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Dating Scams: Quite Comical if You Don't Fall for Them
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Mar 3, 2012 8:20 am
233 Views
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The other day, I was on a reputable friendship/dating site when a gentleman I had never previously chatted with sent me an IM. We talked briefly on the site, but then he immediately suggested switching our chat to an outside messenger. Without thinking, I thought, "Sure, what the heck. It's just my alias, so no harm there."
I had also made it quite clear in my profile that I was strictly looking for "friends" and not a relationship or dating yet, so the idea of chatting on a different messenger made no difference to me. I also assumed that he had at least glanced at my profile.
He was a pleasant-looking fellow around my age and seemed to be polite and interesting. His typing wasn't that great, but hey, that goes for a lot of us. Also, I suspected that English wasn't his first language anyway, so the typos and rather stilted style of conversation didn't raise any red flags ... YET. LOL
Once we got to the external messenger, the highlights of our chat went something like this. Certain details have been changed for privacy.(Note the text in red.):
HIM: its nice to have you on here and i will love to know more about you and let see where it goes from there
ME: It's always great to make new friends! How long have you been on this site?
HIM: i am totally new like 1week nw and i have not been checking much. i work alot and take care of my daughter
ME: Yes, I hear you. I joined a couple of weeks ago, but I've been pretty busy. I lost my beloved partner recently, so I'm still in the grieving stages.
HIM: I am so sorry to hear about your lose and i lost my wife and son to a drunk driver in Oregon 7years ago may their soul rest in perfect peace
ME: Oh no! My heart goes out to you.
HIM: Thx... hw old are you ?
ME: I'm 54, and you?
HIM: I am 56 single dad with one daughter christine
ME: Well, I'm sure you're a great dad. I have two sons. They're on their own now.
HIM: Thats cool..sound like a great mother
ME: You must have been very strong for your daughter after the accident. I guess you had to lean on each other.
HIM: thats cool. what brought you to this site?
ME: Well, I was lonely and wanted someone to talk to.
HIM: yesh i have been taking care of my daughter ever since i lost the mother its painfull i lost all my family
The conversation goes on for a while and finally ends up here:
ME: You've had a lot to carry on your shoulders. I admire your strength.
HIM: thank you and i will be here for you or did you found someone else for your self??
ME: LOL... no, I'm nowhere near ready to date, but I do need friends.
HIM: yeah we can be friends and let see where it goes from there....
ME: How did you hear about this site? Or have you been on other dating sites?
HIM: yeah i have been waiting for the right woman like you to talk and get along with eachother likes and deslike
i am just bored here dont have friends to keep me company so christine introduce me to this site so i registred and pay and you seems to be my first contact
i dated a woman after 4years from my wife death and she use me play me and take me for a fool.she slept with my best friend on my matrimonial bed and now they frooze my account and bankrupted me (Uh-oh... here it comes)
ME: I am so sorry! There are some pretty evil people out there.
HIM: thats sound nice i think i am on the right track and i will love you to be my best friend and lovers
hw do you mean evil? (Really???)
ME: Well, that woman and your best friend ... wasn't that an evil thing to do to you?
HIM: yeah they are but i have to carry on with life and presently i am in west africa Nigeria on a Bridge Project and i will be back home soon , hope we can meet then and our first date could be causall and maybe i can cook for you next (There ya go! Bingo!)
I had to play along a bit further though:
ME: Aren't you in the US?
HIM: i am presently out on a business trip and i will be back soon.. i dont mind to relocate with the right woman that know the true meaning of a relationship (Of course, you don't!)
ME: Well, I am sure there are a ton of women around you locally.
HIM: Yeah you are right but i have meet some local ladies and they are all for one night stand and i think i am too old for that , just want the right woman to spent the rest of my life with
i think you are the right one from me , i get that thru the way you talking and your beautifull smile on your face
ME: lol
Finally, after further chit-chat back and forth and while I'm practically spewing coffee through my nose with every comment he makes, he says:
HIM: we can take it one day at a time , i beleive there is a reason for everything and there is a reason for our meeting K
ME: I'm just being your pal here, okay?
HIM: ok cool do you have cam?
ME: That's one thing I've never bought, but I hear they can be great for keeping in touch with friends and family. (Oooh, I just had to tell that little white lie!)
HIM: ok baby (Baby???)
I am Looking for the right woman to share the rest of my life with, I want to be with a wonderful, loving, good-hearted woman and am willing to take my time to find the right one
Okay, so blah, blah, blah ... I let him continue on a bit further until I got bored.
This fellow had a normal-looking picture and profile, so there were no clues there. The clues to watch were these:
1) They seem to fall in love with you quickly.
2) They immediately want you to leave the dating site to use IM or email.
3) They may claim to be from the US or Canada, but are working overseas, like in Nigeria or the UK.
4) They will quickly make you aware of their own hardship (financial or otherwise) even though they haven't actually asked you for any money yet.
5) Despite their excellent jobs, they have no one else to turn to for support (emotional or otherwise).
6) After a while, you will notice their lack of understanding of common North American terms and phrases. They won't speak in a smooth-flowing fashion. They rarely capitalize their "I's."
7) Their photos won't necessarily appear "too good to be true" because they often steal photos from other dating site users who are attractive but don't look like models.
If the relationship is carried further, they will try to send you gifts (often with stolen credit cards) to prove their sincerity.
They will try to get you on webcam. This is so they can later try to obtain material they can use to blackmail you with, threatening to expose you to friends and family.
They'll try to rope you into cashing money orders for them because they can't cash them wherever they happen to be stationed at the time. Of course, the money orders are fake.
Well, you know the rest. It's the typical scam, just played out on the dating site scene.
By the way, I've blocked this guy on my messenger and reported him to the site administrator for further investigation. Don't hesitate to do that if your gut tells you something is wrong. Trust your own intuition ... it has your best interests at heart!
Until next time,
Marjatta
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No More Lobsters! (Part 1)
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Feb 18, 2012 10:25 am
225 Views
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We all know them ... those people who pretend to be human beings but have more of a lobster mentality than a human one.
What do I mean?
Watch a group of lobsters in a tank and observe how they each try to pull each other back down each time one tries to escape. A lobster will claw, pull, latch on, pinch, and step on the weaker ones, and do just about anything to prevent one of their own from climbing out to freedom. There's no teamwork here ... except to make sure that everyone stays at the bottom.
Know any people like that? I do. Years ago, I almost married one.
A person with a lobster mentality always sees the success of others in terms of their own failure. The happier and more successful their friends and family, the more miserable they become. Their only solace is in their efforts to keep others down at the bottom of the lobster tank of life with them. Feeling like failures, they hate to be alone in their misery.
Rather than being happy when good things happen to others, they feel compelled to point out the negatives and cast a shadow over whatever good fortune has happened to someone else. They can drain your energy and suck the life right out of you if you let them.
The worst part is that by the time you realize they've been effectively trying to sabotage your efforts all along under the guise of it being "for your own good," the damage has already been done. You're a little less sure now ... a little less confident ... a little less content ... as if you really don't deserve the rewards you've reaped from your own hard work and efforts.
A constant state of guilt for daring to pursue one's own happiness is almost a requirement in order to sustain a relationship with a lobster for any period of time.
Sadder still, the lobster tends to blame you for their own misery and inability to escape the boiling pot. They lack confidence in themselves, and so they latch on to you. Then if you succeed, they feel left behind and betrayed. If you succeed, rather than becoming an inspiration to them, you become a traitor and abandon them to a life of misery.
In some perverse kind of way, it seems that misery is their chosen lot in life. They can’t imagine life beyond the tank for themselves, and therefore they can’t imagine a good life for you either.
To sustain a relationship with a lobster, you both have to sink together. Unfortunately, a lobster cannot imagine life any other way and is unlikely to change. Your happiness will always be a detriment to their own, and they'll never be happy unless you are miserable. In effect, your misery is their happiness.
How do you spot a lobster from a mile away? Stay tuned for Part 2, and I'll give you some dead giveaways that this new "friend" is no friend indeed. Run as fast and far away as you can ...
Until next time,
Marjatta
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Moving on after the loss of your soul mate, is it even possible?
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Feb 12, 2012 8:21 am
311 Views
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How many of us have faced the reality of the death of a loved one in our lives? Pretty much everyone, I would imagine.
Today, I'm going to talk specifically about the death of a spouse and/or soul mate.
Physical death – although the doorway into another life for the person who has died – is still a doorway that we can't enter unless we ourselves die. Reading about near-death experiences or perhaps even experiencing it for ourselves does not mean we really know what life is like after our physical death. We simply can't. We weren't meant to know.
But one thing we're always reminded of is the necessity to "carry on." What does "carrying on" mean to the survivor who still has to cope with life here on earth without the presence of the person they are grieving for? I mean, how in the hell are we supposed to do that?
Accepting the Reality of Their Physical Death
Well, for starters, it means accepting the reality of your loved one's physical death. His or her physical body died. Just because we continue to communicate with them in our hearts doesn't mean that their physical body didn't die. It did. Their physical presence will never again be known to us.
We will never again be graced by their shadow, their embrace, their touch, their scent, their laughter, or the eyes that communicated directly into our souls when they looked at us. We will never again have that physical connection with them while we still remain here on earth. Their physical presence is gone, plain and simple. They are no longer able to be there for us in the way they once were.
This can make us feel incredibly lonely, sometimes to the point of feeling unsafe on all fronts. We can no longer share stuff with them. We might look at their framed picture and talk to them, but we still feel very disconnected. Occasionally, we might ask God for a sign, any sign at all, that our loved one is okay and is hearing our never-ending dialogue with them ... but we never get definitive proof, at least not physically.
This is very hard, but we must accept that our loved one is not going to ever again materialize physically to us, no matter how much we pray. It is what it is. They transformed. We didn't.
Re-examining Your Own Faith
At this point, you must be wondering, "Okay, so what's the point here? My loved one died. I am lost without him or her. I still need that person so desperately. How could God be so cruel as to take that love away from me? For that matter, how am I supposed to carry on?"
Our loved ones have already learned all of the lessons they needed to learn while on this planet. I have no doubt that they are now exactly where they are meant to be ... they are surrounded by love and joy and don't want us to hurt over the loss of them in our lives. Instead, they gently guide us each time we falter and keep reminding us, "It's okay. I am surrounded by love, and you will also be surrounded by that same love some day. We are all connected. We are all one."
Re-examining our faith in something greater than ourselves isn't all that difficult once we have lost someone dear to us from this physical world. In order to carry on despite sometimes miserable, lonely circumstances, all we need to ask is, "Did I love that person? Did they touch my heart? Did they make me feel loved?"
If your answer to those questions is yes, then you already have your bigger answer. Once you connect with someone on this planet, you are connected forever. Love is more than an emotional response hardwired into our physical brains ... true love transcends all things physical and is what sustains us through our incredible journeys ... with or without our loved ones. It is the essence of our lives. It is what makes us tick, and we would all die without it.
Living Day to Day – Putting an End to Our Pity Party
"Yeah, but how do I put one foot in front of the other on a day-to-day basis? I mean, this is SO hard for me. How in heck am I supposed to 'carry on'? The love of my life is no longer with me! Don't you get that?"
Yes, I truly do get that. What's the point of going through the motions each and every day if our loved ones are no longer here to share it with us? I mean, it's a pretty empty life, right? All we want to do is speed up our own demise so that we can be with them. Yes, let's pull out that cask of wine or case of beer and live the rest of our lives regretting the things that we never had any control of to begin with.
That type of thinking is okay for a while, but only for a very little while. And I do believe that anyone who has lost someone dear to them is entitled to their meltdowns ... so long as those moments/hours/days of sheer agony and despair don't transform into an entire lifetime of grief.
At the end of the day, after we have cried our eyes out and damned our wretched lives enough times, we have to start thinking about our own contribution to this planet and what that means to us. We have to come to grips with whether or not our day-to-day existence means anything to anybody.
Do you have a son or daughter you've become estranged from? When was the last time you called your elderly father or mother? Did you make someone else smile because of your sense of humour? Did you joke with a co-worker, friend, or a stranger on the subway? What did you do today to contribute to the life of another human being? Are you aware that whatever small token of kindness (without any hidden agenda) you extend to another person is also helping to fortify their soul during their own tough journey through this sometimes brutal and perplexing life we all lead?
Yes, your life has a day-to-day purpose ... even if you have lost the only person you thought could ever understand you or love you for exactly the person you are. You'd be surprised by how many of the good things your loved one taught you can be easily extended to others. Pass on their gift. Share the joy. Make each day an opportunity to do at least one good thing for a fellow human being. That will make your departed loved one very, very happy indeed ... something you will be proud to tell them at the end of the day while you are talking to their photograph.
Finally, Give Yourself Permission to Love Again
"Love again? I doubt it. There will never be another person on this planet who could replace him/her."
True. No one will ever replace your loved one in your heart, nor should they. But to forever close your heart to others would be a real shame. After all, every person on this planet needs love ... it's so basic to our survival. And our hearts are capable of infinite love for as many people as we will let into our lives. Our hearts can never be too full of love.
If you allow your own soul to die inside, you are removing yourself from this existence and are living out the rest of your life almost like a prison sentence ... just crossing off the days on the calendar until you can be with that person again. In the meantime, all of the opportunities to connect with other souls on this earth are passing you by unnoticed. It's no longer your loved one who has become a shadow ... it's you!
Would your loved one want you to suffer so? Would they want you to waste the rest of the precious gift that is your life by never again feeling love for another person? Would they want you to live in mortal fear of experiencing yet another loss of someone you dare to love? Would they want you to feel guilty that you are somehow disrespecting their memory simply because you have found it in your heart to love someone again?
We all know the answers to these questions. In every case, it's an emphatic no.
I know an incredibly loving woman who has survived the death of two husbands, and yet still found it in her heart to love a third. Had she not done that, she wouldn't have had the experience of making someone else's journey through this life as happy as it was. Her gift of love was blessed upon others three times! Do those previous two husbands look down from heaven and say, "Gee, I'm jealous that she's with another man"? No, they say, "Thank you for continuing to be the loving person that you are. That is why I fell in love with you in the first place."
Another woman that I know died peacefully a few months ago. She was the fiancée of my best friend. She herself had lost her husband before she met my friend. She used to say to him that her departed husband had picked him out for her!
During the time she was alive, I saw such an incredible transformation in my friend, I can't even begin to tell you. His step was lighter, his eyes twinkled more, and his self-confidence soared. She truly was the "love of his life." A love he never would have known had she shut off her heart to the world while she waited to join her deceased husband. She made an incredibly wonderful difference in the life of my dear friend ... and I thank her for that.
He says to me now, "When I die, I know that she will be there on one side and he will be there on the other. They will both be there to greet me when my time comes."
At the end of the day, love always wins and living with a closed-off heart always loses.
This one's for you, my beloved Shaun. Thank you for teaching me how to live with an open heart. I love you.
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Losing your soul mate and moving forward...
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Feb 11, 2012 3:37 pm
338 Views
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We all know there are no guarantees in life, right? Well, nothing drives that point home more sharply than when you lose the love of your life suddenly and without warning.
You wake up one morning with the expectation of another routine (but satisfying) day, and you go to bed that night, not to sleep, but to toss and turn and lie awake in disbelief that your life has forever changed ... unalterably, unforgivingly, and unmistakably.
Fast forward three months and you slowly start to pick up the pieces of your former life and try to put them back together again. But they never quite fit right. One of the pieces is missing, and while you try to shape another one to fit in its place, you finally realize that you'll never be able to do that. The only solution is to start over again with a brand-new life and start filling it up with new pieces until it is once again whole and solid.
That's where I am right now. My soul mate, for whatever reason, was taken from this world abruptly and tragically early in November 2011. It was just after his 50th birthday. It was just before our first anniversary (New Year's Eve). It was just after we had both found in each other what neither of us had ever found in anyone else before - complete and utter acceptance and unconditional love.
It was all good, and then it all went away in the span of minutes ... mere minutes to say that last "I love you" and "You'll be okay, hon, the paramedics are on the way." Mere minutes to watch helplessly as the death rattle choked his breathing and his body seized uncontrollably on the living room floor. Mere minutes ... mere minutes that seemed like hours and hours... a merciful heart attack that took away his consciousness long before his body ceased to fight the inevitable.
Now, this may seem like a rather morbid topic to put as my first blog post, I agree, especially on a friendship/dating site. But you know, that's what friends are for. They help you move forward and enjoy the continuation of your journey. They put a positive spin on things. They remind you that there is still LIFE to be lived. And maybe you can even help them get over their losses too. At this stage of our lives, I doubt many of us have escaped unscathed by sorrow, grief, and loss. It's just a natural part of life.
I'm looking forward to sharing my new adventure - my new chapter of life - with my new friends. One of the most wonderful legacies my beloved left me was his attitude of gratitude, appreciation, joy, and faith in all things good and kind. And damned if I'm going to let him down by becoming bitter and sad and disappointed with life. If I'm still here, there must be a reason for it, and I'm going to find it!
Until next time,
Marjatta
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