There *ARE* good men out there.

The idea struck me the other day to see if I could get more readers for my blog by mentioning it in my dating app profiles.

Guess what?

It worked. The page views started increasing.

While responding to messages as fast as I could on my phone, I stared at my Google Analytics on my computer and watched the traffic on my blog. I obsessively refreshed and refreshed my page statistics and watched, jaw dropped, as the numbers grew.

It was SO EXCITING.

But you know what was even better than the numbers and the traffic?

The messages I received.

I got countless messages. NICE messages. So many messages I felt like I was going cross-eyed trying to respond to everyone.

Men were reading my blog and they liked it. They related to me. I was thrilled to know that my writing appealed to a male audience. They told me I made them laugh. They took the time out of their day to compliment my writing, outlook, honesty, personality and viewpoints. I got so much encouragement. Some made me laugh. Some shared with me very personal, sad stories of their own. There are a lot of lonely, dejected people out there. We all really need to be kind to each other.

These men were so kind to me. These men renewed my faith that there are so many good men out there. Kind, nice, high quality men.

It was so refreshing!

I spent the last two years being treated so rudely by so many men to the point that it depressed me and made me not want to put myself out there anymore. These men made up for that in spades.

I hope those of you who wrote me won't mind me sharing some of your kind and thoughtful words anonymously. I want others to see how nice you are, to give them hope that in this depressing dating app world, there are genuine, kind and generous people.

Here are some of my favorites:

"I have to admit, I took a look at your blog and it's fascinating! Honestly, a really unique idea, and really well written! You seem like an intelligent and thoughtful woman."

"I think my favorite part was your honesty. Dating nowadays is full of so much deception (especially online dating). Why can't more people just be more real? And then you think about all of the games people play not texting or messaging back quickly because they want to act like they're busy."

"I read Desperation. Very well written and fun to read. Kudos to you and your honesty, courage, and insight. I wish there were more people like you walking this planet."

"I love your work. Keep going."

"I enjoyed reading your blog posts. I hope you keep writing them. Have been out of the dating scene for a while and now getting thrown back in (completely unprepared), it was nice to see that I am not the only one with similar thoughts to your posts."

"Your blog... f*cking wow... I just read Desperation.  I have a spreadsheet... That story, that f*cking moment..."

"I read your blog. You're a wonderful writer. I also understand your frustration, the world of relationships and dating has changed to a point where we struggle with our happiness because the norms we grew up on have changed themselves. It's life's struggles which always bring perspective to ourselves."

"Dig the blog... I'll add the blog about friendship rung true. It is something that requires vigilance and sometimes I forget that."

"You give voice to the general mode of modern living. You talk about the pettiness, the thoughtlessness and the ephemeralness of you being every woman and us out here being every man. You express disdain at how people are wound up even more tightly in ourselves. Here we are with what we believe is the easy path and all of a sudden we're more alienated, more suspicious and in the end more unable to communicate! The confidence I see is your ability to lay low the current cultural norms, and say there has to be more than this."

"I really like the description of desperation in continuing to meet someone for human contact without burning bridges, I have tried that and sometimes holding on feels desperate but it is good to hear it said."

"Wow, I just discovered your profile and your blog. Amazing stuff that you're writing. I'm way too far away for you to even consider me as anything but a fan. I'll just admire you from fly-over country."

I think this one was the funniest:

"When I see links in people's profiles I usually assume it'll lead to some weird niche transgender porn site and never click but for some reason this was the only link I pursued and WOW. You're a gifted writer... I marvel at you for putting yourself on the line like that. I liked your post about friendship and if I was Ten, I'd get my sh*t together so not to burn a bridge with you and then go down on you for an excessive amount of time as a token of my apology."

And, possibly my favorite:

"Hello Jennifer Bradshaw."

Thank you. <3

Thank you more than you can possibly know. You warmed my heart.

I hope I get to meet some of you.

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Has someone written something to you on a dating app that warmed your heart? Tell us about it in the comments!

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