The best way to get back at an ex involves personalizing your payback. It's one thing to post a bunch on social media about how much fun you're having and how much you've moved on since the breakup. It's also one thing to block someone outright. Those options might be petty, but they are also uninventive. What you really need to do, if payback is necessary, is to find something niche about your former partner and see if you can use that to your advantage. Now, payback is not pretty and it's not…

Who doesn't love a bold swing on the dating apps? It could be a home run or a big swing and a miss, but you can't help but appreciate the attempt at the very least. Dating apps have become so ubiquitous in our culture of “courtship” that we have made swiping left and right a passive part of our daily routines, like brushing our teeth or checking our emails. This portion of the dating process has lost most of its flair and excitement, so when you do receive a message that genuinely catches your…

It's usually best to take responsibility for your own decisions and actions. Unfortunately, when you have a propensity for making bad ones, you're also more likely to not want to take responsibility for them, instead casting them off on the other people who had the misfortune of being in your immediate proverbial vicinity. Being eternally financially bound to one of these liabilities through other accountabilities is not a great situation to be in. But, as with anything in life, the best you ca…

When you know, you know . This is, of course, what everyone says when they find the partner with whom they may want to share the rest of their lives. However, this sentiment very much applies to couples who are on the verge of falling apart. As a third party, you can often see the signs that two people are not meant to be. Sure, there are the obvious signs: fighting, infidelity, etc, but when it comes to the subtle red flags, that's when side remarks, body language, and social media posting bec…

In a perfect world, one should know that success is the best form of revenge and there's no need to go any further than that, but this is not a perfect world. Sure, if you know that you've found success and happiness following a breakup, then there should not be a need to publicize that in any way in order to feel gratification. Knowing that you're happy in and of itself should be enough. However, some moments are just too perfect that you have to post about them on all social media platforms t…

It's perhaps the understatement of the century to say that learning to live with your significant other can present itself with challenges. We all form habits, some of which date back to how we were raised, and it's not until you share space with a partner that all those habits reveal themselves. Suddenly, you wonder if how you do the dishes or get ready for bed makes you incredibly bizarre. Or perhaps you start wondering how you managed to fall for somebody who sleepwalks. Perhaps you're rethi…

Some breakups do not call for maturity. Some exes are so deserving of payback that it would be a grave injustice if you chose not to do something. Obviously, the sensible thing to do following a breakup is to take the high road and to trust that the best revenge is success and happiness. That being said, we cannot expect the anonymous folks from this Reddit thread to do the sensible thing in these situations. We can only expect drama and unnecessary overreactions because, let's be real here, th…

In theory, swiping through potential partners on dating apps should not be the soul-crushing activity that it is. It should be thrilling to assess potential suitors, to scroll through their pictures and profile information while imagining what a relationship with them could look like. Unfortunately, reality has made it nearly impossible to enjoy the eternal misery of swiping on the apps. Perhaps it's our fault for always opening these apps during moments of loneliness and general low points. We…

When you move in with your partner, all their quirks and eccentricities come out. Perhaps they've been hiding that they like to trim their toenails on the couch without cleaning up the remains afterward. Perhaps they've been hiding their inability to clean dishes or their tendency to fold and put away wet towels. All of these strange habits are included in the screenshots below, which were compiled from the following Redditors who boldly shared their stories of what happened after moving in wit…

They say every breakup is unique. That would be true if these anecdotes serve as any indication. Sure, there are the standard reasons why people split up: infidelity, different life goals, timing, location, etc. And then there are these folks who shared their breakup stories via the following r/AskReddit thread. Some of my favorites include the girl who was dumped because her now ex-boyfriend got a dog and realized he couldn't balance the two. Then, there is the person who got dumped because th…

It's never easy to spot red flags when you're actually looking for them. Often, we see them in hindsight or when it's far too late. What gets in the way of catching these obvious signs? Tunnel vision, social pressures to be in a serious relationship, or perhaps the other person is legitimately a convincing pathological liar. Here's the thing to remember if you think this applies to you or a close friend: ignorance is actually not bliss. The illusion of happiness and stability is still just an i…

Sure, it's true that kids will do and say crazy things, but let's take a look at all the crazy things parents and teachers say to them. Perhaps craziness begets craziness. After all, and this will annoy all the anti-musical theater folks out there, but it was Stephen Sondheim who said “children will listen.” If you tell an impressionable eight year old that toilets are evil creatures trying to swallow you whole, that eight year old may very well believe you. And what happens when they believe y…

There comes a time in everyone's dating experiences when you realize that the person with whom you have been spending time is a complete and total doofus. When this happens, you have three options. First, you can give them the benefit of the doubt. You let whatever silly comment they made slide, you try to explain why they are mistaken, and you move on. Sometimes, people simply do not know things because they have yet to be exposed to them. You taught your partner something. Isn't that a produc…

Swipe left, swipe right, but whatever you do, don't stop swiping.

Everyone knows that there are just as many disastrous Valentine's Day dinners as great ones. Something about the commercialism of the fake holiday creates a bizarre mix of emotions, unrealistic expectations, and a weird amount of stakes despite, you know, the meaning of the holiday to be virtually empty. However, instead of hearing about all the Valentine's Day fails from the perspective of the couples themselves, let's looks at these dinners gone wrong from a more objective viewpoint. These se…

Everyone wonders what their ex is saying about them to their group of friends, so it's not uncommon to imagine what those conversations might sound like. Sometimes, your ex was so “in the wrong” that it will take a tremendous amount of creativity to fabricate another reason why things fell apart. Other times, the reasons behind the split remained nuanced, and both parties may still have wildly different perspectives years after all the drama went down. These newly single folks shared what they…