This is long. It could definitely be shorter, but I just started writing and kept on going. So apologies for that.
At a very drunken house party at the weekend, DP (well, DFiancé to be precise) kissed and made out with his ex girlfriend of about seven years ago. I’d originally also been at the party, but had left before he did. I’ve always had a slight discomfort about how their relationship ended: I know that she cheated and then broke up with him, completely blindsiding him; and that it took him a very long time to get past her. I know that for a long time afterwards if she’d suggested trying again he’d have jumped at the chance. In the early stages of our relationship this niggled me; however, we’ve now been together over five years and so I’ve felt it was well in the past.
He told me what had happened as soon as he got home (and I do believe this was because he wanted to be honest; but ultimately have to acknowledge that he will also have known he had to tell me because mutual friends who saw him do it would certainly have fed back to me.) However, he also (which I know because I asked to see) sent her a message the following morning saying some lovely things about her (not a problem - I know that she was made redundant recently and has really been struggling with where to go next)… and then telling her that he still has mixed feelings for her.
I can deal with a one-off drunken kiss: we’ve all done stuff we regret when very drunk (although in alcohol’s defence, I’ve done a lot of very stupid stuff when completely sober as well!) and unlike an affair or other type of duplicitous cheating I’ve never felt it should automatically be the end of a relationship in itself. Also, I’m not the thought police, I’m sure many people still have some mixed feelings about an ex, what goes on inside his head in private isn’t something I need to know about, I can live, I think, with the idea that he still cares about her, to some level.
But it’s the combination of all of the things - having remaining feelings for an ex, kissing that ex, AND then telling her that he still has feelings for her - that I’m not sure I can move on from.
I can’t insist he never sees her again: we have a very large interinvolved social group of which she’s a part (I consider/ed her a friend, although not a close one) and I’m not going to become the sort of partner who tells him where he can go and monitors where he’s been, just in case she’s going to be there. And unless I avoid every single activity or party where she could potentially be, then also I’ll have to socialise with her sometimes knowing that she knows I’m in a relationship with her ex who still has feelings for her. Plus any other mutual friends she may have told. I don’t want her or anyone else feeling sorry for me (or gloating behind my back.) I think this is the bit I’m really struggling with. But also, I don’t want to end my relationship out of worry of what others might think or say.
I’ve asked him for some space to think. He’s said all the right things. It isn’t that I don’t believe him. It is, as I said above, the combination of three less than ideal points.
Can we move on from this? Or do I just end things now, to save myself a load of stress and worry in the future? Or is that actually the easy, lazy way out?