One of the biggest pieces of advice I’ve internalised since I started dating was to always leave a relationship quietly and with grace. Don’t ever get emotional, because you’d never want to give the other person the opportunity to call you “crazy” — because being called crazy is the modern-day equivalent to wearing a scarlet “A” on your chest. That was a piece of advice I held sacrosanct until a few weeks ago, when I went absolutely batshit crazy on an ex of mine in an incredibly public setting. Here’s a very brief synopsis: Rob* and I met on OkCupid and started seeing each other off and on about two years ago. He was your typical “hot-and-cold” dater — he’d be into me one minute, and then turn around and say he didn’t want a relationship. I, being young and desperate to play the “cool girl,” acted like I was 100% fine with the fact that I wouldn’t hear from him for weeks, only to be summoned to his apartment on a random Thursday. This continued for about a year and change, culminating in us just being friends, and then fizzling into nothingness. I’d basically forgotten about Rob until he started sliding into my DMs on Instagram a few months ago. We chatted platonically, so I suggested drinks as a part of my “bury-the-hatchet-and-move-on-it’s-the-new-year” zen state of mind that always bubbles up around the holidays. Rob and I met for drinks and started hitting the bourbon. Things got fuzzy quickly, but here’s what I’ve been able to piece together: As I get a little lubricated, we start talking about the past, and things rapidly slide into emotional territory. The entire situation culminates in me trying to kiss him, which he rebuffs, and then I just unload on the guy. I tell him how fucked up it was that he strung me along for as long as he did, and how there was no reason for him to reach out to me if he had no interest in picking things back up, because he knew how much I had always cared about him. Rob tries to calm me down, but I’m already on a brown liquor-fuelled roll. My voice gets louder, and I slur-yell that he was emotionally immature, that we would have been perfect together, but that he was too much of a wimp to ever try to be vulnerable with me. I then stumble off the bar stool, scoop up my coat, tell him to never contact me again, and storm out of the bar, everyone’s eyes following me the entire way out. Mercifully, my dear friend Elisabeth answers my weeping phone call when I get outside. I wind up on her couch eating chocolate cake until I sober up enough to get into an Uber home. Now, I had never let myself lose it this badly in front of an ex before. In past situations, when I’d let my emotions run wild around men I’ve had romantic attachments to, I’d wake up the next morning with a serious regret hangover. I’d replay the scenario over and over again, wincing every time I thought about how I slurred or stuttered or went a little “crazy.” But that didn’t happen this time. Instead of feeling embarrassed and ashamed, I felt free — like I could finally walk away from a situation that had been haunting me for the past two years. It was a greater sense of relief than when you unbutton your pants after eating too much Chipotle.