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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to google my ex-boyfriends?

40 replies

Wuldric · 11/08/2013 22:54

This sounds a little odd. Well, more than a little odd. But here goes.

I bumped into an old boyfriend at a restaurant in London today. Was utterly odd, as you can imagine. 'Let me introduce you to my wife' 'Pleased to meet you. Let me introduce you to my husband'. You get the scenario. It was fun though, and he hasn't changed a bit and his wife seems lovely and his kids seem jolly (and got on with mine) and we did the whole 'isn't it a small world' thing.

So when I got slightly tipsily home, I decided that the thing to do was google my ex-boyfriends.

This has worked out very oddly.

One of them is apparently tipped to win the next Nobel prize in his field (I am NOT joking) in a field which I will not divulge because it would therefore out him and me. How utterly delightful!

One of them has just declared himself bankrupt. The notice was in the London Gazette. This has had me in tears. I left him because he was utterly feckless. Gorgeous but feckless.

I'm not googling any more.

OP posts:
luckyclucky · 11/08/2013 22:59

Yanbu
It is highly entertaining on many levels although I definitely do not do this when I am still up late at night for no good reason Wink

rockybalboa · 11/08/2013 22:59

Neither of my significant exes are that interesting! One I do google every now and then out of interest and the other I have on FB (and his now wife!) anyway.

gallicgirl · 11/08/2013 23:02

One of mine is rock climbing in Norway or Sweden and married to a native.

One I am friends with.

Don't care too much about the others.

I always feel that the past me us a different person and something is learned from each relationship.

tinkertitonk · 11/08/2013 23:08

Outstanding, OP. But you do realize that with one boyfriend bankrupt and one soon-to-be-nobelling GCHQ has you totally triangulated?

Original poster
Wuldric · 11/08/2013 23:09

Yes, that's true and I think of my exes with fondness (as I hope they do me!). We live and we learn and we move forwards. Still a bit odd though to find out ...

OP posts:
MikeOxard · 11/08/2013 23:13

Well I just tried it, but after about 4 seconds of looking down the google list of ex's name, I realised I just didn't give enough of a shit to be doing that.

Sophita · 11/08/2013 23:56

I've done this quite recently - I'm not long out of my only major relationship, and after a night in drinking too much and feeling maudlin, curiosity got the better of me.

I found most of them easily enough. Nothing exciting or scandalous to report, but it did make me feel really strange - uncomfortable and nostalgic and sad, and then sometimes it made me remember a daft, sweet moment or joke or something that we'd shared, and it was lovely to have that back in my head when I'd forgotten all about it for years. The thing that got to me the most is that these were teenage relationships, and it made me tired just to remember the intensity of it all - being so stupidly in love with someone that you really thought you'd die without them and all that melodramatic hormonal crap.

Gah, is making me sad again to think about it. I wouldn't want to be sixteen again for a million pounds, but I do feel very old and dull in comparison.

WorraLiberty · 11/08/2013 23:59

Yeah it's a bit odd.

You actually cried because one of them declared bankruptcy?

Or were you being sarcastic?

EBearhug · 12/08/2013 00:00

I haven't had many boyfriends, and I'm still in touch with them, so I don't have to google them.

(Erm, you can still get all that intense melodramatic hormonal crap in your 40s. And they're still not bloody interested. sigh )

MadameDefarge · 12/08/2013 00:10

It was fun in the early years of google...and now I don't do it much unless reminded by something or other. tbh wish I hadn't last week, as found out my first proper bf had committed suicide. so so sad.

bananananacoconuts · 12/08/2013 00:11

I actually saw one of mine on Friday. Haven't seen him for 15 years but he's still as hot as he was then, if not better with age! A quick google tells me he's an engineer and lives round the corner!

underthemountain · 12/08/2013 00:11

God-I just googled someone from my past and found a date of death. Am really shaken-he was only 25 at the time (ten years ago). Is there any way to find a cause of death online?

cozietoesie · 12/08/2013 02:14

Yes - finding an ex who has died is a sobering moment.

VixZenFenchell · 12/08/2013 05:14

Can't find many of mine. One seems to have got fat and bald - amazing what 15 years does to you. I otoh have slimmed down, toned up and now realise there are many reasons why they are exes :)

MammaTJ · 12/08/2013 07:06

One of mine (well exH # 1 ) has totally reinvented his past! So much so that his communist father be be becomes an Orthodox Jew!

My 'first' is chairperson of a bowling club! Yes, a BOWLING CLUB!

No good can come of googling exes! Grin

Tiredemma · 12/08/2013 07:09

My first love is in prison serving 7 years for drug offences and related violent crimes. This doesn't surprise me at all.

glastocat · 12/08/2013 07:20

One of mine is fat, bald, still lives in the same house and is a country and western singer at weekends. I find this hilarious as he used to be into Echo and the Bunnymen and he absolutely hated the town we lived in and everyone in it, but he is still there!

But worse than that, The One That Got Away is now.......an evangelical Christian that appears to belong to some weird sect. He's still fit though! He was very lapsed Catholic back in the day, can't work that one out at all!

AnnaKissed · 12/08/2013 07:22

How disappointing! My ex who was a PhD student is now a doctor, who occasionally donates to Just Giving. That's it.

Can't remember the surname of a previous ex / fling Blush

livinginwonderland · 12/08/2013 07:44

One of my ex's ended up on Jeremy Kyle...[cringe emoticon]

Bumblequeen · 12/08/2013 08:04

This reply has been deleted

Withdrawn at poster's request.

Gobbolinothewitchscat · 12/08/2013 08:07

Ooooh - I love doing this and I'm a very good googler Grin

Delighted to be married to DH but very nosy. I sometimes google his exes too. He's totally uninterested

Gobbolinothewitchscat · 12/08/2013 08:09

bumble - just put their name in. If its John Smith try a location too. Look up Friends Reunited for info as to where they have moved to. That helps although it's usually out if date. Might give a job though. mad stalker alert

Remember to look at google images too

Bumblequeen · 12/08/2013 08:11

This reply has been deleted

Withdrawn at poster's request.

pinkdelight · 12/08/2013 08:18

living may I share your cringe emoticon? One of mine was on WifeSwap as the 'bad' dad/husband a.k.a. hideous slob. actually a *nauseous emoticon' would be even better.

mumofboyo · 12/08/2013 08:29

I googled mine. One has been on the gadget show having spotted a gap in the market and opened his own company selling a piece of tech to schools, army etc.

Another went to prison for downloading and printing out very unsavoury images. On his work's laptop. He was a teacher. I think I had a very lucky escape.

If any of my exes were to Google me, they wouldn't find anything. I've Googled myself as well lol

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