When You Know It’S Over Now That Valentine’S Day Is Behind Us, We Look At All The Reasons Breakups Happen

At long last, our national nightmare is over.

Valentine’s season is behind us.

No more hearts and flowers for a while. No more cloying Cupids.

Now maybe we can talk true romance.

And what could be more real-world than a discussion of that magical moment when people look at the person they’re dating and think, “I gotta get out of this relationship”?

Sometimes all it takes is seeing him clip his toenails in the living room. Or hearing her say, “Why can’t you be more like George Clooney?”

Suddenly all your doubts and misgivings crystallize into a clear, concise mission statement: “I want out. Now.”

Call it the last straw or seeing the light. You don’t hear much about this during the temporary insanity surrounding Valentine’s Day. Maybe that’s because the truth hurts.

But now it’s the Day After. Time to get real.

So here, in honor of love neither shiny nor new, IN Life presents 99 nails in romance’s coffin.

1. She no longer wants to yak on the phone forever and is obviously looking for an excuse to hang up.

2. He suggests breast implants.

3. You realize you didn’t used to say “I’m sorry” all the time.

4. Driving away from a party, you get to listen to an analysis of your social skills and personality.

5. The police are looking into his latest case of “harmless flirting.”

6. You’re at a GU basketball game and she keeps yelling to one of the players, “I want to have your child!”

7. At a restaurant, he pulls back part of the tip when he thinks you’re not looking.

8. Your first sexual overture in ages is greeted with a snappish, “Can’t you think about anything else?”

9. Her 19th mood swing in the last five minutes has you feeling weary.

10. She winces and recoils when you cough, as if the possibility that you might be ill is a personal affront.

11. You finally face up to the fact that there’s nothing going on behind his sunglasses.

12. For the trillionth time, she starts a sentence “Like …”

13. One day you notice that the way he walks makes you want to body-check him. Hard.

14. You see evidence of lying.

15. He is unmoved by that scene near the end of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” where Audrey Hepburn chucks the orange cat out of the cab.

16. “You’re too dumb to shop.”

17. She embarrasses you by berating yet another waitress.

18. All his celebrity role models are immature jerks.

19. Her scorched-earth arguing suddenly makes everything clear.

20. The wrong name is uttered.

21. He demonstrates once again that he doesn’t understand that you are the only one who gets to make fun of your religious upbringing.

22. You’ve never even heard of the stuff she wants on the pizza.

23. You’re visiting the Vietnam Memorial and she’s bored.

24. He calls you a “focus-group feminist.”

25. You realize you don’t want to spend your life with a man who cares that much about sports.

26. She sticks your cell phone where she always said she would.

27. Once again, he makes a spectacle of himself trying to wrestle huge bags into the overhead bin.

28. You face the fact that he’s not trying to be funny when he uses lingo picked up from TV cop shows.

29. He says, “Your friend Katrina is the Mary; you’re the Rhoda.”

30. You can no longer escape the conclusion that she’s a racist.

31. When you finally agree to talk about your feelings concerning the relationship, the only ones that come to mind are boredom and fatigue.

32. Her making fun of homely girls wasn’t just a one-time thing.

33. He just belittled your parents.

34. You realize you are tired of everything smelling like an ashtray.

35. “The Simpsons” is over his head.

36. His taste in movie rentals once again confirms that he’s a moron.

37. What she calls “spiritual,” you call being a self-centered twit.

38. He doesn’t notice that your hair is a different color.

39. She proudly spouts hackneyed buzz phrases like “Don’t go there.”

40. I say, “potato”; you say, “Is that what you’re gonna wear?”

41. A behavioral quirk that you used to think was cute suddenly seems annoyingly neurotic.

42. You give up trying to explain why you are bothered by those misogynistic rants he calls music.

43. His obsession with your old flames finally forces you to blurt out, “OK, yes, Brad was a better lover.”

44. She’s obviously uncomfortable around elderly people.

45. You decide that you’ve had it with the way she overdoes the cooing around babies, as if you didn’t get it.

46. Two words: dirty hair.

47. She calls you a gutless loser during a coed softball game.

48. You notice that he never waits for your answer when saying, “Mind if I change the channel?”

49. You finally admit it to yourself. He is the long-sought Missing Link.

50. There is only silence after you ask, “Do those porn sites mean more to you than I do?”

51. You’ve had enough of his desire to seem tough.

52. She says she can keep a secret. The angry voice on the phone suggests she can’t.

53. You realize he started taking you for granted on the first date.

54. It dawns on you that he has never said, “You need more light.”

55. You’re at Riverfront Park when all of a sudden she starts cursing at the ducks.

56. You discover that he has continued e-mailing supermodels.

57. When he reveals his sexual fantasies, you find them disturbing.

58. The only reason you’ve stayed with him is that you enjoy mocking his knuckledragger politics.

59. You can’t help but notice that cats and dogs are afraid of her.

60. You run out of rationalizations for the fact he drives like a bully.

61. It becomes painfully clear that she thinks you will forgive any transgression if she goes into that dumb baby-talk routine.

62. You discover him actually talking to his copy of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.

63. It’s been a year now, and nothing has ever been his fault.

64. You notice that her pupils dilate when your brother is around.

65. You catch him winking in a suggestive way at a sales clerk young enough to be his daughter.

66. You finally get tired of her referring to you as a product of the military-industrial complex.

67. He has been reading your mail.

68. You’re out to dinner with another couple, and he makes an “oink” sound as you order.

69. Listening to her on the telephone, you confront what you’ve always suspected: She is a phony.

70. You finally get fed up with him hitting on your friends.

71. She says “What’s that smell?” every time you walk into the room.

72. You realize the jokes about your alma mater will never end.

73. You learn that all her shrewish co-workers know the titles of every movie that has made you cry.

74. They also know that you like to make stuffed animals talk.

75. Exasperated, you ask if there is anything about you she doesn’t want to change. She draws a blank.

76. He brings up that thing you made him promise to never mention.

77. Despite the evidence, he persists in believing that his Conway Twitty albums get you in the mood.

78. He spends more time looking in the mirror than a 15-year-old girl.

79. He puts his hand on your breast during Thanksgiving dinner.

80. The way he says “Babycakes” suddenly creeps you out.

81. In a social setting, you realize she is pretending she’s not with you.

82. It finally dawns on you that he’s an undiscovered genius because he’s a talentless lout.

83. The sight of him eating with his mouth open makes you want to run screaming into the night.

84. Those tell-all vulnerable moments you once found endearing now make you pine for strong silence.

85. You call him on staring at a woman in tight jeans, and he says, “I’m a shark - gotta keep moving.”

86. You walk into a room full of his friends, and they start humming the “Twilight Zone” theme.

87. You realize that you fantasize about suicide when he goes into that simpering laugh.

88. He simply refuses to get it about how fighting with your sister doesn’t mean you don’t love her.

89. She says all the wrong things while looking at your family photos.

90. You see him shoot an unkind look at a silent homeless person.

91. You realize that he has never complimented your eyes.

92. Everybody except him thinks you have a great sense of humor.

93. You finally stop denying what’s obvious: Your talents and successes threaten him.

94. You cringe at recognition of the fact that you are happier when he’s out of town on business.

95. A magazine relationship-quiz score puts you in the “Run for your life” category.

96. He just said, “I’m confused about my feelings.”

97. You’re not sorry that you called her what you just called her.

98. The two of you didn’t laugh once during Valentine’s Day.

99. The light bulb goes on, and you realize you both deserve to find partners who would be better fits.