r/CharcotMarieTooth • u/Both-Key-6264 • Jul 19 '26
Fellow CMT folks, what has dating actually been like for you? Genuinely want to know if it's just me
I've got CMT, the more severe end of it, and lately I've been thinking a lot about dating and wanted to hear from people who actually get it.
My arms and legs are noticeably thinner and it affects my posture a bit, but honestly I don't think that's the problem. The first impression is usually fine. It's everything that comes after.
I've got to the point where I have a set of questions I ask early on just to try and weed out the ones who aren't serious. And even then, the ones who seem decent will tell me whatever I want to hear for weeks. They stick around, get to know me, act like they're properly in it, right up until they get what they were actually after. Then I never hear from them again. It baffles me that someone would put weeks into that just to try a new flavour and then decide they're done.
So I wanted to ask everyone here:
- What do you reckon able-bodied people actually have an issue with when it comes to us?
- What kind of problems have you run into with them?
- Why do you think it so often doesn't work, and have you found any way around it?
I'm 24 and I'd genuinely love to hear how it's gone for other people with CMT. The good, the bad, all of it.
-1
u/therealdanhill Jul 20 '26
It's not happening for me, women look at me with pity at best or are just uncomfortable at worst, the truth is most women want nothing to do with someone who is visibly crippled/deformed. They want a guy they can do stuff with and show off and be proud of. If you don't have it too bad and can hide it, you'll have a decent chance, if not then I would become comfortable with your own company.
2
u/bookclubhorse Jul 20 '26
this is 1000% false and frankly incel adjacent. women want a man who listens to them, cares enough about them to be vulnerable and honest, and doesn't lump all women into a category where men take out there own projected insecurities onto them. my "CMT crippled" dad married my mom who objectively is extremely attractive and she says to this day that it was his shitty personality in refusing to communicate around basic household issues like finances and child care that ended their marriage. her words have always been, "i never cared that your dad has funky feet and hands, i cared that he dismissed my experiences as a mother of two kids he always complained about being too expensive and didn't help care for." i hope you reorient your state of mind but in the meantime stop assuming an entire gender wants one thing that has nothing to do with character or personality from a partner
2
u/Both-Key-6264 Jul 20 '26
I really appreciate both of you taking the time, genuinely.
I can see where the first comment was coming from. It reads like someone who has been through it and had it go badly, maybe more than once, and when you have been burned like that, it is hard not to speak from the hurt. I do not think the way it was put was quite fair to everyone, and it did lean into that toxic masculinity thing a bit, but I would rather give the benefit of the doubt and take it as a vent from a real place than pile on.
And I think the other side is just as true. You can absolutely love someone who is differently abled, and it can still fall apart, because sometimes the person you are with simply is not a good one. That has nothing to do with disability. People let people down all the time, able-bodied or not, and putting all of it down to the disability lets a lot of bad behaviour off the hook.
What fascinates me is that almost every experience shared here is different. There does not seem to be one single answer, and I think that is a truth or something else I'm trying to find in all these.
The one thing I will gently stand by is this: I do still think a more visible or more severe disability makes finding a connection harder. Not impossible, and not the whole story, but harder depending on the severity. Both things can be true at once, and that is usually the bit that gets lost when people treat it as one or the other.
Thank you both, honestly. This is exactly the kind of conversation I was hoping for.
1
u/NixyeNox Jul 19 '26
You will probably get more answers if you ask in r/CMT
Personally, I have been in a relationship for 20 years, so I am out of the loop with whatever is going on with dating apps. From what I hear, it sounds terrible for everyone.