My wise and adorable friend Lemmonex offered some great tips today on mistakes women make while dating. They're mostly of the self-delusional, "I love him! I can fix him!" variety.I thought I'd add some tips to help women determine whether their boyfriends are bad news, or quite possibly psycho loonies. As my last breakup involved changing the locks and circulating his description to my neighbors, landlord, and employer, I feel I am uniquely qualified. Much of this knowledge comes from over sixteen years of hilariously iffy taste and a kamikaze, devil-may-care approach to dating. (Also, I might like to learn things the hard way.)
Here, in rapid-fire list format, are the top ten ways to determine if the person you are dating is quite possibly a narcissistic emotional intelligence-deprived psycho loony:
1. He takes everything personally. My last boyfriend sulked for hours because he didn't like the ending of Slumdog Millionaire, and, in fact, felt the entire film had been deliberately engineeered to personally disappoint him.
2. Every cab ride home is contentious, usually because you're rehashing every microsecond of the evening to determine who behaved like the bigger dink.
3. He believes he's a vampire. (On the other hand, he had a leather jacket, drove a sweet vintage Mustang and my parents couldn't stand him. That's pretty hot for Hoodbridge.)
4. His idea of fun is spray-painting "Whore Bitch Slut" across the side of your house. Note: This was after my mom called the cops because he'd toilet-papered our trees, leaving me and my sister to pull everything down while Skye came up with a song called, "The Toilet Paper Trees Are Ready for Harvesting."
5. He has a bullet still lodged in his left thigh and an imaginary modeling career.
6. He wants a relationship. But he doesn't. But he does! But he doesn't!
7. He stops by your house to say hi. Your house in Woodbridge. Note: He lives in North Carolina. Also, I cannot remember if this was before or after he threw a rock through his own windshield and told people I'd done it.
8. You break up over a turkey, and the turkey was so totally worth it.
9. He doesn't like your friends, because they don't like him. Note: Friends? Almost always right in these cases.
10. He gets bitten by his own dog.
Anyone have one to add?
27 comments:
Oh, the pouters! I have dated a few of those...I just love being punished for some imagined slight!
The first one makes is a great reason... but the rest of them makes me feel you had one crazy ex... please tell me this is a composite of multiple douchbags...if your ex did all of this then I have to say good riddance.
The movie "Signs" was definitely created specifically to waste my time and make me feel as if I'd been hoodwinked like a red-haired stepchild. But I am over it. Mostly.
The Ex believed that everyone else on the highway was engaged in an elaborate conspiracy to keep him from getting to his destination.
Oh, the drama.
He throws a lit cigarette at you.
He smells constantly of liquor.
Raging Mood Swings.
Geesh I do not miss him!
Great post love
Lem - Once you become GRATEFUL for the silent treatment, because you're getting a moment's peace, it's time to get the hell out.
Dmbosstone - the vast majority of these are high school and college. I like to think I've become at least a little wiser since then.
Jamie - #11: He travels all the way across the galaxy, only to be defeated by a boarded-up basement door.
Fearless - Belief in conspiracies, in general, is a disqualifying factor.
Zip - Thanks. And I'm so proud of your successful satanectomy!
I have two.
He constantly compares you to his best female friend, everything from your bra size to your relationship with your mother.
Every time you bring up something he's done that upsets or bothers you, you end up being the one who apologizes to him.
Huh. My ex would pout if I didn't worship at the church of her awesomeness on a regular basis. Nothing says sunday like listening to somebody tell you how awesome everyone thinks they are before you've had your first cup of coffee.
#11a - He begs and pleads with you to move to the intergalactic equivalent of Seattle or London. Then, after you finally concede to the move, he stays inside drinking beer and playing video games all the time because he will "die if he gets wet."
Hmm. Maybe there's more to this movie than I thought...
K - Your second is such a peeve of mine! I get over things really fast if somebody owns up to doing something wrong...but if they try to make me out to be the guilty party, I get cranky and resentful.
bh - Personally, I save boyfriends that dilemma by saying my affirmations into the mirror every morning. "I am the most awesome of all the awesome people! Awesomely so, in fact." And all this time, y'all thought I was just putting on my makeup.
Jamie - Signs = Dating. Well, dating can also be mediocre and convoluted.
He tries to change *you* by transforming you into his vision of the perfect [insert lame stereotype here].
He won't spend time with you on weekends, because weekends are for "going out with the guys." (uh, sure they are).
He doesn't respect your schedule and is ALWAYS late when you're supposed hang out.
He strands you alone in bars or at social events to go hit on other women.
He hasn't met half of your friends and you've been dating for over a year.
I'm sorry, what was the question?
My dating mistakes seem so...tame...all of a sudden. :)
HP - Oh, that last one would be a dealbreaker for me. I tend to introduce guys to my friends straight off, because, well, they're better judges of character than I am.
Zandria - Well, at least the vast majority of these are over a decade old. So I like to think I've learned something.
See, I always get scared off because girls want me to be their boyfriend on like the second date or so. Or try to sleep with me on the first.
Be weary of former professional dominatrixes who claim you have revitalized their interest in the opposite gender.
Be weary of girls who claim they plan to get you drunk and sleep with you. But not in that sexy way that's actually fun.
Oh, and be weary of girls who actually have roofies. She claimed she only used them on boring houseguests to shut them up..
He wants a relationship. But he doesn't. But he does! But he doesn't! Oh. Love this. Love. And I totally dated that pouter guy.
I would add: He has a belly button piercing and you can literally smell his liver rotting from his bouts of binge drinking.
J - Really, it's better to wait until at least midway through the second date to push for any kind of commitment.
Frecks - I can understand not being sure about things in a general sense, because there's always timing to be considered. But I've learned the hard way (and occasionally have had to re-learn), that if a guy truly can't decide how much he likes you, that's really NOT a compliment.
She picks fights just to prove she's smarter than you. When you refuse to engage in the argument because it's stupid, she gets even more pissed.
She talks about her ex. While you're in bed.
my list of bad chioces to avoid in the future include:
(roughtly inorder of importance)
anyone with a record for domestic violence
anyone who deals drugs - whether they have been convicted or even arrested or not
anyone with a substance abuse problem that has not been in recovery for at least a year
anyone who tosses their loaded handgun into the back seat of my car when we get pulled over for speeding
anyone who is not yet in their 20s once you have left yours behind
anyone who claims that they are not upset its all in your head even though they were speaking through clenched teeth before you even asked
Um I'm sure there were more but I've kind of lost track of the total list since I finally met a nice guy and got married.
I can't add anything to this list, nor do I want to.
OK my comment sounded about harsh. What I really meant was that I'm glad that I couldn't add to this list. And I would never want to experience a relationship with anyone crazy as these fools.
Foggy - As someone who may or may not have been married to a lawyer, I may or may not be familiar with that one.
Tina - Um, where any of your exes ever on an episode of Cops?
Patty - No worries, I took the joke in the spirited it was intended. (The spirit being, well, jackassery isn't all bad if you have a sense of humor about it)
Cops no - but I did swear off dating for almost a year when I got up one morning to find the guy that had just asked me out had just been arrested on 1st degree murder charges. I never actually went on a dated with him. He got arrested two days before we were supposed to have our first date.
Narrow escape. I feel compelled to add that most of these lessons were learned duing my post divorce "unsuitable mne" binge. Normally I have better judgement - really!!
"He believes he's a vampire."
wow. that is scarily true. haha.
my own:
-He doesn't believe in titles. Does not mean he is coolly going against the system like I once thought, it simply is an excuse to have as many partners as possible.
-You have been dating for 3 years and he still tells his mom that you two, are "just friends", with you standing there. You question him later and he states that his relationships with the opposite sex are none of his mother's business. yeahh....
-He has to drink a can of beer in the morning or he can't function. Not just on the weekends, every single morning.
Signs I ignored in my last two boyfriends (yes, I'll limit it):
-When he broke up with his baby mama, she stabbed him in the thigh with a fork...and he seemed kind of proudy of it.
-Same dude got stationed in Atlanta for a while and tried to do the long-distance-booty-call (for which I'm still have a Amtrak ticket voucher) and then tried to pull the same shit from IRAQ. Yep, Iraq.
-Boyfriend before that - after he left my house in the middle of the night, I found out he had a wife in Utah, took out $35,000 under my name, and was wanted in at least two other states. Um, yeah.
They killed Paul Newman at the end of "Cool Hand Luke"! The bastards.
Wanna smoke some dope? I can always look for a job tomorrow.
Fix your hair, it's a mess, I am so embarrassed.
Love me always?
Tina - Well, if it had been manslaughter...
Heather - Welcome! The 'titles' thing to me is a dealbreaker -- like, really, your soul will shrivel into nothing if you have to introduce me as your girlfriend? Really?
Redhead - The longer I have this blog, the more disturbing things that I learned. Did he at least clean out the fork wound?
Michael - Your hair looks fine from here! (Yes, I installed webcams on all my commenters)
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