Dating Daycare
Welcome to "Dating Daycare," the ultimate safe space for women navigating the unpredictable world of modern dating. Join hosts Melissa Firpo and Allison Waterman as they dish out candid advice, share hilarious anecdotes, and tackle the toughest dating dilemmas faced by women today.
In a dating landscape filled with frogs disguised as princes and a jungle of jerks, Melissa and Allison offer a nurturing haven where women can laugh, learn, and empower each other to find love on their own terms. From ghosting to breadcrumbing, from disastrous first dates to navigating online profiles, "Dating Daycare" covers it all with wit, wisdom, and plenty of wine.
With Melissa's no-nonsense approach and Allison's comedic charm, each episode feels like a heart-to-heart chat with your best girlfriends over brunch. Whether you're swiping left or swiping right, "Dating Daycare" is your go-to guide for surviving and thriving in the wild world of modern romance.
So grab your favorite beverage, kick back, and join Melissa and Allison as they navigate the highs, lows, and hilarities of dating life. Because when it comes to matters of the heart, everyone could use a little TLC from "Dating Daycare.
Dating Daycare
F'n Fish Bowl - Unhealthy Illusions of FRIENDS WITH BENEFITS
Have you ever felt pressured to offer more than friendship when accepting help? Join us as we unpack this common experience, particularly for women who often feel caught in the web of societal expectations. We tackle the delicate dance of navigating friendships with men who seem to expect something more in return for their generosity. With a focus on the importance of setting and respecting boundaries, we challenge the notion that gratitude should come with strings attached and encourage women to embrace their worth without guilt or obligation.
Our conversation takes a deeper dive into the art of setting personal boundaries and holding them firm, even when they don't match societal norms. We explore how writing down these boundaries can serve as a powerful reminder to ourselves and those around us. From discussing the hosts' unique approaches to relationship boundaries—like avoiding partners with young children or rejecting long-distance first dates—we highlight how these personal rules safeguard our emotional well-being. Discover how embracing your individual boundaries can lead to more authentic and fulfilling relationships, enriching your life with truly compatible connections.
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Welcome to David's Daycare, where we help you navigate through the jungle of jerks. My name is Melissa.
Speaker 2:I'm Allison.
Speaker 1:And today, for our lovely viewers, we have another fishbowl episode. If you're just joining us, we will explain to you what our fishbowl episode. If you're just joining us, we will explain to you what our fish bowl is all about. We take real questions from real women, from real online sites, we fold them up anonymously and we put them into our fishbowl, we open them up and we help you navigate through it.
Speaker 2:Yes, so let's start shall we, shall we. I think I'm going to do this. I don't want it to be a long one.
Speaker 1:I know Allison hates the long ones.
Speaker 2:Okay, anonymous member. Ugh, men drive me crazy. Three exclamation points. I'm chronically single because I don't have time, nor do I want any friends with benefits. I don't want any of the quote benefit part and so I will let myself struggle with not asking my guy friends for help, because even though they insist on not wanting the benefit part, they will always guilt me into saying yes and giving in and then say quote, I don't just call you for that end quote BS, we can just talk or just hang out, blah, blah, blah. So here we go again with you. Never call if you need help, I say because I have no service to provide in in exchange for help, so I don't call. Rinse and repeat the cycle.
Speaker 1:Ugh all right, I I yeah I think I understand.
Speaker 2:Okay, I gotta look at this as we as we walk through this.
Speaker 1:Okay, so she's single because she does not have time, nor does she want friends with benefits. Well, anonymous member, I agree with you. I am not a friends with benefits girl. I'm not even emotionally capable of doing something like that personally, and I believe that 95% of the female population is not emotionally equipped to deal with that. It goes against nature. So any of you that are in a friends with benefits, I love to hear your side of it. But I don't believe that it ends well for the women. At least the men get what they want and it's easy for them to go fluttering. But okay, let's move on now.
Speaker 1:So she struggles with not asking her guy friends for help, because, even though they insist of not wanting the ben, the sex with friends with benefits, they always guilt her into saying okay, I'll have sex with you. Okay, you have the wrong friends. Okay, because I have quite a few guy friends and I get a lot of things from them. I have a friend that owns Verizon stores and he's nice enough to. Every time I get a new au pair, need a new phone line, he hooks it up and gives me a great deal. I don't have sex with him, nor is he asking me for sex. I have another friend that I go out with all the time. We'll meet up at a restaurant, a restaurant, have some dinner, uh, wine, or if there's a certain restaurant I want to go into in manhattan, I meet up with him. He sure as shit isn't asking me, after he pays for dinner, for sex.
Speaker 1:So no, she has. No, she has the wrong friends. Okay, that's. Second you, you have the wrong friends. Then it says that the guy's like don't worry, I won't ask to have sex with you, we'll just hang out, we don't have to have sex. Blah, blah, blah. Why don't you ever call me for help? I promise we won't have sex. And then she's saying she'll call them for help. I guess she doesn't say what kind of help, maybe around her house or whatever. And then they come over and do it and then they guilt her into having sex again. Rinse and repeat. So she said she doesn't call them because she doesn't want to give sex in exchange for help. I don't blame you. Anonymous member.
Speaker 2:Something that my spidey senses are tingling and telling me. I mean, we don't know the full story, but something is telling me that this woman is making up the story in her head, like the guilt is coming from her. It's coming from something in the past. I would wager to bet they're not saying I just hung up this picture frame. Now, blow me. I don't think that's really what's happening.
Speaker 1:Or they could be at this point, because she's done it so many times, yeah, so it's an expectation, it's an expectation. Okay, so I think that we went through this. We addressed the question. We went through this. We addressed the question. You should not be giving sex or blowjobs or anything sexual out for friends, male friends coming over and changing a light bulb, helping you put a fish tank up into your crawl space or mowing your lawn or anything else in that matter. But you know what?
Speaker 2:Because they're doing it because they want to. At the end of the day, I think women, yeah, women. I just have to say that women have this thing where they have a hard time accepting help and just kindness from people without feeling that they have to give back. I don't, yeah, I don't feel that either.
Speaker 1:But there was a time when I did.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, there was a time when I did, and even with some girlfriends they'll be like are you sure you want to come to Manhattan? I want to come to Manhattan because I want to come to Manhattan. They're just like questioning. Your intentions Exactly.
Speaker 1:Okay, All right. So for those ladies that you feel guilty and you know what, you're right, Allison, because I see a lot of online posts with women saying he took me out to dinner and offered to pay, and I feel guilty.
Speaker 2:Or.
Speaker 1:I feel like I have to pay half the bill because I ate half the dinner or any of these crazy 50-50 type. You know how I feel about the 50-50.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we don't.
Speaker 1:Ladies, you should not feel guilty if you have a friend. If my girlfriend calls me up and says, hey, melissa, could you come over and help me out, I don't expect anything back. No, that is what a real friend does. So the fact that these men that she calls friends are accepting sex, they should have negated that from the beginning. That's telling me that they're not friends. If one of my guy friends came over that was truly a friend for years and helped me I don't know install a lamp in my kitchen, a chandelier, and then I started taking off my clothes, I mean they would be like what the fuck are you doing? Like I mean. I truly I mean they might like it and be like come here.
Speaker 1:I didn't know you felt this way about me. But, joking aside, the same as if I went to a friend's house and it was a male and he started taking off his clothes after I don't know, maybe I washed his car for him. Let's say, I mean, I'm thinking of favors here. You made him a brisket or something.
Speaker 1:And there you go, I cooked him dinner and he's greeting me naked or starts taking off his clothes. I'd be in shock too. But you know what? Ladies, all joking aside, this is a real big topic that we haven't done yet. I don't think boundaries. So let's get into it, let's go from this, because this has to do with boundaries. This girl, you need to figure out your boundaries and when you figure them out, you can't feel guilty about them. I think that is a big number one problem of women not holding too strong to their boundaries. A scenario will come up and they will feel like the black sheep or guilty about the boundary. Maybe your boundary is not the norm, maybe you have a boundary that is kind of an outcast boundary, yeah, and I feel like women when you're first figuring this kind of stuff out.
Speaker 2:And I know it sounds like corny and hokey, but honestly, get like a, like a molluscine, like a journal, and write out like that, right?
Speaker 1:yes, what I do, but it's good for this. Yeah, just write down like.
Speaker 2:These are things that make me feel safe, and these things will um. I will feel comfortable out in the world I can live with it.
Speaker 1:Yes, I can live with it, and you know what lady said is good to you. I will say, on on the reverse flip side, when I tried to get back with my kid's dad my ex, by the end of the three months and I'm glad I did this, because I'm not a writer, allison Jotson writes her notes Me I'm off the cuff I wrote down, by the end of the three months, 25 things he said he didn't like about me and every time which is rare now, but in the past when I got that little feeling of, oh, I feel bad, my kids, their dad, you know the future. I pull out that list. I pull out that list and I reminisce.
Speaker 2:It snaps you back into reality.
Speaker 1:So, ladies, that is good advice Write down your boundaries and whatever those boundaries are, it's okay. I think a lot of people feel like their boundaries have to fit the cultural status quo of their friends or their family members or where they live and what the dating scenes like, because obviously the dating scene in New York City is going to be very different from the dating scene, let's say, in Manhattan, new York or, you know, tennessee or California, or it's going to be different everywhere. So, ladies, write down your boundaries and stick with them. I have a lot, god knows.
Speaker 2:What I find didn't mean to interrupt, but what I find is that women will have these, what they perceive to be their boundaries, and then they meet someone who just knocks their socks off.
Speaker 2:They feel chemistry with and all that crap goes out the window. That's when the boundaries need to be held firmly too. So, for instance, say you know you want to be married and you know you want to have kids. You meet this really hot guy who makes you feel all the things and you know what. He doesn't want kids and he doesn't want to get married. But you're like, oh, you know, maybe.
Speaker 1:I can convince him. Maybe I'll change him yeah no.
Speaker 2:That's when they're the most important. That's another thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And here's the thing If you stick with those boundaries and find there will be somebody who's okay with them, who's okay with them, you don't have to wait for the change, you don't have to say, oh well, maybe when this happens he'll want kids. Maybe when this happens he'll want kids. Maybe when this happens he'll want to move to Florida, like I do.
Speaker 2:Maybe when his ex-wife blank blanks this, or when his kids grow up. That's no way to live. It's no way to live, and it doesn't end well.
Speaker 1:And let me tell you something I have those boundaries that are, if you want, to call, off the cuff. I have boundaries that most women my age in my position do not have, and I'll name one of them, which I've mentioned this before, if you don't know, if you're just joining us, I am, if you want. I've never been married but separated. I call it divorce because it's the same basic thing. From my kid's dad two kids, nine and 10. And this is the pot calling the kettle black and it is a hard lying boundary for me. I will not date men with young children. They have to be 18 or older. Now, not only is that the pot calling the kettle black, and I'm sure a lot of our viewers are going to be like, like how can you say that you have two young kids? How can you say you won't date a man with young kids you have? So what happens if the man says it about you and you never get a date? That's fine, I'm good. I am good. You're good with dying alone. I'm good with dying alone. But that is a hardcore boundary for me, because I don't believe in Brady bunching what I call my family. I'm not dipping my toe in it. I don't want to deal with your ex-wife. I don't want to deal with the alimony you're paying. I don't want to deal with the alimony you're paying. I don't want to deal with any of that. I don't want to deal with the hardship of the child support, because that only, in my view, hinders my life. I am able to do with my children and work very hard to be able to do basically whatever I want with my kids. Do basically whatever I want with my kids. You coming into my life, having financial expectations somewhere else, and young children you gotta be on the soccer. You should be on the soccer field. You should be with them Christmas morning, you should be at their birthday parties. That is where you should be. I don't wanna be there with you. And here's another thing You're not meeting my children. Another thing You're not meeting my children. Another boundary no man is meeting my children unless we're getting engaged or married sometime in the near future. So all those relationship things of oh, you went to my kid's soccer game. Next weekend's your soccer game, let me go. You're not coming to my kid's soccer game. Next weekend's your soccer game, let me go. You're not coming to my kid's soccer game, because when we don't work out and we break up and my kids are attached to you, they're not losing another man in their life to have more daddy issues than they already have. It's not happening. So those are my hard car boundaries.
Speaker 1:Now are those my girlfriend's boundaries? Nope, do they look at me like I'm insane? Probably Do. They date men and after three, four, five months, introduce them to their kids? Nope, absolutely. At a carnival or at a you know whatever. Absolutely they do. A lot of them do. A lot of them don't, but a lot of them do so. But that's their prerogative. That's my hardcore boundary, and people may look at it as it's crazy. People tell me you're gonna be alone for a long time and I'm okay, I'm ready. So my point being I don't care what someone tells me. I know it's not the norm, but it's what works for me and what I want for my children.
Speaker 2:Do you want to hear one of my boundaries? Yes, I do. Okay, Of course, you know I am dating, I'm single. You know I am dating single. I really, and I will get into this later. But I think people need to know the difference between a boundary and something that is such a high wall up that you're which I don't think that your thing is. But sometimes people say I have a boundary where I only date six feet tall Ben. People get that's not a boundary, that's a preference, Correct. People get very confused. I do not feel comfortable traveling on a first date to see a man.
Speaker 2:If a man wants to see me, he will come my way. I feel most comfortable that way.
Speaker 1:So for instance- and you know where you are, if God forbid you have something happens. You're familiar with where to drive, how to get there, where the good towns are, where the bad towns are. As if you're traveling from New York to New Jersey, you don't know where you are, what kind of town you're going to.
Speaker 2:I agree with you 100% and I've definitely turned down many a first date or second, second date because they weren't willing to come to you. I did that last week as well someone who seemed you know great on paper, who wanted to take me nice places oh my god, do I hear a dick of the week? Dick of the week is coming it wasn't a match, just it just wasn't a match. He was just not willing to come my way.
Speaker 1:So where'd he live?
Speaker 2:he actually. So when we matched he was in the city. I was thinking he was living in the city, actually lived in westchester, which you know. I I've dated guys who are willing to come my way absolutely, which is fine, he wasn't, that's fine that's how far is west an hour? Yeah, it's like probably. He's probably probably as far from the city as I was, so like 45-50 minutes from the city.
Speaker 1:And wait.
Speaker 2:You wanted to meet in Manhattan, no, I wanted him to come this way To Long Island. Yeah, I didn't want to go to the city on the first date. No, I agree.
Speaker 1:I agree, 100%. Dick of the week, dick of the week, and you know what, and not for nothing. But the man should pursue yeah. And then that's not saying if you got with him you wouldn't travel to Westchester Once you start your inner relationship and it's give and take and you want to work.
Speaker 2:Want it to work, of course, I agree, I agree and you want it to work.
Speaker 1:Of course, I agree I agree, but yes, we should be clear on boundaries versus preferences. Yes, there is a big difference. So, ladies, to me a boundary is something that I set in the sand that I know could be harmful to my emotional well-being if it doesn't go well later on. Ladies, that's how you set boundaries. You look at something you've either been through and it hurt you, or something that didn't work out for you, and you say to yourself I don't want to do that again. And you think how did I get into that position? Oh, I traveled to Westchester on a first date and got ghosted. He never showed up. That sucked. I spent three hours. What's your boundary now? Always have the guy meet you on the first date.
Speaker 2:That's a perfect example with a boundary. You know it on a visceral, like a gut level.
Speaker 1:You know like if you go against it, it really does not feel good all right, or you just know that it could end up in a in a bad position. I've mentioned this in in other um episodes but I'll I'll mention it again. So my ex, my kid's dad, did not have a great childhood and upbringing was not close to you. Know mother, father, whole background story that I'm not going to get into. Mom and dad married 51 years, big family, always together, barbecues, my cousins like my sister, sort of upbringing and how they say the way a man treats his mother is the way he's going to treat you. I never thought that I had no experience with it. I did with my ex. He did not treat me so well.
Speaker 1:So now a boundary if you do not come, if you come from a horrifically broken family or there's any abuse, you know childhood in your past and you're still not from close mother, brother, sister, I won't get involved. It's a boundary for me Just because now that's not saying and that's why boundaries are different for everybody that's not saying you didn't, because you know I'm going to get comments. I know there's one of you out there that dated a guy from a horrible upbringing. That's been married 45 years and couldn't be happier. I know that. But now this wouldn't be your boundary if you ever got divorced. Boundaries also come from bad, bad experiences that we've had that we're scared to repeat.
Speaker 2:So that's a boundary for me, because I think it'll alleviate me from dating a guy and getting in a bad, toxic relationship Works for me.
Speaker 1:Yep, works for me. That works for you, Ladies, if you have any questions about boundaries, or any boundaries that you want to bounce off of us that you think may be unreasonable, that you want to lay down Sometimes they are.
Speaker 1:No, sometimes they are and we're here to tell you if they are, like you said, a six foot tall, a man with you know finance, what is that thing from TikTok? I want a man. My daughter would say it in two seconds if she was here Six, five blue eyes, Yep, If you think that your boundaries are outlandish, run them by us. We'll definitely. We'll be happy to comment and go over it with you what we think is healthy. There's healthy and not healthy, right, and there has to be leeway sometimes and there's always exceptions, but they're few and far between. I don't want to hear about the exceptions. You know what I mean. A boundary is meant not to be broken and to prevent you from being hurt, Even if that exception comes along, sometimes you got to let it go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and another thing I just want to mention I feel like a lot of women feel that they, if they have these safeguards in place, if they have these boundaries and they adhere to them, that they're going to be turning men off and that's okay.
Speaker 1:we want to turn those kinds of men off because they weren't meant for us to be right, don't, yeah, don't be insulted when a man, when you know, when a man comes up to me I've been out plenty of of times and he's like, oh, you know, you sit, you talk, I'm polite. And then he's like, oh, I'm in the middle of a divorce and I have a two and three-year-old. I right then and there say I'm sorry, you're not for me, but it was nice meeting you. And sometimes they'll ask me well, why, like you're quote quote, unquote divorced with, uh, maybe at the time five and six year old? Well, I don't understand, where did the problem occur? And I'll say I don't date men with young kids. And they'll look at me like I am a insane and then, if they want, me to elaborate.
Speaker 1:I have no problem elaborating, but that boundary does not get crossed because he's the hottest guy in the bar and is driving the Lamborghini. It doesn't get crossed, the boundary stays. It stays because there's a reason for it and all those fears or complications that I consider complications, of course, are going to arise if he's a good man. So that's why the boundary's there. If he wasn't on the kids' soccer field and if he wasn't there Christmas morning and if he wasn't dealing with the ex-wife, I don't want to be dating him, but I don't want to be dating him and dealing with all that either. So there's my boundary Right.
Speaker 2:Got it.
Speaker 1:Yep, all right, ladies Boundaries. So please write us, let us know, bounce some things off of us and we will see you soon. Thank you for joining us. Thank you, see you next time. See you next time, bye.
