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The first thing I have to say about the "boyfriend sweater curse" is that it could stand to be more inclusive. Calling it the "boyfriend sweater curse" is only valid for heterosexual female knitters, or homosexual male knitters. It leaves lesbian knitters and straight male knitters out in the cold. But I digress.

According to this curse, if you knit your partner a sweater, they will break up with you soon afterward. It's an interesting idea because although it sounds silly, it turns out to have a lot of validity.

First of all you have the problem of communication. Many knitters are moved to knit someone a sweater because they never see that person wearing a sweater. Trust me, it's not because that person doesn't own a sweater. People who don't wear sweaters do it because they don't like sweaters.

Thus, this is an act of willful disregard for the other person's feelings. It's saying, "I think you should wear sweaters, so I'm going to burden you with a sweater that has so much emotional overhead that you can't help but wear it."

Guess what? The sweater is not the problem here. And that relationship was doomed anyway.

Another source of sweater curse lore is the situation where the knitter is basically making a last-ditch attempt to save the relationship with a big, showy, labor intensive gift. This kind of hand-knit sweater says, "Love me! See how much I love you? PLEASE DON'T LEAVE."

Once again, the sweater isn't the problem, and the relationship was already doomed.

Notice something that these scenarios have in common? The other party did not ask for the sweater to be knit. In fact, in every "boyfriend sweater curse" story I have heard, this feature stands out: he never asked for a hand-knit sweater in the first place.

All of which is to say, if you find yourself wanting to knit something huge for someone, and they haven't asked you to, it would be wise to explore your own motivations before you cast on.

Image courtesy Flickr/peregrine.blue