It's hard out there for the lovelorn.
And these apps aren't as reliable as they once were.
It's like a scene out of a Mad Max movie.
Even the ones where you pay don't seem to offer much help.
How in the world do people find romance through these apps?
Redditor TheRussianGuy9 wanted everyone to share their tales of looking for love, so they asked:
"What was your worst experience from dating apps?"
The Chaperone
"One of my more unique experiences was when she brought her 10-year-old sister to the date. The sister was more fun to talk to."
~ citky
HER
"I was catfished. I thought she was legit, and we talked for months. I went to go visit 'her,' and it was a guy, claiming to be her best friend, and she had to run to pick up a friend who was drunk. The woman in the profile never returned, and he was trying his best to get with me."
~ BoysenberrySuperb442
Hey Family
"I matched with my oldest cousin's daughter whom I hadn't seen for about 20 years. Didn't recognize her until we started talking, then we both had the same 'God this is an awkward... moment when we realized the fact.'"
~ Technical-Garlic2672
"I've always been paranoid about this. My mom comes from a family of 11 kids, and they're not super close, so I have like 30 cousins I don't know well and may not have seen in 10 years that live in the area. I really don't want to be the guy who tried to hook up with his cousin on a dating site."
~ profJesusfish
You Again?
"I struck out on a date so fast I got the same Uber driver for my ride home."
"Unfortunately, there is not much of a story. The date was at a bar right by the beach with a beautiful European woman here for post-doc work. I guess she wasn’t feeling the spark with me and/or wasn’t attracted to me because it ended in less than an hour. I can’t really point out anything that I did wrong. When the Uber arrived, we were both shocked to see each other. It was an awkward ride home. No second date, of course. The experience kind of mentally wrecked for a few days."
~ litex2x
I can hear you...
"I got catfished. She was heavily editing her photos using FaceTune or whatever. At the date, we were talking and she just pulled up her phone and started mindlessly scrolling on social media, at that point, I just stopped talking and she was like 'Yeah yeah you keep talking I can hear you.' The worst part is that I went to another city to meet up with her."
~ momsdirtysecret
Single Now
"Just how they kinda grind away at your soul or self-esteem."
~ ZonedForCoffee
"Yeah, this is it. I went into it a year ago, knowing full well it's a terrible place and mentally prepared, and it's fine for a while, but the extreme shallowness, constant rejection, and never feeling good enough wears you down with time, no matter what. I deleted it a few months later and have resorted to just being happily single now."
~ lnx84
BUSY
"I had a great first date with a girl from Tinder. She was super happy to set up a second date for later that week and was sending me memes and chatting until the night before. The day of, she decided to stand me up in below-freezing weather without warning. I was texting her asking where she was, and I could see her come online just to ignore me."
"Besides that, probably the multiple matches who would agree to a date, cancel the day before, pretend to be interested in rescheduling the date, and then drag out the process for weeks until I gave up and unmatched. Interested people will make time for you. 99.9% of the time, no one is 'busy' for weeks on end."
~ Rambo7112
Controlled
"I met this girl on Bumble who seemed really sweet, and we clicked super well at first. She told me that she was stuck in a lease with her ex (whom she broke up with a couple of months before), but she was trying to move back in with her mother. I wasn’t thrilled, but I was thinking, whatever, it’s not her fault."
"A week later I had lost my virginity to her and a couple of days after that I got a text from her telling me that she had a wonderful time with me but that she realized she was still in love with her ex. Apparently, I made her feel like her old self, and that included being in love with a man who started dating her when she was 17 and he was 26."
"Stupidly, I gave her a chance to make up her mind, and she said she would pick me even though her brain told her not to. However, the final straw was that she insisted on staying friends with him and that I was ‘controlling’ for not wanting to date her if she would do that."
~ Bill__Wilson
Blocked
"I am widowed and dating again. It's difficult to use a dating app as I came from a time before when I did very well, and there were no apps. I met a woman, and we decided to meet in Starbucks in the Barnes and Noble bookstore, which is attached to a mall. The conversation is going well. We walk into the mall, and she bumps into her ex. They start arguing and then hitting each other until they are fist-fighting. There is a crowd now and security comes. I duck into the crowd and make a beeline to my car. She texts me later to apologize but comments about why I didn't step in for her defense. I just said not interested, and I blocked her response."
~ nomaxxallowed
The Schemer
"This happened to a friend of mine. Matched with a girl, and not too long after, they agreed to meet up and have coffee. Meet her at this Cafe, and she pulls out a tablet pretty much right after they sit down and order. She starts a presentation about some dodgy pyramid scheme. My poor mate was too polite to say anything. He sat through the whole thing, politely declined, and even paid for the bill. Never heard from her again."
~ siewmai
A Bad Standard
"Honestly meeting people who I vibed well with and could really see myself dating, only to find that it just wasn't there eventually. it turns out that's a lot harder than the standard dating app bulls**t. Really makes you question whether you will find 'it.'"
~ Majestic-Republic929
"Same for me - great first couple dates, sometimes even hook up, and then she makes no real effort to take things to the next level or sometimes just ghosts. Just makes you feel like you’ll never be good enough."
~ kw0711
"Ya man, it really hurts when the date goes extremely well, and they start ghosting you like it literally physically hurts. Has happened twice only but I felt like s**t. Felt like they used me just to entertain themselves."
~ secondhand_bra
Gotta Go
"Matched with someone and agreed to go out after I got out of work. She was an hour late, texting me updates like 'running late... doing my hair... be there soon, etc." S**t happens, I can wait. Then she sent me a picture from outside the bar with my back turned, saying she was outside. I went to where the picture was taken, and she wasn't there. I decided I was tired of being messed with and told her I was leaving, and she seemed disappointed. Told her I'd be down to try again, but nothing happened."
~ ercdude
At the Funeral
"So I started dating a girl a few years younger than me. Everything was fine, we seemed to have a lot in common. One day she called me crying telling me that her dad died. It was really unfortunate, and I tried to help her process this as best as I could
Sometime later I got a call from my grandma telling me her younger brother died, asking if I wanted to attend the funeral."
"It was a bit surprising as they had a really bad fight about inheritance like 30 years ago and, as far as I know, never interacted ever since. I actually didn't make anything out of it at first, only that it's an unfortunate row of tragedies. Well, you can already guess who I saw at the funeral. It was extremely awkward, but now I know that apparently I have an aunt who's younger than me... LOL."
~ SectorSpark
NOTHING?!?!?!
"First date I went on with this guy we went to a breakfast place. Had the personality of a wet newspaper, no hobbies, and he smelled like moldy laundry. He ordered a short stack of pancakes with NOTHING and water. NOTHING ON HIS PANCAKES! No butter, no syrup, no powdered sugar, no jelly, no fruit, no whipped cream, NOTHING!!"
~ heartsholly
Season 3 Nbc GIF by The Office
Giphy
No syrup or butter on pancakes?
That is straight-up serial killer behavior.
Well, actually, this entire list is compromised of "peculiar" behavior.
These dating apps have really just sunk into the depths of the abyss.
Now, yes, some people will have luck, but the bad-to-good ratio is staggering.
I think we should start focusing more on having pets and plants for the long term.
Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images