Here you are ‘over-fifty’ and single … maybe again!
But quite likely for the first time in decades …
An inevitable ending or an enviable ‘last act’?
What do you do … now?
Candyland S.I.N.S
What’s It All About?
The truths and the lies
The facts and the fiction
The preconceptions and the misconceptions
The expectations and the realities
The heartthrobs and the heartaches
The successes and the disappointments
The chills and the thrills
Joan Barrett discusses ‘Over-fifty’ dating …
Mature and Senior online dating on TV and radio.
Articles by Joan Barrett
Will he ever change?
Candyland S.I.N.S.
Take a Sneak Peek into the Baby Boomer/Mature online dating world. Learn how to be reborn, flourish, and find romance on such online dating sites as Match.com, eHarmony.com, OurTime.com, POF.com, Zoosk.com, Silver Singles.com and dozens more with winning tips and safety procedures. There is a Candyland of dating sites (1500+) to suite your age and interests.
Teaser Chapters
Chapter 5
Feelings of Fear, Rejection, Mistrust, Hurt, and Anger ... dump them ...
These ‘thieves’ rob you of your potential for happiness and/or contentment. How can you rid yourself of such ballast?
Chapter 6
Picking Your Site/s...
Chapter 8
Photos
A picture is worth a thousand words could not be truer than in online dating.
Chapter 9
How to Read a Profile ...
Eyes wide open and between the lines. What they are telling you …and what they are not telling you.
Chapter 11
Catfish & Players
You are now a member of SINS … how are you going to handle Catfish and Players?
Chapter 12
Safety is paramount ....
“Luck runs out, but safety is good for life”.
Author Unknown
Chapter 15
SEX ... intimate engagements
Almost forgotten, illusive, highly-prized and sought-after.
Chapter 16
Going Solo Again ...
This chapter could make you laugh or make you cry.
If you decide to …
Go solo again … is it rare?
Go solo again … is it despair?
Go solo again … is it narcissism?
Go solo again … is it just ‘settling’?
Go solo again … is it bliss?
“Why not go out on a limb? That’s where the fruit is”
Will Rogers
Candyland Cartoon Snippets
by Randy Glasbergen
About the Book
Candyland S.I.N.S. …. S.I.N.S. is Joan Barrett’s playful acronym for Singles INternet-dating Services. But, Candyland S.I.N.S. is a very serious endeavor with much research and statistics … sprinkled with humorous aging and online dating cartoons by an internationally syndicated (The Other Half) periodic cartoonist of the Chicken Soup series. Supported by … Joan’s first hand online dating accounts, it is an insider’s practical and emotional guide thoroughly detailed with how to prepare, enter, enjoy and survive Mature online dating with a smile on your face … perhaps one of a Cheshire cat! Joan Barrett encourages her readers to practice safe involvement in what is really the only game in town for the majority of Mature Singles.
Candyland S.I.N.S. is the author Joan Barrett’s compilation of truthful firsthand and shared accounts of Mature online dating and an in-depth guide on how to successfully navigate it … practically and emotionally. It is based on her experiences and those of other members in the Internet dating community, as well as on numerous topical and statistical resources and studies. At times light-hearted supported by spot-on topical cartoons and at other times serious with online dating cautionary tales and safety conduct recommendations, but never dull, Candyland S.I.N.S. informs and entertains.
Mature online dating is a pertinent topic in a still murky area that needs clarification along with encouragement. Detailed safety measures are part of this positive guide … Candyland S.I.N.S. with chapters on ‘Scammers’, ‘Catfish and Players’, ‘Safety Guidelines’ and ‘How to Read a Profile … what they say and what they don’t say’. The practical aspects of ‘Picking Sites’ and ‘Online Dating Etiquette’ are discussed including the important tasks of the writing, reading and photography of online dating profiles; the emotions of ‘Fear, Rejection, Mistrust, Hurt and Anger’ borne by Mature daters, and ‘Sex’ with its health benefits and precautions are sensitively addressed along with today’s Mature Singles’ option of ‘Living Solo’ and enjoying the social aspects of online dating.
Joan Barrett introduces her readers to the online dating world and in ensuing chapters keeps them looking forward to what could be around the next corner for them (and her) as they all seek their later-in-life and, possibly, the best of life’s ‘hurrahs’.
Candyland S.I.N.S. Book Chapter Snippets
Break down the barriers
Young and Seasoned Mature Dating for Senior men and Senior woman and Sex are here to stay! As is Senior romance. Get used to it! Baby Boomers are once again breaking down barriers. Yes, BABY BOOMER and SENIOR DATING and SEX are now mentioned in public … and even in the same sentence! Not very common years ago in polite conversation until the stunning revelations of finding love on online dating. Dating sites such as SilverSingles.com, Ourtime.com, MatureDating.com, Match.com, Zoosk.com, eHarmony.com, etc. have opened Seniors’ social and dating worlds. Google ‘Best Dating Sites for Matures’, ‘Best Dating Sites for Seniors’, and ‘Best Dating Sites for Baby Boomers’. Try ‘Best Dating Sites for over 50’, ‘Best Dating Sites for over 60’, ‘Best Dating Sites for over 70’, etc. There are so many dating sites readily available and easy to join. Remember, you are always in control of whom and where you meet. Safe online dating is possible and pleasurable when using your head and listening to your gut feel, and importantly, reading safety guidelines available on the online dating sites and in helpful books like Candyland S.I.N.S. Our hearts can still skip a beat … and unfortunately, ache and break as well. May the happier sort of heart condition be in store for you as you venture through the Candyland of Internet dating. Be ready for a rollercoaster ride that can place your heart in your throat, a heart pumping with new life, exhilarated and re-generated … and a heart sometimes broken if you leap into online without sufficient guidance and controls in place. Mature romance can be the most life-affirming ride of your life!
Dip into the pool
Candyland SINS. (my playful loose acronym for Singles Internet-dating Services) had been a seemingly murky, if not temptingly exotic world to which so many Single divorce-dating and widow-dating Baby Boomers and Matures were being drawn. With time and public exposure Internet dating has become an ever-expanding worldwide phenomenon that is more than flourishing. It is burgeoning. You can be a part of and benefit significantly from that growth because the dating pool for Matures is becoming increasingly larger. A 2013 E-Harmony study predicted that the age 55-64 bracket is expected to have the biggest online growth, with a 30 percent increase between 2013 and 2030 … from 1.87 million to 2.41 million members in this age category. The study further foresees by 2031 half of all couples will have met online … as will seven in ten couple by 2040. Senior online dating sites await you to join other Mature and Baby Boomer daters in their search for future partners and mates. Isn’t it great to think not of inevitable endings but of expectant beginnings!
Find your mate
Joan Barrett writes of many examples of members who have emailed her with almost every lifestyle that she could imagine depicted in their photos: from sea farmers to cattle ranchers, from metropolitan sophisticates to farmers in suspendered dungarees, from a yogi in his wrapped robe to an Indian chief in his headdress, and so many more. She will always remember the prisoner! She didn’t see his surroundings, but his headshot in the orange jump suit was a big clue. He stated his profession as ‘law enforcement’ … very clever. She believed he lived in a gated community, just not the one that most would want to share with him. He certainly was creative! A large number of matching sites are dedicated to both male and female prisoners, as well as more traditional walks of life. There is a site for everyone and every interest. Online dating is a Candyland!
Enjoy a healthy sex life
Sex in your Senior years …. You cannot ignore that it will become, at minimum an occasional focus of your thoughts, and likely more than a few discussions with your potential partner as you continue to see each other. And, if you are both agreeable and sexually compatible you can enjoy some of the best sexual sharing of your lives while dating in your 50’s, 60’s, 70’s and beyond.
Write your later-life chapters worthy of a best-seller
Embrace efforts to find love at this stage of life with good humor, passion, gusto and goals. Your family and friends will just have to go with the flow. Many Matures will not be deterred from living their remaining years and decades with enthusiasm … and positive actions, exploring and forging new paths to Mature romance and Mature relationships and greater happiness. Most Mature Singles facing later life do not want to roll over … alone.
Get back that zany feeling
Baby Boomer daters experience new love with the same telltale characteristics as those zany feelings and emotions of their teens and twenties. Finding love and falling in love at any later age can bring out the teenager in most of us, the best and the worst parts. Quite often we experience exhilarating romance and even better relationships in later-life, less fleeting and with more depth. Most of us who have loved and lost are truly appreciative and treasure this glorious state in which we may now find ourselves.
Step by step
Consider slowly joining (as in not all in the same day or even the same week) a combination of online dating sites that might be appropriate and for free in order to get your feet wet and give yourself some experience in the vast Mature dating world. Doing so will allow you to explore interesting Internet dating sites in different directions at little cost. Take the time to devote to each one. Play the different fields just as you might do socially in your own traditional dating communities. Mature online dating is your new community … and a wide open one it is. Please be aware that the free sites tend to be more heavily populated with unsavoury characters. Whether you are ‘over 40 dating’, ‘over 50 dating, ‘over 60 dating’, ‘over 70 dating’ and beyond, always practice safe singling. Follow your safety guidelines on the various online dating sites and as outlined by Joan Barrett in Candyland S.I.N.S.; stay in control of your communications and interactions.
Browse confidently and securely at your leisure
Internet dating sites take their members’ safety and security very seriously. Many dating sites use fraud detection algorithms and employ living, breathing people who review every dating profile at the time of registration. Men seeking women, men seeking men, women seeking men, women seeking women, etc. can browse, connect, flirt and email with confidence. Unless you foolishly break some of the safety precautions recommended both in Candyland S.I.N.S. and on individual dating sites, your privacy and security are pretty much secured.
Would anyone be interested in me?
Yes, generally. Of course, you have to be realistic in your expectations of how many might be interested in you. Also, you may not find all of those contacting you acceptable or up to the standards you would like. Remember, you are not offering perfection so you cannot realistically expect it either. You must do more searches on your dating sites, extend yourself, truthfully re-work your profile, and approach those whom you want to meet because you sense something special about them in their profiles … their appearance, lifestyle, interests, background, etc. And certainly, how well you present yourself and express your personality in your profile all come into play. You can broaden not just your dating world if you keep an open mind but also so much more. Candyland’s author, Joan Barrett is living proof how Mature online dating can change your life forever.
A healthy lifestyle choice
How you expand your dating boundaries and morph your potential partner expectations while meeting members from many walks of life is dependent upon your openness to new experiences … and, of course, a bit upon fate. I suspect most of us, if we met the absolutely right one who knocked our socks off, would settle into a partnered life. But in this era, the alternative lifestyle of self-determined Singleton living (living Solo) is not at all a negative one and certainly better than so many Marrieds tied down and drowning in unhappy relationships. The Solo living option may be one you want to explore as an alternative to full-time partnering. Here is yet another lifestyle choice you might have never imagined would fulfill you until enjoying the romance and the friendships of the social network of Mature online dating, chat rooms and related activities on sites such as AARP.org and CARP.com. and everthingzoomer.com , all highly recommended by Candyland’s Joan Barrett.
About Joan Barrett
Seasoned Single author Joan Barrett has navigated the tricky, exciting and challenging Mature Singles lifestyle in her own modus vivendi, as can you. Joan’s passion for SINS, Joan’s playful term for Singles INternet Dating Services and its benefits for Mature Singles inspired her to create Candyland S.I.N.S. to support current Mature dating site members, especially newbies, and not-yet members who want to know more about this Candyland of tempting treats.
In Joan’s continuing journey, one punctuated with sugary highs and fall-back lows, she has endured many disappointments and disillusionments but has always bounced back. Her experiences will ably help readers navigate the peaks, the valleys and … the inevitable curves. She has maneuvered them all and has survived to tell about some of them with a smile.
Left Suddenly Single at 62, Joan began her new life in unfamiliar territory by facing it head-on. She opened a cooking school for ‘Seasoned’ Singles called Kiss the Cook xo. She saw the need to encourage interaction in the somewhat socially marginalized Baby Boomer and Mature Singles segment of the population. This venture renewed her energy and love of life … and romance.
Joan then discovered the existence of Internet dating for Baby Boomer and Mature Singles. Her entrance into this new-to-her, exciting online dating world further invigorated her as she joined other like-minded ‘over-fifty’ Singles who were not about to roll over alone and sit out their remaining years. Candyland S.I.N.S. was written for those Singles who have chosen, as Joan did, to do the same. Life loves people who live it with passion.
As a member of online dating sites, Joan has formed innumerable friendships and been blessed with two very deep relationships that morphed into enduring connections. Her exposure to the broad range of members on Internet dating has changed her life forever. She has actively participated in online dating over a fun-filled eight plus year period, a deep enough engagement to know the game and how the game is played … and how not to be played!
Joan initially joined Internet dating with the intention to find that special one long-term relationship so many seek. At times she found it necessary after disappointing or failed attempts to connect with that exceptional match to pick herself up, dust herself off and start all over again. At other times she communicated and dated just for the sheer fun of it or to allow herself to heal, recharge and once again move forward.
Joan discovered online dating is a world of continuous life, romance, even love, and a whirlwind of activity if you know how to present and conduct yourself. This world is anything but dull; “… any new member of popular dating sites may be the one, focusing on their age groups, sexual orientations, backgrounds, and interests, such as SilverSilvers.com, EliteSingles.com, JDate.com, ChristianDatinfCompany.com, Weareher.com (HER), ManJam.com, etc. Over 1500 sites to choose from.
Joan Barrett has never lost her fascination with Internet dating and how it functions in Singles society … particularly Baby Boomer and Mature Singles society. She has seen and experienced Internet dating sites become the mainstay for Baby Boomer and Mature Singles dating … yes, the only real game in town for their age ranges, as Mature daters generally do not hang out, prowl bars or go to Singles socials to meet potential partners.
While online dating sites have provided Joan and so many Mature Singles with abundant smiles, laughs, good times and love, she and other Matures have also been dealt their share of heartaches and tears. To experience the bad along with the good … isn’t that how we know we are still alive?
Candyland S.I.N.S. is Joan Barrett’s compilation of truthful firsthand and shared accounts of Baby Boomer and Mature Internet-dating and is an in-depth guide on how to successfully navigate it … practically and emotionally. It is based on her experiences and those of other members in the online dating community, as well as in topical and statistical resources and studies. At times light-hearted and at times bleak, but never dull, Candyland S.I.N.S. informs and entertains you. Joan will introduce you to this online dating world and in ensuing chapters keep you looking forward to what could be around the next corner for you (and her) as you all seek your later-in-life and, possibly, life’s most ebullient ‘hurrahs’!
Joan now extends her ongoing interest in Mature relationships and the online dating scene as she writes articles and TV series content on this timely worldwide pertinent subject … Matures living their later-life chapters as Singles. She shares how these online warriors cope and face challenges while savouring their remaining years, creating later-life acts worthy of a standing ovation.
