When you’re single AF with no decent prospects in sight and all your exes are happily coupled up and in love, it brings up all kinds of mixed emotions. On the one hand, you broke up for a reason — they weren’t the right guys for you, for whatever reason; on the other hand, WTF? If you’re still waiting around for the love of your life, it can be really tough knowing that everyone you’ve dated has moved on to greener pastures. This is a little taste of what you might experience:
- It forces you to accept it’s over. Technically you could still live in some fantasy world where you think the two of you could still work out — and hey, never say never. In reality, though, the reunion of two long-lost loves rarely happens. If he’s moved on happily with a different woman, you should look ahead to your future instead of longing for the past.
- It kind of pisses you off, if you’re honest. You’re human! It feels crappy to know that you’re still thinking of your ex and he’s off traipsing around with the new love of his life. Interesting, since he said that you filled that position once upon a time. It’s natural to be upset. You can feel sorry for yourself for a while — just don’t let your jealousy and anger take over your life.
- It brings up wistful feelings of nostalgia. Suddenly, all you can remember are the good times you had together. You wonder if he and his new girl have as much fun as the two of you did. Before you know it, you’re in an obsession spiral and you’re trying to find out all about her. Don’t do this to yourself. It’s useless and unproductive.
- It makes you jealous. There are varying degrees of jealousy according to how long ago you broke up, how bad it was, and how much you still care about him. Be real — you still care about all of your exes to some extent. You can’t just throw away feelings of love for a person. You may be jealous of his new girlfriend. You may be jealous of him for moving on while you’re still processing. Everyone has their own way of working through grief, but it sucks when yours takes longer.
- You wonder if something’s wrong with you. That’s not really the case, and you know that… most of the time. You simply have understandable moments of weakness when your track record gets you down. If there’s nothing wrong with you, why are all these loser guys happy in love and you aren’t yet? It’s more complicated than that, and you know it. So you just haven’t found the right guy. Maybe your exes aren’t as discerning as you, or maybe those new girls put up with more crap than you will. It doesn’t matter. Not your problem.
- It seems super unfair. Well, yeah, life’s not fair. It sucks. They either broke your heart or basically treated you so poorly you had to let them go. Why do they get to be all satisfied and crap? Stop wasting your time thinking about it. While you’re feeling lonely and cast aside and forgotten, all those other guys are out there in the world passing you by. Life is short. There’s no room for worrying about the current lives of your exes. It’s not important.
- You have to remind yourself why it ended. Nothing makes your ex look more attractive than a pretty new girl on his arm. He can’t be that bad if she wants to be with him, right? Maybe you made a huge mistake. Maybe you blew the issues out of proportion. Maybe you need to stop thinking that way and remember the truth! You didn’t just give up on him out of nowhere. Relationships usually end for very good reasons after a lot of work and effort to save them. Don’t forget the truth of what happened.
- You get lonely. Not only do you miss the man who was most recently yours, now you have to imagine him in the arms of another woman. It feels doubly lonely to know for sure that you’re the only one missing your relationship. Men tend to move on faster than women in general, but it sucks to know for a fact that he has. Social media makes it almost impossible not to find out. If you aren’t ready to date or don’t have any prospects, it gets depressing.
- Even if you’re happy, you question it. You might be single and loving it, and then you find out your ex is getting engaged and it still knocks the wind out of you. It’s hard to remember your strength in that moment you’re taken by surprise with a flood of old emotion. Sit with it, accept it for what it is, remind yourself of your current reality, and move on. You were happy before you found out and nothing of substance has changed. It’s just your mind screwing with you.
- You wonder what she has that you don’t. You can really drive yourself crazy with this one, especially if he broke up with you. Suddenly you’re measuring your every quality against those of someone you probably don’t even know. Hopefully, you don’t know her! That’s a whole different kind of hell. It makes you feel small and insecure and bad about yourself to know that he’s with someone who is somehow “better” for him than you were. Heartbreak really is a bitch.
- You also wonder what’s wrong with her. If you and your ex had a lot of issues, you probably don’t understand how he got someone new so quickly. He’s a mess! How could that happen? You are the one with your act together, and yet he’s the one suddenly posting a million Instagram pictures of the two of them. He doesn’t even USE Instagram. WTF? Something must be inherently wrong with her that she doesn’t see his issues. Of course, once upon a time, neither did you.
- You secretly hope it fails. No one wants to admit it, but everyone has this thought at least once in a while. If he hurt you, this feeling is especially likely to surface. You can swear up and down all you want to your friends that you “only want the best for him” and hope that he “ends up happy”, but sometimes you just want him to hurt as much as he hurt you. It’s selfish, it’s petty, and it’s absolutely bound to happen. You’re not a saint. If you honestly don’t feel this, more power to you — teach the rest of us your selfless ways!
