After a brutal, long-drawn-out break up with a guy I had been off and on with for over two years, I finally recently decided to get back into the "dating" game. I put "dating" in quotes because the game has changed so much over the years. Traditional dinner dates turned into club grinding boozy make-outs. Ya know, the whole: sit down at a loud bar talking and attempting to somewhat get to know each other awkwardly before that "one-too-many" drinks happens and you end up making out in a corner? That's what "dating" is now. This is all thanks to the recent spike in online dating. The whole point of social media dating apps, such as Tinder, Bumble, and Heartbeat is to make the first interaction with someone less awkward. First you match with one another on said app. Then you start talking and eventually you pick a day to finally meet. You walk into the bar and there he is: your tinder-fella! Your first date goes well, you get drunk, go back to your place to have sex, and then you two never speak again. A true Tinderella story! For some, dating apps are the only way to go. I have friends that swear by the gods of Tinder. For others, it's a casual way to meet friends. For some, it's all about the sex. Dating apps are full of diversity in that aspect. In my short time on Tinder, I've seen it all. I've been harassed, complimented, and even taken out a couple of times. This article is all about my Tinder experience thus far (yes - despite all that has happened, I'm still on that Tinder grind). It's not meant to promote or demote the popular dating app, it's more to share what happened to me and say that it can happen to anyone who isn't careful.

I'll admit that I was open minded to any possibility when I created my Tinder app. I let my rowdy personality show through my pictures and my bio featured below:

I like to have fun, joke around, and poke at the fragility of masculinity in today's society. I also like to rock the dark lipstick and look flame when I go out. When I first downloaded Tinder, I asked my guy friends tell me what to write in my bio to attract "Mr. Right".

"Make sure they know you're in college. Guys like smart girls."

"Be funny! Every man wants a woman who can make him laugh."

"Make sure they know you're a Dem. I hate finding out my girls for Hillary half-way through a date..."

"Your pics should be sexy but also, guys like fun girls. Post party pics!"

I have a wide variety of friends who all knew exactly what I was looking for in creating the perfect TInderella appearance. And they were right! After a few glasses of wine and some "right swiping" action, I got my first message. A cheesy pickup line, kind of expected that. But nonetheless, nothing sexual. No unsolicited dick pics, so we're off to a good start! The second message was much expected as well. "DTF?" He wrote. The third guy is a sweetheart. Totally not what I was expecting. He did not immediately hit me up wanting to "Netflix and Chill", there was no corny pickup line involved, just a genuine compliment. So far, I've hit all three of the standard Tinder men. It's been exactly what I expected.

Below is another example of a bad Tinder match. A friend of mine shared her experience on Facebook and I got her permission to share it here. Here's what she has to say on the matter:

"I have never considered posting anything of my own like this on Facebook until now. He opened with "hi" and the rest you can read. I am sickened by the language, the blatant misogyny, along with his general disposition. Please understand that this is why feminism exists. Because I said one sarcastic word, he defaced women as an entire group. I am disgusted."

I have heard of men acting like this towards women online. They hide behind their phone screens as their fragile masculinity crumbles beneath them. Since my overall experience with Tinder has been pleasant (that might be a slight overkill, but let's roll with it), it never truly crossed my mind that it could happen to me. What I truly did not expect was the fourth messenger. I got his first message around 3 o'clock in the morning. Unfortunately, I can't share the original messages on here because I un-matched him in order to get him to stop messaging me once this whole fiasco was over. Tinder has a feature that shows how far away from someone you are. I just so happened to be "less than a mile away" from him. When we started talking. he seemed nice. He happened to be a bouncer at a bar that I used to go to regularly with friends, he graduated from my high school's rival, and he lives in the same apartment complex as I do.... Right across the street. One night, he kept calling me over and over again. I work at a bar downtown and was at work until 4 in the morning when I finally checked my phone to see that he had called half a dozen times. When I listened to my voicemail, he had threatened to break into my apartment and "let my dogs out on the street" if I didn't call him back. I rushed home in tears thinking I would find my sweet little dogs roaming the streets of Greenwood. Fortunately, I never told him what apartment I live in. All he knew was the building number - although looking back, giving him that was a death wish since it is not hard to figure out what home is mine based on just looking at it. I woke up the next morning to my phone ringing again. I picked up to hear him apologizing profusely about his "drunk behavior" the night before. Keep in mind - I [still] have never met this guy before. I hung up after telling him I didn't want anything to do with him. I put my phone down and got ready for work thinking that my Tinder nightmare was over. A few days later, it began again. The following texts are from him:

To be honest, rereading this makes me just as angry as I was when I received the texts. He had texted me to ask how I was doing and I responded with the classic: "new phone who dis?" When he responded with his name, I told him yet again that I wanted nothing to do with him. In between these texts, he would call and leave a voicemail saying how he knew I was being a "prissy bitch" who "needed some dick in her life". After protesting his requests and ignoring his phone calls, he sent me every girls worst nightmare: an unsolicited dick pic. It has taken a while, but according to social media outlets such as Reddit, officers are finally taking cyber harassment seriously. I hope that's truly the case since receiving a threat after an unsolicited dick pic was pretty scary. Even though I live directly across the street from the Sheriffs office and my apartment has round-the-clock security, I have never been so afraid to be in my own home before. Nobody should feel like that because of someone they came into contact with online.

After another week or so of dealing with these types of texts and empty threats, I ran into him at the bar he works at. I didn't know he was there at the time until I was being forcefully removed from the premises. The other bouncers called me a slut and said that I had "too much to drink" (off the record, I had not even finished the one drink that I bought from there and it was my first stop that night). While being shamed publicly by the bouncers, my friends came to the rescue and we all left. Shocked by what had just happened, I decided to grab a few more drinks and ride the night out with my girl friends. I decided that I would not let some guy who I barely even knew get in my way of a good time! My friends and I danced the night away and shut down the club at 3 in the morning. After getting some food and waiting for the Uber fare prices to go down, we were finally on our way home. I live the closest and am always dropped off first and when we got to my apartment, my heart stopped. Flashing lights lit up the complex and officers were standing on my lawn. My friends got out of the cab with me and we asked what was going on. I heard my name and when I turned around, there he was, my Tinderfella, sitting in the back of a cop car with his hands behind his back. I found out that he had been drunkenly screaming my name outside of my building at 3 o'clock in the morning and then resisted when he was asked to leave when the police got the disturbance call from my neighbors.

Having someone I never really knew harass me like this was one of the worst things I can imagine going through. The fear or him coming back (since he then knew exactly which apartment I live in) still haunts me when I try to sleep. Although rumor has it he moved out a week after the incident, I still worry if he is going to try and come back. This is one of the biggest fears that women have when online dating. You never know somebody's true intentions from behind a computer or cell phone screen. Anybody can pretend to be anything they want. Even with the strongest guard up, you still might not be safe. Tinder, as well as the rest of the internet, can be a scary place. And I say that wholeheartedly. It is easy to hide behind your phone screen. As we've seen on MTV's "Catfish", some people go to extreme lengths to bait others. We sometimes hear stories in the news about women getting murdered because they rejected men on and offline. I still stand in my decision in that I stood up to this guy. Despite what he might have done, he did not deserve the easy way out of me giving into him or quietly going away. His ego was too fragile to handle rejection and because of that, he lashed out with violence as many men do. I guess what we can learn from this is: #masculinitysofragile. And be careful when using apps like Tinder. You never know who's out there.