Despite trying my luck at gay bars, strumming up some false charm to flirt with everyone at work, and being set up by what few friends I had, I was luckless in the love game.

That is, until I decided that I was no longer too proud to pimp myself out on a dating site.

I have always been the type to fall in love far too easily. Yet, as many of you might sympathize, the rest of the world has never been too quick to fall for me.

I realized promptly when I came out that the sheer quantity of my potential dates had dwindled to a sliver of what it once was—and I wasn’t very good with meeting people to begin with.

Unless you regularly go out to queer-abundant areas of your city or town, there’s absolutely no guarantee you’ll even cross paths with someone of your orientation.

To start, when you’re exclusively looking for those who identify as LGBTQ, there is less than 5% of the population who do (as calculated by Gallup polls in 2012). You can go ahead and nearly cut that number in half if you’re only looking for women.

[interaction id=”5613a22877aa6c1a03542bef”]

The fraction gets smaller when you factor in how many of those few live in your general vicinity, and who might go to in the same place at the same time.

Then there are so many other variables when looking for your same-sex other-half beyond simply meeting them: Will they like you? Will either of you know that the other is looking for the same thing? How to make a move and risk rejection? Are they already dating someone?

If you want to increase your chances of meeting the right person by any amount, I do suggest getting over the negative stigma and trying a dating website or phone application.

There are plenty of others out there looking for the same thing that you are, who might be too afraid to put themselves out there.

You might just find the perfect person, who otherwise you never would have come across.