Its Complicated: Confessions of messy modern love

Its Complicated is a mosaic of human connections in all their shades from breaking up to making out, quiet contentment to agonising loneliness, sexting to ghosting, navigating friendships to fuckboys, pregnancy loss to profound fulfilment.

🤌 Maya Jama

If youve ever checked your exs social media at 2am or their new partners LinkedIn (because its the only social profile you can access) or are having sex with your partner knowing youre going to leave or if you cant stop thinking about the one who broke your heart a decade ago or if everyone thinks youre the perfect couple but youve been drifting apart for years or if youre swiping to fill a void then youve probably felt a smarting of shame. But let me tell you something radical: your darkest secrets, your most repulsively shameful thoughts, feelings, and behaviours: youre not alone.

Philippa Found's project emerged during the early days of the pandemic, aiming to dissolve the isolation that gripped us all. Through anonymous submissions, people shared their unfiltered stories. It grew beyond the shadows, featuring in large-scale street exhibitions across the TfL network and earning an award from the London Mayor. It became a counterpoint to the stigma around love stories, standing against the shame we carry with our love.

Beyond lockdown, the project thrived, collecting over 1,500 stories. This short story collection, showcasing over 250 curated pieces for the first time, peels back the layers of modern relationships. Each story gives a glimpse into the lives of others; cultivating empathy and reminding us of our shared humanity. By reading about others' experiences, we learn to understand and embrace ourselves better our desires (or lack of) and those burning, poisonous, suffocating, uncomfortable feelings.

The short stories are grouped into sections mirroring the stages of a relationship, including platonic ones. These arent love stories theyre stories about love.

1. EXES
2. SINGLE
3. HOOKING UP
4. DATING
5. ITS COMPLICATED
6. FRIENDS & FAMILY
7. IN A RELATIONSHIP
8. BREAK-UPS