Birth Months Ranked From Low To High Maintenance
When it comes to relationships, the idea of being “low maintenance” or “high maintenance” is often misunderstood.
Research in relationship psychology suggests that what people label as maintenance is usually tied to emotional needs, communication styles, and personal boundaries. Some individuals require more reassurance and attention, while others thrive on independence and space. Neither is inherently better than the other, but mismatched expectations can create tension if they are not clearly understood.
Looking at personality through birth months can be a fun way to reflect on these tendencies. While it is not an exact science, many people recognize familiar patterns in how they show up in relationships. Whether you are someone who needs constant connection or someone who values distance and autonomy, there is insight to be found in understanding your own habits. Keep reading to see where your birth month falls on the spectrum.
1. February
You need time for yourself. A LOT of time for yourself. If you don’t get enough time for yourself, even the most loving and attractive partner will start to annoy you. As the saying goes, no one is an island, but if you put on a life preserver and just floated in the middle of the ocean, it would be hard to tell the difference between you and an island. You are neither clingy nor needy—you are intensely independent, which places you below “low maintenance” into the realm of “no maintenance.” Sometimes, lovers will misinterpret your self-sufficiency as a sign that you don’t care because you hardly ever ask for anything. You stay inside your shell, which may be why they should switch your star sign to the Turtle.
2. January
You lean strongly toward the independent, self-sufficient end of the spectrum. You are plug-and-play, easy-peasy, extremely low maintenance. You never need any repairs; at most you’re OK if someone changes your oil every 3,000 miles. You expect a lot of yourself and almost nothing of others. You hate asking anyone else for anything, even if you really need it. You realize that you came into this world alone and will leave it the same way—unless you decide to go out by dragging others down with you in a mass-murdering hail of gunfire because someone hurt your feelings. But since you’re not a high-maintenance psycho, this will never happen.
3. March
If you don’t feel like someone is lavishing you with enough attention, you’ll blame yourself rather than them, which is what makes you relatively low maintenance. Relationships should be about fulfilling mutual needs, but since you meet most of your needs yourself and never nag, pester, or hector your partner, this is often misinterpreted as coldness, aloofness, or indifference. You like feeling reassured, but you won’t flip out if someone doesn’t immediately reply to your text or Snapchat. Like your namesake the fish, you are happy swimming with a school of other fish or completely alone. The water feels fine either way to you.
4. September
You’re a perfectionist with yourself, which is an admirable trait. Your biggest flaw, though, is that you’re also a perfectionist with others. I know it sounds contradictory to say that perfectionism can be a flaw, but you fail to realize how imperfect others are. Not everyone can live up to your lofty standards. Go a little bit easier on your lovers. You don’t want them to resent your perfectionism; you want them to emulate it. If it makes you feel better, pretend that you’re absolutely perfect—divine, even—and that it would be unfair to expect such shimmering excellence from mere mortals.
5. October
In honor of your namesake, you keep your Scales perfectly balanced between emotional neediness and self-sufficiency. You can get along fine by yourself or with your forever partner. In the name of reciprocity and fairmindedness, you don’t like extremes of aloofness or clinginess in your partner, either. You’re willing to meet everyone halfway. If someone doesn’t quickly respond to your messages, your vivid imagination will take you somewhere else instead of manically searching for their response or torturing yourself with vivid fantasies of how they don’t care for you and never did. You tell your lover what you need, but you aren’t so demanding that they inevitably run for the hills.
6. June
One Twin is needy and the other is self-sufficient, and somehow they find a way to reach some middle ground. For you, “maintenance” is neither high nor low—it’s all about maintaining a happy balance. You set high standards for yourself but also for others. You want to know that your lover cares about you and needs you, but you also don’t want to make yourself an absolute screaming hemorrhoidal pain in the ass about it. Being mindful of whether or not you’re annoying your partner is a trait that’s completely lacking in those of the high-maintenance ilk, so pat yourself on the back for being considerate.
7. August
You are intensely generous with others, and you expect the same in return. You like the big romantic gestures such as diamond rings, trips to Europe, and even marriage proposals via a skywriting plane. You won’t just send someone a Valentine’s Day card—you’ll rent out the JumboTron in Times Square to announce your undying love for them. You won’t just give them a box of chocolates—you’ll fly them to a Swiss chocolate factory. But your lovers should realize that you expect all the PDAs and gifts and almost comically grandiose expressions of love in return, or your relationship won’t last very long. If someone isn’t willing to go the extra mile for you, you might just leave them at the starting line.
8. May
Bulls are not known for their subtlety. You vacillate wildly between intense clinginess and a level of self-sufficiency that’s so high, it can be off-putting to those who care about you, because to them it feels like you’ve constructed an invisible wall around yourself. You depend on your partner in good times and retreat into your shell when things go badly. You expect a sort of extra-special treatment that you’re rarely willing to dole out to your partners. And it’s this latter trait that causes you the most trouble—if you expect to be treated like a princess, treat your partner like a prince rather than a pauper.
9. July
I hope it doesn’t hurt your feelings or pierce your shell too much for me to inform you that you are one clingy and possessive crab. Once you have someone in your claws, you will not let go. You will even set traps for them to test their loyalty. You want to know that you’re the only thing that matters to them—and if you’re not, you’ll cut the cord simply to avoid being hurt. You’ve ruined many a good thing by being this way. Yes, sometimes people are unfaithful. Yes, sometimes your suspicions are well-founded. But you need to learn the difference between holding someone close to you and locking them in a prison cell.
10. November
Your undying jealousy is what makes you so high maintenance. Once you suspect a romantic partner of infidelity, no amount of dynamite can dislodge that stubborn idea from your head. Even if you were to implant a GPS chip in your partner’s body so that you could snoop on their whereabouts at any given moment, you will still accuse them of cheating. Even if they’re willing to provide you with detailed phone records of every call and text they made over the last year to disprove your constant accusations of unfaithfulness, you’ll find a workaround by accusing them of keeping a separate “secret” phone line. It gets tiresome very quickly and will push away even someone who loves you with all their heart.
11. December
You need to be heard far more than you want to listen, which is why you tend to hog every conversation. Even if your partner leaves the house, drives two hours to pick up some Chinese takeout, drives all the way back, sets the table with food, and finishes their meal, you’ve been so busy blabbing the entire time that you didn’t even realize they were gone. Then, when you realize all the effort they expended just to surprise you with a nice, delicious meal, you’ll start yelling at them for not informing you beforehand. But they did inform you—problem is, you were too busy yapping to hear them. You are the incarnation of high maintenance.
12. April
You are absurdly dependent on others’ attention and approval. If someone ever dares to wait five minutes to respond to your text, you immediately start plotting massive waves of revenge against them. You will lash out at others for the tiniest perceived slight. It’s this rash tendency to lash out that has destroyed many of your best relationships. Don’t pretend that you don’t know what I’m talking about, either. The problem is, even a starving mechanic will turn down the job of trying to repair all that’s wrong with you. Before you dive headfirst into another doomed-to-fail relationship, take yourself off the market and fix what’s wrong with yourself.