Ryan Björklund, the Moustache Club of America’s Special Bad Dating Correspondent, offers a field-tested set of rules that will enable you to survive even the most brutal break-up.

So I’ve been surfing the interwebz, reading all the famous, top-grossing lists on there: How to Lose a Girl in 10 Days, How to Lose a Woman…Forever, How to Lose a Guy…Forever  10 Ways to Get a Woman to Leave Your Apartment, etc. I thought the ultimate homage to family man Paul Hennessy would be to offer up my own 8 Simple Rules for Surviving a Break-Up.

1. Clean out your joint vacation savings. Set a weekday aside to visit all of the Asian massage parlors in town using the money. Never wear the towel, learn a new language, and be sure to leave $40 on the little table next to the lotion. When she asks you to flip over, just remind yourself that this trip was much better than shortening your life at Rehoboth Beach, Delaware for the second time.

2. Upload all sexually-explicit media created during this relationship onto exposingsmuts tumblr. This is an excellent way to commemorate all of the good times together. Just share it with the world. Think of it as philanthropy–you might be helping some lonely chap shoot his goo at home, rendering him too tired to go on his bi-weekly rape-spree. #winning, #beentheredonethat, #ontothenext1, #healtheworld

3. Destroy any family heirlooms of hers that you are aware of. If this breakup is going to be complete, you must take a scorched earth policy and ensure that all things sacred are demolished. Getting over a rough breakup can be mentally exhausting, and permanence is best exemplified through action. You’ll be doing her a huge favor by demolishing whatever ancient gewgaw her Nana and Pep-Pep gave to her before they went on muttering and shitting themselves to death at an overpriced retirement villa.

4. Become a coach for her niece’s/nephew’s sports team. Be the “cool guy”, especially if they’re very young and impressionable. Teach them to win at all costs, and that there is a weak link in every chain. Andrew Ference tells us: Be accountable. Don’t be the weakest link. Don’t be like your aunt:  (Amy, Brittany, Henrietta, etc.).  Pay the referees beforehand to make sure you always win.  That way the kids will unquestioningly associate you with success, and her with failure.  Make sure to really drive that wedge deep in the family,  as truth comes from the mouths of babes.

5.Convince all of your mutual friends that she is an awful person and no longer deserves the time of day, in the best interest of preserving the friend group (sometimes you have to cut off a finger to save the arm)  While this may seem petty, it will drive the issue home and allow them to reflect on all the times they’ve been wronged by her. If this doesn’t work as well as you want it to, just log onto her facebook and “share” her new tumblr fame on her wall.

6. For non-mutual friends of yours, take a play out of Dennis Rodman’s ex-wife’s playbook: Tell them she wouldn’t take an HIV test. You had your suspicions, her internet history led to local “Caj Encounters,“ so you had to go. Thankfully, after careful medical scrutiny, your blood is clean as a whistle. Meanwhile, she’s still out there humping every Tom, Dick, and Hank without Abu-Ghraibing the heads of their slingdingers. Your friends will buy you a beer, or take you to a strip club.

7. As for her sketchy female friend– she’s heard the most slandering jibberjabber spewn from your ex’s cumdumpster. Her hotter, more superficial friend (or frenemy) has been the cause of her past insecurities. Chances are this is also the friend that she complained about to you the most during the course of your relationship. This girl is certainly DTF, because unlike her other friends who offer shoulders to cry on, this friend is her sleaziest and is already sick of hearing her go on about how hard it is. Their relationship is all but done for anyway, and both acknowledge they have very few things in common except being perfunctory sperm receptacles. She’ll appreciate your forward spitefulness and happily accept your invitation to beat her cheeks.

8.Take inventory of the random things she left behind. Sell everything of value, use the leftover money to buy assorted sex toys. Strap-ons, diamond buttplugs, fluffycuffs, speculums, etc. Put sex toys in a box with seemingly random items (curling irons, half-empty boxes of tampons, Best Beach Bods of 2006 etc.) and return the box to her parents’ house. At the door, tell them you tried and tried, and simply could not in touch with their daughter to return her things.  If her parents are divorced, always opt to deliver the goods to Dad.

Look at all the money you saved! Heed all the important lessons you’ve learned and go on with your life, sowing your wild oats. You’ve covered a lot of ground, so be sure to pat yourself on the back once in a while. Go eat some steak. Go salmon fishing. Learn to tie some new knots. Rid your county of feral cats. Go bear hunting. Or if you’re tired of doing heteronormative things, go bear hunting. Write an article for goodmenproject.com. You’re free to do as you please, and be your own man.

Here at GMP, we accept you for who you are.

“Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” ― Dr. Seuss

Photo–Flickr/the amazing JACrews7