Love is a crazy drug and it can make us do some pretty embarrassing things. However, if I’ve learned anything over the years it’s that for every one of your embarrassing stories, there’s someone who has one that’s way worse.
For the sake of solidarity, here are my top three:
The actual crazy crazy person: After having my heart broken for the very first time at age eighteen, I went on a dramatic teenage rampage. The day after the break-up, I stormed into my ex-boyfriend’s work, pulled him aside and proceeded to yell at him in the break room, while his coworkers listened through the door, hearing every word. This was followed by lots of sobbing on my bedroom floor while Boyz II Men’s “End of the Road” played on repeat. (I blame this one on youth, but still it wasn’t my finest moment.)
The overly sympathetic ex: In University, the guy I was dating broke up with me to go out with another girl. I was devastated and spent the next six weeks unsuccessfully trying to get over him. Then he called me out of the blue to tell me that the other girl dumped him, he was heartbroken and had “nowhere to turn.” He’d treated the new girl poorly and now his circle of friends were giving him the cold shoulder. I foolishly agreed to meet him for coffee. I thought that if he saw what a good listener I was over lattes and scones, he might remember what we had and want to get back together. It worked. We got back together, only to break up again a few months later when he once again dumped me for someone else. #Fail.
The thief: This one is probably the most embarrassing because it happened fairly recently. A few years ago, I had a crush on the guy who had been the best man at my best friend’s wedding. One night, I went out to a hip cocktail bar with my bestie, her husband, and the best man. Attached to the bar was a small gift shop. After enjoying some cocktails, we browsed the goods. The best man wanted to buy this fancy ice tray, but didn’t want to carry it around for the rest of the night. Seeing my opportunity, I said, “oh, you can put it in my purse!” At the end of the night, I conveniently forgot to give him his ice tray in hopes that it would give me an excuse to see him again. However, when I texted him the next day to let him know I had his purchase he was like, “nah, just keep it. It was only $10.” (Which makes sense. This man makes well into the mid six figures, why would he sweat an ice cube tray? No pun intended.)
If you’re still craving more proof that you’re not alone in your lovestruck antics, there’s now an entire Twitter thread devoted to the most embarrassing things people have done to impress their crushes — and the results are utterly cringe-worthy in the best way possible.
Here’s some of the top posts and what we can learn from them:
- Changing your appearance for someone you like.
I went to a department store, got full make up done by one of the makeup artists and went to my then girlfriend’s house to show her because she always nagged me about making more of an effort and I wanted to surprise her and she critiqued my make up while I stood on her porch.
— roxane gay (@rgay) March 20, 2018
What we can learn: Sure, that Kardashian-esque contouring job you just had done at Sephora may seem like the way to impress your crush, but you probably are going to have way more luck just being yourself. If someone doesn’t like the real you, it’s their loss.
- Making someone a priority when you’re not their priority:
there’s a lot of competition in my life for this, but asking the non-boyfriend I was desperately in love with if he wanted me to fly out to visit him on MY birthday, and then deciding to go after he said, “sure, if you want to,” is probably near the top of the list
— jennifer (@__nif__) March 19, 2018
What we can learn: Actions speak louder than words. If someone isn’t super excited about you being a part of their life, they probably don’t deserve to be a part of your life.
- Sticking around after the breakup.
Ummmmm I was broken up with in his mom’s kitchen after he BROUGHT ME HOME TO MEET HIS FAMILY for the first time 🙁 and then I kept…doing the dishes … because i thought it would make him see I was useful … ??????
— Caro (@socarolinesays) March 19, 2018
What we can learn: If you can leave the scene of the break-up, do. Also, if someone is willing to break up with you in such a thoughtless and immature manner, you owe them nada.
- Borrowing family photos because you want a photo of them.
Was 13 and crushing HARD on my best friend’s brother; asked her to borrow pictures from family photo album so I could photocopy them. They somehow fell out of the trunk of our car and, mortifyingly, I had to explain to his mum why loads of her family photos were gone forever
— well loved stories (@ms_peaceweaver) March 19, 2018
What we can learn: Oh, the days before Facebook. There’s no way this situation could have gone well. Just don’t do this. You’re welcome.
At the end of the day, I think it’s fair to say we all have at least one experience like this in our dating track record that we can learn from. If we’re lucky, it makes for a great story.
