I was asked by one of the Staff Writers of My One Amor, who is a friend of a friend, if I ever dated anyone with mixed children. The answer is yes, and several times. The next question was what is it like dating someone with mixed children ?
Being someone who grew up in a very diverse neighborhood and residing in southern Florida, I don’t give the race of a person a lot of thought. I see everyone as an individual person. Having said that, dating someone with a mixed child was not seen as any different to me than just dating someone with children. But unfortunately, there are people who don’t see the world quite like that.
Before I even get into all of that, I know some people are very sensitive to their perception that people may be looking at them in a public place. If you’re someone like that, dating a person of another race or being in public with mixed children may cause you some uneasiness.
When I was asked about this, two particular women I met came to mind. Both I had seen for a few weeks and had been in public with their children. One I even met her family. I had dated others but either didn’t meet their children or we never went out as a family. I previously wrote a story about a woman I dated with a baby.
The first of the two, I’ll call Laurie, regular readers know I use the correct first letter of someone’s name but not their actual first name. I remember her for another reason as she asked me if I had ever heard of the Dating Addict from My One Amor. I replied, I heard that there was a serial dater sharing his stories on some matchmaker dating advice blog but hadn’t read any. I know, I lied. I am wondering by writing this story if I’ll now hear from her again.
I met her through Tinder and she had pictures of her child posted and made it clear before we met if I had a problem with mixed children there was no sense in meeting. I told her that it didn’t matter to me at all. She said that there were a lot of “racist hillbillies” in Florida who even sent her mean messages online.
We had sex on the first date and I wound up meeting her 5 year old daughter on the 3rd date. And subsequently met her mother and brother around the 5th date. Here is where the ugliness began. Her mother immediately made a comment to her “at least this one’s white”. No good, I thought.
Laurie shared with me later that day that her family did not approve of the man who was the father of her child. And it had made for a very strained relationship with her family. She also shared that the father of her child’s family was equally as unaccepting of the relationship. Although I wasn’t surprised by all of this, it did make me realize that I was different in that I was very accepting.
Ironically as it turned out our short relationship ended as she ultimately reconciled with the father of her child. Hopefully another reason she won’t be upset if she reads this story and connects the dots.
The other woman I met, I’ll call Claire, had 3 mixed children. We met through POF and what struck me right off the bat about her was that she was a tough girl. From the initial time we first talked she told me that finding a man when you have 3 kids is hard enough but mixed kids she felt that it may never happen. She was very independent and said she had no problem raising her kids alone but would love to have an accepting man in her life.
She was a little more cautious with me, so it took 3 dates to have sex. And like Laurie, I met her kids quickly (around the 6th date). Her kids were great and very happy. We did a number of things together as a family, dinners, fairs and even the beach.
I did meet her mother who seemed very accepting of Claire’s situation. This was quite a difference from what I had experienced with Laurie.
We actually dated about 8 weeks but this ended as, you guessed it, she wanted to get real serous and move in together. That was a deal breaker for me. It was not a good break up, but shit happens.
The take away for me about the mixed kids is that we live in a somewhat divided society regarded acceptance and tolerance, this is unfortunate. I enjoyed both relationships (sex was great) and their kids.
When asked the question, what is it like dating someone with mixed children ? The answer for me is, no different than anyone else.