Another problem that plagues single workers occurs during office parties and events. Since you’re unmarried, many offices will assume that you’ll be coming to these fetes alone. But that doesn’t mean you have to put up with it.

“I had a situation once with a Christmas party where everyone was invited to bring a ‘significant other.’ The assumption was that I wouldn’t bring someone, so it wasn’t included in the final head count,” Gugeler says.

According to Gugeler, there are very simple ways to preserve your singlehood sanity in a coupled workplace:

1. “Be clear about monitoring your work hours. If you have a tendency to stay late, and therefore the assumption is that you can/will, look at your activities so you can have a place to be after work.

2. “Take full advantage of vacations, book them in advance, give your dates, and don’t go into detail about where you’re going, with whom or why.

3. “When you’re signing up for a company-sponsored event, make sure to always mark it ‘+1.’ Whether you bring someone, romantic or otherwise, is not the point. The point is that there are different kinds of arrangements and 1+1=2, no matter its romantic hierarchy.”

Or, if all else fails, “lie,” jests Nazanin, a 20-something executive assistant. “Tell your boss that you have a partner or that you have a lot of family obligations,” Nazanin says. “My boss started giving me more work and hours for the same pay when he realized I didn’t have a family or partner, but I work with someone who is married and she does indeed get preferential treatment—he’s not as demanding of her time.”

Being single does not give an employer any right to ask you to put in more time than your partnered coworkers. For federal and state marital-status antidiscrimination legislation, check out the following URLs for information about your rights: