When You’re Done With Dating & Ready For Something Real, You Won’t Tolerate These Things

You will reach a point in your life when you realize that being single isn’t as bad as it seems. You realize that you don’t have the time or energy to waste on people who don’t deserve your attention and you enact a new standard of acceptable behavior when it comes to dating. With this standard come some new rules, and that means if you notice any of these 12 things happening with a guy, it’s a dealbreaker:

1. He’s unreliable. You refuse to put up with his lame excuses about why he didn’t reply or why he disappeared for a week. You need a guy who will stick to his word and won’t change his mind at the drop of a hat. You need reliability and a guy who will follow through. If you can’t trust him, you don’t need him. It’s that simple, really.
2. He refuses to define the relationship. You’re bored of trying to play mind games to figure out what you are and where you stand with a guy. If he wants to be with you, he’ll be with you and you won’t have to dig to get him to admit it. Any guy who’s worth being with will make his feelings known.
3. He constantly flakes on your plans. Sitting at home alone bored because he flaked at the last minute (or didn’t even bother to tell you he was flaking) is the worst and you’ll never do it again. If a guy doesn’t make you a priority enough to keep the plans he makes with you and respect that your time is as valuable as his, he can go. You deserve to be more than a backup plan.
4. He’s rude. Whether he’s rude to the waiter or rude about his ex, he’s a jerk. It can get embarrassing pretty quickly when you’re are with a guy like this and you have no desire to associate yourself with someone who thinks treating other people like dirt is okay. If kindness and compassion don’t come naturally to him, screw him.
5. He dismisses your opinions. Patronizing men have no place in your life. You don’t need a mansplainer to tell you why your thoughts and opinions are wrong and his are right. It’s condescending AF and total BS. If a guy doesn’t value your intellect and opinions, he doesn’t deserve to be in your life.
6. He’s close-minded. Racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia and any other form of prejudice is a huge deal breaker. If he doesn’t value every human being as worthy of having rights, then you have a right to move on to someone who has a sense of common decency. It’s 2016 and if he can’t get with the times, then he needs to get out of your life.
7. He has a bad temper. You don’t want to be walking on eggshells around a guy that you are trusting with your emotions. You should be able to have discussions and disagreements in your relationship without it escalating into a full-on confrontation. It’s even more worrying if he’s acting this way early on in the relationship, so if you notice it, you’re out of there.
8. He’s selfish and up his own ass. Losers usually come with huge egos that need to be reinflated on the daily. His selfish tendencies and high opinion of himself might be something you can overlook for the first few dates, but soon it will be something that wears you thin. You need a guy who will be interested in you AND your interests. If he’s not, you’re not interested in him.
9. He tries to control you. If a guy tries to have a say in every part of your life and starts dictating who you should and shouldn’t be friends with, it’s a massive red flag. Being in a relationship doesn’t mean losing your independence and free will — no one is worth compromising those things. If a guy shows any signs of this kind of insanity, he has no place in your life.
10. He’s jealous and possessive. When a guy wants your whole life to be about him, he’s either cripplingly insecure or abusive — likely both. Jealousy can be flattering at first but it will lead to lots of issues and endless fights later down the line. A healthy relationship is built on trust, which means there’s nothing to be jealous of. If he can’t cope with you so much as talking to a male bartender to order a drink without fuming, you have to go.
11. He hides your relationship. He refuses to introduce you to family or friends and hides your relationship on social media? No thanks. A guy who’s with you should be proud to be with you. You want to be included in his life, not be kept secret. It makes you wonder why he’s so hesitant to share you with the world, and the possibilities aren’t particularly pleasant. If he’s not willing to have you on his arm as his girlfriend in public, you certainly don’t do it in private either.