“Kya karu ram mjhe buddha mil gya?” translation “What do I do? I got married to an old man?” This Bollywood classic is about a woman who keeps comically complaining about the age gap between her and her husband.
Even though this song is made for entertainment purposes, it does raise the question if it is a good idea to date someone much older than you. Let’s dwell on this topic together.
I’ll tell you my story of when I dated a guy 12 years older than me. I was a freshman in college, and just like every other teenager, I, too, was excited to exploit my newfound freedom and wish to experiment with things that I had never done before.
Call it a stereotype, but it has always been my fantasy to be with an older man. I came across one of our college alumni on Instagram. Despite the 12-year age gap, we started talking and instantly clicked with each other. He was so easy to talk to, something I struggle with while talking to guys my age. After exchanging messages and memes for a few days, we decided to meet up.
He took me to a fancy cafe for our first date, and I had the time of my life. After that, we started officially seeing each other.
When you are a kid, still living off of your parents, struggling to manage your expenses within your pocket money, it is intoxicating to be with a financially independent man who loves to spoil you.
He started taking me to high-end restaurants and clubs. He bought me expensive dresses and even gave me one of his credit cards. I am not saying I was dating him for his money, but boy! does it make a man more attractive? As a cherry on top, he had a good experience in the sack and knew what he was doing.
But things soon took an ugly turn. While I was over the top with all the gifts I was getting; I lost my freedom. He started behaving like my dad, always telling me what to do, where to go, who to talk to, and who to block. He treated me like a stupid little girl who didn’t know what was right for her. He didn’t like to hang out with my friends. I think being around younger people made him feel old. He started to control the relationship and made me feel like a dependent child.
Now he wasn’t a bad man. As I said before, he was very easy to chitchat to. And he was very understanding and got exactly how I was feeling, maybe because he was also a teenager at some point. But other than that, we had very little to talk about. We didn’t have a lot in common, and that showed. We didn’t even have the same taste in music and always struggled to decide what show to watch. We also had different ideas of what qualifies as fun.
Needless to say, the relationship didn’t work. While breaking up, I used our age gap as the reason, but the issue was compatibility in retrospect. After all, there are so many couples where one partner is older than the other, and they are making this work beautifully, Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas, Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt, Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds, to name a few.
At the end of the day, it all comes down to intimacy and understanding. I’ve seen same-age couples who quarrel all the time, and I’ve also had a chance to witness understanding and love between couples with a huge age gap.
It’s your life. You do what you wish to do. If your partner gets your motor running, don’t let anyone make you feel bad about the difference in your age. Because after all is said and done, age is just a number.
