I was reading a post on Dating is Warfare last week and it reminded me of one of my biggest online dating mistakes.

I had signed up for a my first profile on a dating site at a point where I really didn’t want a boyfriend, but I wanted a guy to go out with (movies, coffee, whatever). I wanted to keep it light and I wanted to keep it fun. When my profile questionnaire asked me to select what I was looking for, it was pretty simple. My options were Relationship, Dating, Hang Out, Pen Pal and I selected Hang Out.

I started getting a lot of sexual messages from guys which I promptly deleted. Then I started talking to a cute red-headed guy and by the third day of chatting, he asked when I was free. I told him my schedule and then he started getting really graphic and sexual asking what we would do when we saw each other. I responded saying something like “Um… I thought we’d go to the movies or something. That’s all.” After going back and forth for a bit, I was very clear with him that we would not be hooking up. After a long pause, he said, “I don’t understand, your profile said you wanted to ‘hang out’ if that’s not what you’re into- you should really change it so you don’t waste people’s time.”

Whoa. I had no idea that “hang out” was a code for “hook up”, I thought it literally meant hang out/spend time together.

Needless to say, I changed my profile selection right away to “dating” but like Dating Trooper, in my effort to keep it light and easy I made myself look like I just wanted sex.

Lesson Learned.

Have any of you made any Online Dating mistakes?