Things never get stale. With a liar, you never have to worry about your relationship becoming boring. A liar will make your heart flutter with fear, anxiety, and doubt every single day. Every time they’re on the phone or they leave the house, you’ll feel tingles throughout your body wondering if they are cheating on you or participating in illegal activity or god knows what else. We all know, according to soap operas and movies, that real love is all about drama — and liars are drama kings and queens! All that panic followed by rage will keep the spark alive. A spark that will turn into a fire that will burn your self-worth to the ground. What a thrill!

You don’t need to spend money on drugs. When you date a liar, you can feel out of your mind the natural way. Liars drive you crazy by lying to you, and then by calling you crazy when you accuse them of lying to you. They make you act in ways you’ve never acted before (i.e., snooping, throwing things, disregarding your own mental well-being). Sometimes I’d be so disconnected from myself, I’d end up apologizing to him for him lying to me: “I’m sorry that I have such a bad temper that it makes you afraid to be honest with me.” Whoa man, that statement is about as real as when I looked in a mirror while on ecstasy and saw my face melt into a puddle of rainbows. So, say goodbye to marijuana and magical mushrooms — dating a liar is its own special trip.

Your friends will love him. No need to worry about your pals approving of your beau, because liars are charming as fuck. He will make everyone melt with his constant compliments and outrageous stories that you will later learn were lies. Just make sure you DO NOT tell your friends that your boyfriend lies and that you argue all the time and that you feel like you’re falling apart, because then they will hate him and try to convince you that, “You’re better than this.” After you break up, you and your friends will have a blast recalling all the suspicious things he said. Like, when my best friend told me, “I did think it was weird that he was broke but had also won a Latin Grammy,” and I was like, “[Even though] he’s not a musician nor is he Latino!” And then we laughed and laughed and laughed (once I was done rocking in the corner, screaming, “Why, dear God, why did I waste all those years?”).

You become really creative. Your lying boyfriend ain’t the only thespian in this relationship. You, too, will become a good actor and writer when you realize you’re also crafting stories. You will be lying every time you make a false threat of, “If you betray me again, we are done,” and then stay. You will be lying every time you tell your therapist, friends, and family that, “It’s not that bad.” You will be lying to yourself when you think, “My love will change him,” when what you really need is self-love and to change yourself.

You’ll get over him fast. Once you break up (for real), you won’t miss your liar boyfriend because, conveniently, you never knew who he was anyway.

You will learn to never compromise yourself again. When we first broke up, I felt so much “How could I have been so stupid?!” shame. I was, not only embarrassed, but scared to share my story because of how it might affect my ex. This is one of the symptoms of dating an emotionally abusive person: Even after you break up, you sometimes still feel responsible for their feelings. I know, in order for him to lie that much, he has to be in an incredible amount of pain, and I don’t want anyone to be in pain. However, you have to share to get over the shame. The more I shared, the more I realized I wasn’t alone — so many people have lost themselves in all sorts of unhealthy relationships. So, if you’re dating a liar, or have dated a liar, please don’t be ashamed. Don’t be ashamed that someone took advantage of your beautiful kindness. Please give yourself time to reconnect to your intuition. One of the best (real) benefits of dating a liar is that you develop an incredibly low tolerance for future bullshit. Please don’t ever stop being empathetic: Empathy is a wonderful and special thing. Just be careful to not be empathetic at your own expense.