Dear PMS,

So nice of you to have stopped by. I wasn’t expecting you for at least another few days, but now that you’re here I suppose I should be a good hostess and let you make yourself at home. Heaven knows you’re good at that. I’ve put together a nice little veggie platter for you to snack on in case you get hungry... Oh? You don’t want a healthy snack? Only Chinese food and a strict diet of Chick-Fil-A sauce? Well, I’ll see what I can do.

Listen, I actually wanted to talk to you about something. I feel like this relationship that we’ve created is a little... one-sided, to say the least. I invite you in, you sit down, then after a while you do this thing where you don’t leave my house for at least a week, and all you do is sit on my couch and eat all my food.

That alone isn’t too bad, but what you do to my brain is only a little bit concerning. See, I don’t know if you realize this, but whenever you stop by you try to have these philosophical conversations with me that leave me feeling kind of bummed out. You’ll be laying on the floor popping some of my Flaming Hot Cheeto fries and then you’ll ask something like, “Hey, what if nobody actually really likes us and we’re just wasting their time?” Or, “Have you ever thought that maybe, we’re more of an inconvenience to everyone we love than anything else? Because I sure think about that.”

And then after these questions have laid themselves out on the table, you do this thing where you get irrationally angry and clench your fists until your knuckles turn white, mumbling stuff like, “F@&# ‘em, they don’t deserve us. We’re too good for anyone,” or, “You should make an incredibly open-ended statement on social media that’ll make people roll their eyes when they see it. I dunno, seems like the logical thing to do.”

And then you decide to lay facedown on my bed for several hours, which I don’t mind too much, besides the fact that it makes cleaning my room a little more difficult than usual.

The reason I’m telling you all this is because... well, I just don’t really see this friendship being a very healthy one. I know we’ve known eachother for about eight years now, but I need a little bit of space until we can figure out how we can both benefit from this relationship. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t bottle up all your emotions until the week before your aunt comes to visit. I know you don’t like her, and I don’t particularly appreciate her visiting either, but for God’s sake, don’t just let it build up like that. Write in a journal; write some sad poetry. Do something to vent besides letting it all out on me, because it’s getting to be a little too exhausting.

There, I’m glad we had this talk. Now, have a good night. Tell your aunt I say hi.

Sincerely,

Your Generous Hostess