17 Red Flags To Avoid If You Don’t Want To End Up With A Crazy Ex

1. They are obsessed with social media. This is not the same as having a profile on the most popular networks and updating daily. Obsession is talking about their follower count, sending you a status and asking you to like or fav it (this has happened!), telling you how much time they spend thinking about each update or what they are trying to project, or asking you why you haven’t followed them.

2. They have “crazy” exes. Whenever anyone talks about a terrible ex, always remember they had the poor taste to date them, the poor taste to bitch about their decision afterwards, and the poor taste to forget that like attracts like.

3. Early on, they complain you don’t initiate as much contact as they do. Run. This kind of score-keeping only worsens over the course of a relationship.

4. They get blackout drunk, on purpose.

5. They live alone and have more than one pet. This person has issues with being alone, they’ll come up later. Trust.

6. In every story they tell, they are the victim. Their boss doesn’t give them a chance, their friends are mean and walk all over them, they’ve had bad luck and blah blah blah. Victims are terrible people to be in a relationship with because in every fight you have, they will consider themselves to be correct by virtue of being the most hurt by whatever fight is happening — with no regard to reality, your feelings, or any wrongdoing they have done.

7. They make elusive social media updates like “terrible day” and beg people to ask them what happened so they can get attention and feel better about themselves.

8. They are elusive about normal, commonplace things like where they live, what they do for work, where they’re from, etc. Not only is this person most likely married, but they think you’re dumb or desperate enough not to notice.

9. Their social media stream is all selfies and no friend or family pics. Selfies are fine, but the memories you make with others are the ones you want to remember the most, and worth the sacrifice of pausing for 60 seconds to take a photo and capture the moment. It’s a red flag when a person either doesn’t have friends/family or doesn’t view them as worthy of saving and sharing in the same stream with their selfies.

10. They do anything you couldn’t tell your friends about: drugs, cheating, legal drama — anything you have to apologize for in the early stages of a relationship is a big red flag. You should never start out by apologizing for someone.

11. They are estranged from someone in their family. There can be (very) legit reasons for this, but there are a lot of bad reasons as well. That’s what a red flag is, something that alerts you that you need to look into it further and think about what the specific situation is.

12. They brag unnecessarily, it’s a mark of insecurity and a sign you’re going to spend a lot of time building them up.

13. Likewise, they retweet compliments.

14. They watch a lot of TV news shows which are produced exclusively for drama queens (of both genders) who want something to get upset about. There are less emotional ways to get the news if it’s really about being informed.

15. They are very judgmental of the minutiae details of other’s lives. They will inevitably be very judgmental about the minutiae of your life. Only the extremely hobby-less and unhappy are judgmental about minutiae.

16. They call or text you more than twice in a row when you have not yet responded. This means they are not only needy, but they are unable to pick up on social cues.

17. They are an extremist in any sense. There is any subject or issue which they are incapable of talking about because they are so emotionally wrapped up in everyone having the same opinion on it that they do.