I have nager syndrome which makes me "ugly". I need a guy's opinion...does looks affect the chance of me getting ask to danced? BE HONEST AND DO THINK YOU WILL HURT MY FEELINGS!

On the loast line I meant to type " AND DON'T THINK YOUR HURTING MY FEELING

Hi,

In my opinion I dont care what a male dancer "looks" like (obviously you have to have a dancers physique, meaning not over weight). The most important thing is that you can dance.

My new partner is not handsome and to be honest a tad overweight but he is an amazing dancer and thats all I am concerned about.

you can be the most handsome man in the room but if you cant dance!!! Need I say more.

Recently a very handsome dancer came to our studio wanting work. We all thought WOW!! but when he went through his paces he was not at all very good and didnt get the job.

So...what I am trying to say is work on your posture, your dance technique and if you are not having lessons then do so and get as good as you can, be passionate about dancing and you will have no trouble getting someone to dance with.

Ok is that the same for a girl? I am a teen girl and not a normal looking girl either.

p,

No easy answer for this.

You don't have a problem but if someone treats you badly because of the way you look then they have a problem. But, I'm sure you've heard that before.

Some rejections are obvious, but, I'd also ask you to recognize that it's not always intentional. When I was a teenager (a long time ago) I remember acting distant around people with disabilities. The other person would interpret it as a rejection. Truth was I was trying to be sensitive to their feelings and was afraid if I interacted I might do something they would find offensive. So my good intentions only caused hurt in the other person's eyes.

Life's a learning curve. Over time I learned that if I see a person in a wheelchair struggling with a daily chore I should ask them, "May I open the door for you?" instead of just opening it and to talk to the blind person first instead of their seeing eye dog when the dog is leading them in to traffic. These are two examples where my intentions were misinterpreted.

We don't know the situation you're going into or the kinds of people you'll meet there. We do know they're a lot of jerks out there but there are a lot of good people too and the jerks seem to diminish as we get older. You should also recognize that life is not a fairy tale and everybody, even the so-called "beautiful people" feel rejected by someone or something in their lives.

What's most important is that you're going. We haven't got a magic pill for a perfect night but we want to hear how it turns out. Make sure to come back and vent about what went wrong but also revel in what went right!

OB

phantom,

Just in answer to your question (from a teenage guy), yes, how you look does have an effect on whether you get asked to dance. I said effect... it will not determine. I do, I confess, have a tendency to want to ask the prettiest girls to dance, and it is an unfortunate fact of life that they will often get asked to dance more readily than those less attractive. But I have found that (by trial and error), by far, the most enjoyable girls to dance with are the ones that are most proficient at their art, and love it the most. You get very little enjoyment out of dancing with a girl who, no matter how pretty she happens to be, does not dance well, and doesn't have her heart in what she is doing. I've danced with girls who just didn't seem to "get it" (and I thought guys were supposed to be the reluctant dancers). They did not seem to be having fun, so I didn't have much fun.

I guess what I'm saying is that what dancegirl said, from the female perspective, also applies to guys to a large extent. It won't happen all the time. But the guys who really enjoy dancing will not be primarily concerned with how you look, but how you dance.

And OB... right on the money.

Try taking classes in swing, ballroom, salsa, or tango. The more it becomes about dancing, the more people will value your growing abilities rather than their first impressions. If it's a regular class, the other students will start to get to know the real you. And if you go out dancing with them, strangers will see what you can do to.

What a good topic this is. Phantom, I recently saw a Discovery Channel special on Treacher-Collins, and Perry Romburgh(sp?), so I'm guessing from your post that you have something similar.

It's a sad fact of life that guys (especially young guys) will judge a girl more on her looks than just about anything else. However, for people who enjoy dancing for the pure sake of it, the most important thing is that you can dance. If your condition puts physical limits on what you can do, than it's going to be tough. However, if you're able to become a good dancer, and you find the right dancing circle, I'm sure you won't have any problem finding guys who will ask you to dance. They may not be teenage boys, but you will be asked.

Best wishes

Hey phantom! im a 15 yr old female in high school too, so i know exactly what you mean. ok..girl to girl..(sorry guys!) guys at this age dont really think about what they say or mean before they act. some of them just like OB put it..will mean to hurt you...but most of them have good intentions. dont think about how you look. that will just distract you from the reason you really went there...to DANCE. i know that guys can be very intimidating (can we say awkward silence?), but you have to walk in the room with the attitude of 'i am here for a reason, and that is to show EVERYONE how talented i am'. think of it this way..if a guy cannot accept you for the way you look, why even BOTHER wasting your time and energy on ajerk like that when you could be having fun with someone who DOES accept who you really are? so like i said before..walk in with your head held high, and dont be conserned with your looks, and everything will play out from there. have fun and no worries! post after you get back to let us know how it went!

I do take in swing dancing class,at my high school I am on the board of the swing dancing club. thank you.