Checking your email multiple times a day for the newest deal or product. Searching through dozens of websites. Looking at shoes, watches, sweaters, bags, dresses, tops, home decor, and fan gear for hours on end. Adding and removing items from your shopping bag before finally entering your credit card number from memory and clicking that magical button: “place order.”

A sense of guilt creeps in because this is your third time shopping online this week and its only Monday. However, that small feeling of guilt is diminished in seconds once you see the confirmation email in your inbox “congratulating” you on placing your order. Congratulations for what? You don’t deserve that congratulations. You clicked your mouse three whole times. What you do deserve congratulations for is being able to not go completely postal while the next three or four days drag on as your stalk your order via UPS tracking.

Finally, it arrives. You open your package with excitement, and its like Christmas morning all over again, except on a smaller scale. Looking at the product, you think to yourself, “Yes. I deserve nice things at a great price. I love this. But now…I want more.”

Life wasn’t always this way. You used to shop like a normal person: in public places surrounded by neatly folded articles of clothing, and only buying things that fit and that really seemed worth it. You could see the person eyeing the same pair of dress pants you were, and you didn’t want to stay in one store too long because the children running around without adult supervision really got on your nerves. You shopped during normal store hours, and limited yourself to maybe one shopping trip a week.

But now, things are different. You’re a postgrad, and between traffic and trying to hit the gym after work, the only type of shopping you can do throughout the week is online shopping.

Online shopping is like a world of its own.

A beautiful world. A world where you can buy anything. A world with no one to bother you. No annoying sales associates thirsty for commission asking you questions like, “So what are you shopping for?” or “Are you finding everything okay?” or “Can I start a dressing room for you?”

In the online shopping world, you can take as much time as you like, with no pressure and no judgement. You can price check an item without being guilted into buying it, or being judged when you put it back on the rack because its out of your price range.

Spending time in the online world requires minimal to zero effort. All you have to do is click on one of the enticing emails sent from one of the many websites you are receiving emails from for whatever reason. Sites like Rue La La, Hautelook, Amazon’s My Habit, Stub Hub, Marley Lilly, Zazzle, MLB Shop, Wanelo, JustFab.com, White House Black Market, Groupon, Living Social, Scout Mob, Social Primer, J. Crew, Victoria’s Secret, Off Broadway, Ann Taylor, Brooks Brothers…the list goes on.

Each one of these wonderful organizations will email you several deals throughout the day, often offering 10 to 75 percent off of certain products, but usually only online.
Seriously, who can blame you for reverting to online shopping, and eventually becoming an addict?

A warning to my fellow online shoppers: be wary of the flash sale. The flash sale will get you every time. Half-off all products for two hours on random weeknights? It’s a dangerous game. One minute you’re browsing the clearance section, the next minute you’ve maxed out two credit cards and aren’t sure if you’ll be able to pay rent. But my God, you feel alive!

If you’re anything like me, you can’t help but agree with Carrie Bradshaw. “I like my money where I can see it. Hanging in my closet.”

My name is [redacted] and I’m an online shopaholic. Go ahead, say it out loud. It might help you feel better.