Andrew, my first-ever sugar daddy, planned to meet me for lunch at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel — the same hotel where Richard Gere stayed with Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman. At the end of our date, Andrew would give me an envelope filled with hundreds, but I wasn't an escort like Julia Roberts' character — I was a " sugar baby. A sugar baby is typically defined as a younger woman who dates wealthy, older men. A "sugar arrangement" can consist of anything from a financially established man mentoring a younger woman with free business advice to money for sex.
He may also offer to pay her bills as part of their arrangement. Trips and other expensive gifts often factor into the mix. When I sugar dated for one year, I was a year-old divorced mother of two. Although I was older than the average sugar baby, my sugar daddies didn't mind.
In fact, my age was part of the appeal, mainly because I was a mature and well-rounded adult. Here's what it was like to be a sugar baby in my 40s. Andrew and I met on "Seeking" in , back when it was still called " Seeking Arrangement. But sugar babies and daddies can meet anywhere, even on traditional dating apps like Tinder. There are no set rules on how to have a sugar relationship. Partners negotiate their own terms.
Sugar daddies may offer to pay their sugar babies' bills, but only after they've established a relationship. A few sugar daddies did offer to pay mine. I declined because it felt like I would be involving a man too intimately in my personal finances. At the time, I was still trying to disentangle myself from my ex-husband, so I preferred to receive a gift on each date. I wanted to feel like my time was valued. For some sugar daddies, this was too expensive.
After matching on the site, a man could respond to me with the amount he felt comfortable with. If he offered me less, it was up to me to decide if I still wanted to meet. Some people argue that accepting money on a date is degrading. Honestly, I felt more degraded by men on traditional dating apps who believed "Netflix and chill" was an appropriate first-date option.
