Beyond the Swipe, Part 1: Why the Apps Leave You Feeling Like There's Nobody Out There
Part 1 of a three-part series on finding love in a dating-app-weary world.
You want a relationship. So you open the app.
And there she is: the woman you dated five years ago, still using the same rooftop photo. Below her, your best friend's ex. Then a couple looking for a third. Then a woman who lives eighty miles away, and the one you matched with in March who never answered your second message.
You close the app and think, there's nobody out there.
I hear this all the time, and while our dating pools might be smaller depending on where you live, that is not true. I don’t believe deleting the apps is the solution. For lesbians and queer women, they solved a real problem: knowing, before you ever open your mouth, that she actually dates women. But somewhere in the 2000s, this tool took over dating. And how we date changed so completely that it’s become harder and harder to meet someone in person.
So here's a shift I'm inviting you to make. Stop saying “I'm on HER and it’s awful” and start imagining yourself stepping towards love even when you are afraid.
Excited and Disappointed, at the Same Time
Among lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults who used dating apps in the past year, 85% said the people they encountered left them feeling excited. And 84% said those same people left them feeling disappointed (Gelles-Watnick, 2023).
Nearly everyone feels both. That's the emotional architecture of app dating: hope and letdown running at the same time, often within the same thirty-second scroll. Your nervous system is being asked to open and brace at once, dozens of times a day. No wonder you're tired.
The Apps Solved a Real Queer Problem
The usual advice, put down the phone and talk to someone at the grocery store, is written for straight people. For lesbian and queer women, the hardest part was never the flirting. It was the identification. Does she date women? Is she out? Is it safe to ask?
The apps did change the game: before you open your mouth, you know she actually dates women. Among LGB women, 46% have used online dating, and 18% of partnered LGB women met their partner online (Gelles-Watnick, 2023). So no, I don't think deleting the apps is the answer.
But somewhere along the way, the tool took over dating rituals. Swiping became something we do instead of dating. And the apps made wanting love faintly embarrassing. We built an entire dating culture around pretending we don't want what we want.
But it helps to look at what sits underneath. Among LGB adults who used the apps in the past year, 85% said the people they encountered left them feeling excited. And 84% said those same people left them feeling disappointed. Nearly everyone feels both.
This is where it has taken us, and it is the current emotional blueprint of app dating: hope, disappointment, or rejection running at the same time, often within the same thirty-second scroll. Your nervous system is being asked to open and close at once, dozens of times a day.
No wonder you're tired.
Why This Lands Differently on Queer Women
Scarcity and abundance at once. When the pool is small, every promising woman can start to carry more weight than she should. Meanwhile, the screen whispers that someone better is one swipe away. We hold on too tight when we keep scarcity too close, and then let go too fast when there seem to be so many.
Guardedness mistaken for standards. Many women I work with have survived real relational damage. Somewhere in the healing, discernment hardened into hypervigilance or avoidance - sometimes for years. They scan every interaction for a reason it won't work or for a reason to put off dating, and they usually find one by the third message. This happens when needed protection closes off openness to possibilities, even if they take a while.
Lesbianphobia comes along. The compounded weight of misogyny and homophobia that I named lesbianphobia doesn't stay outside the app. Most intimately, it shows up as the old internal voice that says you're too much, you're not enough, this was never going to work for you anyway.
Try This Before Part 2
The next time you open a dating app, pause for ten seconds, close your eyes, take three deep breaths into your diaphragm, and then ask: Am I opening this to connect, or to soothe? Just notice the answer, without judgment. Awareness is where real change begins (more on that later).
In Part 2, I'll share what queer daters say they actually want (it's more hopeful than you'd think), the one sentence I want you to stop saying to yourself, and why it's time to bring back the lesbian personal ad.
And if you're ready to untangle your own patterns around love now, that's exactly the work I do. Learn about working with me at lovedrlauren.com.
Dr. Lauren Costine is a licensed clinical psychologist, author of Lesbian Love Addiction: Understanding the Urge to Merge, and creator of Love That Fits: An 8-Week Journey for lesbian and queer women.
References
Gelles-Watnick, R. (2023, June 26). About half of lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults have used online dating. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/06/26/about-half-of-lesbian-gay-and-bisexual-adults-have-used-online-dating/
Cover photo: Matilda Wormwood / Pexels
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