break – Rosie Culture

Do What You Have To After A Break Up

How do I know when a girl just went through a break up? She starts posting selfies, deep quotes and poetry, and sharing Thought Catalog articles about how being alone is better (at least share my blog posts guys, come on). And then all of her relationship pictures start to fade from her social media. Her profile picture changes to a solo pic or a photo of a girl’s night out. And the status quietly changes to single.

It’s all a little cliche. That whole dying your hair a wacky color after a break up to try to change your identity. People talk about it all the time and poke fun at the girls having their poetry induced break through. They talk about how much she’s changed and how funny it is that she never used to act that way.

Well, they change because break ups change you. They force you to look at yourself as a lone person and understand who you truly are. Maybe you are a blonde at heart, a party girl, or an independent being.

Who cares what anyone else thinks? As if they’ve never had a life shattering break up, as if they’ve never hit their single and ready to mingle phase.

We’re all guilty of it, and even if we weren’t, girl, DO YOU! Do what you have to to find yourself, to feel better and move on. If you have to make out with a lot of people, do it. If you have to talk crap on your ex, do it. If it makes you feel better I did it on a blog for all of the world to see, you can just do it in a group chat. Or start a blog. Why not?

If you have to share poetry about fueling your fucking fire, shout out Christopher Poindexter, then DO it. No one can tell you how to heal. Don’t ever feel silly about the things you are doing to better yourself and move on. I’m rooting for you and every girl who has had their life changed by a break up is rooting for you.

Photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/samuelyoo/

Relationships

Can You Date Someone With The Same Name As Your Ex?

I recently ran into the problem of whether or not I could date someone who had the same name as my dad. I googled it, read many blogs on the subject, and then realized how silly that was. If I really liked someone – why did it matter what their name was? Also I have never in my life called my dad by his first name so it really wouldn’t be a reminder to me of anything. I never went on a date with the guy anyway, but at least I know for the future.

But then I ran into the problem on whether or not I could date someone who had the same name as my ex.

There’s a lot more attached to the name of someone I used to date than there is to a friend or a family member who I don’t even call by that name. It seems crazy that something so little and pretty irrelevant could make such an impact on the decision to date someone.

Firstly, it’s a little weird just to have a boyfriend with the same name as your ex. Secondly, your friends are going to get so confused when you start talking about your new boyfriend. Can you imagine the look on their faces when they’re listening to you and think you’re telling a story about the ex whose photos you burned together on the porch? And lastly, you just have so many memories attached to that name. And they’re probably not good ones. If they are good ones, you’re probably not even over your ex and then this kind of just sounds like an odd replacement for you.

It all depends on how long you dated the person for and how much they mean to you now.

Would I date someone who has the same name as the ex I dated for four years? No. That seems a little drastic, but he also broke my heart and ruined a good portion of my life. I don’t want to jinx myself somehow and potentially go down that road again. Unless I could call him some kind of variation of the name, it probably wouldn’t work out.

Would I date someone who has the same name as the guy I dated for three months but never actually committed to? Yes, I think so. Because I honestly forgot about 90% of our “relationship” and even though the parts I remember are still bad, I don’t care enough about that ex or that name to turn down someone new just because they have the same name.

It seems silly, until you’re put into that position. Would you date someone with the same name as your ex?

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/helga/

PostGrad

How Postgrads Feel When Everyone Goes Back To School

For a very small part of this summer, I thought graduating was the best thing that happened to me. I was very wrong.

College, without a doubt, was the best four years of my life. I couldn’t have asked for anything more from the school I chose. I left with a degree that I felt I could excel in, friends that I know will stick with me forever, and experiences that sucked enough to make me a better person.

I didn’t think I would miss it. I thought I lived it up and wouldn’t have any regrets. I was getting tired of excessive drinking and expendable people by the time I put on my cap and gown. I was ready to settle down, have my people by my side, and grow up to be something amazing.

But now I’m watching all of my younger friends go back to school and I even miss the things I hated. I miss trying to move all of my stuff up flights of stairs. I miss living with my best friends and going out our first night back together. I miss being able to walk down the street to the bar with all of my friends to run into people I don’t even necessarily like. I miss my on campus job even though I despised waking up early. I’m never going to wake up, grab my books, and walk 15 minutes to the building all of my classes had been located for at least two years.

I did the same routine summer after summer. Get a job, hang out with friends, quit job, and go back to school for the time of my life. I didn’t really realize that that routine had ended. There is no going back to school, no mini break from reality where everything is on your shoulders but somehow you can handle it.

I never wanted to be one of those people that graduated and then constantly yearned to go back to college. But if you really enjoyed your four years, I don’t think that’s a feeling you can shake right away. Especially if your younger friends are doing all the things you wish you could do all over again. We all grow up eventually – but I’m going to hold onto my college past as I enter my grown up future.

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/15267290@N03/

Break Ups

Forgetting Not Forgiving

The phrase goes: forgive and forget. Stop feeling the resent you feel towards someone and put it in the back of your mind. That person’s mistake that caused you anger or hurt is gone forever and you move on with your life.

I’ve never really been one to forgive because a lot of people ask for second chances. Then a third chance. Then eventually they’re taking total advantage of your kindness.

In most cases, I forget rather than forgive.

There are circumstances I’ve been put in where I’ve been hurt enough just to give up on that person completely. They don’t deserve my trust, my friendship, or me in their life in general. I don’t mean it egotistically. I just feel so taken advantage of that I can’t ever act towards this person the way I did before – all they cause is pain – so I remove them from my life.

I delete them from social media. I stop answering their texts. I don’t say hi when I see them in the bar.

I don’t make a big deal out of it, I don’t yell or scream. I don’t subtweet cruelly or give death stares. Because I don’t see why someone who chose to wrong me should even deserve my attention at all. Why should I allow the possibility of hurt back into my life when I can just get rid of it all together?

I have a hard time forgiving because that just allows me to be vulnerable again. Forgiving means, to me, justifying what you did wrong and in most cases – I just can’t do that.

I don’t hate you, I just don’t want to be around you.

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/lukesst/

Relationships

5 Things Single People Need To Stop Doing

Disclaimer: I can say stuff like this because I’m single – right?

1. Talking about how single you are

Yea, we get it you’re single and ready to mingle but having a hard time mingling.

2. Dating temporarily

Choosing someone to date knowing that you were only going to keep them around for a month or two.

3. Falling in love with sucky people

You know they’re bad for you, yet you still yearn for them.

4. Complaining about how no one likes you

People like you, you just don’t like them back.

5. Harassing your friends who are in a relationship

They care about you, but honestly they don’t care about your chronic singleness.

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ehiuomo/

Break Ups

Forgetting How To Be Vulnerable

It happens to the best of us, we put up a wall and we have no idea how to knock it down.

Someone along the way hurt you enough or broke your heart enough for you to start building brick by brick. An indestructible shield around yourself so that no one could get through like that again. So no one could ever cause that kind of damage to you again.

You probably let that wall down a few times since the initial heartache. Believing that this time it would be different, that this time you could handle it, that this time there would only be love and not lies. But this just lead to you building that wall with stronger materials. Taller and wider and stronger. Now there really is no way around it.

Being vulnerable is a huge part of a relationship. The difference between someone being your friend and someone being your significant other has mainly to do how open and comfortable you are with them. If you can’t reveal your blackened and dusty secrets to them – who can you tell?

Now so many of us don’t know how to be vulnerable anymore. Everything we do in the dating world is hidden behind a facade – whether we mean to or not. Yeah, it would be great to connect someone on that level. It would be amazing to dig up the things you’ve buried so far deep in yourself because you didn’t have anyone to tell.

But how do you know when someone deserves this information? And how do you know what they’re going to do with it? They could cherish it and understand you – forming a bond and a love that will make your life bliss. Or they could crush it and ignore you – do what everyone else did and leave you in the dark.

Not being vulnerable will hinder your relationships. I often find myself answering questions generically rather than thoughtfully saying what I’m thinking because I don’t see the point. You can ask me how my day is going and I can either tell you how it really is. How I’m really bummed today because it’s raining, I had awful nightmares and didn’t sleep, I’m just overall cranky. Or I can tell you it’s fine. Because are you really going to fix my bad day – do you really even care?

They say the right person will knock down your wall. They’ll take their hammer and chip away at the hard pieces of you. But if you have no vulnerability left – will that person ever even get close enough?

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/lockechrisj/

Break Ups

Can You Lose The Ability To Fall In Love?

Little girls grow up watching fairytales. They see prince charming saving the princess and ultimately think that something like that will happen to them one day.

As a young teenager, we think having a boyfriend will solve all of our problems. We want to have our first kiss and fill the gap in our hearts that we’ve been filling with angsty music and not-so-real reality tv.

I fell in love (using this term loosely because who the hell knows if I was in love or not) when I was 16 and really did think it solved all of my problems. My relationship got me through my weird high school years of not so great friends and not so close family. It got me through my first very scary year of college. It definitely did not solve all of my problems.

I fell out of love (again, loosely) over a year ago. And I have felt nothing of the sort ever since.

People will say that after a break up, you need to go through your rebound phase and get everything out of your system before you can consider a relationship again. Then, you just need to find the right person and everything will fall into place.

I never thought finding the right person would be so hard. I did the rebound phase and kind of, sort of, tried to seriously date but I could never get myself to stay around long enough.

We all make excuses. I’m in college and now isn’t the right time. I just got out of a relationship and now isn’t the right time. I’m still young and graduated and now isn’t the right time.

Are they all just excuses for the fact that you can lose the ability to fall in love after getting your heart broken? Even if you close your eyes and believe really hard that a fairytale ending is coming your way – what if you already lost all of that princess spark inside of you that was going to make that possible.

photo by: https://www.flickr.com/photos/camdiluv/