11 reasons why you should avoid dating a lawyer at all costs

Your mum would be so proud, but it sounds better than it is

Imagine the joy on your mum’s face if you came home and told her you were dating a lawyer.

We bet she’d be thrilled. Lawyers have it all: power, money, prestige. No wonder they are amongst the most right swiped professions on Tinder.

But don’t do it. Dating a lawyer sounds waaay better than it actually is. They really don’t make very good partners — in the romantic sense, at least.

Here are the 11 reasons why you should avoid dating a lawyer at all costs.

1. They work around the clock

Having a lawyer boyfriend or girlfriend is akin to having an imaginary friend. Lawyers lead notoriously busy lives and work notoriously long hours, so you better get used to ready meals for one.

2. The constant, grinding stress

When your better half finally does manage to break free from the chains of target billable hours — for a few hours away — expect them to take the stresses of work home with them. Sharing a bottle of wine and watching a film on the sofa? Add two hours of tears, sporadic email checking, the occasional angry outburst and three unexpected phone calls from international clients, and you have the perfect lawyer date night.

3. The narcissism

The Hunger Games mentality is instilled in lawyers from law school, and it’s hard to shake. They’ll slap your hand away just for trying to nab a chip off of their plate. The competitiveness, the unwillingness to share, the ego — it’s not what you want from your other half.

4. They’re probably cleverer than you

Law is a fiercely competitive industry to get into, so you can bet your partner is going to be an academic whizz. When it comes to watching the evening news together, prepare to be made to feel stupid at every stage.

5. Arguing with a lawyer is impossible

There’s nothing wrong with a bicker between couples every now and then. It’s a stress releaser, the sign of a healthy relationship. And that’s why fighting with a lawyer is so frustrating — they shut you down at every opportunity. One moment you’re having a private dispute in your living room and the next thing you know your partner’s cross-examining witness testimony from your next-door neighbour. You’re screwed: they will have more evidence against you in their back pocket than you could ever dream of having against them. It might even come in police evidence bags.

6. Prepare to fork out on language lessons

You go to the pub one day with your boyfriend and his work friends, and you feel as though you should’ve brought a dictionary with you. What the hell is a jurisprudence? You don’t really know what a merger is, and you smiled and nodded your way through the conversation on the EU referendum. And then there are the acronyms: LPC, SRA, LLB, BPTC, SDT, LLM — who knows what’s going on? One of their friends even referred to you as his learned friend.

7. The ruthless organisation

Lawyers tend to be robotically organised in everything they do. The calendar will be the focal point in your home, so you can kiss goodbye any hopes of spontaneous romantic getaways (they won’t be able to take the time off work anyway).

8. You’ll always be second best

Lawyers put their work first. No matter how long you’ve been dating, the strong feeling of ‘they just don’t care about me’ is hard to shake. You’ll definitely always be the second most important ‘partner’ in their life. And they probably feel more strongly about the legal aid crisis than they do about you too.

9. The law firm freebies

For the second year in a row, your boyfriend has decided that a Slaughter and May pen is an appropriate anniversary present. All you ask for in life is a nice cat mug, not one with some sort of law firm-based motivational quote on it. And where does all this pink tape keep coming from?

10. The addiction to caffeine is concerning

You could overdose on the caffeine fumes circulating your room when your boyfriend comes to stay. The coffee, the Red Bull… and you nearly fell to your death when you slipped on a half empty packet Pro Plus at the top of the stairs.

11. Lawyers see the world through law-tinted spectacles

Lawyers are notoriously passionate about everything, and it’s simply inevitable that that cute date night you spent days planning will descend into a fierce and unwanted debate. You were just trying to tell the story about Linda from the hairdressers moving in with her sister, and now all of a sudden you’re having an intense discussion about the pros and cons of the Landlord and Tenant Act. Just don’t mention the EU…