5 Cautions to the “Single and Sad About It” From the “Young and Committed”

So, some of you out there have woken up and smelled the proverbial roses of your single lives. You realize that your twenties can be a magical time of self-exploration and discovery (not to mention some really great one night stands). The REST of you fall into two categories: Young and Committed or Single and Sad About It. Those of you in the latter group, you see your friends moving in with their partners or getting married. You are obsessed with the fear that you will be alone forever and you think that you are on some time crunch to find this soul mate that everyone insists is “out there somewhere”. Take it from someone who falls into the “Young and Committed” category- Stop. Take a deep breath and enjoy what’s around you. Because with that commitment that you are craving comes some big life changes that no one ever takes time to process during their unwavering search for The One.

1: Say Goodbye To The Rest of the Opposite Sex

Ok, that’s a little bit extreme, but you know those close opposite sex friends you have? As much as you say you’ll stay super close to them and that you are not going to change your friendships for your significant other, once you are committed you’ll find very quickly that your partner is not 100% comfortable with you being very close to a guy/girl that is not them. No frequent phone calls or lunch dates anymore. The person you are committing yourself to wants to know that they are special. And you will probably realize that you feel the same way even if you always swore you would never be like that.

2: Get Ready For Grossness

When you live together you WILL experience each others potential for extreme grossness. This goes both ways. Women will never admit it but we can be downright disgusting sometimes, as can men. You may put up a valiant fight to do your business behind closed door but eventually the ruse wears thin. Once that happens everyone gets comfortable and once you are comfortable you let it all out. It’s a far cry from the sexy days when you first met and were constantly trying to impress each other.

3: Club Vs. Couch

Fabulous nights out quickly become traded for nights in on the couch. Once you’re not searching for flirts or hookups anymore, going out seems to lose some of its appeal. Your single friends will beg you to come out and it will seem like effort just to put on some good looking clothes and do something that requires you staying up until all hours of the night. No one likes to admit it but the majority of our crazy escapades have a single unspoken goal: to find someone to pay attention to us.

4: Where the Hell Did All the Our Money Go?!

SO you moved in together to save money right? Yeah that’s what they all say. Or you got married and thought that combined finances was going to be fantastic. But somehow even with both incomes, the rent, utilities, groceries, clothes, your new-found love of decorating, and feeding the stray you decided to adopt seem to add up faster then before. And let’s not even talk about grown up stuff like personal property tax that comes with moving out of mommy and daddy’s house.

5: You end up as these guys:

Personally that’s one of my favorite parts of the whole movie (Knocked Up). It’s hilarious, because, as is the case with most great humor, it is true. Now it is down the road a bit, but if you’re committed that is the road you are on. You WILL have less sex. Sometimes you WILL plan it around your schedule. And even worse, you WILL occasionally trade it for household chores. This is just part of life, kids. So do yourself a favor and enjoy the hookups while they’re available.

So that’s it, straight from the mouth of a committed young adult. If you happen upon ‘The One’ when you’re young, that’s great! But if you don’t, remember: you are not on a timer. Hollywood does a pretty great job of letting you know that the one thing you are missing is love. They’re wrong. If you focus on that, the one thing that you’re missing is LIFE.