"I recently joined Guardian soulmates and I have been amazed at the number of 45 to 50 year old men emailing me, despite my being 30, and my preferences clearly stating that I want someone my own age.

All of these men state on their profiles that they want children and list the 'ideal' match as someone younger than themselves. Needless to say, they come across as rather pathetic.

But it is enraging to think that these men, who must have had partners throughout their 30's, think that now they've 'grown up', they can abandon their female contemporaries in favour of someone with younger looking ovaries.

I have been spending alot of time thinking up new and interesting ways of telling them to f**k off."

'Apparently going out and doing stuff, rather than sitting at home honing your cooking skills in preparation for a man to come along and fill all those long, empty hours, is something the 21st century male can't handle. We should be needy. My friend Bron calls out, when she sees me go off on a date, "Don't tell him you're a doctor!"

Like many middle class women I'm left wondering when so many men will stop seeing relationships as a hierarchy with themselves on the upper step, holding tick box lists: "dress size 10-12" "IQ at least 10 points below mine" "makes my male friends envious" (that's a biggie) "always lets me take the lead in social situations" "always knows less than me, so I can tell her stuff"

I know so many smart, funny, busy women who would love to have a man in their lives, who would have loved to have children but have now accepted that the opportunity has passed, while the men shuffle their feet and say "yes, but she's just too..."'

"This painful situation is so similar to what I went through in my own life in my 30s (from the woman's point of view). I agree with Mariella's appropriately stern response to the letter-writer.

One positive thing from reading this today, I guess, is to know that many other men have treated the women they claim to "love" in this way, and many other women have suffered like I have from the immature waffling of grown men who want every benefit of a committed relationship but none of the responsibility, and who refuse to understand how important having children can be to a woman who wants the chance to at least try to have one (or more), sometime in her life."

continued

"What I am trying to say is that I have treated people, relationships and marriages as consumable goods. I go shopping for the thing I think I want or need, and then when I get it home and find it didn't fill the gap, hit the spot, or look as good at the kitchen table as I had expected, I return it or get rid of it.

That's treating people and relationships as disposable goods. That's using people to meet my needs rather than appreciating them as they are, for who they are."

To the tabloid press, the horrific nature of his most recent offence means that he is – and always will be – a monster. But the deeper evidence suggests we are dealing with a confused young man who desperately needs help

"This brain imaging study of individuals who were still 'in love' with their rejecter supplies further evidence that the passion of 'romantic love' is a goal-oriented motivation state rather than a specific emotion" the researchers concluded, noting that brain imaging showed some similarities between romantic rejection and cocaine craving. "The findings are consistent with the hypothesis that romantic love is a specific form of addiction."