Being single over the holidays can be rough.
by Reem Khaleel Dec 24, 2022
Being single throughout the year often feels very freeing. You go about your daily routine, your schedule often changing as you please, not having to take into account a significant other’s needs. You might have small reminders about your single status from time to time, but overall, your life as a me, not a we, is pretty easy to live through.
Then, November rolls around. Between Thanksgiving and the New Year, you suddenly find yourself inundated with reminders that you are, well, all alone. This reminder can come from well-meaning friends or family, or it can creep in after seeing other couples and realizing a partner is what's missing from your life. The best way to sum up the feeling of being single during the holidays? One word: brutal.
This year, instead of pitying yourself for cooking for a party of one, embrace your single status through and through, regardless of whether you're showing up to your aunt's sans a plus one or tonguing mozz sticks instead of a drunken babe when the clock strikes midnight on New Year's Eve. If you’re single AF this holiday season, here are 22 relatable memes to remind you you’re not alone. Cheers to you!
1. Explaining to your extended family that you’re still single because you’re happy being a total homebody.
2. A ticking time bomb is suddenly put on you to find a significant other by your family.
3. Hanging out with your friends at a holiday party turns into abandonment because you’re the only one without a date.
4. A simple movie night turns you into an awkward third wheel when your friend brings their significant other.
5. Going to your hometown for the holidays means running into people you never wanted to see again, including your ex and their new significant other.
6. The words “set up” immediately ring alarm bells in your head because you’re sick of blind dates that end badly.
7. All you need is a good cry session and an even better bottle of wine when you don’t have someone to kiss at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve.
8. When your family asks about the person you last dated, but you stopped seeing them ages ago.
9. How to give cynical and unsolicited dating advice to your friends who are happily monogamous.
10. How it feels to have your relationship status announced at the family dinner table…for the billionth time.
11. The only thing worse than being single is being dragged to a lame singles holiday mixer by friends who want you to find a significant other.
12. Everyone else has lavish and romantic New Year’s Eve plans and you’re enjoying your own company.
13. You don’t have a significant other, so most of your nights are spent hanging out with your pets.
14. Rehearsing an answer for the next time you’re asked about your single status because you’ve already been asked about it a number of excruciating times.
15. The only other eligible singles in your hometown are people you would rather forget ever existed.
16. Attempting to put some holiday spirit into your dating profiles and trying to look effortlessly hot while doing it.
17. Having to do a social media deep dive on any of your or your friends’ prospective dates or hookups to ensure none of you end up dating serial killers.
18. The soul-crushing aftermath of hooking up with an ex or former fling just because you’re lonely over the holidays.
19. Being off your game after a successful date because you just endured a long dry spell.
20. Making everyone who wants to discuss people’s lack of a relationship status as uncomfortable and awkward as they’re making all the singles in the room feel.
21. When you keep the last time you went on a date well-hidden because it’s been so long, it could have been weeks, months, or even years.
22. Being asked if you’re tired about being single and you answer in sarcasm because you would rather not hear pitying responses.
Reem Khaleel Reem Khaleel is the Editorial Assistant at IntrigueMag and a writer from the Maldives who escapes into fictional worlds by writing her own YA rom-com novels. In addition to IntrigueMag, her writing has been featured on CBR.
