A Week in 2017 Relationships

Congratulations, fam. You survived 2016.

It was so bad that I think it needs to be a skill we should all have on our CVs. Anyway, while we were celebrating New Year’s Day with relatives and friends, other people were spending it in the bathroom, crying because of heartbreak.

In this episode of Relationships That Suck, here are a couple of stories that you may have heard in the pipelines recently: A young South African woman was traumatised when she realised that her boyfriend of seven years dumped her over a month-or-so affair with a secretary at his new job. Now, this heartbroken woman cooked for him, cleaned for him, bought him new curtains and pots for his house, alles, all while neglecting her family at home. I know you’re judging her, because she did everything a wife is supposed to do for her husband, just to get dumped with absolutely nothing to show for it, but wow.

If that isn’t sad, I don’t even know what to tell you. It’s like that saying you hear but never really understand until you’re in that situation: Kamma “why buy a cow when you can get milk for free?” Shame, tog, poor woman. And what must happen? Seven years of your life given to a man just to get nothing in return.

Did he really love her or was he just interested in all the benefits? I think that’s pretty cruel, hey. Talk about wasting someone’s time…

Then there was a picture that appeared on social media about an American woman who posted a photo with two promise rings on her finger. Now people are finding promise rings sketchy little objects and it’s summed up in this question: Why give me a promise ring when you can marry me?

But let’s go into the history of the promise ring for a moment: Promise rings date back to 16th century England in the form of posy rings because they were engraved with poems, while acrostic rings became more popular in Georgian and Victorian times.

But their popularity peaked recently with the intention being to show your full commitment to a relationship. It can mean anything between you and your partner, but from what society says, it’s basically a pre-engagement ring. I can understand one promise ring. OK, sure, that’s all well and dandy. Maara two? What are we promising? Someone on Twitter said “it’s a promise to promise to make another promise”. What kind of standard is this? No, guys. Let’s be better people and either marry the person or don’t. That’s it.

If you thought that was bad, well, that’s not the end of it. While scrolling through Twitter recently, a South African woman was infuriated on her friend’s behalf when she found out that her partner appeared on the popular television show ‘Date My Family’, even though they were together.

How do you just appear on a dating show when you know you’re in a relationship? I’m sorry for her, but how nonsensical is that, bra? Where is the respect?

Now I must be in the sitting room with the whole family and watch my life fall apart as you choose another woman? If that isn’t traumatising, then I really don’t know what is, hey.

There’s more though, and I had to save this one for the last. A British woman was arrested recently for stabbing her boyfriend because he ate all of her fried chips and didn’t leave anything for her. This is a real story. Anger issues on fleek! From what the reports say, she even returned to his house the next day and cut his hands, guys.

Use this year to reevaluate your relationships by asking one of the most important questions: Are you happy? And take it from there.

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