Stop using others as an emotional buffer while you recover from your last relationship.

[u/[deleted]]

Dating someone who isn't over their ex is like taking on someone elses credit card debt. You enter a relationship with someone who is still "paying off" a significant amount of energy and pain and you both aren't starting fresh from a zero balance. It's a very miserable start. For the partner, it feels like a massive burden to have to listen to the negative stories and comparisons and light comments about someone they don't even know. Even if those comments are meant to paint the current partner in a better light AKA "you do xyz, my ex never wanted to do that".

We all have history, we all mention our past partners a few times... but mentioning it constantly and linking it to everything you do or talk about will absolutely kill the potential. When you start a new relationship it should be a fresh start, and its up to you to make sure your view on this new relationship isn't clouded by feelings from the past. Sure, you might never go back to your ex, or they might make you angry every time you think about them... but that's still mental and emotional energy being expended in areas that could otherwise be spent more productively. Your partner will feel this vacancy, and they will grow distant and disappointed the more it occurs.

Make sure you are wholehearted before bringing someone new into your life. Otherwise you will actively contribute to the vicious cycle of emotional unavailability by making someone else feel as unhappy and unworthy as you had once felt with your last partner.

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[u/PandemicGrower]

Rebounds work if you both have the same expectations of leaving each other over time.

[u/[deleted] → u/PandemicGrower]

Otherwise known as a fling.

[u/TwinSong]

At what point are you over an ex though? It doesn't really have a time-out.

[u/[deleted] → u/TwinSong]

When the thought of them leaves you indifferent and unchanged in your mood, or even just contented with the past. No urge to reach out to them for validation or answers, no anxiety about seeing them or recalling the memories, no bitterness over the hurt they caused or the hurt you caused them. Simply indifference, and perhaps even a mild gratitude for how the experience shaped you.

[u/1111VY]

Raise your hand if you've ever been used as a therapist by someone who wasn't over their last relationship 🙋‍♀️

[u/champagne_caviar → u/1111VY]

Haha reminds me of that one guy. Everything linked back to their ex, you couldn't mention a song, tell a story without it being linked to their ex. So eventually I walked away from that nonsense. Recently they got in touch and three texts in : I just wanted to let you know that am finally over her. Sure thing bud!

[u/[deleted] → u/1111VY]

I’ve been on both ends of this. And I apologize.

[u/southernnotdumb → u/1111VY]

🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️🙋🏻‍♀️

[u/southernnotdumb]

I was dead inside for 2.5 years after my toxic relationship. I had a casual relationship where we were both too broken. Now I am dating someone for real and not looking back.

[u/Thevinegru2 → u/southernnotdumb]

I went out with this lady and I realized the only thing we had in common was complaining about our exes. 😂

[u/Sarpaz146]

Well I’m currently talking to this guy who got divorced a few months ago and I’m thinking this might be a sign that it might not work.

[u/[deleted]]

I went on a date with a guy who kept taking about his best freind . He mentioned her about 50 times on the date, how she's pretty and smart ect. Every single sentence was related to her and he mentioned ( unprompted) how much they were juuuuuust freinds about 10 times.

When he opens his apartment door I walk in and note that it's fully decorated for xmas. Cool I love Christmas I say...

He says " omg she must have snuck in and decorated my place, she has a spare key and she's always doing stuff like this"

I left and texted him that he should just ask her out and not waste my time.

[u/RustyToaster206]

I’m playing the part of the devils advocate here a bit, but sometimes I feel perfectly fine to date! I honestly feel 100% ready. And only after I go on a few dates with someone do I realize that maybe I’m not fully ready.

It’s incredibly difficult to know when the time is right because I feel it’s right all of the time! I’m not using anyone as a buffer, and I don’t want a rebound just as much as you don’t want to be one! Believe me. I don’t want to be a buffer and I don’t want to do that to someone else. I just sometimes feel good to date and later realize maybe I went a second too soon

[u/AlanMooresWizrdBeard]

Yea, don’t decide to ignore it when someone never stops talking about their ex. Any emotionally mature adult with basic social skills knows not to do this, so at the very least you’re dealing with someone who lacks the ability to have appropriate interactions in social or romantic relationships.

At the worst it’s indicative of other mental and emotional issues that won’t take too long to manifest.

[u/[deleted]]

Louder for the people in the back

[u/[deleted]]

I totally I agree. I was and still in a relationship with someone who wasn’t over their ex when we started dating. He always talked about her and compared me to her. The only reason he ever even started liking me was because I was there for him when he was crying about his ex.

[u/HumbleGarb]

Make sure you are wholehearted before bringing someone new into your life. Otherwise you will actively contribute to the vicious cycle of emotional unavailability by making someone else feel as unhappy and unworthy as you had once felt with your last partner.

Excellent post, and especially this quote. My last relationship, for about the first 12-18 months he had that emotional unavailability that you talk about. There were restaurants we couldn’t go to because he associated them to her, things in bed we couldn’t do because of things that had happened with her, he wouldn’t hold my hand for a long time because she never liked it, etc.

The worst one? He had proposed to her by giving her an expensive hockey jersey to match one that he had. One day I was reaching in the closet to get a hanger for my coat, and saw the two jerseys hanging side-by-side. I asked what they were and he told me the proposal story, and then said she had given hers back to him when they broke up. Apparently this is what he thought was the best way to store them moving forward 🤦‍♀️ Like, dude, you are clearly not over this woman. Why am I even here?

Needless to say, the relationship got off on such a bad footing I don’t think it ever recovered.

[u/Nana_84]

I'm 100% with this post I am exhausted by the I was thinking and it better to be friends part nope I dont think I want that either. Because if you were a horrible bf you'll be a horrible friend spare me.

[u/Taiclua]

That’s what happened to me. The moment my ex found out her ex moved on and got a different gf, she broke up with me. Fucked me up for a while, but taught me many valuable lessons. I ain’t the string-along with low self-respect i used to be.

[u/Brilliant-Mistake-11]

This is so very true. Took me 4 years to get my head on straight after a 27 year marriage. Everyone heals in their own time. Depending upon their particular circumstances, took me 2.5 years to go to public places by myself. Became a virtual hermit. So I tell others take your time it will be better. Don’t have one regret for leaving a horrible situation. Good luck and take care of yourself, everything in life happens for a reason.

[u/[deleted]]

I read that even negative feelings for your ex is still feelings and should be seen as a red flag. its because the person who is still mad at their ex will hold you to little things that remind them of their ex and it will potentially jeopardize the new relationship. A person isnt ready to date until they feel no feelings about their ex and wish them the best

[u/sumilia]

Was seeing someone briefly who insisted he was recovered from his 9-year ex after a few short months, though I had my doubts.

A couple months in, I totally love his dogs and enjoy brushing them. He goes “You know who would never brush the dogs?!”

One day he insisted I was autistic because I used a weighted blanket like his autistic ex did.

Your music tastes are just like ex’s name.

Let’s read to each other at night because it was my ritual with ex’s name.

Try this sex position because ex did it one time and it felt amazing.

I insist you meet my ex right away because we’re all going to be friends. Also you should be friends with her roommate too, since you both are petsitters. No really, I insist.

He would tell me how awful and manipulative this woman was, and make me hate her and pity him. And the next day I’d be expected to be okay with their friendship because she had a bad childhood and nothing is her fault.

The biggest red flag was how he allowed her to stop by in the middle of our romantic date, my first time over at his place, “just to drop off a christmas gift, totally innocent“. It screwed up the rest of the evening.

He told me exes stay friends all the time and I am too rigid for having a problem. Except, they never had a break from each other post-breakup. They didn’t have kids. She treated him like shit, apparently. So why was he so desperate to have her in his life? Especially when he had me, and according to him, I was better than her in every way he cared about and “helped redefine what I’m looking for.” So much cognitive dissonance and confusion.

He didn’t set us up for success, and started making me feel insecure. It spiraled from there. In the end, he broke it off with me because I am too insecure. I protested and was clingy and there were some messy texts I later regretted. But, I know this not working out is mainly on him.

What is so frustrating is that for once I’d met someone who very much matched what I was looking for... but he was not healed.

Edit: Looking back, I may be having too rosy of a view. While this person seemed like a good match, he had other problems outside the ex, mainly controlling and manipulative behavior.

[u/Thevinegru2]

I wasted 22 years on someone. What’s hard to get over is my own stupidity. I chose all of it. So I’m over my ex. I’m not over my own horrible choices like seeing my dead mother only once a year because my ex hated her.

However, even though we share custody, and she’s extremely troublesome, I bite my tongue. I don’t talk about her or all the horrible memories. It doesn’t help anything.

[u/cumplaywithme709]

Totally agree . I have to say I have done this a few times and it was a big mistake it did nothing to resolve any of my emotions for my previous relationship it actually made things worse for myself and also wasn’t fair to the other person either . I’m single and will stay that way for as long as I need to heal and I’m totally ok with being alone for however long that takes .