We learned therapy speak and still keep fucking the same losers

I stare at the text on my phone in disbelief. ‘Actually, Liam slept over last night,’ says a WhatsApp notification from one of my girlies. The same girly I sat with last week, guzzling $12 happy hour Aperol spritzes while we talked about how she was ‘stepping into her power’ by ‘blocking that gaslighter’ because she was ‘at capacity’ and ‘protecting her energy’. 

‘He’s an anxious-avoidant,’ she’d told me. ‘So much unresolved trauma. He gets triggered really easily and just acts out irrationally. I’m so done.’ Thank God, I’d thought, because commiserating over Aperol spritzes – even at happy hour prices – was not a viable habit in this economy. I’d been relieved that my friend was self-aware enough to know this man wasn’t good enough for her.