I’m done looking for love where it doesn’t exist. I am done coughing up dust in attempts to drink from dry wells. –Maggie Young

My whole life, I have always been one of those Carrie Bradshaw, Meg Ryan in all of her romantic comedies, make a grand gesture brand of individuals. I always wanted to be carried away on a giant black steed while my period dress blew in the wind. I wanted the biggest, grandest of all gestures when my proverbial husband proposed, something so sappy that even Donald Trump would be moved. I wanted the fairytale wedding, which I was pretty genuinely sure would include George Clooney, complete with a sand soaked train and a dark haired flower girl. I wanted to kiss that proverbial husband (I mean, George Clooney) as the sun went down, while our limited (celebrity) friends gazed at us and wished they could find a love like ours. I wanted the beautiful house, the white picket fence, the reasonably priced sports utility vehicle, and the two point five children.

I was never one of those people who demanded millions of dollars or a lifestyle fit for Farrah Abraham because that just wasn’t me. I never said things like, “Waiting two years for an engagement is for ugly girls, babe,” or commanded my hypothetical boyfriend to look for a ring for our impending engagement. I never put strict time limitations on the guy I was dating, claiming that if he didn’t propose by this particular date, we were through. (To be honest, that always seemed a little desperate to me, I don’t know why.) I never threw fits at Christmas time when my various boyfriends didn’t get me the gifts I wanted and I never made jokes about them giving me babies or wifing me up. I never begged for anyone to love me because quite frankly, I felt like if I had to do that, it probably wasn’t right.

But the reality of all of this is that I did want that fairytale. I always wanted the really romantic story, I always wanted to be one of those couples that people hate because they’re just so fucking adorable. I’ve always wanted to be one of those couples that finishes each other’s sentences, wears matching outfits on purpose, and hardly ever fights because that’s not something you would intentionally want to do with someone you really, really love more than anyone else in the world. I wanted all these cutesy little things because I was so sure that was the only way to live. I mean, to this day, the thought of being single just terrifies me; that’s no way to live.

And do you want to know what the craziest part of all of this is? I actually found that shit.

I found that crazy, fast-paced, incredibly passionate love with some random person that I actually met in a bar (through a mutual friend) and I swear to God, things have only gotten better. I got my romantic gesture when I got engaged (my husband flew up to Indiana and surprised me on my birthday and it turned out that everyone was in on it but me), I got the beautiful, low-key beach wedding that I always wanted, and I’m pretty darn close to checking all of those other wishes off my list. I’ve got it all and I have never, ever been even close to being this happy. (The other day my husband, who is a man of few words, looked at me and said, “I love our relationship.” My jaw about fell out of my face. It was the absolute nicest, most random thing to hear after almost nine years together. I can’t believe he’s not sick of me yet…)

But the truth is that things weren’t always so perfect. I wasn’t always married to a supportive, kind, soft-spoken African gentleman. I had to go through a lot of miserable, crotchety mother fuckers to find that one sweet soul. I shed a lot of tears and seriously contemplated just getting five or six dogs to consume my lonely days. I’ve said it a million times before and I’ll say it again: before I met my husband, I never thought I would get married.

Because men are goddamn terrible, friends!

People only picked the pretty, sweet-smelling flowers. The ones with thorns were left alone. –Nenia Campbell, Fearscape

I know that I’ve developed this sort of reputation as a “man hater” because of all the bitter diatribes I’m always publishing on this blog but the truth is that I’ve only learned from experience. I can’t say that all of them are terrible, not even all of the ones I’ve come into contact with but more often than not, I’ve found myself laden with disappointment. Too many men are just apparently so riddled with self-doubt and insecurity that they have to incessantly boast about all of the great things they’ve done. They’ll brag and go on about what things cost, what elaborate vacations they’ve been on, and all the allegedly famous people they’ve met. A great many of them are very well-versed in lying and actually go out of their way to be dishonest, to create extravagant stories about where they were, who they were with, and why they neglected to call you for three days. Some of them are just rude or over talkative, interrupting other’s when they’re trying to have a conversation. It’s like they grow up without any sort of structure or lessons in general politeness.

And while the entirety of the male species is probably not unfaithful, there is a crazy amount of men that are. I hate to label all men as cheaters but it seems to just come naturally to a lot of them. And it isn’t just that they’re cheating on their wives or girlfriends; it’s that they seem unfazed by women who cheat on their significant others with them. I mean, it just doesn’t appear to be an issue for most men when they are fully aware that their female counterparts are stepping out on their actual, Facebook official relationships.

If you want to really think about this more rationally, in a way that more closely affects your daily life, ponder for just one second all of the dreadful everyday acts like violent crimes, domestic violence and high speed car chases. People like O.J. Simpson, who may or may not have killed his wife but definitely abused her during their marriage, as it was heavily documented. The Oklahoma City bomber who parked a vehicle in front the Murrah building and incidentally killed 168 people, the youngest of which was a four-month old child. John Wayne Gacy, the middle-aged man who dressed up as a clown for a living and performed at children’s birthday parties; the same middle-aged man who also had the bodies of 33 teenaged boys buried beneath his house in Cook County, Illinois. (I am a serious, almost to the point of being scary, true crime buff, friends. I could write entire blogs about all the random, true crime factoids and incidents I’ve intentionally made myself aware of.)

Of course, it has to be said that women obviously engage in these activities too. (Andrea Yates, who murdered her children because Jesus told her too and Aileen Wuornos, who murdered her “johns” for what many believed was a mix between survival and financial assistance.) But it must also be said and considered very seriously that this is most certainly a male dominated population of people.

I mean, let’s be real: men are dogs. It just is what it is.   

I used to have this work friend that I’ve lost touch with over the years. She was in a fairly serious relationship with this man who, I’ve got to admit, was pretty attractive by most people’s standards. The problem, in my personal opinion, is that he was totally aware of it. He was incessantly on this high horse because he was attractive enough to obviously attract outside women and I think that was a trait he really considered of value. It used to really aggravate me, actually, because his girlfriend was absolutely stunning. I mean, sure they were a fetching couple together but this girl would have made anyone look good. She was that naturally beautiful and actually really pleasant to be around, unlike her counterpart.

But it wasn’t just the fact that he was unreasonably cocky that made him a lower caliber individual. Unlike her, he was not very friendly or talkative when company was around and in fact, made it a point to stay as far away from people as possible. Even if that meant leaving her alone to face the crowd. He was primarily employed for the majority of the time I knew her but he was apparently in some kind of legal trouble and was driving around without a license. He was also an incessant marijuana smoker, to which she turned a blind eye but was never really comfortable with, and went out with his friends all the time.

This gorgeous, friendly, educated and successful woman sat at home almost every night while he was out doing God knows what with God knows who. Eventually they ended up breaking up but for most of the period, he was begging for her to come back. We all learned way after the fact that although he proclaimed to love her and really miss the relationship they had shared, he was frequenting all the shitty dive bars in their neighborhood with a girl that we all worked with. My friend even caught them together once at their old apartment. And from what I recall, the story was that this other girl had “drank too much” and “couldn’t drive home”. Yet, her car was parked right outside next to his.

Yeah, okay. Or you’re a lying, cheating, woman hungry piece of pot smoking garbage who might have just realized that the only person who probably gave a shit about you is the girl you’ve been blowing off all these years. Go ahead and thank yourself because you did this, bro. Yeah, why don’t you just light up another one?

The toxic behaviors were there before you decided to enter into the relationship with them. The signs were there. You may have chosen to look the other way, but the signs were there. –P.A. Speers

I had another friend who was in a different kind of relationship and quite honestly, the guy was a lot worse. On the outside, this guy portrayed himself to be the picturesque portrait of a boyfriend. He was tall and relatively handsome. He could probably open whatever jars she couldn’t because he was nearly a foot taller than her. He was always around, showing his face at all of her extracurricular functions and feigning support whenever she was visibly needing it. He was always rushing over to her whenever she was exhibiting symptoms of her many health problems and I think, quite honestly, he had all of us fooled.

He was really, really good at making her look like she was the crazy one. (And I’m probably going to use that term a lot because that’s what he actually called her when he talked about her. He never said her name; he always said “Crazy One”.) They had a lot of frequent, really explicit arguments in front of anyone that cared to pay attention. One of them would get angry about something the other had done (I later learned that it was usually him getting angry at her for something she had allegedly done) and this explosive quarrel would break out. Sometimes she would try to be quiet and just attempt to diffuse the situation as best she could, other times she would cry and try to vacate, trying to eliminate whatever attention had recently been drawn to her.

Most times he would laugh it off, always play the victim, and turn things around to his friends once she had left the room. She was labeled this crazy, ungrateful drama queen by all of his friends and other various bystanders and in the beginning, I even fell into the romance of it all too. He just always seemed so nice, so pleasant, this guy that would probably help you move if you asked. None of us wanted to believe that he was the one doing all the damage. So we shifted the blame on her. It just seemed so natural.

I mean, after all, she was the “Crazy One”.

He dictated what she wore, who she spoke to, and who her friends were. He obviously didn’t ever want her talking to anyone who was a male, even if it was in friendly, day-to-day school conversation. He didn’t particularly want her out doing anything social unless he was included and if she did something on her own, God forbid, there was almost certainly hell to pay.

I remember, towards the end of the school year they had this really public break-up. I can’t really remember all of the details because we’re talking something like twelve or thirteen years ago but basically, what I recall is that she eventually grew tired of his controlling, incessantly manipulative behavior. (I think she also, and this is purely my own speculation, got really tired of fighting with him because she’s such a free spirit. I can’t imagine her sitting and arguing with someone on a daily basis. It just doesn’t seem to be in her genetic makeup.)

I think she soon came to realize that she was a gorgeous girl from a good family, a person who really took the time to care about people, and an individual who had way too many goals to keep her grounded in Port Richey, Florida. (I’m sure that would have been his plan: to wife her up and keep her on lockdown in some two-bedroom shack in the outskirts of Pasco County. He would have his friends and his life while she stayed home, stayed thin and soft spoken, and kept a clean house. She would definitely have to learn how to panfry thinly sliced chicken cutlets if they were to ever have a future together…)

I think she also quickly learned that the way he was treating her wasn’t indicative of a man who allegedly loved his girlfriend. Looking back on it now, I find it so strange to think that it took her so long to wrap her head around it all. (Young love can be so difficult to decipher; we’ve all been there.) It’s just that her parents are like this awesome couple who have been married for probably thirty years or something close. They’re the type of people who never raised their voices to each other, but instead talked things out (probably a primary reason why she is now such a people person), and really, genuinely loved each other.

I mean, she was bred of a real life love story.

But I can’t fault her for the fact that he was a lying, conniving, manipulative and abusive piece of firefighter garbage. That’s all on him.

But her wising up and dumping him became a huge issue for him. He was quickly losing control and all of his lies were unraveling. Because he had been so used to primarily isolating her from the outside world and thereby maintaining the only stories told were ones that painted him in a positive light, he was starting to panic. He had to quickly engage in some sort of half-assed reconnaissance mission in order to protect his valuable reputation. It seemed like everything he did throughout the day was to either piss her off or get her back but hysterically enough, he was never successful at either. (She was definitely in touch with her feelings so I don’t really believe that she had possessed this incredible poker face. I don’t think she was pretending not to be bothered by it all; I think she was really just past the point of giving a shit.)

He had to enlist everyone in proximity if he wanted to really make a dent in the situation. He had even reached out to people that she was talking to from other schools because he was so convinced that he could flip everyone. He made scenes everywhere, no matter who was present, and tried really hard to convince us all that she was still the crazy one. He had even gone as far as to get our teacher involved in the situation because he had an additional degree in psychology. (Which apparently made him a physician, right?) He was, not even a joke, trying to get our teacher to diagnose my friend with some sort of manic disorder in an attempt to prove that she was actually crazy.

I mean, serious shit, if this guy had gone to as much trouble to do something good in the world as he did to torture his ex-girlfriends, he would probably have developed a cure for cancer by now.

But pretty soon people began to realize that a lot of the lies he had spread about her were just misconceptions meant to make her look pathetic. It took a little bit of time but eventually people either took her side or stayed out of it all together. The people that were considered to be his “really close friends” basically stayed out of the whole debacle because they quickly learned she was just a regular girl that had dumped an unstable, abusive person. She wasn’t the psychotic, bipolar problem starter that he had alluded her to be.

The reality was that he had created all of his problems himself. He had done all of it on his own. And the way that people looked at him was a reflection of himself, not of her. But if I’m honest, I don’t think he’s ever realized that.

He’ll never take accountability for his actions. Because that would make him guilty of something.

Moral of the Crazy: I became a domestic violence advocate because of my own personal twist of fate. I have my own demons and my own story to tell but for the sake of time and viable internet space, I’ll save it for another time. You’ve all got Thanksgiving leftovers to eat and Christmas presents to buy.

The point is that I’ve seen it. I have seen this behavior in so many personal relationships, as well as those relationships engaged by my friends. I saw it growing up with my own parents and I’ve seen it every day in my occupation. It just seems like sometimes men don’t understand how to respect women and while I hate to incessantly harp on this poor, pitiful gender, I wouldn’t have to if they would just get their shit together.

Of course it isn’t all of them because it’s impossible to group everyone into one box. I would be a terrible social worker if I said that everyone fit into their alleged stereotypes. And sure, women can be godawful. Look at Farrah Abraham! Or Heidi Montag! Our hormones make us crazy (that’s just nature, unfortunately), we can be really emotional and likely to cry for no goddamn reason, and we probably spend way too much money on seemingly needless things like pumps, LuLaRoe Leggings, and concealer. (But seriously, I actually DIE for those leggings. Check them out from my favorite shop here!)

But the reality is that men, for whatever reason, have this different way of doing things. They’re indifferent, they’re deadbeats, they abandon their children, they beat their wives, and they cheat on their girlfriends. They drink too much and get in fights because someone stared at them too long. They watch sports on television without any recollection of the amount of work that goes into cooking dinner, cleaning the house, taking care of the children, and bringing them a beer every three seconds because they’re too goddamn lazy to get up. They laze about while their wives work like slaves to deliver healthy babies and make the weekly grocery lists. They use work as an excuse to go out with their friends and stay out all hours of the night instead of coming home to their wives. They have way more needs than women, can’t seem to do anything on their own, even if their life depended on it, and act like spoiled, trust fund children when they don’t get what they want!

I mean, this is just real talk, friends. Tell me I’m wrong. 

The other day I was talking with one of my girlfriends that lives out of state. She and I have been friends for something like two decades and although we’ve had our ups and downs, we always seemed to come back to each other. Because when all the dust settled and we had moved onto other men and adventures, we realized that our friendship was stronger than all of our drama. We had allowed a man to come between us and it took us actual years to learn that he would never respect either one of us. It took us actual years to realize that we weren’t fighting against each other; we were fighting against him. We were striving for independence and love and unfortunately for both of us, we had just gone about it the wrong way. We were in battle with the wrong people.

We always recollect that time in our lives every time we speak, I think, because we’re both so thankful to have escaped all of it primarily unscathed. It’s sort of like we have each other to always depend on because we’re the only ones who know what the experience was like. We’re the only ones that truly understand each other.

When we were talking, she said to me that she feels like she’s sort of emotionally handicapped as a result of all of the things she endured. She spoke to me about the asshole ex-boyfriend we have in common and then another one she dated shortly after that. I read her texts at my little cubicle all the way across the country from California and somehow, I still felt like I was right beside her.

I wanted to offer her some sort of kind words, something to make her realize that she’s a beautiful, valuable person that didn’t deserve any of the crap she got. I wanted to tell her that “her person” was out there, that there was probably some six foot tall tree hugger out there that would fight for all of the same causes that she does every day. I wanted to tell her that she doesn’t have to settle for anyone, that she doesn’t have to feel lonely just because she’s rightfully picky and takes her time with men.

What I really wanted to tell her was that there’s more to her than a moment’s thought. What I really wanted to tell her was that there is more to her, that there’s more to both of us, than our psychotic ex-boyfriend. What I really wanted to tell her was that the horrible way those men treated her is a reflection of themselves, that it’s a reflection of how awful they are. It is in no way a reflection of her.

The things we’ve dealt with from our past relationships isn’t a reflection of any of us. It’s a reminder that we were all strong enough to move on from a person that we knew was detrimental to our wellbeing, no matter how much we may have loved them. If anything, this alleged loneliness and lack of emotional comfort isn’t a weakness; it’s a strength.

It’s perfectly acceptable to know what we deserve and strive to find it. It’s perfectly acceptable to spend your Saturday night with a cuddly cat because they’ve respected you more than the last three men you’ve been on dates with. And I think it’s even more acceptable to be on your own, to find yourself and follow your goals, to drive yourself across the country and start your own life because you were sick of waiting for something to happen. Sometimes I think it’s better to be safe and independent on your own, with a life full of people that love you and think you’re amazing, rather than stuck in a garbage relationship with a man that never treated you the way you deserve.

I just have to say, friends, I can really identify with all of this. Love is hard and it’s even harder when you’re not getting back what you put in. I just think, as a domestic violence advocate most especially, that it’s so important to hold these men, even the ones who aren’t batterers, to a certain standard. Just as with children, if you don’t enable a person to be accountable for his actions, how can he ever mend his ways? If we don’t give a domestic terrorist a proper treason trial, they’re just going to continue to wreak havoc all over the country, right?

Listen, I know men are basically an item that we’ll always have to deal with. Sometimes, like in my marriage, you really luck out. (I always say that the best men are like houseplants: they just need some sunlight, a little talkative attention, and some nutrients.) I swear to God, I keep looking for something wrong with my husband everyday but aside from watching Facebook videos without headphones while I’m trying to read or not packing the dishwasher in a way that I deem appropriate, I keep coming up empty.

They’re not all serial killers. They’re not all domestically violent. And quite frankly, they’re not all terrible. It would just be nice if more of them made a genuine attempt to be better, more well-mannered people. And that’s all we can really hope for, right?

Maybe sometimes it just takes meeting the right woman to turn those boys around.

Once you learn to be happy, you won’t tolerate being around people who make you feel anything less. –Germany Kent