Why I’ll Never Fall In Love With A Gym Rat From Tinder

I’ve been on Tinder for nearly a week and I’m starting to wonder am I using a dating app or signing up at my local gym. Every other man has at least one photo of him flexing his muscles for the typical gym mirror selfie. And I’m not impressed.

Don’t get me wrong: I love when people proactively work towards better health. It shows determination, effort, and consistency. Sadly, the photos of men I’m supposed to want to date make it hard for me to take them seriously. They’re lifting up shirt sleeves to show off rippling muscles or proudly showing off their chests. They’re even getting more clever by convincing someone else to take a photo of them lifting weights while grimacing like The Incredible Hulk. They are also not writing anything interesting in the their profiles because they want their photos to make the bigger statement. This doesn’t catch my eye; it turns my stomach. I know there is a difference between being health conscious and a muscle-bound gym rat. But if John Cena’s character in Trainwreck is any indication of the type of men I seem to be attracting in my daily stack of cards on Tinder, I’m going to keep swiping left with one hand and eating my chili cheese fries with the other.

I blame this whole craze on the women who salivate over men with bulging biceps and washboard abs on magazine covers, in movies, and in the gym. Some women can’t get past well-oiled pecs or those tiny tanks. They don’t care that sometimes these guys are pretentious, arrogant jerks. I have yet to see Magic Mike XXL, but I have heard the sighs and swoons from my friends who have fantasized about Channing Tatum and Joe Manganiello long after the credits stopped rolling. Of all the things men dating online have heard from women, this seems to be the only thing they’re running with. Literally.

I, on the other hand, am not that girl. I like my men with a little pudge. I love meeting a man who encourages me to order the messiest burger on the menu. I don’t want to have to eat salad and drink water because the cute, hunky guy is on another no-carb diet. I’ve never wanted to be picked up with one hand.

Nope, I don’t care how many pushups my man can do in a minute or how many protein shakes he can drink before lunch. My idea of romance is not us working out together or developing healthy meal plans. I just want to know that when I’m feeling fat in my favorite dress, he won’t send me to fat camp and will love me anyway.

I don’t want the average Muscle Mike on Tinder or any dating site. Give me a funny, cute, smart guy who knows his way around a Thanksgiving spread and I may just give him my heart and stomach.