Not interested, thanks

This is something that's been bothering me for a while. It seems that every time I come into contact with a middle-aged woman who has a son in his twenties, she always tries to set him up with me.

The conversation will start with a list of her son's faults. Perhaps he spends too much time in bars with "loose" women, drinks too much and seems to have a lot of girlfriends. Or perhaps he doesn't seem to be interested in girls at all and has never had a girlfriend before. Another one that comes up is that he spends six hours or more per day on the computer, refuses to get a job and won't move out or clean up after himself. Maybe he is frivolous with his money and needs to be bailed out often, or has unrealistic goals or something.

And that's where I come in. I'm so wonderful and responsible and pretty and kind and pleasant that I'd surely be a good influence on him. Though I guess it's technically a vote of confidence in my personality it still irritates me and the end product is that I always feel used.

When they bring it up it's always couched in terms of what they and their family will gain out of the arrangement, as if I'm a dumb commodity and I've been magically transformed into a social worker, or counsellor or psychiatrist who works for free. Perhaps it sounds selfish but problems that I can fix is not something I look for in a relationship. Inevitably these things will come up and I'm willing to deal with them when they do, but I won't go out of my way to look for them. I've got enough of my own.

It's fairly old wisdom that you shouldn't bet on being able to change people you're in a relationship with. If they have faults, they should be things you're willing to live with, because they may never change.

The other thing I don't like is the assumption that I'm interested. Very rarely is that question ever asked. For them it seems to be a foregone conclusion and that irritates me a lot.

When I am at work or the hairdresser's or wherever I do not act the same way as I would at home or around friends. I really don't like being taken out of context, especially when sometimes these people have only just met me.