future ability to bear children. It has been noted many times there is a correlation between a woman’s high count and her ability to pair bond. Could this also have a biological basis?
This is a theory and blog comments are a place to pose new ideas for others to consider. I am not a biologist and am passing along what I have learned MIGHT be true. This video explains some of the science behind it.
Women having sex with many men
I don’t expect much research into this area because the conclusions would not be PC. In other words the results might cause many women to FEEL bad, and we can’t have that!
@jz
@Dalrock, You discredit this woman’s descriptive essays by pointing out that she is old and ugly. Your readers comment in agreement about her appearance.
Are you satisfied with that line of reasoning?
Is the reciprocal also true?………that a young and beautiful author should be credited with wisdom or veracity?
Her first “descriptive essay” described how sexy divorce made her and how men were suddenly attracted to her. Without the pictures it was a tale of divorce empowerment. As Butterfly Flower noted with the pictures it was obvious that it was a cautionary tale, not the divorce empowerment the author was peddling. Did you really not get this? Honestly?
The picture on this one came from the post I was referring to. If you feel it was out of place, take it up with her.
If your hinting passive aggressive point was that I took a shot at her in this post in how I handled the picture, your skills of deduction have served you well. This woman is pouring toxic waste into our culture with her delusional stories. It wasn’t enough that she played the role of human wrecking ball with her two daughters and her husband, she felt the need to transmit this to as many women as possible. Ask yourself this; why doesn’t that bother you? Why did you instinctively leap to her defense, instead of her ex husband, two children, or the millions of others she is attempting to put in the same position?
Does this line of reasoning satisfy you?
@Dalrock,
This author’s first essay did NOT describe divorce empowerment. She did NOT claim that divorce made her sexy. She asserted that after divorce her libido returned. She felt aroused and vibrant again. Your takedown of her relied heavily on the fact that she was old and ugly.
I am not defending this woman. I am simply noting that you rely on her appearance to discredit her. You attack her appearance more than her assertions. You have successfully baited your readers to do the same.
Attacking an author’s appearance has corollaries. If an old and ugly author is to be discredited, than does it follow that a young and beautiful author should be readily accepted ? Shall we as readers, ask about your own pulchritudinous credits before we accept your reasonings? One of your responders here, followed this line of reasoning by asking to see an image of your wife. She was following your lead, not being “catty”.
I am not being passive aggressive. I am being straight forward to question your thinking.
Maybe because of the worldview she represents, this woman is just…depressing.
@jz
This author’s first essay did NOT describe divorce empowerment.
Nonsense. Of course it was about divorce empowerment. The whole piece was about how her frivolous divorce made her life better. In case the slow kids missed that, she left extra clues like:
Just after my 38th birthday, I left him. 38 marked my resurrection.
I’m not sure how you missed that, since I quoted it in my first post.
She did NOT claim that divorce made her sexy. She asserted that after divorce her libido returned.
The title was about her libido. I provided the specific quotes where she talked about being and feeling sexy (all in the context of rebirth after divorce). The first man she became involved with was so young, she knew she was sexy to him, people stared at her everywhere she went, etc. I juxtaposed these statements with the pictures she has recently posted in other contexts. What she is selling is pure fantasy, or more likely delusion. Including the pictures made that obvious.
@dalrock,
you are speaking *around* my point , but not *to* it.
I’ll discontinue this, and touch base on your next post.
jz wants more analysis of why this woman is delusional. The pictures didn’t work for her/him. In the first piece Ms. Berry claimed she and her husband were very happy for the first 9 years together. This is a very different story than the one referenced above, which she says occurred when she was 27 (or perhaps 28). Here is what she said in the first piece:
In her first story it wasn’t until just before the birth of their second child that her feelings changed:
The story included in this post takes place just after the birth of their first child. One or both of these stories isn’t true.
Yeah, sure, lady. This guy who banged ya in a park is going to come back and keep you. I’m not even sure I believe the story. Sounds like something she tells betas to entrap them.
@jz
you are speaking *around* my point , but not *to* it.
I’ll discontinue this, and touch base on your next post.
I’ll try one more time. As you said yourself, her essays are all about description. She isn’t making a logical argument for frivolous divorce; she is using the written word to paint a picture of her charmed life post divorce. If she made a logical argument for frivolous divorce, it would be appropriate for you to expect me to respond in a purely logical fashion. But she wasn’t selling logic. She was selling an image.
I shared what that image actually looks like. She used words; I used her own photos. I used imagery to rebut imagery, and you cry foul.
Tangentially, and I can’t remember where I found the reference, but more than two partners is basically bad for women healthwise, especially before age 25. Once you get past two, female risk of ‘womanly ailments’ beyond STDs and infertility goes up (in addition to the increased risks with those two things), which ties into CPSB’s points, actually. I remember being surprised that the ‘number’ biology prefers for women is so very low. From a Christian perspective, it is extremely suggestive.
It is as if she’s totally clueless about why a guy who only slept with her when drunk makes a different choice when sober. Has she never heard “what’s the difference between a dog and a fox? About three drinks”? Or “Candy is dandy, but liquor’s quicker”?
There’s a great need for girls to listen to their grandmothers, and this gal seriously needed to listen to her dad.
I didn’t post this comment in the original thread, but I thought I’d add it here — it seems to me that the re-awakening of her libido was just the “last hurrah” of her body’s fertility, but she erroneously attributes the cause to her changed circumstances rather than to nature, in order to justify her life choices.
Outstanding work in the comment section Dalrock. It seems people are really stuck on society norms on what right and wrong is and not on reality. The woman was truely selling a false image of bliss to justify her choices she made.
She looks like the older brother on the Wonder Years.
Pingback: On a roll, is he. | Dark Brightness
Yowza, D. I just had my damn coffee. Oh well, I was warned.
Keep rocking it.
OT: this is just to good to ignore:
http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/05/04/hooker_teacher_what_i_was_thinking
The Elephant Man had that problem too.
There are women out there who think like this: I’m horny + Men want to have sex with me = I am hot, sexy, and desirable. And too many men feel like they have to take what they can get.
It all leads to propping up female entitlement and the obesity epidemic.
I think it’s good to have a positive self-image, but it needs to be grounded in reality.
Criminey, Dalrock! I wasn’t going to drink today, but no you’ve forced me to!
[D: My apologies! First round of Rumpleminze is on me.]
jz, I’ll try to add to what Dalrock is explaining.
From reading the two articles, Berry on the one hand experienced some typical post-childbearing effects, in particular she essentially “married” her children by placing them at the center of her life. If her then-husband had known about the female psyche, if he had essentially used “married Game” on her it is possible that they would have remained married. (Although I would like to know when the image in this article was taken: pre or post divorce).
Be that as it may, she divorced him for what is now a fairly standard justification: she wasn’t “in love” any more, and felt unsexual, among other things. Of course these issues could have been worked in in marriage, but that’s not what women are taught to do, now. The modern woman is taught that when the “chemistry”, aka ‘gina tingle stops, then the man is to be dumped, regardless of the harm caused to him or any third parties such as, oh, children.
Her previous article is a celebration of divorce. I do not see how you can avoid or deny that. As Dalrock has pointed out, she proclaims that by divorcing she became more sexual again, and her “proof” is that a younger man (of 24 years IIRC) was willing to have sex with her. I will now address that last point in detail.
It is no great feat for a woman in her 30’s to have sex with a man in his 20’s. It really isn’t. This is not marriage that is being discussed, this is a hookup, a pickup, a one night stand or at most a fling of a few dates. All she had to do was signal interest / availability long enough, and some man in that age group would bed her. To be blunt, all she had to do was make it known she’d spread her legs, and the 20-something man would do the rest. I’ve seen this happen myself, in some social situations – parties or bars after midnight, for example. It is not a great achievement for her, although clearly it was an ego boost for Berry. (as an aside, an image of her 20-something “lover” would be interesting to see, wouldn’t it?)
And that’s the point of the whole exercise. Rather than work with the man she married, allegedly “in sickness, in health”, etc. Berry dumped him and “got her groove back” by making herself available to pretty much any other man around. Then she claims that made her more sexual — but as pb points out, it is a medically known fact that women in their mid-30’s or so often become more sexual as their testosterone increases, in an effort to make sure that reproduction occurs before perimenopause sets in. So I argue that Berry is confusing correlation with causation: she dumped her husband and made herself available to other men at the same time her body was changing hormones to ensure that she’d bear at least one child before getting too old.
If she had stayed with her husband, the hormone shift would have occurred anyway, and then she could have spent all that sexual energy on him. She might still be married, her daughters would still live with an intact family, and she would have a more reliable companion than she has now. She would likely be better off not divorced.
And that is Dalrock’s point. Berry is peddling divorce for emotional reasons, claiming physical betterment from divorce. Therefore her image is part of the issue — we can see for ourselves how she’s been “physically bettered” — and therefore your objection is not well founded.
Why am I thinking of Sylvia Miles in Midnight Cowboy??
Anonymous Reader said: “If she had stayed with her husband, the hormone shift would have occurred anyway, and then she could have spent all that sexual energy on him. She might still be married, her daughters would still live with an intact family, and she would have a more reliable companion than she has now. She would likely be better off not divorced.”
But then what self-justifying fun would she and the other Eat, Pray, Love frivolous-divorce fans out there have? If they can’t got “me, me, me!” then they have nothing, you know.
“Here is what appears to be a much younger Lorraine Berry”
That “much younger” Lorraine Berry still looks at least 46.
Most women over 40 are not pretty. As a thought experiment imagine all the women you see next time you go out completely bald and with no make-up. Do they look like women? At least 80% of them don’t because natural beauty is not the norm.
Lorraine Barry is neither ugly nor pretty. She is simply average- for her age.
What confuses me about her pictures is she is making almost no attempt to be pretty. In the picture posted above she is wearing barely any make-up, her hair is wet and unstyled, and she is wearing a tank-top that shows off her extra weight.
If I took a picture of myself like that at 29 I wouldn’t look very good…let alone at her age.
If I were her I would consider going to full blonde in hair color. Don’t smile so big for pictures because it makes her deep set eyes look even deeper when they squint. Put on a shirt…a black one with long sleeves…to look thinner. Wear some lipstick with lip liner to make those lips look thicker…give a partial smile rather than a full one because the full smile just makes the lips look even thinner. Take the picture from the looking down position, not the looking up position…looking up is almost never flattering.
And for gosh sakes…get some distance from the camera! Nobody wants to see every nook and canyon on your face.
So I did some Googling and I found this shared blog where Ms. Berry often posts: http://flyingconfessions.com/blog/?p=226
Anyway, here’s an except from one of her articles:
My bulimia is fueled by a few things. Basic brain chemistry, for one. My genetic line on both sides of my family condemn me to craziness of various stripes. I am beyond grateful that my brain chemistry can be treated with drugs, and I no longer worry about the fact that I have to take antidepressants. Illness is illness. Despite the fact that I am in the happiest relationship of my life, that I am in love, that I am loved, that my children are doing well, and that nothing, at this moment, seeks to harm me, I feel powerlessness and a need to run. It’s a potent combination, and there have been days in the past where that combination has knocked me on my ass. Or, knocked me to my knees, bending over a toilet.
Ms. Berry is suffering from a mental illness.
I take back anything mean I said about her. She’s obviously an unhealthy individual with impaired judgment.
Although we can debate if all “Hamster wheel spinner” types are mentally unsound.
@Butterfly Flower
Ms. Berry is suffering from a mental illness.
I take back anything mean I said about her. She’s obviously an unhealthy individual with impaired judgment.
I can understand your sentiment, but I have a problem with the end result this would create. Insane ideas need to be called for what they are. Giving the insane a pass to promote insanity (especially in a prominent media source) is extremely dangerous.
If she is truly insane, Salon is doing her great harm by enabling her.
I think this is another case that boils down to who we choose to protect. Do we want to protect people like John (and his children<.htma>), or people like Ms. Berry.
Regarding the bulimia, is that mental illness, or a huge attempt at control? I’d have to suggest that the depression, bulimia, and all is simply a symptom of her trying to achieve a role–overall leader of her family–that God intended for her husband alone. Hence, the results are that she’s helping the Lilly stock options that my stepsister’s husband has, and disaster for herself.
Bike Bubba is correct, I think.
The vast majority of emotional chicks who threaten suicide do it for attention.
Similar deal – playing the vulnerability card.
I’ve lost a ton of respect for Bruce Pavitt.
Paige, Ms. Berry is not “average for her age,” but has rather been aged about 10 years past her actual age by actual life choices. Sorry, I’m married to a 41 year old woman who is cuter today than she was the day I married her nearly 15 years ago. Hitting 40 does not have to do that to you, it’s the result of foolish life choices, in general.
I agree with you, Bike Bubba. I could say that you’re biased because your Mrs. has at that pregnancy glow going on 🙂 , but you’re just right. Ms. Berry is not at all “average for her age”.
I have a good friend who is 49 years old, and she easily looks 7-10 yers younger than Lorraine Berry looks in those photos. I will be 40 myself in a couple of months and I know I don’t look like that. My husband verifies. Clean living makes a world of difference. Some of us have good genes or come from ethnic traditions where we age a little better, but taking good care of yourself can affect how you age.
Paige seems particularly convinced that a woman over 40 is washed up and her husband will want to leave her for a younger woman. I think this colors her ability to see beauty in women of a certain age.
terry: Men who meet their woman before she is 25 or so will have a much more forgiving view on her loss of good looks and his view of her today will be influenced by his memories of her looking better (I am of course talking about a woman who has only natural detoriation, not self induced). Add to that the loyalty a decent man (i.e. most betas) will show a woman who chooses him long enough before his MMV or SMV has peaked and hers being still going up or at the plateau.
I guess most women who marry men who are ascending in value will work harder to keep her value up, to not give him reasons for straying and also for status reasons among women.
Lavazza, not true about people being more forgiving of the “loss of good looks” if they meet before 25. It all has to do with how you live. While my wife does have a few wrinkles and gray hairs she didn’t have when I met her, the big kicker for her looks is that she doesn’t have to worry about where her husband is, and she doesn’t need to spend hours each day primping, tanning, and such to keep me.
Some people might call that kind of loyalty “beta behavior” or something. I call it “being a real man, not some sissy abuser who styles himself as ‘alpha.'”
Bubba: “not true” in what sense? I have observed a correlation between monopolizing a woman’s best years looks wise (or maybe many years in general) and the attitude to her declining looks. I guess nobody would argue for the opposite correlation. But if you do, please elaborate.
It might be possible to set up some kind of scientific study to prove or disprove my view but I guess nobody is willing to invest that money.
I certainly agree that having a sense of security in your marriage and the related reduction is stress can only have a positive effect on a woman’s looks as she ages.
And like you, Bike Bubba, my husband isn’t blind and he sees the gray hairs and whatnot. No wrinkles yet, not even crows’ feet, but that’s ethnic more than anything else.
While I do not spend hours tanning 😉 and primping, I do take what my husband finds attractive into consideration when I adorn myself in the mornings. Not because he demands it, but because I want to do that for him. He keeps a goatee I know he’d rather shave for the exact same reasons.
There’s something of a balance to be struck, you know?
@Lavazza
It might be possible to set up some kind of scientific study to prove or disprove my view but I guess nobody is willing to invest that money.
I think you are probably right. It also strikes me that there is very likely a correlation between a woman’s looks and her history of marital stability. This could point both ways, as Paige’s fears suggest. However my wife and I have noticed that women who take the EPL route often “hit the wall” (often quite hard) shortly thereafter. Again the causal arrow is difficult to point with certainty. It might be that what Athol Kay calls their body agenda sensed the impending wall and created more urgency for them. It might also be the physical manifestation of the psychological stress which occurs when their fantasy vision collides head on with the grim reality of their dating/marriage prospects post divorce. Hard to say. But there does seem to be something very real happening here. And as you say, it is very unlikely to be studied for the same reasons your hypothesis won’t be formally studied.
By the way Lavazza’s point reminds me of Proverbs 5:18 which someone quoted somewhere recently. I’m not one to quote bible verses, but that one really struck me as beautiful. I don’t make any apologies for being beta.
If you don’t age adjust for SMV then it will probably drop a point every 5 years or so. A woman who is a 10 will probably be at least a 6-7 by age 40. A woman who is a 5 at age 20 will be a 2-3 at age 40.
I don’t see a correlation between low SMV and marital instability in my personal life. My prettiest friends have the least stable marriage. It would seem that they all married men with a very strong need for a highly attractive woman and so as they aged their husbands found it hard to be faithful. The women who who were closer to a 5 when they married seem to be married to men who don’t mind their aging. Presumably because being a 5 naturally weeds out men who care a lot about female beauty.
I feel some security in the fact that my husband married me even though I was not very pretty. In fact, I was less attractive than several of his previous girlfriends. I can only assume that he isn’t obsessed with feminine attractiveness enough to stray as I age….but there are no guarantees in life.
regarding Terrys comment: *I* as a woman have no problem seeing beauty in women of every age. But my definition of beauty has very little to do with fertility and has more to do with a sense of warmth and kindness exuding from a person. A mans preferences are heavily based on fertility signals. A 40 year old woman generally has far fewer fertility signals than a woman at 20. In my personal opinion the aged Meryl Streep is more beautiful than Kim Kardashian but I know there aren’t a lot of men who would rather have sex with Meryl than Kim.
Pingback: Trapped in adulthood. | Dalrock
The rest of my comments will be in Braille since I just plunged hot pokers into my eyes.
@Roland3337
“Well…that explains it…the whiskey, I mean.”
I wish I could thank you in person; that line is so funny that I literally have tears rolling down my cheeks!