I DON'T KNOW HOW TO QUIT YOU

Yesterday I was dumped by text.

For shame! But worse, far worse, is the fact I should have done it myself weeks ago. I just never know when to cut and run. Even when it’s plain the relationship is deader than Kerry Katona’s career I’m still plugging away at my latest comeback angle (Strictly Come Dinner Dating On Ice anyone?). I get fond of people you see. Even (especially?) arseholes. I don’t like saying a fundamental goodbye and I feel genuinely sad at the end of dates with nice people that you don’t fancy. This is probably how I get into the accidental passion kissing scenarios (that and my borderline alchoholism) and then have to spend hours of my life constructing overly tactful thanks-but-no-thanks messages. The latest of which resulted in a lengthy conversation with the bread baron while he was in Sao Paulo! I dread to think how much that dumping cost me. Oh and somehow we left it that he’d be in touch in a few weeks to see if I’d changed my mind. See! I suck at dumping people.

In the past I’ve tried the ‘heads-up’ method. I used this on my very first boyfriend – the sweetest loveliest man ever - whose bottom lip started wobbling so furiously when I mooted us splitting up that I backtracked and somehow ended up suggesting that he just think about the possibility and that maybe if he went on a lads holiday and let his hair down, so to speak, that would be ok by me. That way by the time he got back from said holiday – with an orange tan, a serious bleach job and very probably an STD for all I know – he was fully adjusted and ready to take his dumping like a man. So far so successful but since then I’ve found the heads-up method just gives them time to get in there first! Nothing more humiliating than finding the rug’s been unceremoniously whipped from under your feet leaving you firmly in dumpsville, population: you. And this is precisely what happened with KB2. Having identified in the past year the things I do not want in a boyfriend as well as the things I do want in a boyfriend I was at first thrown off the scent when all the things I do not want came packaged in what looked very much like the things that I do want! Are you following me? Almost certainly not but I’ll press on. Eventually I caught on and realised that a 36 year old man who can’t juggle the ‘stress’ of cats and his job is not for me. But despite being deafened by the alarm bells ringing in my ears I still kept plugging away, just long enough for him to clock my displeasure and get in there first. Dammit!

So my new year’s resolution (I am aware that it’s March but the resolution slot is still vacant so I think it’s valid) is this: trust your instincts, cut your losses and at all costs DO NOT GET DUMPED AGAIN! It is very bad for the ego.