It must be tough being Jennifer Aniston. Not because her marriage ended and her husband started adopting and biologically reproducing babies with a Hollywood super-babe five minutes later. That’s not why I feel sorry for Jen. Nope, I feel sorry for her because of all the pity. Poor old single girl Jen, how awful for her to be so unlucky in love, why can’t she just find a man? Well, in actual fact she recently has. He’s got a nice beard and everything – but the point is why do we all feel so sorry for her just for being single? It doesn’t define who she is. As well as being single, she’s also a successful career woman, dog-lover (this is v-important, obvs) and has a body most 40-year-old (and 20-year-old) women would happily swap their own mums for. Yet, for some reason, we gaze at her polished and perfect form on the red carpet and tell ourselves sadly, “Poor girl, she’s clearly not happy.”
If you, like me, are a single girl, I’d like you to ask yourself this question: how often do you actually wish you were in a relationship? Is it every day? Once a week? Maybe on the odd Sunday afternoon, when you’re hungover and want someone to go and buy you some crisps and Cherry Coke. Or maybe it’s even less often; maybe it’s only when you’re flying solo at a wedding, surrounded by seemingly happy couples. And when you do have this wish, is it because you want to please other people, or yourself? Do you think you should have a partner, and is it this assumption that is making you feel so inadequate?
It is a fact that there are now more single women in Britain than there was after the First World War. There are over six million of them. That sounds like a lot, right? Well, would you be surprised to hear that there are actually one whole million more single men in the country? And I tell you what; I bet nobody is looking at any of them with pity in their eyes. In fact, single men are almost celebrated – especially when it comes to their fellow man. “Good on him, not getting tied down,” people cry. When it comes to girls, however, it’s more often than not the total opposite. Men don’t get “left on the shelf” they merely “don’t get snapped up”.
One friend, who is in her mid-twenties and has been single for five years, agrees with this theory. “I don't like to admit how long I've been single,” she says. “Because I feel like people pity me and think I must be a freak for being single so long. I tell myself I'm happy, and don't care about the length of time, but I do worry about what people think of me.” The silly thing about this, is that the very same girl is actually very happy not having a significant other, going on to say, “I’m so used to being on my own that I've become pretty selfish, I can't imagine planning things with someone else in mind, and I like my own company anyway.” Clearly there is much confusion when it comes to the issue of being single – and perhaps society is to blame.
According to one piece of research I unearthed on the internet, women are staying single for longer these days because they are putting their careers first. Right from a very early age at school, it’s drummed between our pigtails that to be respected in this life, then the best thing to do is finish education and pursue a career. How many of you can honestly say that you haven’t judged a past school friend who chose immediate marriage and kids over a degree and a cosy flat-for-one? Being a mother is an amazing and wonderful thing, but for some reason society has begun to look down on those who choose to do it. Unfortunately, by the time we career-driven girls grow up and realise we would, actually, quite like this as well, finding it has become that little bit more difficult. “I think it's a much more even playing field in the working world these days,” agrees one female friend. “Women are applauded for being successful in their own right. They are also having children later in life – it's not a write-off if you want to start having kids in your 40s. Women don't need to get married and start a family in their 20s to be seen as ‘normal’ any more.”
According to one piece of research I unearthed on the internet, women are staying single for longer these days because they are putting their careers first. Right from a very early age at school, it’s drummed between our pigtails that to be respected in this life, then the best thing to do is finish education and pursue a career. How many of you can honestly say that you haven’t judged a past school friend who chose immediate marriage and kids over a degree and a cosy flat-for-one? Being a mother is an amazing and wonderful thing, but for some reason society has begun to look down on those who choose to do it. Unfortunately, by the time we career-driven girls grow up and realise we would, actually, quite like this as well, finding it has become that little bit more difficult. “I think it's a much more even playing field in the working world these days,” agrees one female friend. “Women are applauded for being successful in their own right. They are also having children later in life – it's not a write-off if you want to start having kids in your 40s. Women don't need to get married and start a family in their 20s to be seen as ‘normal’ any more.”
The other thing us ladies do – and we’ve all done this – is blame men. It’s them who are afraid to commit, them who are making us play mind games with their fear of being tied down – but is it? Not according to one report I read. It claims that idealism about family life begins actually earlier in men than in women. While we’re dismissing our 22-year-old university fling as nothing serious, that same boy could actually be considering the prospect of settling down. On the flipside, however, this idealism vanishes much more quickly for men than women. It may catch up with us when we turn 30, but by then the men our age may be losing interest. One source even claimed that most men would be unlikely to want kids at all once they were past the age of 40.
A male single friend I spoke to has his own views as to why there are so many single girls (and indeed boys) in the 25-33 age bracket. “People in general need to chill the f**k out and stop worrying about things,” he tells me. “The thing I'm starting realise right now is that maybe I'm not sure exactly who I am. We spend our 20s getting drunk and f**king as many people as we can, and then start to panic and realise we don't know who we are. I think the key to successful relationships is personal satisfaction and being happy and comfortable in your own skin.” Girls often think that it’s men who are the ones reluctant to relinquish their single status. As one friend puts it, “Guys always want to stretch their wild-oat-sowing days out a bit longer.” That is certainly the case with some people, but women are very guilty of it too. Being a female doesn’t automatically mean you want to settle down, even if the Bridget Jones Clones of the world protest as such.
So, we come back to the fundamental question: why do we want a relationship? Do we think having a significant other will somehow ‘complete’ us? Will the arrival of a boyfriend or girlfriend into our lives make all our other problems magically disappear? Er, nope. Sorry. Maybe it’s much more simple than that? “[I want a boyfriend] just to have someone to hang out with when I’m bored, and to have someone to depend on a little bit,” says one friend. But is it different for guys? “It's changed over the years,” admits one. “Sex always, but it's having a companion too, someone to do stuff with. Having said that, though, I've only had one relationship where I've felt I really needed that person and couldn't live without them. All the other ones become a bit of a chore, to be honest. I think I end up having a girlfriend through boredom, and then get rid of them when I can't take it any more and it takes up more time than I'm willing to give.”
Surely waiting until you meet someone you actually really like is better than simply settling for the first half-decent bloke or girl that come along, just because the single-fear has set in. I’m constantly reminding my single female friends that they don’t have to stay that way if they really don’t want to. Finding a willing companion isn’t the hard part; it’s finding the right one that proves tricky. Another friend backs me up on this. “I've not really been interested in settling down until now and could have had a boyfriend over the past five years if I'd wanted one, but it would have been for the sake of having one – and you definitely get to a stage in life when you're like, 'If he's not the one, then what's the point?’”
For one close friend of mine, Mr Right is also the absolute only man that will do. “After my marriage broke up,” she confesses. “I pledged to have no more men in my life. I no longer believed in love. I was content. I would not call it happy, but I was content and emotionally free. Free to rediscover myself and hopefully figure out what I wanted. Then I met a guy – and that changed my perspective on love completely. It’s not the idea of having a boyfriend; it’s just the idea of being with someone I want to be with. I want a boyfriend because there is one man I really, really like and it would be so nice.” Wouldn’t it be awful if you tired of waiting for Mr Right and settled for Mr Willing And Able, only to meet the man of your dreams a few months later? I think it would, and the fact that 40 per cent of marriages in the UK now end in divorce is certainly a scary enough statistic to put me off that particular course of action.
Of course, to wait for Mr or Mrs Right to come along (presumably through the sunset on a white horse) you have to believe they are out there somewhere, and for some this is an unrealistic prospect. “Romcoms really have a lot to answer for,” complains one friend. “We grew up watching films like Cocktail and Dirty Dancing, films where the girl always gets her guy in the end, and now we have watched so bloody many we believe there is a Mr Right out there.” I'm not so savaged by relationship disasters to have despaired in the existence of a Mr Right, but I do think he's much more likely to be a Mr Right Place Right Time. Since starting this blog back in March (is that all it's been? Christ!), I've learned to like and respect myself a lot more. I can say with absolute conviction that I now know what it is that makes me happy, and it’s not a man. Of course finding a nice man to settle down with and eventually have a child with is hugely important to me, but I’m starting to believe that this time he will actually be falling for the real me, and not a self-loathing, timid and bitter version of a once happy person.
Of course, to wait for Mr or Mrs Right to come along (presumably through the sunset on a white horse) you have to believe they are out there somewhere, and for some this is an unrealistic prospect. “Romcoms really have a lot to answer for,” complains one friend. “We grew up watching films like Cocktail and Dirty Dancing, films where the girl always gets her guy in the end, and now we have watched so bloody many we believe there is a Mr Right out there.” I'm not so savaged by relationship disasters to have despaired in the existence of a Mr Right, but I do think he's much more likely to be a Mr Right Place Right Time. Since starting this blog back in March (is that all it's been? Christ!), I've learned to like and respect myself a lot more. I can say with absolute conviction that I now know what it is that makes me happy, and it’s not a man. Of course finding a nice man to settle down with and eventually have a child with is hugely important to me, but I’m starting to believe that this time he will actually be falling for the real me, and not a self-loathing, timid and bitter version of a once happy person.
Making the decision to be single for a while has made me happy, and I no longer see myself as a failure for not being in a relationship. Sadly, I know that lots of you probably still do feel this way, and to all of you I’ll simply say this: forgive yourself for being single. It’s not some sort of self-inflicted curse that has befallen you; it’s simply a circumstance, like having a bar job, or suffering from a cold. It’s very unlikely that it will last forever, so in the meantime just concentrate on what it is that makes you happy. It’s much easier to fall in love with a whole person than bits of a broken one.
