Last year’s Autostraddle Reader Survey gave us a fascinating look at all of your thoughts, feelings, dreams, beliefs, and online shopping patterns. One of the questions we asked was about your current relationship status. Here’s how those numbers shook out:
But — SURPRISE! — many of you had more feelings about your relationship status than could be accurately conveyed by simply checking a box.
So, here are some of your very best and most illuminating answers to “what is your relationship status,” ripped mercilessly out of context and listed here for our communal enjoyment.
1. just kissed this polyamorous human last night so we’ll see
2. kissing my room mate and not sure if we’re dating. help
3. we call each other “blorp” and “lovah-friend”
4. I have a massive crush on my very best friend so there’s that unfortunate situation.
5. I’ve sort of moved into my girlfriend’s apartment and we have a cat together so we’re basically married
6. tragic
7. Desperately single PLS DATE MEEEEEEEEE
8. LTR with self
9. In “it’s complicated” with grad school
10. Oh dear God I have no clue right now, it’s a mess!
11. Like tim gunn Im single with no plans of ever not being
12. aannd sleeping with my straight best friend
13. Spinster 4 lyfe.
14. In a Significant Relationship with a person that is definitely not dating, nope, that would be scary.
15. 5ever alone
16. Poly triad with one cis gray-ace queer gal and one gendervague demisexual heteroflexible AMAB person
17. I live with an ex girlfriend, but we live on separate floors of the house. it’s complicated.
18. Dumped a week ago :'(
19. LOVE IS A LIE
20. Cat lady forever, probably
21. Desperately pining for the cute queer Hot Topic employee who complimented my yellow doc martens the other day
22. Celibate spinster. It’s not functionally congruent to “single”, trust me.
23. In a long term monogamous relationship with my PhD dissertation
24. Can’t be arsed to talk to people
25. we got in a really bad fight today, so i’m not sure. ughhhh
26. Complicated fucker
27. Single as of last night
28. Fuckbuddy
29. Single as a mothafudgin’ pringle
30. In like kind of a thing
31. CRUSHING HARD ON A GIRL
32. Pining and depressed, emotionally taken
33. Pining over a straight girl
34. Pining over my ex
35. Holding out for a hero
36. Dating in theory, shy introvert in practice.
37. Can’t wait to be married to her, but we have no idea how to plan a wedding
please send help
38. In the words of Facebook, it’s complicated
39. My current human is doing her PhD, which she often jokes is her “wife.” This makes me the mistress!
TAG YOURSELF obviously I’m 19, but also 35, because the lyrics to that song were the entirety of my JDate profile in 2004. It’s still true.
Tag yourself! Currently I’m ‘holding out for a hero’
I’m all the instances of “please help/send help”
“And then a herooo comes along, with the strength to carry on, and you cast your fears aside…”
i’m “complicated fucker”
I finally joined OkCupid after we talked the other day. I have way more questions for you!! Maybe you can help me come up with something more interesting to say instead of the usual “hello” that I’ve been getting in most of my messages. Then I can also brag that queer girl wrote it for me!
Love you D
Yesss Jen!
Shocked at how called out I personally feel by 30 and 31 (With different people). Holding out for a hero is a good one too. Because my relationship status always relates back to Shrek.
#3 is goals
#21 keep wearing those yellow doc martens & I’m sure yr fine (sorry i’m not the hot topic cutie)
Hey 37! I’m currently halfway through planning my wedding. HMU I have hard earned wisdom.
Hey, #37 – I’m a wedding planner, I can help!
I’M FREE! (Heaven helps the man)
Marry me
Are you planning for a 2017 edition? :D
I’m #6 and #7 this is so me right now
Also I just wanted to say y’all are wonderful, idk, I have feelings
Add 8 to that and you have me ;)
I think in mine I might have written “virgin at 23” which is like, true but makes me feel sad
DO NOT BE SAD, MICHELLE
YOUR FUTURE IS BRIGHT
Hey, can I join the club? But in all seriousness, we’ll find someone someday. There’s no rush!
You know I had sex pretty early, like at 15, and then throughout high school, and then starting with college had zero sex until I was about 24. I was really close with someone in my very-not-queer friend group, and couldn’t quite make myself go out of my way to make friends with queer people, who I felt awkward around, so just hung out with the people I already liked spending time with…especially this one person. Now I’m married to her.
SO I think the idea of virginity is dumb. Sometimes you have sex. Sometimes you don’t. Finding someone you have a good connection with is so much more important, and such a better thing to focus on.
Gimme like a month and I’ll be in the same club. It’s okay though.
Haha I read this wrong, like you were going to somehow turn back time and be a virgin in a month? Now I realise you will be turning 23, no magic involved.
Hahahaha I love that. I worked so hard to find a way to phrase my comment in a way that couldn’t be misinterpreted (turns out I have a strange talent for accidentally propositioning people?), but of course the endless creativity of the human brain will always win!
The first time I slept with a girl I was 26 although I knew I liked girls since 13 if it makes you feel any better…..
And what I’ve learned in that time is better no sex than bad sex!!! Trust me :) and things WILL happen!
What I have learnt in that time:
Good chocolate is better than bad sex.
So for all the single Ladies (and gentlefolks): Treat yo self and don’t despair.
I’m a virgin at 25, so, uh, it could be worse?
I think virginity doesn’t really exist. Because I thought I lost mine very young only to be told later in life lesbians can only lose it with toys … the thing that can be measured is vl but I went til I was 24 without anyone wanting to snog me so there’s hope. I mean I kissed a girl when I was seven but that was before I felt desire so that doesn’t count (we were playing ‘sisters’. It was very tame and had to do w me wanting a sister not a gf)
I’m not sure if you’re bi/pan but lgbt ppl are a minority and made to come out/stay closeted rather than being assumed so I think not doing much before you’re thirty is actually quite comparatively usual compared to straight relationships.
For anyone it’s better to lose it in a good way (physically and emotionally) and when you’re ready. It’s not a race. There isn’t even a proper finish line everyone can agree on so it’s def not a race.
Love these!
#6-8, 13, 29 especially. Also, kinda #33 (But i know better, I swear!)
Currently engaged to commitment issues, 50/50 whether we actually go through with the wedding.
I’m #37! Weddings are hard :(
Also #39 only I’m the one with a wife and mistress
8, 20 and 24 – let’s hang out.
Hey #20, maybe our cats would get along! We’d probably have to buy more litter boxes, though.
I was pretty sure I must have just ticked a box, cause I’m boring like that. Then I saw the “Cat lady forever, probably” response, and that is just so incredibly me that suddenly I just don’t know any more.
(writing this comment while lying in bed with one cat asleep next to me and the other- shit, I thought he was asleep on my floordrobe, as he tends to be, but I couldn’t see him anywhere and had to get up to go investigate. I eventually found him sitting silently but nervously underneath a duvet that had half slipped off the bed? I suspect he wandered in and then couldn’t find his way back out? I’m surprised he didn’t start whining, he tends to freak out when covered by a blanket.)
Omg, the word ‘floordrobe’ has literally just changed my life.
I know, right? Sadly I cannot take credit for it, and I can’t remember where I picked it up. But it’s brilliant.
Most definitely #33. I don’t know if she’s straight, but most girls I fall far always seem to be. Why did undercuts have to become so mainstream fashionable!?!?
19 and 20 with a dash of 17– relationship equivalent of soup for one.
Teetering between between #19 and #36 constantly. My mind’s in San Junipero most of the time I just have no idea how to actually get there.
#8 – LTR with self
Oh my god 24 is so me. When someone messages me, 9 times out of 10 my reaction is just “ehhhhhhhh”. Why is dating so mentally exhausting!?
yes yes yes “talking” can be soooo boring
lol after any breakup, the slang should be to say “I’m number 19.” (LOVE IS A LIE)
#7 is my parents silent hope and #22 is probably accurate in practice
Hard 20. Love you, little buddy!
Given the timing of the survey, I think there’s an extremely high chance that I actually wrote #4.
GOOD NEWS I’VE MOVED ON
I’m in a massive hole of 6 7 and 8 combined….
Waiting for 35 to happen to rescue me.
Please send help…..or pizza.
currently overwhelmed by a big fat crush on my cute dapper butch women’s studies professor and in a committed relationship with jstor and the library. YAY ACADEMIA.
also, i live in a college town near a large metropolitain area and gay girls are nowhere to be found. what am i doing wrong? where are they??
they’re on tinder!
Ugh. That is not the answer I was hoping for.
Try the uni sports teams. Part of my need for rugby in my life is that training is the only non-herteronormative space I get to be in three times a week.
I’m definitely #23. Fairly high chance that my (non-thesis) significant other wrote #39.
Hoping to have mutual (positive) breakup with my thesis soon though :)
# 1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, 20, 22, 29, and 31-36 so
But actually #8 forever
I’m a #4 wishing I was a #12 but also in an open marriage with a man…sigh.
I am #27 and #33. A friend recently told me that who cares if she’s straight, cause you could be her queer. Which as a(n amab) non-binary/genderqueer person that puts me in a weird spot.
I’m a really fun combination of #24 and #36. At least I’m not pining over any straight girls at the moment THAT’S THE WORST
THE WORST!
*throws back a piece of chocolate and cries softly*
I wonder how many of us have remotely the same answer now as at the time of the survey?
oh, I just realized this was only in late October, not a full year ago. I think I was confusing it with an older survey, possibly the one for old people, because I am old and my memory is going
I may have actually written 32. Not pining on anyone at the moment, but all the ones about being eternally single are me.
Maybe it’s time I embrace #22.
Get it printed on a shirt and wear it to the club kind of embrace it.
But I’d add a comma and a “bitch”, to it.
Certainly.
If there were one for ‘currently crushing on several poly girls in primary relationships with dudes’ I would be all over that shit.
Meanwhile #4, #10, #17, #30, #31 also.
Can I tag myself in another person’s tags?
Excuse me, that should read ‘dating/crushing on’
Straddlers, find each other!
“Where in the world is number 7?”
#19 Love is a damn lie.
6, 24, 35, am willing to be called “blorp” or similar
Wow, that’s a lot of pining. :-)
I’m pretty sure this is the slogan you get on a sticker at the same time you’re assigned your lesbian card and toaster oven.
Ladies. *intense eyebrow wiggle*
definitely 7. Desperately single PLS DATE MEEEEEEEEE
ha.
I reaaaally wanna help 37 because 2 weekends ago I went to a wedding that’s reception details and aisle music were put together at the last minute.
It was possibly the best straight wedding I’ll ever attend (been to 5 in my life so far), the bride wore purple, the best man was a punk haired lady so like it was also accidentally the gayest looking too.
But I dunno know them or where they live so I’m gunna lay out some general stuff they could use to start making a plan or narrow down some ideas and leave this link that leads to the legal how to’s of marriage in the US, da license
http://www.usmarriagelaws.com/marriage-license/application/procedures/documents-required.shtml
Okay so first the nuptial couple needs to decide on budget, size (how many they inviting/think will come), level of formality and date. Then they can start with venue(s) and what to do for the reception, decoration or favours.
A justice of the peace can cost from $50 to $350 depending upon where they live and if the JP has “travel charges”
A pretty library that’s popular wedding spot is thousands of dollars with a waiting list.
So really…
1) Budget, attendance size
2) Date, time and formality of attire (b/c do you want people in July to suffer through a black tie wedding before 5 at venue where parking is far away and there will be walking and get blasted by the sun as it’s going down during the ceremony outside or the windows of the nice building with AC, no u do not)
http://lifehacker.com/what-all-of-those-confusing-dress-code-terms-really-mea-1724671659
Once you got those down where and by who the wedding ceremony gets performed narrows itself down as does what the reception is going to be.
Using the wedding I went to as an example:
BUDGET for a JP, a large batch of brunch food, cakes and a rec center hall with a kitchenette.
ATTENDANCE of about 40 people; the parents of the nuptial couple, the couple’s friends with their plus ones’ and kids
DATE winter
TIME the sunniest hours
ATTIRE business casual, kidlets in attedence yo
VENUE pretty park with nice rec hall
RECEPTION catering came from a brunch place and was brunch food with tiny cereal packets, no bartender just a collection of alcohol (wine to hard liquor) DIY cocktails and an ice chest of locally beloved beers. The cake was kept in the kitchette fridge till cutting time, and there was an oven used to warm the food for serving.
DECOR just some cute faux flowers in buckets with cute things written on them on the tables that doubled as favours
Wedding I didn’t go to as an example:
BUDGET was JP and I think a haunted house
ATTENDANCE anyone who could come, art community basically (parents and birth family not in picture)
DATE was weekend before Halloween
RECEPTION was at a bar which is where I heard most of the attending really happened
Um I hope this is helpful for someone, I didn’t mean to write so much stuff but here we are and I’m not deleting any of it.
Um lex did you just plan an entire wedding in a comment?
Kudos
Nooooo, I outlined how to plan a wedding with examples and provided 2 helpful links.
Love the concept of “celibate spinster” not being equal to single. I’ll tag myself that one.
#8 forever and always! But like also always crushing on people who have no interest in me….
#9–I mean I’m not saying Grad School loves me, but we have been spending all our time together lately
I’m now in a poly relationship and having so much fun sleeping with sexy men. I am using Tinder & it’s highly entertaining. I just wish some sexy ladies would match with me. Sick of falling for straight girls.
#14
Also have other stuff going on (poly style), but that’s the one that made me go “same.”
Me too!! My person is so lovely and beautiful and special and I love her and we are not dating because dating is scary and maybe love is a lie?
Mine is: ‘I have a stupid crush on my almost definitely straight boss and it feels like we’re flirting but it’s probably just in my head???’
That’s exactly me with a married-to-a-man-with-two-kids coworker. The crush is thankfully waning.
Hey
![](//imgur.com/ByBkHTy”)
Well that was heroic
Re-do:
Last try but now the joke is no longer worth it because I’m becoming a villain
I’m glad I held out for this hero
#30 and I’m wondering if I wrote it or not because it looks like something I’d write.
Really does.
13!! Spinster is my favorite identity <3
I vaguely remember writing 34… 32 & 35 are also accurate ?
28 for life!
Why does autostraddle not have a dating section? So many single peeps and definitely not enough in one place to meet and fall in love.
I believe the dating section is called “A-Camp”.
“Can’t be arsed to talk to people” is the story of my life.
#40 Helping my best friend (also an ex) TTC with artificial insemination, while declaring our love for each other, but being too scared of an age gap (12.5 years) to actually be together. Also using the AI as an excuse to have sex, but no kissing allowed because that would cross a line. Lol help us.
Wow. Good luck with that (sincerely)
Yikes! Wishing both of you luck with this one! ;)
19 is Stef. 7 Let’s go
tfw you check how your crush commented on this article in the hopes of getting an indication of if they’re interested in you and the result is not the most encouraging :/
(my friend thinks I should actually talk to the crush instead of making inferences from a single comment but that seems silly)
tfw you tried to post this anonymously by being logged out but forgot that it would get a not-entirely-anonymous picture from your email address oops
Life is short! Tell your crush! I believe in you
CAN’T BE ARSED TO TALK TO PEOPLE
new fave phrase
#22! It’s so true, it’s kind of depressing. Actually, no, it isn’t. Yesterday I had a “no-pants Sunday”, and today’s my birthday. I have an awesome life. At least today, I do.
17. Oh wow not just me // C is that you??
#14, #32, & #34 … & #35 is my gay karaoke song, so ….
— Yes, I am male. But please, don’t hold it against me; I promise, it wasn’t my fault. —
Um … follow-up question … Is it offensive to say “gay karaoke”? ‘Cos if it is, then I need to know so I can stop. Sorry.
— Yes, I am male. But please, don’t hold it against me; I promise, it wasn’t my fault. —
I guess it depends on what you mean?
When we go to karaoke, it’s always only at a gay bar. So I think of it as “gay karaoke” as opposed to regular karaoke. Which … I guess kind of answers the question, doesn’t it? Using the modifier implies that karaoke at a gay bar is somehow “not regular”, so … that’s bad. Thank you.
— Yes, I am male. But please, don’t hold it against me; I promise, it wasn’t my fault. —