As much as we try to act all civilised and adult about it, most of us probably secretly (or openly) hate our exes.
Here are ten fellow Malaysians who have been given some of the most stupid breakup excuses!
1. He likes to dress me up
"After about 5 months into the relationship, my ex started buying my loads of clothes. Like, every other weekend, he’d have something for me for when we went out. He insisted I wore whatever he’d bought for me for our date nights, which we had every weekend.
When he first started doing that, I thought it was super sweet and thoughtful of him. But after a while it just started to get boring. Although it wasn’t a big deal to me (at that time), I was a little ticked off that I couldn’t decide for myself what I wanted to wear.
And not to mention, half the things he bought me just weren’t my kind of thing to wear – not that they were anything sexual or too revealing, I just didn’t really like how they looked.
This continued for around three months before he decided he’s had enough. That’s right, he had enough. He said he was tired of always having to make sure I looked good when I’m with him. But I didn’t even ask him to, in the first place! Looking back, I wonder why I didn’t break up with him earlier."
- Eliza, 24
2. Can't stand the distance
"Our entire relationship was long-distance. Right from the start of our relationship, we knew that we’d be doing long distance. A year and a half into the relationship, he dropped the distance excuse on me.
‘I don’t think I can handle the distance.’ Really? You’ve only realised this after more than year? It sounded pretty stupid to me, but fair enough, distance isn’t easy. What’s stupid though, is that a week later, I see pictures of him and someone else: a woman I had told him I didn’t quite like.
This lady – 12 years older than him, mind you – had spent a lot of time with him while we were dating. But he assured me there was nothing between them because she’s way too old for him. Turns out age is just a number, I guess!
Now they’re happily together but he still drops me texts once in a while, telling me he misses me. He even texted me on our 'monthsary', asking if I remember what date it was."
- Sarah*, 20
3. Too afraid of commitments
"Naturally, as all new partners are, I was curious about my then-boyfriend’s past love life. So I asked about his previous relationships and whatnot.
Probably wasn’t the best move because amidst the conversation, he suddenly got so triggered about the mess he had caused with his ex. And at the end of it all, he said: ‘I’m afraid of commitment’.
And that was it. The end of our relationship. Not too long later, he got himself a new girlfriend."
- Brenda, 22
4. Racial differences (and probably cold feet!)
"I once dated a girl for about five years. We were a mixed-race couple. Our first couple of years of the relationship was quite private, as we were both studying at an outstation university. When we came back to KL (where we both are from) to work, that’s when we formally introduced each other to our families.
At first, my family was quite skeptical as I come from a pretty traditional and conservative Chinese family. But as my then-girlfriend started spending more time with my family, they grew to love her. My mom, especially, adored her and kept pushing for me to marry her – moms, I tell you.
Her family, they didn’t adore me or anything like that, but they were always very welcoming of me. Then came the fifth year together. We had talked about marriage, and so I was prepared to propose to her.
Thank goodness I didn’t buy the ring yet because around this time, she decided to break up with me. Her excuse was that her family didn’t want her to get married to a Chinese guy, and so she saw no purpose in being together any longer.
Fast forward just a little over a year, she’s now married to a Chinese guy. The irony!"
- Jo, 27
5. She doesn't like my music
"A while back, I was seeing this girl. We got along very well, or so I thought. But apparently she didn’t think the same of me.
Just three weeks into the relationship (I don’t even know if you can even call it one!), she wanted to end things. Her excuse? My taste in music sucks. She said she can’t stand it whenever I picked her up because I was always playing bad music.
I didn’t even bother trying to save the relationship. Nobody insults Linkin Park like that."
- Khairi, 21
6. She doesn't deserve me...because she cheated!
"So I was going out with this girl overseas, where I was studying at that time. Things were going good. Going great, in fact. We were starting to get more serious – no longer some puppy love nonsense.
Then came summer; I came back to Malaysia for the holidays. Despite the distance, things were still going great with her. It was when I got back I realised it wasn’t so great after all. She told me we needed to talk – the typical line that almost always leads to a breakup.
She went on to say ‘You’re such a good guy.’ and at that time I’m wondering where all this is going. She continues with ‘So you deserve to know’. And I’m still there wondering what all this is about. And then she finishes with ‘I kissed another guy’.
I didn’t know what to say, so I just said okay. She then proceeded to breakup with me because apparently she ‘doesn’t deserve me’. Because she cheated. So she left me. So basically, I was dumped by my girlfriend because she cheated on me. Can’t get any stupider."
- Raj*, 22
7. I'm just not ready yet
"Pretty ashamed to say this but I wasn’t given a stupid excuse – I gave one. I was young and wasn’t even in love. We were like how every other young couple were, but I’d never admit we were actually together. Yes, I was that jerk.
But that’s only because I was so tired of trying to tell him I wasn’t interested to be more than just friends. For nearly three years he had tried to get with me, so I finally just kind of layan-ed him. We went out on dates and all that stuff, but that was super short-lived.
In the end, I told him I was not ready for a relationship. I said I was too young for him (and just too young, in general) and that he shouldn’t wait for me. A couple of months later, I got together with someone else, even older than my ‘ex’ was, and we’ve been in a relationship for close to four years now."
- Jolin, 20
8. She didn't want to hurt me
"Not sure if this is a stupid reason, but my ex ended things with me because she was leaving for England to study. Before she left, she broke up with me saying she didn’t want to hurt me while she’s overseas.
She said she was afraid that I’ll find out if she was seeing other guys there, and that would hurt me. I found out two weeks later, after she had left, that she had already slept with a guy she met there. Our relationship lasted about a year and a half."
- Danny*, 23
9. She thought I was too smart for her
"I had an ex that dumped me because I was ‘too smart’ – no joke. Her excuse was that I conversed with my family in English (while she and her family spoke in their mother tongue).
She also said that the fact I was a science student, while she wasn’t, made her feel like we weren’t compatible. I tried to convince her otherwise, and assured her I’d help her improve academically if she wanted. But she kept insisting we shouldn’t be together anymore.
Because I’ve never ever complained about her education or knowledge, the excuse she gave didn’t make much sense to me. So I eventually stopped trying, only to find out she had already gone out with someone else."
- Capi*, 22
10. She had daddy issues - literally
"So this one girl I was seeing came from fatherless family. And yup, you guessed it, she left me because she said she had ‘daddy issues’ and can’t deal with a relationship.
I understand that you may be emotionally wounded because of a non-present father figure, but in her case, she was most definitely just using it to break up with me. Her dad left when she was just a kid and she’s telling me that over twenty years later she still isn’t ready to date?
Funny how I wasn’t even her first or last boyfriend. I wonder if they were all given the ‘daddy issues’ excuse."
- Nick, 25
Come on, if you want to break up with people, break up lah, with better excuses! But we’re sure as hell glad these ten people have gotten over their exes (yes, we checked).
Got a crazy breakup story to share? We’re all ears. Story us in the comments!
* Some names have been changed. Submissions have been edited for length and clarity.