Cute But Still Single

 Welcome to my new blog, cute but still single.  I’m in my 30s, and literally on the heels of yet another breakup. I've decided it's time to share some wisdom.   This blog is  for anyone else out there, male or female, who is creeping up in age. You find that getting yourself into a healthy, committed, long-term relationship still eludes you.  And you can’t seem to figure out “why”.  Well I’m gonna tell you exactly why, and where it is we’re all continually going wrong. Very few successfully coupled people come back to show clueless singles the way, or share the real truths until you've jacked something up and need thier advice. So now you can learn along with me how to avoid trainwrecking your own love life. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

Lying on your online dating profile serves no one. Especially not you.

Have you ever matched with someone on a dating profile, only to discover that they’re lying about a critically important detail that drew you to them in the first place? 

Why do people do this??? And what does it say about those people if you read between the lines?

When you lie on your dating profile, at best it says that you’re not tech savvy enough to contact a company to get problems solved.  At worst, there is nothing like a big fat lie to scream “Look at me, ladies!!! I’m in my 30s and I’m wildly insecure about myself!!!!”.  

I legitimately had a guy drive in traffic for over an hour to meet me for a date, only for him to show up and reveal that he had lied about his age by a decade. 

Don’t lie about critical details on your dating profile.  There is no greater turn off in the dating arena than a guy who is insecure, and/or a guy who is a liar.  You’re not a man if you lie about important details. You’re still a fucking baby.  And there is nothing attractive about immaturity for women of quality.  Grow up already.  Or just, please get off the platform because you are literally a waste of space.   We are so over guys like you.  I can’t speak for every woman out there but I report liars on dating sites 110% of the time. Because it’s not okay. 

At my age, when you know what you’re looking for, it makes a huge difference how old you are, and how you feel about children in your future.  We’re at a critical juncture in our 30s. 

If you can’t even be honest with yourself about who you are, what makes you think anyone would ever want to date you?  Hell-o.  There’s no integrity there, no self-acceptance, no courage, or confidence.  And not only is that all a turn off, it’s truly sad. Because you’re way too old to be in your 30s or beyond and still spinning lies like a little boy.  

We hope you grow up one day. But if that day is not today, fine with me. Because my answer to considering you as a valid dating prospect is also “not today.  Not ever”.  

[cutebutstillsingle]

[cutebutstillsingle]

Isn’t it annoying when chronically single women perpetuate this lie...

Chronically/ tragically/ hopelessly romantically single women love to emerge out of the singles quicksand, and suddenly **poof**--  they think they have all the answers about why they believe they aren’t single anymore. 

And it’s fucking annoying. 

You know why you’re not single anymore? 

Pure. Random. Chance/ Coincidence.  

And then you’re going to spin whatever story supports your own confirmation bias about singles/ non-singles. 

The truth is that finding a romantic partner is legitimately a purely random crap shoot.  Literally no one on earth can do anything or not do anything that makes them more or less likely to magically, randomly meet a person out of billions of people on earth, who becomes their next boyfriend or life partner.  And even if he becomes your boyfriend/ partner, if you don’t get into a marriage that can last longer than, idk... 10 years?  I don’t even think I consider your advice valid. 

People may *delude yourselves* into thinking that “working on you” or “not looking” or “putting yourself back out there” or “trying harder”, or whatever delusion you want to say is the reason for why you now coincidentally have a boyfriend, is why you now are no longer single. 

But no. That’s not how it works.  Acquiring a life partner is not like trying to make a baby.  It’s not a thing where “the more you do it” or “the moment you let go of desiring it”, it’s magically going to come your way.  It’s a two-way agreement.  You have to be attracted to him, AND he has to be attracted back to you.  You have to know what you want and agree that you’re satisfied enough to give up your single status for him, AND some man has to waltz along who is even desiring more than just sex.  

Literally no one on earth can magically control how anyone else on earth chooses to feel about them, or what anyone else on earth truly desires.  We cannot control who we’re attracted to, why, or when and if that person shows up; nor can we read into anyone’s soul or intentions and fully know what those actually are.  There are lots of men who are really good at acting like long-term commitment material until the day they’re suddenly ready to dump your ass. 

If you aren’t single right now, it’s pure random chance. 

Just like it’s pure random chance that someone’s husband of forever might die tomorrow.  

There are certain things in life that are simply never in our control; and I think finding love is one of them.  There is nothing you can do or not do that will ever change how anyone else chooses to feel about you and what level of commitment someone else is truly desiring or ready for.  It’s not up to you. 

So can everyone please stop putting videos on YouTube about “how you finally found love” or how you healed from heartbreak and voila-- now you have a boyfriend?  These videos don’t actually help anyone and are highly misleading and annoying.  They just perpetuate a lie that more people are partnered than they are single.  Because ain’t nobody making annual videos about how they are still single.  New year, same status.  When in fact research proves it’s like a 50/50 split.  Half of us are single, half of us aren’t.  And even amongst those who are married, many of them aren’t happy, many of them aren’t having sex, and many of them are cheating and lying about how they really feel about it all.  

[cutebutstillsingle]

There’s nothing that baffles me more than when people retort back to single people that the reason we’re still single is because we don’t love ourselves enough. Like “self love” is a magic bullet for long-term singleness. If that’s all it took, I’m confident a lot of us would not still be single. Here are my arguments against “self love is why you’re still single”… 1. Perhaps the exact opposite phenomenon might actually be at play– you love yourself more than enough. But if all you’re surrounded by is a bunch of other people (ahem… probably men) who *don’t* love themselves, then how can you find someone able to love you back? 2. I know a LOT of girls who don’t love themselves and manage to find themselves in committed, long-term relationships. 3. How can other people randomly conclude something that audacious about anyone who is not themselves? Are other people spending 24/7 with me, shadowing my every move, reading my thoughts? LOL. 4. If ‘dating myself’ was a marathon I’d be an ultramarathon runner and in first place, y’all. Sometimes it’s like “are there even any ways left TO love myself? Because I’ve been spending 24/7 by myself, dating myself, spoiling myself, working my ass off, allowing myself to have damn near all the things I desire, doing things I desire, going where I desire, working on myself, doing all the therapies, reading all the self-help books, doing all the workouts, eating all the ice cream, pursing everything that interests me– because I can. Does it even get more self-lovely? 5. To bring it back full circle, you can love you to the end of the earth, and never fill a hole that remains perpetually empty: you still lack a partner. A companion. A helper in life. A side kick. You can’t kiss your own neck. There’s no one next to you enjoying that sunset, except your puppy. I can’t be my own boyfriend. And a lot of people seem to think that if you love yourself “enough”, you won’t need a boyfriend. False.

[cutebutstillsingle]

wheeeeew here’s a hard one to swallow.  But I cannot produce this blog without doing it due diligence. 

Ladies... have you ever dated a guy who totally seemed like a catch, totally seemed like they were into you, and then per usual, some shit goes sideways, he flees, and yet another relationship doesn’t work out?  

Well did it ever occur to you to consider what if maybe, just maybe, this dude got sexually abused in his past? This is a huge secret a lot of men are carrying around with him that they do not go around disclosing.  In some cases, the truth has been repressed. 

Does he have a history of alcohol and drug abuse?  Is he physically unhealthy overweight, or obese?  Does he cheat on you habitually or refuse to be in a committed, monogamous relationship?  Does he have gender identity confusion?  Does he have a history of being incarcerated? Is he physically abusive?   Verbally abusive? Does he run from every romantic relationship he’s ever in?  Does he have a history of one or multiple divorces? 

Aaaaaall of these signs can very well be manifestations of the horrific trauma from being sexually molested or sexually abused as children.  And many men are never going to disclose unless they feel safe enough.  

Men... have you ever dated that woman who immediately opens her legs up to you?  She seems emotionally unstable if you had to be honest with yourself? She’s a raging alcoholic or abuses drugs? Has she ever been physically violent towards you?  It’s possible that she, too, was sexualized at too early of an age.  Anyone who has sex before the age of sixteen; and maybe even at ages around 16 but who had sex with grown adult men instead of with peers their own age, has experienced childhood sexual abuse.  

I’m going to let you take that however you will.  

It is also possible that many of the behaviors outlined above are the results of other flavors of trauma.  But it is the God’s honest truth that a lot more people have been sexually abused as children than you would like to think. So I felt the need to shine a light on that possibility specifically.  Men with ex wives, raising children as single dads could have at one point been the victim of sexual abuse.   You never know. 

I have a friend who works as a prison guard and the stories he tells me about how many people are in there for child sexual abuse are astounding.  I live in a state where sex trafficking of teenage girls and women is unbelievable.  The perpetrators go onto high school campuses to “hunt” for them and keep them in the cycle. 

So I don’t care how many people roll their eyes or shrink away in horror upon reading this one-- it can’t not be said.  

If you were a victim of childhood sexual abuse, here’s a resource: psych central , and here's a resource. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

I was thinking the other day.  Success begets success, and people go further towards pursuits if they have the right mentors in their corner.  

Well the exact same opposing phenomenon applies to dating.  If all you keep dating is unhealed, traumatizing and traumatized, broken people, then all you ever know is relationship failure.   Like a soldier in battle who keeps experiencing assault after assault, repeatedly stepping on land mines, booby traps, and detonating explosions every time he tries to proceed towards safe ground, there comes a point where one can only experience so many failures and dating traumas before the natural response is that... 

a) you’re either deadened and disillusioned

b)  you give up, and/or 

c) you start to experience soul famine and soul death.  

Because reciprocal and true love is an experience your soul craves, if  successful, healthy and lasting romantic connection can’t ever come to pass no matter what you try to do to experience success, your soul begins to wilt or rage.  

Every time she thinks she’s one date closer, he too, turns around and abandons her.  And if she’s lucky enough to even get some breadcrumbs of clues as to what the hell went wrong “this time”, he reveals some kind of emotionally unwell aspect of himself paired with the unwillingness to allow her to accept him as he is.  And paired with the unwillingness to do the work to heal himself. 

Here, she thought this dude was FINALLY going to represent someone low-drama, healthy, and as close to normal and whole as reasonably possible.  She’s given up the delusion that perfection exists in a human partner. She’s done a shit ton of  therapy and self-work.  She’s now seeing the writing on the wall with the no-go’s, and she’s no longer allowing herself to be mistreated,  used, and abused. She’s no longer fucking every dude who wants to have her-- she did the work.  

And yet, there are so many broken singles in the dating pool, especially from online dating sites, that there is basically an insanely low likelihood that she will ever succeed in romantic endeavor. The boat is only going to paddle straight if both sides are paddling evenly.  It can’t be just one person’s efforts alone. So she’s just going around in circles, in circles, in circles. Failure, after failure, after failure.  There comes a point where she has to accept this goal is not a one-person goal; and if you can’t trust the other team mate to show up and show up successfully, she is uncontrollably fated for continual romantic failure. 

Human beings were designed for emotional and relational romantic connection. Love is a human need.  And if you keep failing at experiencing it, you start to develop a mistrust.  Just like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs during childhood.  During childhood, love is freely given to you in an ideal situation.  During romance, that shit is no longer freely given to you. You have to be “good enough” to earn it; and hope you’re going to earn it at all, firstly; and secondly from someone else who can love healthily and love sufficiently. 

The problem is, society’s character as a whole is getting worse and worse (at least in America).  We now live in a time where no one means what they say. No one wants to commit.  Online dating is such a horrible shit show that no one has corrected.  No one wants to connect with strangers anymore unless there’s money involved.  Half the strangers are straight up psycho, as evidenced by their off the wall dating profiles.  

 Friends cancel friends.  Guys only want to “date” you if there’s something in it for them (sex), and they’ll turn right back around and abandon you at the first sign of discontent or as soon as they’ve pillaged and plundered a woman for an ejaculation.  Women do the same thing to men for financial leverage.  

You can’t predict if someone is going to flake on the plans for a date, ghost you, or date you for a decade and never ask to marry you.  Or you might get married and be cheated on and dumped anyway, because even marriage vows, which once used to be sacred, don’t mean shit anymore. Don’t even get me started on the paranoia that COVID has pumped into the modern dating scene as of 2020.  People are now so terrified of one another, a solid 50% of people refuse to even meet up with anyone found on an online dating platform. 

So how in the hell is anyone supposed to trust anyone romantically anymore, if society as a whole is no longer a safe and trustworthy entity?  

[cutebutstillsingle]

Here’s one every dater should practice: the relationship postmortem autopsy. 

Anytime you end a relationship you need to go back in and asses why that shit died, OK? And know that it takes two to start and two to end any relationship.  

I walked away from my most recent relationship death with two critical questions that I will now be sure to ask of every single guy who pulls the cord on a relationship with me, but...

I won’t be sharing them here because they will be part of a program I’m developing, sorry!

Nevertheless, anyone can do a relationship postmortem.  Other coaches and experts have recommended a similar review process.  Relationship expert Tony Gaskins calls it “analyzing the game film”, which he pulls from his history as an athlete.  David Goggins (though he’s not a relationship coach, he’s arguably a success role model) describes a similar process of review the military requires soldiers to go through after each completed and failed mission.  

You have to take the time to assess your actions, your choices, your successes, and your failures; because if you don’t, you will continue to have the same blind spots, repeat the same mistakes, and you will carry the same weaknesses into every future relationship.  

The only caveat I give is that sometimes we make decisions when we’re partnered with certain people that seem like they created “destructive sabotage” for you. In actuality, sometimes certain decisions that appear to be destructive decisions at first glance, are actually excisions.  Sometimes certain people, certain connections, certain influences, the potential for scarred emotional tissue in your life, need to be excised.  And the universe will use that relationship to do it.  

Did you know that when plastic surgeons perform an operation, they actually remove some of the tissue below the incision so that when the cut heals, it will heal flat, and won’t leave a scar?  That’s how certain happenings work during a breakup.  Sometimes things need to be cut out in, in what appears to be a painful or shocking way at the time, in order to reduce the tension and not leave a lasting mark in the future.  

Second part of this... “dumping them is not always the answer”...

A LOT of guys are avoidant-attachment style, or what Pia Mellody calls “avoidant love addicted”.  This kind of person habitually flees from any true shot at emotional intimacy and connection.  So I could not write these posts without mentioning that phenomenon.  

If you want to see yourself be successful in romantic connections, you cannot make a habit of dumping a partner every time the going gets tough.  After enough of my own dating failures I’m comfortable sharing the confident observation that if a partner dumps you out of nowhere, or at the first incident of a problem, they do not yet know how to problem-solve while staying in a relationship.  And if a partner is not a willing or able problem-solver while staying in connection, that’s not good.  

There is something called “fair weather friends”-- as long as there are no problems, the two of you consider yourselves lovers; and you’re willing to emotionally connect. But if it starts to rain and one or both of you can’t weather the storm; if, when the raindrops begin to fall and the wind begins to blow, you discover that the relationship begins to melt and blow away like paper dolls, that’s not good.   

I’ve literally done this exact thing before.  Textbook.  I came to my own conclusion without consulting my partner that I had to exit this relationship in order to reduce my own anxiety and fear that I could not handle feeling.  I dumped what may have been the closest thing to a soulmate if you went off of our compatibility and check boxes ticked.  When what you should be doing in these moments is communicating. “I’m feeling afraid because...”, “I’m feeling worried about...”.  “This situation/ happening is giving me anxiety; and I need...”.  Most importantly you must have the ability to recognize that the problem is even arising. Those all-too-familiar feelings of anxiety and tension are rising in you.  Those feelings of fear and panic that are making you want to jump off the skateboard that is picking up momentum as it rolls down the hill, faster and faster.  You want to jump off the board because you are convinced you’re going to crash and burn.  

... but what if you didn’t?  What if you stayed on and successfully rode that shit down the hill until it cruised to a pleasant stop?  

Well that is relationships, over and over and over.  Up, and down, and up, and downhill.  Fast, then slow.  Exciting, then boring.  Growth, stagnation. Storms, then sun. Sunshine, then rain.  rainbows. Arcs.  Cycles. 

One of you needs to have the wisdom and strength to know how to pull out the umbrella, rain boots, and parkas.  And it’s going to be the person who has been caught in a storm before, and successfully learned how to not get caught in storms.  The problem solver is going to be a winner in romantic relationships.  

You want that partner who knows how to prepare for the hurricane.  Who has the fully stocked food stash, the water jugs, the flashlights, and batteries. The one who has ideas for how to respond to the inevitable challenges that I most assure you, are going to arise in every single romantic relationship.  Being a willing problem solver, and even better, a willing teammate in order to synergize around conquering problems-- that is the person you want to be dating.  You want the man who’s like “baby don’t worry-- I’m gonna get us through this storm, we’re gonna make it out”.  You don’t want to be dating the man who runs away with his tail between his legs every time the winds pick up, ladies.  

and yes I direct this more in a gender-specific direction because it is the men who tend to run away and abandon more often than it is the women.  Women don't tend to put up with bullshit so we’ll straight up walk out. We’re not gonna run away.  I hope some men read this!

[cutebutstillsingle]

This is a thing in these modern times.  While it may seem drastic to over-fear your singleness, the actual truth is that romantic partnership is right in the same lane as who gets to have kids, who gets cancer, who gets hired for a job, and all the other shit no one can ever technically predict with absolute certainty. 

 It’s not actually guaranteed that anyone who isn’t in one right now will in fact end up in a committed, happy relationship.  Even with billions of people on earth and even despite the alleged statistics that at any given time, half the population is actually single.   Even for the people who are happily married right now, you cannot predict what will happen tomorrow.  True commitment is never, ever a certainty. 

Compound that fear with the truth that we’re having this full-on romantic revolution in the 2020s where it’s now socially acceptable to do and be whatever the hell you could absolutely dream up romantically, and it now genuinely validates the fear that lasting, healthy romance might not happen for you.  Because it might actually not. Or, based on the menu of options now out there,  it demands that you have to be willing to settle for what you can get, or expand your possibilities and say ‘yes’ to all these new alternative formats of relationship if you want a chance at lasting love.  

I can definitely say the online dating scene is NOT helping anyone get clear on what they desire romantically, and how to find exactly who it is they prefer to be partnered with.  TBH, fear alone, fear of what’s out there, will drive people to just learn to be satisfied with what you can get.  Like even if you’re not 100% sure the person you’re dating is “it”, when you look back across the water from the loveboat after you’ve left the dock, and see all the people doing all the  shit that you’re just not about-- the narcissists manipulating people, the cheaters, the baby daddies that lie about having kids, the overweight and unhealthy hotties trapped in an obese body, the guys with substance abuse and domestic abuse problems, the guys who want some sort of sexually deviant freak-- when you look back out into the singles pool and see whose in there, you will stay with what you manage to get, if what you can get represents any degree of stable, committed, healthy romantic promise. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

ahhhh, moving way the hell too fast... or are you?  Does this whole “pacing of a healthy relationship” thing elude you?  It honestly eludes me, too.  

On the one hand most people these days know about the ‘ol love bomb.  When he makes you feel like...

 you were his future wife from the moment you met.  Until that day he fucking discards you like complete trash he refuses to ever speak to again because you vocalized the first-ever highly valid doubt about your relationship soundness.  

And then on the other hand I know of couples where the guy told the girl he loved her within two weeks of meeting her, and now they’ve been happily married for years.  

Likewise, I know of many, many instances from myself and many friends where if you hop in bed with a dude too fast, he will use you like the condom you helped him fill, and toss you in the same damn place that condom ended up.  He never loved nor valued you.  It was all about getting in your pants. And if you had only forced the situation to slow down and not dropped your panties, maybe he wouldn’t have been able to play you like that. 

And on the other hand, I have heard of a shockingly huge number of couples who fucked after the first date and now they’ve all been married for a decade plus.  

No one has the answer, really. Or, it’s safe to say if you don’t know the answer, you’re at a higher risk for failing in relationships versus the people who seem to know how to navigate relationship pacing appropriately.  

I can say that you’ll never lose out if you make him wait for sex.  You can give yourself an orgasm any time you need one.  But I once heard someone say “there is no condom for your heart and your memory bank”.  So decide wisely. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

If you went into every relationship with the mainframe that this thing is about to last for the next 10 years +, that mental shift alone would change the entire way you approached the relationship.  Coming at it as if you were forced to be stuck in it for the long haul, versus approaching it with the mentality that if you don’t like anything about it, you can just hit the emergency escape button. 

This dude I went on a date with once said he read some article posing the question “If everyone was forced to renew marriage licenses every five years, how would it affect people’s level of commitment?”.  

Now there’s a thought to chew on. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

This has been a mistake I’ve definitely made, and which my ex made. This misguided, cut-throat, perfect-or-else mentality may put people at risk to throw away perfectly wonderful relationships.  

You *must* develop a tolerance for a certain level of imperfection, challenges, problems, disagreement, and less-than-ideal situations when you date.  Because every healthy, normal, long-lasting relationship is full of them.  There is no such thing as a long-term anything that doesn’t include imperfect situations, compromising, or problems. You just shouldn’t be *harming* each other.  That’s the difference. No one ever said relationships were easy to be in. They should ideally be more good than bad, and they should not involve undue harm.  But yes. Yes, they’ll involve a lot of imperfection and problems the two of you have to learn to figure out.  From girlfriend to the end.  So it’s best to go into it understanding that’s how it works. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

oops. looks like I did some editing in the past and this is the new #15. LOL

[cutebutstillsingle]

My ex boyfriend’s answer to me was “nope”. Our very *first* problem arose, in what felt like a dream-come-true relationship; and it  was a suuuuper valid problem.   I had every identity marker taken away from me, including my 13-year-long career that I had quite literally worked my entire life for, as a result of the pandemic.  I think that qualifies as a valid problem. Joblessness.  And so with us, 

this problem surfaced, we both  bailed so fast it wasn’t even funny. 

To stick with the car analogy, my rationale at the time was this: if your car was just broken into and stripped, and the vandals took every possible thing from under the hood except the engine, would you feel like it was time to take that car on a road trip with a passenger?  Absolutely not.  This was a fear-based, irrational rationale.  I now understand that at least half the population was getting their “cars” broken into thanks to the ‘VID; and that what makes me awesome and what allowed me to bounce back from having my entire identity stripped away is that I’m creative and resourceful AF.  I went from having no job to having 3.5 jobs. Could be 4 if I fully pulled the trigger on that last 0.5.  

But I was terrified after watching my 13-year career vanish in the blink of an eye, and I was shook.  So I initiated a breakup rather impulsively which I should not have done (thus the point of this reason for remaining single).  But also on the flip side, on his end, I realized I made an impulsive decision and tried to go back and talk to him in less than 24 hours time. 

And instead of being willing to talk to his girlfriend, hear, and learn what was going on in her mind at the time; instead of having the desire to understand why his partner suddenly found herself questioning this seemingly wonderful relationship for the first time ever; instead of reminding her what was so wonderful and what was going well in the relationship, and instead of reassuring her that he was with her no matter how stripped to the bone her life could ever get because what made her awesome wasn’t all the temporary external stuff... he just dumped her.  And bailed on the entire relationship. 

And that’s weak AF.  Give the man a round of applause for maturity and courage, ladies and gents.  Especially b/c in our case I wrote him this long love letter and gave him every possible opportunity not to respond like a completely selfish coward.  

TL:DR = Whenever problems surface in your relationship, which I most assure you, they will!  You need to stop and ask “Why? Why does my partner feel this way? Why might my partner be responding like this?”. Just like you would if your car’s check engine light suddenly came on.  And also ask yourself “How might we be able to fix this problem together?” and “What does my partner need in order to be successful in continuing on this journey comfortably, and perhaps stronger than before this problem arose?”.  Ask yourself those questions before you jump to “it’s time to throw it all away”. 

I’ll say this a million times throughout this blog-- the only way to have a successful, lasting, long-term relationship is to stay in it.  Don’t get me wrong, certain problems do indeed “total” a romantic relationship like a head-on collision.   And in response to those circumstances, you must be willing to part ways in order to save yourself from a total wreck. But a good chunk of relationship problems are indeed solvable. It may not involve an easy fix, but it can be done.  And in today’s day and age, we live in this “throw away” mentality in regards to a lot of things-- even our relationship possibilities. 

So if you’re the kind of person who bails on every potential keeper in the face of most relationship problems, you will never see yourself experience relationship success. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

What to do when your boyfriend refuses to talk to you

My last ex boyfriend was somebody who I thought at the time I deeply loved and admired. Part of my heart will always have these feelings, perhaps. He was by no means perfect; but there was a lot that I loved about him. 

In the past year,  I’ve read a LOT of books  that have shed a lot of light about...

why people behave the way they do towards others. And it has given me some insight on how to approach challenging communication in relationships. 

In the case of me and my ex, JB, I’m the one who initiated ending that relationship because when Covid got really bad my whole entire life crashed and burned against my will. I felt really insecure, literally.  I watched myself get laid off after working a 13-year arguably rare career in a very specific industry.  And I didn’t know if I’d find another respectable job anytime soon & be able to support myself after watching what COVID did to the industry I was working in.  I’ve been financially independent since I was 17 years old; so my survival is truly on me, 100%. (for the record I was right-- I did not find another full-time job in my industry for another 8 months). 

Since I found myself jobless and in genuine survival mode, and noticed myself really stressing out, I thought “maybe this is not the best timing to be in a romantic relationship”.  Reasonable enough, right? 

 I was also observing how my ex was responding to my unemployment stress and fear.  He was hardly supportive or emotionally available.   And I began to question if he was really the ideal partner in that regard. If he couldn’t hang emotionally for problem #1 of our relationship, it didn’t exactly bode well for long-term potential.  

I have since learned, again, a LOT, about the human tendency to respond to others.  And I now know that if I had to live that situation over again, I would have responded to his response to me in a completely different way and with a lot more maturity and understanding.  

But ultimately, if I’m concerned about my basic survival, what the fuck am I doing in a romantic relationship, yenno? So I (foolishly and rashly, in retrospect) initiated ended things.  While it may have indeed been rash, it was not a totally irrational train of thought. 

But here’s what happened next.

What happened next is that he decided to curse me out, then stonewall me and completely refuse to speak to me any further. He completely refused to have an adult conversation,  like a grown adult man; so that he could hear my entire perspective of about why I didn’t think it best to be in a relationship at that point. And how I was feeling, etc. At the time that I dumped him, I just dumped him and I didn’t really give any true details why.  There’s a mistake I will never repeat again. But hey, live and learn. 

But less than 24 hours later after most of my fear subsided (dumping him was like a pressure release valve on a lot of over-built anxiety), I dropped back down into my rational brain. And I regretted making such a quick and “final” decision. 

The truth in actuality is that nothing is final until both people decide it’s final; and the truth is that a lot of couples take a break, take space,  and get back together after they smooth some wrinkles out and think things through. I will say, sometimes you have to take some serious space from the things you love to fully realize just how much you actually love them.

In response to him stonewalling me, I responded by trying to write him a letter, which is what some dating coaches suggest a girl ought to do when her boyfriend refuses to hear her out. Well fuck that advice-- I don’t think he read the letter to this very day.

Dating coaches also recommend that you take a full 72 hours of no contact if any disagreements with your partner gets really emotionally intense. 

STRATEGY 1: 72 HOURS OF SEPARATION + come back and discuss + are you forcing me to figure it out on my own? 

I didn’t know that at the time.  But having lived through my experience, I say give space up to 72 hours tops, and make a non-negotiable agreement that by day 4, the problem must be addressed, assuming no one is in legitimate danger; and your partner must be willing to communicate, or you will have no choice but to “figure something out on your own”. Especially if the solution involves continuing on in your relationship.  This time-sensitivity should motivate him to respond accordingly if he’s smart.  But sometimes they’re not the sharpest marbles in the drawer.  

if the 72 hours rule doesn’t work, I recommend every female try this assuming your boyfriend is being an immature idiot and refuses to talk to you or listen to you. There is a lot of information online from dumb men to other men about how to manipulate or respond to women in dating scenarios. And trust me when I say that advice is not produced in a woman’s favor.  So listen up, my sistren.

If your boyfriend refuses to hear you out & talk to you like a grown ass man after the 72 hour rule, you schedule an appointment with his mom, dad, sibling, his best friend, or someone else from within his inner circle of trust instead of trying to talk to him.

That’s right. Just bypass him altogether; if he’s not man enough to speak to you, and you remain dissatisfied but determined to try and solve problems and make your relationship last, move up the chain of command in his “emotional support family”, if you will, so that you can be heard like the respectable adult you deserve to be regarded as. 

Let me be clear-- you are not welcomed to march in there like a psycho and go off-- you need to request a meeting with your person of choice,  and remain calm, collected, and almost business-like.   With gentle power, be determined to be heard. The goal is that anyone besides yourself, who genuinely cares about this guy, and has half a brain and heart,  knows the full truth of the situation, not just his version of the truth.  Because otherwise, all everyone on his side will ever hear is his victimized boo-hoo, woe-is-me or “fuck that bitch, she’s crazy” version of his filter on the actual truth. 

Do note that this strategy may not work if his people are too immature, emotionally detached, or emotionally dysfunctional in any way. But if his people are reasonable, skip him & move up that household chain of communication.

At least then, you know you can walk away with your head held high, having been heard. And at least they will know you genuinely loved their son, you weren’t some crazy bitch, you actually cared about him, & you tried to fix shit. 

There’s always the possibility that they will talk some sense into him later, or that you might learn to understand him better through the eyes of the people who love him and have known him his whole life if they offer you any insight. 

There’s also the chance they may side with him & hate on you, too. I have a best friend whose mom told her own son (my friends boyfriend at the time) “Son, you don’t deserve a woman like (my friend)”. And it actually drove him to dump her because he had weak ego boundaries in the face of his overbearing mother. 

 But if a man’s emotional support posse sides with him in encouraging him to bail on the relationship, that’s your very clear answer that it’s time to walk away— they’re all nuts, or none of them like you, he’s weak and would have always chosen them over you instead of adding you to the family, and now you know the truth.  Go where you’re celebrated and embraced. 

If he wants to act like a boy, then what do you do? You do what kids are trained to do-- Tell on him.  Tell his mama, or a sibling, or his best friend.  Except you’re going to do it like a woman.  With maturity, poise, and rationality. From the space of “I have a problem and I need the help of my boyfriend’s closest loved ones to fix it”.  

If you have to go to his house to make this appointment, make it very clear that you’re not there to talk to him— you’re there to talk to his mother/sibling/father in private. Person to person, they should have the heart and mind to know that you’re there trying to defend a beautiful relationship with your boyfriend.  For your boyfriend.    And if your boyfriend said anything emotionally damaging to you in the process of this argument/ issue, now is also the time to tell the person that he said that shit, and that you didn’t appreciate it. Because chances are high that if he won't even talk to you,  he probably didn’t tell any of his people the cruel and heartless shit he said to you.  This is not a plea to make him look like the bad guy, which you can outright say.  We all make mistakes and say things we don’t mean. but it’s just an opportunity to shed light on the truth.  Because if things end between you two,  chances are high there will be another girl coming to walk down the same path as you.  And if he repeats the same mistakes with her, too, they’ll see the patterns. 

So there it is, ladies. If your boyfriend is acting like an immature jerk, and  won’t talk to you, talk to his people. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

Some people lack the maturity and awareness to realize that actions speak louder than words in a romantic relationship

unknown

[cutebutstillsingle]

Why love & romance is never a “It’s either a fuck yes or fuck no” situation

There are a lot of guys who subscribe to the idea that when it comes to love and romance, it either has to be a “fuck yes” or it’s a “fuck no”; and there is no other way to operate.  This whole framework for decision-making, and whole idea came from Mark Manson.  And I’m here to warn people that when it comes specifically to love and romance, you have to learn to operate in the gray zone if you want to see yourself last in relationships. 

First of all, most people don’t realize that the goal of relationships is to actually try to make them last as long as humanly possible.  So if you’re inclined to ‘fuck no’ everyone, you will fail in relationship over and over and over. 

"fuck yes or fuck no" mind frame can be a dangerous framework to operate from because...

"fuck yes or fuck no" mind frame can be a dangerous framework to operate from because it can actually incline you to say “fuck no” to a lot of truly wonderful or fun romantic opportunities that could become a 'fuck yes' down the road.

 Life is not black and white; and love is most certainly never black and white. Even your dreamiest partner will never be a "fuck yes" 100% of the time.  And in today’s emotionally-devoid, cut-throat, ‘protect my peace at all costs or else’ social culture, we love to live in this fantasy that everything has to be a “fuck yes” all the damn time, or else that person is not worthy enough to be a part of one’s elite, sacred, velvet rope existence. When in fact, there are couples out there who got cheated on and still decide to come back together and make it work. 

The only real  ‘fuck yes/ fuck no’ where love is concerned is that either ‘fuck yes’, this relationship is still going, or ‘fuck no’, it’s not.  

And it would amaze you how simple that truth is, and yet how hard it is for people to understand.  Therefore, a lot of people can’t seem to navigate their way into the success lane of love and relationships. Again, relationship success IS in fact a  “black/white”.  Either you’re successful at relationships, or you’re not.  And that’s a hard but necessary pill to swallow. There is no gray zone of romantic success-- people either have a successful, thriving, growing one, or they don’t. 

In my case, it took saying 'no' to my ex to realize in less than 24 hours that I may have been mistaken-- in actuality, dumping him made me realize he could totally become my ‘absolutely, I think I could walk to the ends of the earth with this man if he felt the same way. But I went and erroneously believed this "it has to be a hard core fuck yes or it’s a fuck no" lie.  

Not that I’ll ever know for sure, but it’s possible I might have fucked up one of the best relationship of my life by saying 'fuck no' to my ex.  And now this is a memory that may very well haunt me for the rest of my life, no joke, because of that perpetual uncertainty. 

 It’s been almost a year and I am still not over this man. I’m actually terrified that I will never be over him because I never got clear answers. I’m frankly always afraid no one will ever come close to making me feel how I felt with him both because of the unique qualities he possessed which I adored; and because he left in this narcissistic way of never making it clear how he felt about me back.  He just had this vague “I regret not giving us another chance” half-assed answer to rejecting my pleas to talk and try to work shit out.  If that’s not a mind fuck I don’t know what is. 

Sometimes you will meet someone in your lifetime to whom literally no one compares.  There may be no one else who possesses their unique pairings of positive qualities that you happen to adore and admire; and which allowed the two of you to thrive before one of you fucked it all up and ended the relationship somehow.  Only time will tell if that turns out to be a blessing in disguise, and what is really meant for you. 

But sometimes you're not just making it up in your head that no one compares-- no one actually brings to the table what that person brought to the table. No one has the vibe they did. No one else has that ideal pairing of qualities that you longed for in a partner, which they had. No one else makes you feel like you're home the way they did. Some people in this world are rare AF.  And sometimes you can’t appreciate it until you realize there aren’t a lot of other  “fuck yes’s” out there like them.  But if they reject you with a “fuck no”, were any of your conclusions about this person even real? Or were they all projections coming from your ability to love? 

On the flip side of rejection examples, I have two friends who are now happily married with two kids. In the process of their engagement, the now-wife told her now-husband "I need a year to truly know if you're the one for me". They separated for a full year, dated other people, and at the end of that year, they came back together and knew beyond the shadow of a doubt they were meant for each other. 

THE TAKE HOME... 

You have to learn how to be your own decision-making calibration, instead of letting Mark Manson, or any one else, tell you how to develop and design your decision-making compass. Don't believe every piece of romance advice you read just b/c it's dramatic, and written by someone popular. 

Most importantly, you must learn to exist in life’s,  and especially in love’s gray zones. There are actually few things in this world that are a true 'fuck yes' / 'fuck no' situation. And really, the only real fuck yes/ fuck no’s when it comes down to it is  a) “is this relationship still going?” and b) your decision-making. By which I mean to say that when you commit to any decision, especially if it is a decision in love or romance, there will be no undoings.  

The moment you make that decision, it’s an automatic "fuck yes, I'm committing to this decision, I'm taking the leap, and whatever follows follows, whatever dies, dies”; alongside “the world now says ‘fuck no’ to everything you didn’t say yes to, and there will be no undoing that, either.   

The decision is the real fuck yes/ fuck no.  

When you say 'fuck no' to love, that decision is going to haunt you every damn day of the rest of your life until you get another opportunity and maybe if you’re lucky, you replace the love of your life you said fuck no to years ago. 

So when it comes to fuck yes/ fuck no, always say ‘fuck yes’ to love. You’ll be better off for it. And also know that love is created between two people who have the right compatibility, chemistry, and willingness to work and hold onto love together. So the only other biggest ‘fuck yes’ besides the decision, is when two people both decide to say ‘fuck yes, I agree to hold onto this love for as long as I can, through the good, the bad, and the ugly’.  That’s how people succeed in relationships. 

[cutebutstillsingle]

...and if you really want to see ‘crazy’ there are many Hollywood films that will show you what bona fide crazy really looks like.  Loving someone like a normal person? That’s not crazy, that’s healthy.