Are you single and dating—or thinking about it? If partnered, did you connect later in life? Did you watch and enjoy The Later Daters? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
I hadn’t seriously thought about what it might mean to date later in life until multiple social media groups with members in the thousands started buzzing at year-end about The Later Daters. The limited series is executive produced by former First Lady Michelle Obama via Higher Ground, the production company she co-founded with her husband. I don’t have to tell you that it quickly became one of the hottest shows on Netflix. At 68, I haven’t been on a date in over 40 years. My husband, whom I married in 1982, passed away in late 2022 of cancer. Like a lot of sisters, I was curious about what a show like this could teach me about getting back out there if and when I am ready.
The producers have elevated the reality show genre, thank goodness, because nobody wants to see dignified, accomplished Black women (three daters are Black) out here looking thirsty and throwing drinks.
Logan Ury, a behavioral scientist and author of How to Not Die Alone: The Surprising Science That Will Help You Find Love helps season one’s six singles ages 56 to 71 along the path of dating and companionship. Each dater also has their adult kids act as their wing men and women to help break down the vibes. For instance, Suzanne’s daughter had to explain what the eggplant emoji represents. I thought about my own two kids, and already know they are not ready. My oldest literally trolls my social media to make sure some random man is not making a move on me. It was interesting seeing the pitfalls of communication in dating. The flirting. While viewers detected a hint of ABC’s The Golden Bachelor and The Golden Bachelorette, The Later Daters is not a competition for love with an end game of marriage.
The producers have elevated the reality show genre, thank goodness, because nobody wants to see dignified, accomplished Black women (three daters are Black) out here looking thirsty and throwing drinks. I’ve seen that show before. Instead, we follow the daters as they go on specially curated blind dates, to see if any of them might plant the seeds of a meaningful love connection.
Watching the show is like hitting the fast forward button on our own dating potential.
The former first lady appeared on The Jennifer Hudson Show in December to talk about how she had always wanted to make something that was "aspirational for folks of our age." She was on to something with The Later Daters. "I have a lot of girlfriends who have lost spouses, who have divorced," she said. "They're in new chapters of their lives. And we talk amongst our group about, ‘How do you date?' My single friends and I ask this a lot. Many have given up.”
There is no doubt that dating now is so different from when I was in my 20s
Decades ago, my friends and I were each looking for a spouse who completed us, would be good parents to future children and with whom we could build a life. But today’s single women beyond age 50 know that finding the right person may not be that easy or perhaps not that permanent. And there are a lot of us out here. The American Psychological Association estimates that 41 percent of first marriages and 60 percent of second ones end in divorce. Then there are the millions of women out there who, like me, are widows. Watching the show is like hitting the fast forward button on our own dating potential.
A refreshing level of freedom
Most of the women in the show, like my single friends and I, have different wants now. I’m not looking for a provider or a soul mate, but it might be nice to go out to dinner, a movie or just sit around and laugh. Like the women in the show, I don’t need the cavalry to save me, because I am my own cavalry. And unlike the women on The Golden Bachelor, The Later Dater’s single women were clear that they weren’t looking for a new spouse or significant other. But it did get me to consider gradually being open to what fate might present.
Should women in their 50, 60s and 70s+ have to settle?
Sherri Williams, PhD, is assistant professor in race, media and communication at American University and the author of the upcoming Black Social Television: How Black Twitter Changed Television. Williams says the timing for a show with older Black daters was just right. “Mature Black women are the cultural blueprint for America,” Williams says. “The women are still hip and vibrant. There is nothing boring or stale about them.” Williams says people are drawn to the fact that they are real and relatable.
I talked to a friend, Sylvia Sims, a widow in her seventies from Southfield, Michigan. She told me, “it isn’t as easy to find single, available and interesting men to go out with.” She adds that in her experience, men in her age group haven’t physically aged as well as she has. Sims says she wasn’t looking for a husband or an intimate relationship. But some of the men she encountered had other ideas and that was a deal breaker.
The good news for all of us is that Netflix has hinted at a season two.
While rooting for the daters and their supporters, thinking about just tipping my toe in the water left me interested but exhausted. I’d not only need a coach, but I’d also need a stylist and an interpreter.
Robin Gorman Newman, an author and self-described “Love Coach,” understands all the pitfalls of dating at this age. “Women don’t have to settle,” she says, with the caveat that “going for what feels familiar doesn’t always work.” She tells her clients that they deserve to find someone who will treat them well.
Ury echoes Newman, saying that women of a certain age might be too rigid in what they want.
But the show reaffirmed that I wasn’t willing to bend my standards, and helped me think about what I want and what doesn’t interest me. I’ve raised my own kids and am not going back into the Mommy Mode, to be with a man who has full custody of his young children. I want to travel and have adventures with a companion who likes to do the same things. I don’t want that guy who stays home stretched out on the couch watching sports and old Westerns.
The good news for all of us is that Obama has hinted at a season two, and identified at least one individual she'd like to see cast. Who knows. I might actually be a later dater by then.
Are you single and dating—or thinking about it? If partnered, did you connect later in life? Did you watch and enjoy The Later Daters? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
