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Newly divorced at age 40 with two teenage children, I jumped into the cyber dating craze. It was very exciting at first and I became almost addicted to this new found attention. It sure beat combing the singles bars and it was a great way to hide my shyness.

The problem is nothing is real on line, you can be anyone you want to be and can easily confuse your Internet persona with real life. Unfortunately the two are hardly ever a match. What you think you want and what you really want are usually very different. I'm going to list my first five real time encounters, with men that eventually persuaded me to meet them in person, so you can see what I mean.

Ken- Lived 200 miles away and told me that he often came to Boston for business. His idea of a date
was for me to meet him in his hotel room around 9pm, have sex until 11pm and then politely tell me I should leave because he had to be at work early the next morning. Come to find out he had a wife and two kids at home and no job at all.

Paul- Sent me his gorgeous photo and it was almost love at first sight. He had a romantic poem waiting in my in box each morning when I woke up. I had to meet this dream boat in person and was convinced
I had found my prince. When we did meet I discovered he was about 500 pounds and had a few missing teeth! He just used someone else's photo and figured I would never notice the 300 lb difference.

Eric- Lived in Paris, France. He truly was handsome. He flew all the way to Boston to meet me, so I was sure he must be serious if he was willing to spend so much money on airfare. The plan was to meet and get to know each other and if we felt the same as we did during our months of on line dating, I would move to Paris and live in his real live castle! I even introduced this one to my children. Well he should have had a dungeon instead because as it turned out his passion was for bondage and discipline!

Joel- Dignified, wealthy, handsome, poised. We dated for three months and then he revealed his line of work. Joel was an undertaker. There is nothing wrong with that profession of course, but it goes to show you the deception that surfaces in these on line encounters. Had he told me up front I could of made a decision as to whether or not I wanted to be involved with someone who tinkers with dead bodies in his basement! Instead of months later when I had already fallen head over heels in love with him.

Tom- This guy really turned out to be a sicko. He revealed to me after a few drinks one night that he had sexual feelings for my sixteen year old daughter and asked me if we could have a threesome!
Obviously I threw him out of my house and filed a restraining order against him, but that also signified the end of my Internet dating phase. I must say that one really scared me.

So the motto of this story is to be very careful and skeptical when you meet someone on line. Only believe half of what they say and never assume they are who they say they are. Look into yourself
to see if you are being as honest as you should be too. Otherwise you can end up with a four person relationship. The pretend couple vs. the real couple.

Learn more about this author, Karen Truax.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.

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