So you pour your whole life and soul into a television show for months and months, just for the series finale to be unsatisfactory. If you’re anything like me, you probably flipped when you watch the series finale of HIMYM. For months, I thought, “WHY WOULD THE PRODUCERS MAKE AN ENTIRE SEASON CONSIST OF ONE DAY AND THEN PRACTICALLY FAST FORWARD THROUGH THE NEXT 25 YEARS?! THOSE 25 YEARS ARE THE POINT OF THE TV SHOW.” “WHY WOULD TED’S TRUE LOVE JUST DIE AFTER HE WAITED FOR HER HIS WHOLE LIFE?!” “ISN’T THIS SHOW CALLED ‘How I Met Your MOTHER?!” Well, that is the irony my friend.

If you binge-watch the show about five times like I did, (and I’m proud to say that’s not an exaggeration), you will have the same revelation that I had. But instead of you watching 208 30-minute episodes five times, I’ll wrap up in a couple hundred words why things ended the way they did, leaving you in the fit of confusion, anger, and ugly tears.

First, Robin had to get married to someone that Ted could not possibly hurt: Barney. I mean, come on, they’re bros. Ted would never ruin his bro’s chance at love. Robin marrying Barney made her completely unattainable, thus Ted was able to move on.

Ted needed a woman he could settle down and have kids with. Tracy was that woman for him. She admired his dorky ways, and even shared some of those dorky interests herself. She is the Gore/Lieberman supporter to his Hanging Chad ballot. If that’s not the cutest thing ever, I don’t know what is. Tracy was the perfect woman to give Ted the life he’d always dreamed about. They became an adorable, old married couple. Can we just say goals?

Let’s take a look at Robin. She distanced herself in such a Robin-like way after she and Barney divorced. She obviously wished she could end up with Ted, but she knew that just would not work. Robin too got the life that she wanted. She got to travel as a journalist and live her dream.

So, Ted fell madly in love with an amazing woman, until death parted the two of them. As perfect as Tracy and Ted were for each other, there was one fact staring us all in the face at the end of season 9: she wasn’t Robin. For Ted, it has always been Robin, and it will always be Robin. I’m pretty sure that no one has ever loved anyone like Ted loves Robin. So after they lived out their dream lives, there was still time and practicality for the two of them to be together.

So basically, the show is not about how Ted met Penny and Luke’s mother. Penny even says so herself: this is the story of how Ted met and fell in love with Robin. It’s a story of Ted’s quest for love and how he found it twice, in two completely different ways. So really, the name of the show “How I Met Your Mother,” is simply an ironic title.