What Good Things Did Your ex Do?

[SnailShell]

This might not be a popular topic(!), but I’m interested.

Earlier, I was thinking about why things with my ex were hard to move on from (although it’s much, much easier these days).

I realised it’s partly because she did do some really nice things - even they had selfish motives, or were otherwise a bit clumsy.

For example, towards the end of everything - when I felt totally devalued - she still said “I love the fact that you stuck around to look after your family when x, y and z happened - not many men would do that”.

She had tears in her eyes when she said it, and it felt genuine.

After we broke up, it wasn’t a total discard straight away - she broke up with me three times, and two of those times were actually very amicable, even if they were sudden and felt totally unfair.

(Though my therapist has pointed out that those amicable breakups didn’t really reflect the nature of the relationship - we said lots of nice things to each other, without really confronting the bad things which happened.)

She took me to a petting zoo because she knew I love animals, she woke up early to cook me breakfast/make me packed lunches - I didn’t ask her to, she just did it.

She bought my dog anti anxiety tablets because a firework festival was coming to my home town, and she sent them through the post.

She wrote me a letter, and sent a mug through post with tea, coffee and sweets in when she knew I was down (even though I was partly down because I was in the early stages of a wild relationship with her - and the speed of it didn’t feel healthy to me).

She had a strong faith (which I believe was genuine), and she was pretty humble within her social group (cooking for everyone etc).

I don’t know how close she really was to her group - I thought they were really close, but actually I’m not sure now - I think they may’ve just seen each other at church really.

She loved kids, flowers, writing poetry and playing the piano (though I often felt like she might just want me so that I’d give her a child of her own, she didn’t talk much about flowers, she only showed me one poem and she wouldn’t let me see her play the piano…).

She bought me concert tickets, and spent time listening to my difficulties when her mood was balanced.

I stayed for a reason, y’know?

And some of that was all the trauma stories she shared with me/hope she’d settle and change/just plain not knowing how to respond to all of the craziness.

But some of the craziness consisted of good things - even if some of it was y’know - a bit inappropriate or mistimed or whatever.

[SnailShell]

Oh - and she could be perceptive.

She walked into the flat in my city, saw it wasn’t very homely and said “you know, you really need a proper home place”.

I shrugged it off at the time, but realised she was right a few months later.

When I was upset about some social cause, she said “yeah - I don’t understand everything about this, but it’s on your heart for a reason - maybe you should try to do something about this?”

I felt it was perceptive and supportive.

[once removed]

I stayed for a reason, y’know?

and youre mourning for a reason.

in time, these things that we miss/mourn in/about our exes are good things to look for in future partners.

presently, its a good sign that youre in touch with your grief.

my ex did a lot of good things. she was the most thoughtful gift giver ive ever met in my life. her ability to find something, that never would have occurred to you that you might want or need, or that it even existed, and make you feel so seen at the same time, astounds me to this day. it wasnt only me i saw her do it to. and when, sometime after my breakup, discussing it with a mutual friend, she knew exactly what i was talking about.

it doesnt have to be my ex. it doesnt even have to be in the same way. but that level of thoughtfulness is mighty attractive to me; its something i would want to find again, and its something that i aspire toward myself.

I realised it’s partly because she did do some really nice things - even they had selfish motives, or were otherwise a bit clumsy.

not to get all philosophical on ya, but so many of the ways we relate to others come from a place of selfishness on some level - not only to get love from others - but also to get that love in the way that we want it. ideally, our ability evolves beyond that, in a more individuated way, but thats what relationships of all kinds come into our lives to teach us.

[quizzicalcat]

Thanks snailshell. Really helpful post. I think the temptation is to only consider the bad things in the other person after a breakup. I have such a similar story to you. I could write so much on how amazing my ex was. She was thoughtful, generous, tender and loving, cultured, ferociously intelligent, curious... the list goes on. I had come out of a 17 year marriage before I met my (now ex) and have spent 4 years with her. Hard to count the time together given the numerous breakups. But in the four years she taught me what real love looked like to an extent I think. I realized what i was missing from that marriage in all those years. So yes, the breakup was painful, I wanted it to be amicable but she didnt want that. I believe she did love me and was really hurt by the breakup (which she initiated). She could not accept I actually did love her, which seems to be common theme here. Its been two months since the final breakup and ironically I've suffered as I really do miss her. I'm trying to hold onto the amazing and good memories with a smile and gratitude, and not feel like I've lost the past, as I did in my previous marriage. I want to take the best from the past, know I do love her, (even if I know a future relationship cannot work without her acknowledging and working on the inner demons) and move into the future with a smile and deep gratitude for the amazing time spent together. Its hard... really hard but thats what I'm trying to do.

What i've found really hard is taking the many critisicms she had of me and trying to get something concrete out of that for my personal development. I feel a lot of what she said was accusations about the way i made her feel and that I didnt love her or do enough or treat her right. Thats kind of hard to work with as a self development plan.

[SnailShell]

and youre mourning for a reason.

in time, these things that we miss/mourn in/about our exes are good things to look for in future partners.

presently, its a good sign that youre in touch with your grief.

my ex did a lot of good things. she was the most thoughtful gift giver ive ever met in my life. her ability to find something, that never would have occurred to you that you might want or need, or that it even existed, and make you feel so seen at the same time, astounds me to this day. it wasnt only me i saw her do it to. and when, sometime after my breakup, discussing it with a mutual friend, she knew exactly what i was talking about.

it doesnt have to be my ex. it doesnt even have to be in the same way. but that level of thoughtfulness is mighty attractive to me; its something i would want to find again, and its something that i aspire toward myself.

not to get all philosophical on ya, but so many of the ways we relate to others come from a place of selfishness on some level - not only to get love from others - but also to get that love in the way that we want it. ideally, our ability evolves beyond that, in a more individuated way, but thats what relationships of all kinds come into our lives to teach us.

Yeah - this is a helpful take!

I'll say more underneath the next quote.

I think the 'nice things = selfishness' distinction is quite important though.

I don't think there's something inherently selfish about doing a nice thing with the expectation of receiving something in return - relationships are just built that way (imo).

I'm more referring to nice things with the built-in sense that there was an immediate reason why - the sense that:

"Ahh, she'll bring this up in an argument later, or expect me to do something very clear and specific in return... this isn't a free gift in a free relationship..."

But I don't think she tended to see that pattern, or realise it was happening - so I don't think it was deliberately malicious or anything.

Thanks snailshell. Really helpful post. I think the temptation is to only consider the bad things in the other person after a breakup. I have such a similar story to you. I could write so much on how amazing my ex was. She was thoughtful, generous, tender and loving, cultured, ferociously intelligent, curious... the list goes on. I had come out of a 17 year marriage before I met my (now ex) and have spent 4 years with her. Hard to count the time together given the numerous breakups. But in the four years she taught me what real love looked like to an extent I think. I realized what i was missing from that marriage in all those years. So yes, the breakup was painful, I wanted it to be amicable but she didnt want that. I believe she did love me and was really hurt by the breakup (which she initiated). She could not accept I actually did love her, which seems to be common theme here. Its been two months since the final breakup and ironically I've suffered as I really do miss her. I'm trying to hold onto the amazing and good memories with a smile and gratitude, and not feel like I've lost the past, as I did in my previous marriage. I want to take the best from the past, know I do love her, (even if I know a future relationship cannot work without her acknowledging and working on the inner demons) and move into the future with a smile and deep gratitude for the amazing time spent together. Its hard... really hard but thats what I'm trying to do.

What i've found really hard is taking the many critisicms she had of me and trying to get something concrete out of that for my personal development. I feel a lot of what she said was accusations about the way i made her feel and that I didnt love her or do enough or treat her right. Thats kind of hard to work with as a self development plan.

Yeah, this is also helpful!

The idea of taking those qualities into a future relationship.

I'm not trying to set anyone back in their process here by the way, but it's interesting to make sense of the different behaviours.

I often read the horror stories on here, and I have horror stories of my own; but I feel it creates a kind of 'cognitive dissonance' type thing in me, where I think

"Yeah but... why do I still see her as special, then?"

And people can talk about trauma bonding, and other things... but in reality, some of the behaviours I experienced were genuinely charming, and were really appreciated at the time - even if they're still a bit confusing, and I'm not sure what the motives were exactly.

It's helpful then (I think) to realise that

"Well yeah, of course I miss those things - there's nothing weird about that.
It's just that it wasn't the whole story, and the trade off was in no way worth it."

Even violent abusers can buy their wife flowers now and then, but yeah... holding the two things at the same time is better than pretending that the good didn't exist (in my opinion) - dismissing the good almost feels like fighting and repressing it, which might hinder the moving on process somehow, y'know?

Just a thought, anyway - if it helps then great; if it doesn't, feel free to disregard :D

[seekingtheway]

I have a very long list of things that I loved about my ex. I admired a lot about him as a person, what he brought to our community, and he did bring a lot of unique things that I'd never experienced in any other relationship, and those are the things I still miss a lot. Some of the conversations we had were so interesting and stimulating to me - we'd create imaginary music festivals, analyse movies we'd seen for hours, come up with solutions to all kinds of problems in the world... we also had a shared love of nature, so we spent a lot of time bushwalking etc. I really loved his creativity... and the way his mind turned things over, my mind works in a similar way, and I don't think it's just mirroring at play there. I still think, despite all of it, the end of this relationship was a big loss for me. I've never felt such a close connection with any other man and I do think in those moments, he felt the connection deeply as well (although I think he has experienced that deep connection with many other people, not just me...).

I have had friends and even some trauma counsellors that encouraged me to see my ex as a 'all bad' person and write him off as a user and abuser, but that's just encouraging me into the same black-and-white thinking that my ex suffers with when he splits. I prefer to hold the good and the bad in one hand, and know it wasn't all trickery, manipulation or that he was operating 100% of the time from a false self. As Once Removed said, it's not unique to people with BPD to act in ways that ultimately serve our own needs. I think if we look deep, we all do that to some degree.

But I'm also clear there were very damaging behaviours within the relationship that made it impossible for me to continue with it. And I hold compassion for myself because I was deeply wounded within this relationship, and so there's a process I need to complete in terms of healing all of that.

I think it's a good and healthy thing that you want to hold the light and dark of your experience and take lessons from all of it.