Do you ever think about the fact that Ted is hypersexual due to his childhood/teenage traumas or is that just me?
Like not only did he associate losing his first love forever with not being douchebaggy enough, but he also experienced the Lumber Axe and survived. With how quickly Peter was about to be murdered for looking at Ted’s old magazine you KNOW Ted probably had to deal with narrow escape after narrow escape himself. Ted literally suppresses the memory of the Lumber Axe entirely until bringing Peter to camp reminds him, and he doesn’t even take Peter with him as he runs away. He is FUcked up.
My guy went for the cat lady who cut off his fingers because sex is inherently dangerous to him in his mind. He goes for the worst options on purpose because sex isn’t safe unless there’s risk, and he goes for the best options just to lose them on purpose so they don't leave him first, as many times as possible until he's single and lonely at the wedding reception. He’s a sleazeball as a coping mechanism, and he keeps dying for it. One single safe relationship would decimate this dude, and it also wouldn’t fix him. Therapy would do wonders if he actually accepted how messed up he is. And tbh, if TInky wasn’t around there might’ve been a chance for him to recover.
Anyway another reason this dweeb is doomed by the narrative and fucked up beyond belief