“Nothing ages worse than a beautiful woman’s ego.” – 80s-90s supermodel Paulina Porizkova

Sloan: When my last boyfriend broke up with me and moved out, I was about to have a birthday. I’m still in my early 40s, but suddenly I felt OLD. Like purple dress old. Like support stockings old. Like saggy, dimpled butt old.

I started hitting the pavement – running at least 5 times a week for 5 miles – and doing ballet. I did lunges while waiting for the elevator and down my hallway. I did squats at various times throughout the day. Because MY BUTT. Duh.

Post-breakup, I looked at myself in full-length mirrors the way copyeditors look at pages of text…closely, scrutinizing each error. My butt was too dimpled. My thighs were saggy. My stomach was a small pooch. I am over 40, so of course I don’t look like I did at 20. But I wanted to. No, it’s worse than that – I felt I *needed* to – because I was about to go back onto the dating scene.

Men are visual creatures. This is both common folk knowledge and research-backed fact. They look first and find the inner beauty second. (I would argue that a lot, if not most, women do the same thing, perhaps with differently weighted values attached to inner versus outer attributes.) My guy friends and former boyfriends are always trying to tell me that what’s special about me is not my looks. So why don’t I believe them? Why do I mourn the transition of my face and body? Why do I worry so much about aging?

Maybe it’s because “You’re so hot” is one of the things uttered the most from the men I’ve dated. My looks have always been a driver of my success with the opposite sex. So now that I’m single and aging, I am naturally worried that I’ll be at a disadvantage on the dating scene. I’m worried that I’m slowly becoming invisible. The real trouble is that I’ve always played the beauty card. It’s part of my identity and how I exist in the world. I don’t know how to play the dating game without it. But I also know I’m going to have to figure out how to start relying on things other than my beauty to attract men. My “hot” days are numbered.

Viv:  I am younger than you, Sloan, but I feel ya.  Big time.  I am no longer an awkward looking 25 year old.  Now I am an awkward looking 34 year old.  I have lines on my face, crows feet, and dry hair.  Dry hair!  I am in the best shape of my life, post divorce (I run and do ab work as though it were my job), but this only seems to keep the dreaded “thickening” at bay.  All the exercise does not reverse the aging process.  I wear more makeup now than I ever have before (to look like I am not wearing any makeup, of course), and I get my nails done in a lazy attempt to look “put together.”  What does that even mean?

I still have men tell me that I am “hot” all the time, but this doesn’t phase me and I don’t seek it out.  Truth be told, I want someone to tell me that I am beautiful.  Now that I am older and wiser, hotness doesn’t impress me anymore.  Hotness is a dime a dozen.  If I keep up my efforts I know I will remain hot.  But the ephemeral quality of beauty is something else again.  I think that I have had it at some points in my life, but I can’t say if I have it now, and I don’t really know how it happens.

Analysis:

First, let’s just get the research out the way: Looks really do matter.

They matter in terms of career, or how much you will make and what type of job you’ll get (see this and this).

And in terms of relationships, men do, on average, care about looks more than women. Just ask UCLA researchers:

“Because for men, the attractiveness of their wives is part of the deal,” said Karney. “For women, that’s not part of the deal. The deal that women get isn’t being with an attractive man. It’s being with a protective man, or a wealthy man, or an ambitious man, or even a sensitive man. So they didn’t care as much about the appearance of their husbands.”

Apparently, we also tend to couple up based on our looks. Models tend to date models. The rest of us sort ourselves into some approximation of rank by beauty. And, unsurprisingly, looks matter the most to those of us who have them. People who are considered less attractive tend to rank partners based on attributes other than looks.

So are we just shallow when we worry about aging? Do looks really matter that much?

Yes and no. Yes and no. On some level, looks matter because we need to be attracted to our partners. And we need them to be attracted to us. (Sloan: I’ve been in relationships in which I wasn’t physically attracted to my partner and a few months or a year in, we basically stopped having sex altogether.) That being said, looks aren’t the only thing that matters. And we all know that. (Sloan: I’ve also been in relationships with men who were gorgeous, but hollow or warped or broken. I think I stayed with them because their looks hid their terrible personalities for a bit. But ultimately, it would never work out with someone if I could only look at them and not talk to them or laugh with them.  Viv: Yes, I once dated a man sheerly for his beauty.  He was vain, selfish, and insecure.  But I liked how other women would be so envious of us.  That thrill lasted a couple weeks, and then I got over it.)

Sloan: I’m vain, not shallow. I think there’s an order of magnitude between these things. I’m smart enough to know that my beauty – such as it is – is part of my privilege. I am aware that I am attractive to men and I’ve leaned on that fact both in my career and in dating life. So now that my looks are fading – slowly, but surely – I am worried that I will have to learn a different way of relating to men. Right now, I enjoy a lot of attention. In the future, I expect I’ll enjoy less of it. And I might have to work to get dates. And that scares the shit out of me.

My best male friend asked me the other day when I was going to stop defining myself by my looks and I looked him dead in the face and replied: “Probably never.” And I meant it. Beauty is a curse as much as a blessing. It takes a lot of work to redefine yourself as you age. And to not to overdo it at the dermatologist’s office.

Viv!! Please do not let me go crazy on the Botox and fillers!!!

Viv: Not to worry, I won’t let you get space face.  I myself may never go the Botox route, but I will surely keep up my vanity and note the signs of aging as they spread over my body.  But I don’t think aging will take away my beauty.  I really don’t.  If I am beautiful (and this isn’t something I can judge for myself because I tend to only see the things that bother me when I look in the mirror), it is because I am comfortable in my skin (and dry hair), and because I have confidence when it comes to engaging with others.  And the older I get, the more interesting I look.  My face tells a story that some people are drawn to.  This is a quality that I expect will only strengthen in the coming years.  I also realize that not everyone can see this beauty and I am OK with that.  I still have an amazing butt.