DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I read you a lot, and I think you have amazing advice for men and women alike. I especially appreciate the idea of a pre-date date as a vibe check before you invest a whole bunch of hours in someone who you’d rather just not…
My question is more practical. I totally get the idea that, for a guy, a pair of well fitting jeans, swapping a ratty T shirt for a nice button down, and spending 5ish mins every morning on general grooming can really elevate a guys overall presentation. My issue is that, as a woman, getting ready for a date takes me 45min (and that’s as streamlined as I can make it). I have gorgeous long curly hair that’s just a bushy Jew fro if I don’t put all the effort (and product) into it. Same thing with makeup. I’m not one of those girls that looks like a different person with a full face of makeup, but I do look objectively better when I put that effort in. These are things I don’t do before I work a 12h shift at the hospital.
It just feels like a lot of work for 15min and a coffee. But the first in person impression is really important and I want to look my best. Do you have any advice? Or do I just have to suck it up and use the time & product?
Thanks!!!�The Price Of Beauty
DEAR THE PRICE OF BEAUTY: Honestly, I’d say don’t underestimate the amount of effort guys put into their grooming, TPOB. We as a gender don’t have as many expectations put upon us, nor do most of us put on a full face, but a lot of men put in considerably more work than “a couple of spritz under the pits and out the door we go”. Especially if we’re going to be meeting up on a first date with someone we’re into.
But that’s us, not you. You have both a challenging schedule and more of a process of getting ready than most men, which, needless to say, can be a challenge. So how do you thread this needle – meeting someone to make sure a proper first date is in your future without spending oodles of time on what may end up being 15 minutes of “thanks, but we’re just not a match”?
Part of this is baked into the general concept of a pre-date date. The idea behind a “pre-date date” is that the meeting up is something you’re fitting into your otherwise busy schedule; the presumption is that you’re between engagements, on your lunch break or otherwise finding time in your busy day to see if you want to invest more time with this person. By setting up the idea that this is a pre-date, something you’re carving out time for, you’re making it clear that this isn’t necessarily your first-date look. You don’t want to look like you just rolled out of bed and into the least offensive clothes you’ve had, but you also don’t want to look like you went to Ulta right before you met up at Starbucks. So presumably someone would be able to understand that this is a mid-range look – more likely to be part of your workday appearance than night-on-the-town.
But as you say: your workday look is no makeup and natural hair. This is hardly a bad thing, but it’s understandable that this isn’t how you want to meet a potential partner. What to do?
There’re two obvious answers. The first is, as you say: just accept that you’re going to be investing the time (and product) on someone you’re planning on only talking with for 20 minutes. The second is, you go in au natural and let the chips fall where they may. You let the prospective beau know that they’re getting you at your frizzy, post-ER shift and hope they’re understanding or into that.
But there’re a few other possibilities to this as well.
One would be to schedule a pre-date date at a time when you’re going to have your hair and make-up on point already – a girl’s night out, meeting family or friends for dinner, whatever your social life may entail. This has both the benefit of not feeling like you may have put in all that effort for nothing – if you don’t click, you’re still going out – and you have a hard limit on how much time you can spend with him. It’s easy to peace-out at a pre-set time when you know you’re meeting up with your former classmates from med school for drinks and catching up.
Another would be to build in the possibility of upgrading the pre-date to an actual date; meet up after work for coffee and if things are clicking, blow off your “appointment” to get dinner, go for a walk or otherwise spend more time with him than you planned initially. If you’re someone who’s good at judging character quickly or who knows fairly rapidly whether or not you’re into a guy, this could work out well; you even have a moment of buttering up his ego by choosing to spend more time with him than whatever your other obligation was. But this still comes with the risk of getting there and realizing off the bat that he’s just not your type or you two just aren’t the match in person that you are on the app.
A third possibility would be to figure out a look that’s somewhere between “no makeup or product at all” and “full face and hair on point”. If, for example, you could get by with minimal make-up – possibly even down to tinted moisturizer and lip gloss – then that might work for you instead of having to do the works. That is, admittedly a big “if”, especially if your streamlined process takes 45 minutes.
At the end of the day, the best thing you can do is figure out what works and is actually feasible for you. You may find that 45 minute prep for a 15 minute meetup to be rewarding, or you may find that it’s a time sink that makes things harder and more frustrating. Or you may decide to just skip the pre-date idea entirely. That’s absolutely cool too; everything I advocate is advice, not a contractual obligation or The One True Way. Whatever works for you is what works. As long as it makes you happy and helps you get the results you want, then it’s all good.
Good luck.
Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com