my girlfriend [23f] and I [22f] have problems with her ex getting mentioned. My gf and I started talking after she broke up with her ex gf. And after my gf realized she likes me, she completely stopped talking with her ex. She still talks about her ex’s with me, about their relationship. Their bad and good stories. I realized that before I got into relationship with her. I was feeling unfair for me when she’d talk about her ex, cause I didn’t want to date someone who hasn’t forget about their ex. But I still date her anyway.
At the first few months of dating her. Whenever I did something that she’s not happy with. If her ex did it. She’ll say “ I really hate you doing it, it triggers me, bc my ex gf did it all the time”, or even something like “ I don’t feel like you know how to handle me, unlike my ex” and would start to give me examples of how her ex did it in the past. I felt like being constant compared with her ex, and feeling like I have to be her ex2.0 who was obligated to do better than her ex. There were a couple times she told me “ my ex is the one who I felt like home, you don’t make me feel like home yet”, “ I put 100% in for my ex, I sacrificed it so much for her, and I can’t do it to you yet”, all of those words makes me feel super insecure, and being scared and sad a lot. To the point that I will feel nauseous and can’t continue to listen to my gf talk if her ex was just being brought up.
We talked about it a lot of time, we took relationships breaks from it. And tried to tell her that bringing up her ex and comparing me to her makes me feel super uncomfortable. She will always say she understands, and that she’ll never bring her up again. But it never stops. We will just get in constant fights bc of it.
The last fight we had about it. She told me she think it through. And that she’s sorry for making me feel this way for months. And promised me she won’t do it again. But just yesterday she mentioned her again. And this time I felt nothing. I don’t feel nauseous anymore. All I want to do is leave. Cause I am so tired with talking about the same problem over and over again.
My gf realized I was not ok, and said “Idek why you care so much, I talk about her was not because I still love her, I was just want you to know now I feel, and those are my feelings, are things that I’ve been through”
I told her “you knew that I don’t feel comfortable with you mentioning her, can’t you just address on the issue, and not bring ur ex in it ?, I always change and help you, there’s no need to bring ur ex in it.”
And now we are in an very awkward situation, where everything goes to the original place, she doesn’t want to change, and I don’t want to take a step back.
Is there any advices? Like Should I be a bigger person to just accept it? Or should I break up with her to end this cycle?
Tl;dr
My gf and I have problem with her mentioning her ex for months, I felt very uncomfortable if she mentioned her ex. But she continues to do it over and over again, should I break up with her ? Or any advices that will be helpful will do too.
Update:
We had another talk, and decided to break up. I asked her if she knows the reason why she mentioned her ex, she said she has no idea. Sometimes it just slips from her lips. She didn’t meant to mention her ex. She didn’t realized it sometimes. And said “ you made me feel anxious, I will get cold if I accidentally mention my ex bc of you”. I feel so disappointed that even till this time she’s still behaving like she has no control of her own body and head.
She said “it’s more complicated than controlling my mouth, all of my friends and families knows her and I am still in the circle same circle as her “ “and u made me feel like i had to disconnect all of the things that connect to her which is impossible”
Update 2:
She said “our relationship feel so fragile, no matter how much sweat and tears I put for you, the trusts will disappear in the blink of the eyes of that name is mentioned, it wasn’t right for me to made u feel compared that time, but it wasn’t right for you to put this into a core of trust and our whole relationship over the edge because of it”
I have to be very honest that she did treat me very nice. She’s the nicest person I’ve ever met. She’s sweet and thoughtful. And it’s the only thing that made me feel super uncomfortable about her. And the thought of letting this relationship go is hard. Cause if I can just deal with the pain of it. I will still be able to be in the relationship with her happily. But there will be a part of me who can’t forget about it.
3 comments
I am really sorry that such a manipulative person is the nicest person you have met. I hope you meet better people in the future.
She’s so caught up in her own perspective that she cannot see yours fully, that kind of behavior will bleed into other issues. The reason she mentions her ex is because even if she “doesn’t love her” anymore, she still hasn’t healed from the relationship. There’s a quote that goes, “ if you don’t heal, you’ll end up bleeding in ppl that didn’t hurt you”. The major red flag is her lack of accountability, even when she takes some little accountability she shifts the blame towards you or the relationship somehow. As if she has control over nothing. She’s showing very little emotional intelligence and a lot of immaturity. My advice is to leave now, I feel like in 2 girl relationships the bond grows deep real fast and it becomes an attachment hard to break. Do it now before you find yourself in a year long toxic relationship with someone that cannot even control their own words. You’re really not at fault don’t let her gaslight you into thinking that you’re in the wrong, the relationship is “fragile” because she has made it so, and if it so fragile, let it break. Will hurt a little but at the end, you deserve better.
Google: self worth, self respect and begin rebuilding your own self worth so these INSECURITIES will not keep hurting you.