Home › Forums › Dating and Sex Advice › Getting back into dating after a long term breakup? Expectations?
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Newbie.
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Brittany
My ex broke up with me after 3 and a half years and told me he no longer loved me. He was my first love and my first and only relationship. I’m 20 atm and just don’t know quite how to get back into the dating scene or what to expect.
Right now I am talking to a guy and he’s aware of my ex, (my ex and I still live together with our roommates, separate rooms but there’s no choice for either of us to leave until 2021.)
Honestly I have so many questions. I spent post breakup working on myself, focusing on exercising and taking care of myself, relearning about my own interests and reconnecting with old friends. I went to therapy and worked on managing my anxiety and learned about things where I fell short in the relationship. Obviously COVID has made things complicated since I live with my ex still but I’m managing.
So in my last relationship I became 100% dependent on my ex and that I completely understand. I can be clingy and attached and I’m terrified of being that person again and would appreciate any advice on managing those feelings of attachment as I move into future stages with the guy I’m currently talking too.
What are things to avoid when first beginning to talk too people such as red flags?
How often should you wait to text or call someone if you’re going on dates and what not but not in a relationship?
How do I know if I’m truly even over my ex? I had good and bad days for a while honestly but haven’t had any bad days or sad days in a minute which is why I chose to start checking through tinder though I do catch myself unconsciously almost calling my ex babe or doing things that were once habit before the breakup.
I know you shouldn’t talk about your ex when talking too someone new but honestly before the breakup we were each other’s entire world and so with the guy I’m currently talking too if I want to bring up a memory or an experience such as let’s says going to Halloween horror nights, I don’t know if I should talk about it or not because 99% of the time those memories or experiences include my ex and I don’t want to make the guy I’m talking with uncomfortable, even though I’m remembering the memory not so much my ex. So I don’t know what to do in those instances or is it okay to just bring up?
There’s a lot that I just don’t know, my high school and college years for the most part were devoted to my ex so I feel like I’ve lost a certain level of experience and maturity that other’s my age might have with dating and putting themselves out there and would really appreciate any advice. Thank you so much!Raven
Why do you have to wait until 2021 to leave your current housing situation?
Tallspicy
You should not be dating until you are moved out. And never again have a man be your entire world.
And as to they guy you are talking to. He means nothing at the moment and there are no future stages. Just take it one day at a time.
Lane
If you keep talking about your ex then you aren’t fully recovered and need more *you time* to fully move on and start a new chapter that revolves around you to the point you have so much to talk about that your ex rarely pops in your mind.
I think you should take a long dating hiatus and start the process of overriding your memories with *you* topics instead of WE topics. Whenever I a guy talks about their ex my mind instinctively believes they are still not over them, their heart is still blocked (walled up/closed off to others), and need more single time before they are able to fully untwine the ex from their life. It’s a major red flag that I do not ignore because I’ve been there myself, and until I had no desire to talk about my ex only then did I know my heart was ready to be open to another man.
Being that you still live with your ex is a double-whammy and not a good dating prospect for any guy. These guys are going to disappear the moment they think you are getting *too serious* (needy behavior) which is when your *co-dependency* is going to rear its ugly head because you haven’t learned how to be INTERDEPENDENT which is the ultimate goal you need to work towards before you can be in a healthy relationship.
If I were you, I would get to the root of your co-dependency, determine what your *triggers* are and how to counter it by doing the opposite (non-partner related) by doing your own thing so you are not dependent on a man for feeling valued or validated but because you derive it though many external sources such as family, friends, work, hobbies, activities, etc. to the point you become more reliant on yourself for your happiness than you do a man. Once you’ve achieved that, and can retain those boundaries for a long time can you know if you’ve beaten and defeated it. You need a lot more *single time* to get there though so I would refrain from dating and build an awesome single life first before you venture into dating land again.
Newbie
I also dont see any reasons to get back to dating so soon after a first 3 1/2 year relationship with you still living with your ex as roommates. Especially if you lost track of you are in this relationship and made the guy the center of your universe. You are only 20 years old and still not fully mature brainwise so why dont you enjoy being on your own first. So what is your rush?
Brittany
We live in a college housing style which requires us to sign a lease a year ahead so we signed our leases for 2021 last year, in order to break the lease (500$) and find a new place is way too expensive for me and most housing is already full for next year, I’m independent from my parents, and would also put unnecessary stress on our roommates to find someone too replace me or him if he left. So I’m kinda stuck until we graduate which isn’t until April of 2021.
Brittany
Thank you guys all for your responses! I guess I need to backtrack and reevaluate some things. One of the biggest things I learned from our relationship is I never want to be as dependent and attached as I was with him, though I’m still struggling with fully establishing my own self at times. I do go to therapy and am working on these problems of dependency, it was kinda a wakeup call for me in some ways. Thank you!
Newbie
By itself not falling apart after the break up, still being amical with him and also doing a lot of exploration on who you are and why you got clingy, is seriously impressive. So first give yourself some credits for that. If you can be amicable then staying in the same house should work out. Maybe after a while you can have a rule not to shove new lovers in each others face. And seeing how many times you talked about the ex tells you, you are not ready
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