boyfriend Archives - Womens Post

Living August 19, 2016

Thinking of moving in with your partner?

Moving in with a boyfriend is an exciting and life-changing experience. It can also highlight some of the less flattering realities of living with a stinky man-bear and his habits. Luckily, I have managed to discover a few solutions.

One of the more difficult aspects of living with someone is how you both deal with cleanliness. There is nothing worse than having a roommate (not to mention a bedmate) that is too messy. For me, the limit is the difference between being dirty and messy. If someone leaves clothes on the floor or keeps collections of odds and ends — that is acceptable. If your partner leaves garbage on the floor or lets dishes collect until there are new insect roommates moving in, that is an immediate red flag that you will end up being more of a maid than a girlfriend. I’m blessed to have a messy boyfriend and not one that is dirty. If you have a partner who is inherently disgusting, training can help the situation, but it may take more work than it’s worth ladies.

I’ve always lived in my girly zen zone. It smelled nice, there were decorations, and everything had a place. Now, I have smelly socks hanging from my jewellery stand and I can’t seem to ever locate my brush (I should mention my boyfriend has long locks). The lady cave I built has been infiltrated by a man, who is half bear when he wakes up in the morning.

Though this would leave many women running for the hills, I can honestly say I’ve never been happier. My perfectly clean apartment was lovely no doubt, but there is nothing better than coming home and being met with a smiling man you love, especially one that has a couple glasses of wine and dinner on the table. Love is messy girls. It is stinky and it is unorganized. Love has required me to give up any pretences of perfection I’ve carried with me for years. But perfection be damned. It isn’t worth it to have a show home and give up actually learning how to compromise space and love someone for who they are and how they live.

Compromise is key. It is important that both parties feel they have a stake in what an apartment looks like. An example is moving over my vintage Patti Smith artwork to make room for a Toronto Maple Leafs poster beside it. It looks better with both anyways. My boyfriend also knows how insane I get over clothes on the floor. It is a pet peeve. So, to meet in the middle, we have a corner that is solely his. He can dump his clothes, and anything else he wants, in this area and I can’t bother him about it. I’ve come to accept this messy area and by keeping it contained, we are both happy.

Open communication is a must. Talking about expectations, financial plans, and emotional needs BEFORE moving in is essential.. To make things simple and functional, try making a schedule of tasks that need to be done around the house. For example, my boyfriend and I pick a day to clean, and contribute equally by splitting cleaning, dishes, and cooking right down the middle to avoid any resentments.

Be prepared to learn the oddest things about your partner. For example, my boyfriend collects receipts. Not just a few, but ALL of them. Apparently, he has this epic plan to file them all (this will never happen). I find them everywhere and quietly dispose of them when he isn’t looking. It is a quirky, albeit adorable, habit that I’ve learned to accept. On my end, apparently I can’t brush my teeth without looking like I just dunked my face into a bowl of ice cream. It is juvenile and gross, but my man laughs about it when we brush our teeth in the morning.

The bottom line is quite simple — Learn to love the mess. Moving in together is a hectic and exciting process of getting to know all the habits and quirks of your loved one. Previously, I had this idea that if you lived together, all the mystery of that person disappears. I thought this would be a bad thing. Instead, the fact that two individuals with different habits and histories can come together and grow as one is truly mysterious and magical. We only have one tender moment to love after all and then we are gone. So take the leap and make room on the bookshelf. I wish you the best in your pursuit of the madness of the mess. It is one of the best adventures to embark on.

Love & Sex December 18, 2013

Christmas shopping: Can I find the perfect gift for the perfect guy?

Normally I love shopping for Christmas presents. I like finding the perfect gift for each person and I consider it a personal triumph when I make someone cry; tears are a clear sign of victory. But Boyfriend is impossible to buy for and he’s far better than me at getting presents because everything he gets me is something personal and deeply meaningful; at this point I wish he’d show up with an iPod shuffle and an ugly Christmas sweater in a box that says, “To: Janet.” At least then I wouldn’t feel like such a failure.

For our anniversary Boyfriend made me, literally made, a Zombie Boyfriend Munny doll that he had hand drawn and coloured in. For my birthday he had someone make me a one-of-a-kind Sasquatch stuffed creature wearing a red vest because when he sat next to me in the hospital and I was doped up beyond recognition I told him I had a conversation with a Sasquatch wearing a red vest.

See?! There is literally no competing with him at gift giving.

I wanted to get us a trip to somewhere warm and toasty for New Years Eve, even if it was just a couple days, but then I took a new job and a last minute trip seemed like a pretty terrible idea. Boyfriend has never been on a vacation, ever, so it would have been the perfect gift for him but unless Flight Centre wants to gift us three days in the Bahamas I don’t think that’s happening this year. I’m back to square one.

After the vacation idea I thought I had found a great gift, a comic book artist who would make a print based on our story; beautiful, simple and so very perfect for my comic book loving manfriend. But I didn’t think far enough ahead so it wouldn’t arrive until after Christmas and that’s just not going to work, maybe I’ll do that for his birthday in April.

Right now I’m out of ideas, I’m 100% sure that he’s ordered something or made something that is brilliant, sweet and something I didn’t even realize I needed in my life. At this point I’ll probably end up getting him something he wants but wouldn’t buy for himself, like a new TV he needs a new TV. The worst part is that he will probably love whatever I get him, he’ll probably think it’s great but so far there’s nothing I can think of that will even compare to the things he’s already given me.

Is dating always this hard? We did the, “I love you thing.” Shouldn’t I be calmer about what gifts I get him? Shouldn’t holidays be easier now? Maybe it never gets easier, maybe when you love someone you spend the rest of your life trying to make theirs better whether that’s a gift, a favour or a phone call to check in after a bad day.

I guess I’ll spend the rest of my days wondering if I’ll ever be able to beat him at gift giving.

Challenge accepted.

Uncategorized June 13, 2013

I Picked You

Last weekend Boyfriend and I got into a bit of a tiff. I had jokingly said, “Let’s talk about our relationship and the future and be all romantic and stuff.” To which he responded, “We don’t need to talk about the future. We’ll just keep having fun and petting kittens and being together.” Aside from noticing that we tend to speak like children of the internet on a regular basis, I was a little put off by the idea that he just saw the future as same old, same old and never moving forward because that is definitely not what I want our relationship to be.

Having grown up in a household where yelling was how most discussions happened I am always a little nervous to have a real discussion because I don’t like yelling and I don’t like fighting. Because of this, I avoided having a conversation about why I was upset and I just let it sit for a day. The next day Boyfriend came over and insisted that we talk because I had been acting “weird.” And he needed to know why. So after a lot of avoiding I finally told him why I was upset and his response made it all better.

When I told Boyfriend that I was upset because I was afraid he was just passing the time with me and it wouldn’t matter if I was me or any other girl he responded by saying, “Shan, I picked you. I could have been with someone else but I wanted you, I picked you.” So we’re not perfect and it isn’t easy but we picked each other and even if the future is uncertain I think it’s worth figuring it out together.

I wish I wasn’t so afraid of confrontation. I can do it at work, in interviews and on twitter but when it comes to someone I care about it’s really hard for me to say what I think when I’m upset. I’m afraid that with one wrong turn he’ll leave me because everyone who came before did. But that’s kind of how it works isn’t it? All the ones that came before were wrong because you have to wade through all the bad relationships to find the good ones.

Whatever happens in the future with Boyfriend I know that he chose to be with me and doesn’t want to be with anyone else and for now I’m happy with the plan for the future which is simply to keep being happy and having fun. Eventually we’re going to have this conversation for real and without all the interweb speak, except that there totally will be interweb speak because we’re nerds of epic proportions. At that point we’ll have to see if we’re ready to go in the same direction because a year from now I’m going to want to live together and in two years I’ll want to think about other options for our future.

For now the future is a little bit uncertain but at least I know I have someone who gets the joke when I ask husky owners if their dog’s name is moon-moon.

Follow Shannon on Twitter at @Shananigans.