unHINGEd

Recommendations from a heartbroken millennial entering a new decade.

If you want to go through a devastating break-up, I highly recommend doing it over the phone, on your 30th birthday, on the other side of the world.

If you want to go through heartbreak, I highly recommend doing it when Sabrina Carpenter and HAIM release break-up albums like they are gift-wrapped in gold foil with a red ribbon.

If you want to grieve the shock and loss of your relationship, I highly recommend reading a book about a woman who loses her husband to cancer, finds love again in her 70s, then gets diagnosed with cancer (Delia Ephron, you are a force and thank you for the gift of your words).

If you want to relieve yourself of the anger that comes next, I highly recommend smashing plates at a Greek BBQ, dancing on top of them, losing a shoe, cutting your foot, then saving a piece of the plate for later (a souvenir, if you will).

If you want to get revenge, I highly recommend losing your appetite despite every plate of fried feta, ice cream, cake, bread, and baklava that is put in front of you. All of a sudden, your gut will disappear, and you will forget that you had anything in there in the first place (Can you say… OzemPRICK?).

If you want to reinforce your brain and heart, I highly recommend having a squad of unwavering support fairies (see: friends, parents, and siblings) who slap you silly over the head every time you second guess yourself, your character, and your decisions. Fairies who also send you memes and podcasts and articles to remind you where you are, how you got here, and where you’re going.

If you want to feel rage, I highly recommend having friends reveal that your ex of < 1 week has already re-emerged on Hinge with his main photo being one you took of him and posted on Instagram, days prior, on the couch in your apartment.

If you want to question your well-being, I highly recommend discovering that you now pee yourself like an 80-year-old incontinent woman because your body is in a state of shock and PTSD.

If you want to sleep, I highly recommend forcing yourself awake on FaceTime with 4 girlfriends until the point at which you are so deeply exhausted that you fall asleep on the call (multiple times in one week) and leave them deeply concerned that you have either stopped breathing and/or become narcoleptic (Dayvigo, sponsor me).

If you want to find solace, I highly recommend writing your feelings in journals, texts to yourself, poems, and on Substack.

But hey, do what you will. These are only my recommendations.