Wednesday, January 16, 2019 // The Statement
7B
Wednesday, February 20, 2019 // The Statement
7B
L
ast year, a friend of mine, who
had been searching for a girl-
friend for a decade, finally found
someone. When I heard the wonderful
news, I texted him, “I’m happy for you.”
His reply was odd but familiar. He wrote,
“aww thanks, it’ll happen for you one
day, don’t worry.” I was slightly irritated.
I had never expressed that I was search-
ing for a relationship, and his assumption
that being single was not my choice both-
ered me.
He was not the first one to manifest
such a bizarre judgment regarding my
single status. I have gotten used to being
stereotyped as the lonely, single woman
who is unable to find love — the future
“crazy cat lady.” I have internalized these
social standards by constantly bombard-
ing myself with question: “What if I never
find someone?”
In reality, I am grossly burned out
from trying to find a life partner because
I have had a little too many eerie and
rather unpleasant experiences with seri-
ous relationships, non-relationships and
flings. Between the ages of 15 and 20, I
had four long-term relationships. Until
August last year, I was technically “sin-
gle,” but in a non-labeled relationship
with someone. In other words, I have
gone to great lengths to eschew the for-
lorn psychological state widely known as
“loneliness.”
As a teenager, I settled for incompat-
ibility, convincing myself that being
slightly unhappy was better than soli-
tude and loneliness. I jumped from one
dysfunctional relationship into another,
seeking another person every time I was
encumbered with the emotional vacuum
and fresh scars of a breakup. Allowing
myself room to breathe, grow and devel-
op myself was not an option.
At 16, my first serious relationship
ended somewhere between hell and the
wildfire that wrecked the Battle of Black-
water (Game of Thrones, Season 2). Its
repercussions demolished my sense of
self-worth, which expectedly takes time
to recover from. But I wasn’t one to stop
dating. I entered another serious long-
distance relationship. The three months
between my first two relationships felt
like purgatory gaps in my search to find
“the one.”
Romance was my main priority in my
teenage years because the vignette of a
partner heavily imprinted my vision of
an enviable adult life. I grew up watch-
ing romantic comedies, both of the Bol-
lywood and Hollywood variety, which all
end with a grand reconciliation between
the male and female protagonists. Even
the “happily ever after” in Disney prin-
cess movies depicts romantic partner-
ship as the basis of a happy life. The word
“couple” remains an essential component
of the socially sanctioned boxes of adult-
hood that include a real job, a house, a
family and, of course, a partner. Like
myself, many friends of mine entered
toxic relationships and stayed in them for
long periods of time.
When imagining myself single, I visu-
alized a lonely woman, sitting on the floor
with Chinese take-out and cheap wine,
blinking tears as the tragic cloud that
reads, “You are alone” settles around her
aura. I was apprehensive of an embar-
rassing scenario — having only my par-
ents to call when I got into colleges. But,
since I always had a boyfriend during
that time in my life, I would deem myself
lucky that I wouldn’t have to do that. Yet,
my relationships ironically brought lone-
liness and insecurity into my life.
I was perfectly happy with my friends
and family until I stumbled upon the
repetitive relationship syndrome. My
self-confidence went missing, and I
wavered with bitterness and fragility. I
spent nights wondering if someone was
cheating on me. Days unfolded in horrid
blurs, arguments and tears. But I deli-
cately camouflaged the negative aspects
of my relationships under the shiny
wrapper called “love.”
I was too spellbound with the idea
of having a boyfriend to recognize the
infringement on my personal develop-
ment every time I embarked upon a jour-
ney to share love with someone else. But
when my last relationship met its dis-
tasteful demise, I celebrated my newly
acquired singledom as a marker of free-
dom to casually date whomever I want.
My divorce from relationships lead to the
“party girl” lifestyle.
In today’s millennial world, being
single envelopes the hook-up culture,
in an effort to free the term from an
association with isolation. As a result,
non-relationships have become the new
relationships. I frivolously dove into
a rampage of “friends with benefits”
arrangements. I would have frolicking
hook-ups that would turn into a salacious
game of “who’s going to be the first one
to text.” My non-relationships eventu-
ally involved the same amount of work
as relationships, except with a confus-
ing headache that emerges with the gray
area.
My mind would perform gymnastics
with thoughts like, “Should I message
him now? I don’t want him to think I’m
his girlfriend. He’s not my boyfriend,
I can’t randomly message him on a
Wednesday night.” Non-relationships
weren’t the “chill” I expected. It was the
same as relationships, except without
a label. It was like trespassing the same
danger zone with a “lifeguard” Hallow-
een costume.
During this phase of my love life, going
home alone on weekends was another
scenario I dreaded. Finding someone at a
party to fulfill my sexual needs was my
definition of being single. Men flocked to
my life like pigeons, and I considered it
my pride. But I knowingly resented the
pressure of having to text a man when I
just wanted to be alone. In some ways, I
loved the idea of attention more than the
attention itself.
After two years, I realized that I was
paradoxically sustaining the ideals of
finding a partner that I hoped to dispense
from my ideological landscapes. I was
denying myself that room I needed to
breathe and learn who I am and what I
want from my life.
Last August, I moved into a studio
apartment and decided to concentrate
on myself rather than men, sex, love and
relationships. Alas! I discovered what it
means to be single and happy. I
began watching more television, read-
ing more books, talking to my parents
and friends whom I had lost touch with.
Strangely, I didn’t feel that void I pre-
dicted I would feel if I were single. There
has been a surge in my independence and
I finally have headspace to think about
the different things I can do with my
life. I even began writing and publishing,
and I discovered domains of my life that
brought me pleasure and satisfaction.
I’m not saying relationships always
blind individuals from unearthing their
own inner potential. But we often feel
this need to be with someone else, and
thereby forget that self-sufficiency and
self-love are important dimensions of a
happy adult life. I enforced this require-
ment in my life at the cost of subjugat-
ing my personal fulfillment. Though I
don’t regret any relationships, I am glad I
finally went on hiatus from them a hiatus
from them. Every significant moment of
my life, such as graduating high school,
leaving Bangladesh for boarding school
and beginning college, involved a part-
ner.
Three months away from graduating
college, I truly feel refreshed and ready
to start a new life by myself. For now, it is
me, myself and I, on my couch relishing
chicken wings, tacos and ice cream. And
I couldn’t love it more.
BY RAMISA ROB, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR
Failing in love
ILLUSTRATION BY WILLA HUA