JACI STEPHEN: I hate Valentine’s Day, and so does most of America.

Let me declare once and for all: I hate Valentine’s Day, and chances are, you do too.

There. Was it that hard?

I have my reasons and I’m sure you have yours. Let’s get it out in the open in the hope that one day, God willing, we can finally put an end to this sadistic farce.

So, here goes: I’ve never been on a Valentine’s Day date. No, not one. Ever.

I almost had one when I was 16, when my 21-year-old boyfriend bought me a huge satin card, but the night came to nothing because I broke up with him when he looked like he was about to propose.

My disastrous love life for the next 47 years might as well have been my punishment for that fateful unromantic day. Surely Cupid couldn’t be so cruel?

If it is, it means that you have been operating not with a bow and arrow, but with a veritable arsenal of emotional weapons of mass destruction. All directed at me.

But guess that. I don’t mind.

I am blissfully happy to spend another Valentine’s Day alone and was overjoyed when Fox News host Julie Banderas announced on live television that she was divorcing soon-to-be ex-husband Andrew Sansone, during the Valentine’s Day segment on gutfeld. .

‘Fuck Valentine’s Day,’ he said. ‘Yeah, it’s stupid. Even when I was married, I didn’t give a damn about Valentine’s Day… well, I’m getting divorced.

Finally, someone calls it out for what it really is: a nonsensical ‘Hallmark vacation’.

Many pretend to appreciate the day. But really, deep down, we know the truth. Under cover of anonymity, more than seven in ten DailyMail.com readers admitted they also ‘hated’ Valentine’s Day.

We are not alone! Why pretend?

So much pressure. The expense. Forced expressions of love. Get the right gift.

It is men with girlfriends and wives who feel this most intensely. Women want to be courted, but men can never get it right.

Buy her chocolates: ‘You know I’m on a diet.’ Don’t give her chocolates – ‘Are you saying I’m fat?’ Jewelry – ‘I hate amethyst. Why didn’t you let me choose mine? A meal in a fancy restaurant – ‘Why are you wasting money when we have a freezer full of good food at home?’ What about the flowers? ‘I can’t believe you wasted $369.55 on a box of Heart Black red roses’ (from The Million Roses Company, if you’re tempted). Perfume – ‘Why did you buy eau de toilette? You know I only use eau de parfum. The latter is more expensive, guys, you should know.

But don’t buy her anything at all: ‘I knew you never loved me. I’ve wasted 30 years on you.

It’s a Hallmark house of horrors.

I feel Valentine’s Day like Dickens’ Scrooge feels Christmas. Ugh, bullshit, I yell, as yet another card from a florist shows up at my door, asking me to send flowers to my loved one. Bah humbug to the red hearts, ribbons and smiling teddy bears in every shop window. And especially Bah humbug a la paella or the Chateaubriand ‘for two’, which restaurants strangely insist on, making singles lonely every day of the year too.

Just like Scrooge and his Christmas ghosts visit, this is the time of year that I get visited by the Ghosts of Men Past, the Ghosts of Men Now, and the Ghosts of Men From The Future.

Where do I start with the Past? The older man who ruined 30 years of my life (and counting) and whose shadow still looms over a damaged unconscious so I now know he is a disturbing, disturbing predator?

The diet announcer, who brought his slim, calorie-counted meal for dinner but decided to eat my meal, too? No wonder he never lost weight.

The journalist who was going to dump his girlfriend for me but decided to give her three months ‘so she can lose enough weight to be attractive enough to meet someone else’? Yes, at that moment I decided it wasn’t for me after all.

My Australian Hungarian dentist who said, “I’m falling for you big time,” and then came out with a rash on her face and dumped me?

The redheaded, boring graphic designer who I gave thousands to when he professed poverty and then bought a bottle of Bollinger for women he liked at another table, on my account. He left me for a nurse in Boston. That’s all over now, too, and apparently his life is a mess. He broke his leg in the snow in Boston. Abandoned by the nurse. Karma?

The one from Liverpudlian who claimed to be in the SAS based at Hereford in the UK and robbed me? How was he to know? He had a one-way train ticket from Hereford to London; that seemed to me evidence enough. I was never very good at spotting criminals, always too blinded by the possibility of sex instead of the next heist.

The Ghosts of Present Men do not fare much better.

The journalist I started seeing 35 years ago and for whom I still have sympathy, it’s a shame that her sympathy extended to so many other women. A writer in the US who promised, “I’ll take you somewhere amazing and treat you to the best food you’ve ever had,” which quickly turned into, “Do you want me to pick up a sandwich and bring it to your apartment? “.

My crush on another man I can’t have: married and wouldn’t have wanted me even if I’d been single.

And, believe me, the graphic designer, who contacted me after 15 years, bemoaning his now terrible life on the grounds that I could ‘understand’.

No wonder he’s not optimistic about the ghosts of men to come. But that’s the thing about love: its inherent optimism keeps outliving its own story, no matter how bad it was. It’s an emotional birth: it can be hard when you’re going through it, but the memory of what love could be is brought back to life and it’s what keeps us going.

At the end of every relationship, I always say, ‘I won’t make that mistake again.’ Maybe not, but being human, I’ll just make different mistakes.

And I’ve learned from most of those mistakes. I say no to sandwiches when I expect Chateaubriand for two at the Ritz. I don’t lend money to men. I also no longer believe anything that comes out of their mouths. Men are rotten liars, and I’ve learned to trust my gut, which is what I should have done years ago. But hey ho – hindsight and all.

This, unfortunately, is the problem with the Ghosts of Men Yet to Come. The Past is a wasteland of mistrust and pain. The Present would be that, if I didn’t find everything so pleasant. The Future, despite the survival of fond memories, is inevitably tainted with all that has gone before. Suspicion, doubt and insecurity are inseparable triplets.

But I have a great life. I am surrounded by wonderful family and friends and there is not a single day that I wake up not feeling passionate about my work. I always knew I was a writer, and being who I really am, instead of harboring fantasies about what I wanted to be, is a blessing every minute.

Love is not just for Valentine’s Day. It’s there to seize every second, in so many more ways than chocolate and flowers.

The present is all we really have, or the only thing we can hope for. So we might as well live it and enjoy it while we can. And you can do just fine without a romantic partner.

So Happy Valentine’s Day to me.

I am genuinely grateful to be alone, free of pressure, expense, and most of all, the obligation to put on a show of fake love.

Now where’s that Chateaubriand for one?