I am not sure. I guess it has to do with triangulation. I felt my ex created conflicts and drama so that I and her ex would not be on speaking terms and compare notes. Exes further back in time were portrayed in a way that made me afraid to contact them. Up until now. I did contact her. First thing she said was I am so sorry that you were afraid to contact me sooner (she didn't know of my existence since she went NC with my ex some time after breaking up). I would have warned you before she moved in with you and your kids (she had children too when she was the partner of my ex more than ten years ago).
I also think they have all these delusive fantasies about us raging with jealousy when they find a replacement. Maybe they think we would react the same way they would to a replacement/new attachment. And therefore think we are a real threat to them (if I would have found someone new and broken up with my ex because of it i am pretty sure she would rage against that woman in a way that could have been potentially dangerous. She is vindictive and very aggressive (mostly verbally aggressive but she has these fantasies about violence against people she hates. And she does hate a lot of people)
This was a very helpful post for me to read. My ex made all the exes before me sound like abusers or just not very likeable people who broke up with him for no real reason. He was also keen to tell me how much the ex before me disliked me, how she'd thought I was judgmental and arrogant. Now I'm pretty sure she never said anything of the sort. I'm equally sure that my ex will have been telling my replacement (his flatmate) all about how jealous I am of her and how much I dislike her.
That said, during the discard meeting he did tell me that he hoped I would come and visit them both, because "she [replacement] really likes you and she hopes you'll still come round." It's true that the replacement and I had got on well. But although he said that, he still did everything he could to prevent us meeting. He was always too busy to see me, even for five minutes, and the amount of contact we had dwindled until I snapped and went NC to protect my mental health and what was left of my dignity. It was better not to have him in my life at all than to see him online and know he was ignoring me, and to send texts that never got a reply. Until now I've been interpreting this as a sign that he was happy to toss me aside now he had a shiny new toy to play with. Reading your post, I think that's only part of the story, and he was also worried about what might come out if the replacement and I were ever talking. Before the discard, he got very rattled when he found out we'd bumped into each other in a salad bar one day and had eaten together, and he said to me, "You can be friends so long as you don't gossip about me." A couple of weeks later, they were together. Now I suspect he was worrying about what exactly I might tell her... .
