manslations

We begin the week with a very long manslation request from a reader named Eli. The gist of it? She was dating a guy for 4 years, they broke up, and within a month he was dating another chick. What’s to be manslated? Here’s the finale to her magnum opus:

So, why does all this matter?

Because they are still dating and he is now planning on bringing her down here to our home town for a week or so over the summer while I will be here. I have let him know that I can barely deal with him being here, not to mention being in town myself even without him because its a small town and I have very vivid memories of pretty much every place in my town and him for 4 years. So, the idea of him bringing her here is obviously not the most exciting thing that could happen to me and actually the idea makes me simultaneously sick to my stomach and filled with hate for her and him (even though she did nothing wrong).

So what is the best way that I can communicate to him that I do not want this to happen. To show him how much it will hurt me? And what the hell is going through his mind?

Dear Eli,

First of all, I’m sorry about the whole “getting dumped, and then having him date another girl right away” deal. Rough one, that is. And no, I wasn’t thinking about Yoda when I just typed that sentence backwards like that. Not much about Yoda anyway. I mean, there’s always a part of me that’s thinking about Yoda, sure. But…anyway, moving on.

Ok, so you’ve got a couple of questions. How to communicate that you do NOT want this to happen, and what’s going through his mind. Here we go:

HOW TO LET HIM KNOW THAT THIS WILL DRIVE YOU BATPOOP CRAZY?

Well, I can’t think of a way for you to keep him from bringing the girl home. The good news is that my advice is this: Don’t bother trying. Whatever happened between you and this guy, it’s over, yes? And regardless of whether this new girl is “the one” for him or not, it seems that your ex is…well, he’s your EX. As in, he’s now going to be with other women forever. And you’re going to be with other dudes. The sooner you get used to that, the better. Even if it’s harsh.

Why shouldn’t you bother asking him to do this? Here are a couple of reasons:

1. It likely won’t prevent the trip. Like it or not, she is now his girlfriend. By definition, he is more interested in her feelings than yours. Sorry about the bluntness there, but it’s true. And if he wants to bring his new squeeze to his hometown, well, he’s almost certainly going to do it even if it bothers you.
2. It wouldn’t help if it DID prevent the trip. Again, he’s with her now. So even if you asked him not to bring her and he somehow agreed to it…he’s still with HER. All it would do is postpone the lousiest part of the breakup — i.e. the REALITY part.
3. If you accept them together it could be a good thing. The flipside of #2. If you try to pretend this other girl doesn’t exist, it isn’t helping you get over him. It might be helping you not feel as lousy today as you could, but it is most definitely prolonging the situation.

I know I’m not really answering the question, but truthfully I don’t think that there IS a good way to tell him this. What’s the point? That he’ll say, “Well, regardless of how much I care about my current girlfriend, I’ll tell her to stay home while I go and visit the town where my ex lives“? Yeah, not so likely. Not healthy for his relationship, and not healthy for you getting over your last one.

WHAT’S GOING ON IN THAT LITTLE MIND OF HIS??

Sounds to me like pretty standard dating behavior. He’s with a girl, he is coming home, and he wants to show her around, show her off to his old pals, his family, whatever it is. I mean, as sucky as it is for you, my suspicion is that he likely didn’t really give much consideration to how this might be for you.

My guess is that he assumed that you were either a.) ok with it, or b.) were going to have to GET ok with it. Or most likely c.) he didn’t even think much about what you’d feel.

FORECAST: PARTLY SUCKY WITH A CHANCE OF ACCEPTANCE

Eli, I’m here to tell you that I really KNOW KNOW KNOW what it’s like to have an ex parade their new relationship in front of you before you’re ready. And in my case, boy did I handle it with quiet grace and dignity…er…as long as no one who was THERE is here to rebut me, yes, that’s exactly how it went down.

The main thing that I learned is that the feeling of “not ready” to see the ex with a new person? That’s your cue to get in there and make SURE that you see them. Because what it means is that you’re sort of “leaving the porch light on” for the ex. As in, you’re expecting that he might just come home to you one day, and if you see him with her, well, it blows that whole idea out of the water.

Know what? Good. Blow that idea out of the water. Let it be as sucky as it’s going to be. As soon as it’s the suckiest it’s ever going to be and you embrace the WHOLE suckitude of it? That’s when you’re over it. And not a minute before.

Good luck, Eli. I hope it’s not too-too traumatic for you, but I also hope that you decide to face it and move onto the greener 3:1 guy/girl pastures that you talk about in your letter!

Ladies? Anybody ever gotten an ex to leave the new gal at home? How’d you do it? Did it help?

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(full text of request follows)

Hey Jeff, I really like reading your site and its amazing how many of the questions being asked actually pertain to questions I’ve had before. Great job!

So heres my question:

There is a bit of history behind the situation, 4 years to be exact, but I’ll try and breeze through them.

So I began dating this guy freshman year of high school, yeah I know, immature relationship, blah blah blah, but he was actually very mature for his age and was frequently thought to be a senior that first year. Well, regardless, we dated through out our entire high school career, we had our rough times, mostly brought on by my parents, but we always made it through and were never close to breaking up. So, with the end of high school comes college, and although we both attempted to go to U.Va. only he got in. So, we knew we were not going to be going to school together, but we looked at ticket prices and vacation schedules and decided that we could do it. He kept saying that he wanted to go to the same school as me, or at least to one in the same area but he had gotten into Yale and so I told him I didn’t want him to risk his future for me because if it didn’t work out, I didn’t want him to blame me. Finally, he consented and he went to Yale and I went to Georgia Tech. Either way,
both schools were out of state and in much bigger cities than our home towns.

So, college starts, I go before him, he comes up and visits for a few days, he’s willing to pay for a greyhound up to Atlanta to spend the day and night with me and a greyhound back. (I could not have a car for the first semester) So then he leaves for school and as the hub of the South, he leaves from Atlanta so I get to say goodbye and everything is fine.

Then, less than a month after he gets up there he starts to not call as often and when he does, I have to ask question to keep him even talking and he complains he’s tired all the time. I will admit, I got a bit jealous because he was friends with a lot of girls and his college had dances a lot (think Hogwarts houses) with other colleges within Yale and he always went and sometimes neglected to tell me.

Stupidly, I thought it’ll be ok, everything’ll be back to normal at Thanksgiving because he’s gonna come see me. Before that he breaks up with me, and then calls me back the next day saying he wants to take it back and get back together. He claimed that he didn’t feel entirely connected to what was happening at Yale because he was still tied to me and that he thought he’d feel better if he broke up with me and that instead he felt worse. So I forgave him and we got back together and it was better for a while, then he came to visit me on his Thanksgiving break.

He was supposed to stay a few days and the night that he got in my roommates all left for the night….*wink wink*….and so he gets there and we’re messing around and in the middle of it, then he tells me that it isn’t working for him and he thinks we should break up. Needless to say I got really really mad. We talked about it, and through his tears he was telling me that he was so sorry blah blah blah. He wouldn’t stay the night even though we have an extra futon and his dad was going to be in Atlanta the next day at 4. Instead, he takes the MARTA (aka subway) to the greyhound station and sleeps there for 4 hours until the next bus home.

I see him over Christmas and we end up hooking up at a Krimma  party at his house with a bit of alcohol in our systems and at the time its ok. So then he goes back to school, we decide to remain friends, a month later I find out he’s dating someone up there (he doesn’t tell me, I have to confront him about it and he admits its true)

Needless to say I am pissed off because a month after he gets out of a 4 year relationship, he is already dating another girl, which means he must have been “talking” to her right after we broke up (he swears it wasn’t before) and to top it off I can’t get a guy to save my life (this should be easy since the guy to girl ratio at tech is 3:1)

So, why does all this matter?

Because they are still dating and he is now planning on bringing her down here to our home town for a week or so over the summer while I will be here. I have let him know that I can barely deal with him being here, not to mention being in town myself even without him because its a small town and I have very vivid memories of pretty much every place in my town and him for 4 years. So, the idea of him bringing her here is obviously not the most exciting thing that could happen to me and actually the idea makes me simultaneously sick to my stomach and filled with hate for her and him (even though she did nothing wrong).

So what is the best way that I can communicate to him that I do not want this to happen. To show him how much it will hurt me? And what the hell is going through his mind?

(he claims he still wants to be my friend, I told him I never wanted to talk to him again, but when I unfortunately have to, he always seems glad to hear from me)