If seeing people make out next to you in Green Library sounds about as appealing as crashing into a bicycle pile-up in the Circle of Death, you’re not alone. Every year around this time, 30 percent of the U.S. population is reminded — through a deluge of greeting cards, “Kiss Me” candy and heart-shaped chocolates — how painfully single we are. Wouldn’t it be nice to have someone to pillow-talk to, rip on people from work with and get laughs from for our bad jokes? Yes, yes it would, but it’s not like you can just order your ideal partner on Amazon, so it’s easy to feel left out sometimes.

I usually console myself by thinking of the positive aspects of existing outside the comfort of a stable relationship: I don’t have to check in with anybody except Mother, I always get the whole bed to myself and I never have to worry about sharing my double dark chocolate fudge sundaes. But this year that didn’t seem to help. Then I realized, this is Stanford, damn it, and if there’s one thing I learned in math class, it’s that the negative of a negative is a positive. So, after scouring the internet for more time than I care to admit, here are some of the best worst relationship stories to remind us that we’re also being left out of a whole bunch of crap:

My girlfriend and I went to the mall because she wanted to go shopping for a bathing suit. When we got there, she asked me what I thought about the bikini she was considering. I told her it looked amazing but — naively — I questioned why she was getting one since she already had one. She responded that it was for a guy that evening and I wouldn’t want her to look bad in her old, raggy suit, would I? I stood perplexed and asked why she wanted to see the guy. She said it was to see if he liked her. She bought the bikini and left me at the store, breaking up with me at the register — all with a smile. I think I just stood there for 20 minutes not knowing WTF happened.

Source: Reddit

 

My boyfriend and I celebrated our anniversary with a seven-day Caribbean cruise. He’d been through a rough year, with family issues and getting his work hours cut, so I offered to pay for the whole thing. I tried to make it the most romantic experience ever, so I spared no expense, and we had a great time. The day after we got back, he called me on my lunch break to tell me he just didn’t think his head was in the right place for a relationship. He explained that he really needed a vacation and didn’t want me to waste my money, so he’d “put on a happy face” and went along on the trip before he broke up with me.

Source: Damn My Ex

 

My boyfriend took me to a basketball game, which I was excited for because he was such a huge fan. During half time, the kiss cam panned our section and the couple next to us started making out heavily, to which the whole arena roared with applause. I nudged my boyfriend to kiss me, but he started waving his hands at the camera and shaking his head no, to which the whole arena booed. When I started to go off on him he asked me to quiet down and went on to explain that he wanted to break up. When I asked him why he brought me when he knew he was dumping me, he said it was because he didn’t want to miss the game and he figured if he dumped me in front of a crowd of people I wouldn’t make a scene. Then he got up and said, “I’m going to the concession stand. You want a popcorn or anything?” Yeah, no thanks.

Source: Damn My Ex

 

It was high school. She sat me down and said she wanted to break up because other people thought she was flirting with some people in class. She told me she didn’t want us to be together because she was scared of appearing like she was flirting, so her solution instead was to break up so it would be okay for her non-flirting actions to appear flirtatious, even though she “wasn’t flirting” with other people in the first place. In short, we broke up and I still don’t understand what she meant.

Source: Reddit

 

Breakup text:

“Just tell her, ‘Hey, I like you and I’ve really enjoyed spending time with you, but I need some time to find myself so I think it’s best if we go our separate ways.’ Then she can’t be mad at you and I’ll still be her BFF.”

He hadn’t even bothered to crop the ends out of the cut and paste.

Source: Fellow Daily Writer

 

It’s not just that she cheated on me, it’s that I knew the guy from Taekwondo (this was high school, okay?) and he was significantly better than me at flying roundhouse kicks and probably less emotionally needy. “He’s flirting with you,” I told her. “Don’t be silly,” she replied. She’s right, I thought, I’m being silly. This was before I learned that “Don’t be silly” is actually code for “How did you know?”

Turns out he had visited her when she was on vacation with her parents and they had slept together in the same tent that I would sleep in alone when I visited just a few days after he left.

Source: A friend, definitely not me.

 

“I don’t like listening to you breathe.”

“I know your dad died two months ago but you’re just such a bummer to be around.”

“I’ve met someone else, he’s much richer than you are, it’s not me it’s you, I think we’re better off as friends.”

Source: Reddit

So next time you’re feeling blue for not having a bae to go “Facebook official” with, remember to look on the bright side: There’s no chance you’ll be featured in next year’s edition of this article.

 

Contact Nestor Walters at waltersx ‘at’ stanford.edu.