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Dreaming about my ex and sick of it
A little history first - I broke up with my boyfriend in 2008, then almost immediately met my current HB (been married for 7 months). When original bf and I broke up, it was extremely difficult on me, but I broke up with him because he had lied to me for several months about his grades, and I had to get a call from a friend (on my birthday no less) that he was flunking out of college. When I confronted him about it, he said that he was going to try to fix it "before anyone had to find out." Well, we broke up, and he ended up having to drop out of the university and last I heard he was taking classes at a community college.
But this is not really the point. The point is that basically ever since we broke up, I have dreams about it. I can't help thinking about him, and I always hate myself for thinking about him. I married a great guy who I love very much and who provides for me in every way. Yet, my ex keeps popping up in my stupid subconscious.
The last time I contacted my ex was just before I moved in with my current HB, getting some things off my chest and telling him that I just needed to say them to have some peace, and that I would never contact him again. I have stayed true to that. He did reply, and he apologized for what he had done, and he wished me well.
I guess sometimes I feel like maybe I gave up on him too quickly, and even if we weren't destined to be together, I could have motivated him to do better and I could have stuck with him. We had never had any troubles in our relationship, so I couldn't handle one and we broke up. Looking back I think we were both pretty immature, but we dated longer than my HB and I had dated before getting married.
I know I'm with a great guy and that my ex and I broke up for a reason...So why do I still have to dream about him??? I wish there was something I could do.
Re: Dreaming about my ex and sick of it
I'm going to go with, "Sex was hotter with the Ex for $1000, Alex."
There is a school of thought that you are everyone in your dream. That familiar faces are only used by your subconscience to work-out issues about yourself that are unresolved.
So, it's not really about the ex, it's about you. Think about it, do these dreams tell you something about you? Something you are trying to work-out for yourself? Something about YOU, not your ex, or your time together, something about YOU? Something he represents.
And I have to say - thank g*d you dogged this little bullet- good g*d could there be anything worse than "motivating" your partner to be better? That's likke the seventh ring of hell. It never works or ends well. We women think it will, but it doesn't.
::shudder::
Do you mean literally dreaming about him or daydreaming/thinking about him when you're wide awake?
Because you really can't control the former.
Click me, click me!
Sometimes it takes a huge realization for someone to get their sh!t together. Like losing someone they care about. Loss and hurt aren't easy emotions to go through, but sometimes they are necessary.
You're probably still dwelling on this guy because you never allowed yourself to move on. IDK why you rushed into a relationship and marriage without taking some time for yourself to sort through your emotions. Do you?
Dreams are subconscious. You have some type of unresolved issues from the past relationship (and even you know that, or else you wouldn't have contacted him and tried to get closure). In hindsight, you should have taken time to process what happened in your last relationship before moving on the the next (I'm not even going to touch the whole "rebound guy" thing).
What can you do now? If your dreams are as bad as you are describing, I think you should try therapy.
She means while awake. She wrote on S&R that she's not too attracted to her husband, and fantasizes sexually about the ex all the time.
I know this is a beebee thing to say, but man, her husband has a crappy deal here.
Uhm, eww and I totally agree.
It's escapism, pure and simple.
Click me, click me!
First let me say that I appreciate the input. I think I need to clarify a couple of things....
I am mostly referring to my subconscious. Literal dreams. And for the most part actually not sexual. We'll just be hanging out together, or at a club, or at my parents' house (which makes sense I think because that's where I lived when I was dating him). Sometimes it feels like we're "together" and once in a while I will acknowledge that it's wrong to be hanging out with him because I'm committed to someone else. Yes, sometimes I do think / wonder about him while I'm awake, but I think everyone has a tendency to reminisce once in a while. It's the dreaming part that leaves me bothered the next morning.
I did write a post once about not being sexually attracted to my husband all the time, but I can actually say that our sex life has improved since then and we have both been putting in more effort. And, one other thing about him, we didn't jump into a relationship right away, although we did click right away...perhaps it was "rebound" but I took some time away from him for that reason, and then we ended up becoming official a few months later.
I don't know if this is escapism as you say or if maybe I thought I took enough time for myself but didn't ...but, either way my life is what it is now (which is FINE. I am happy. That's what doesn't make sense.) ....basically do you think I'm just stuck with this?
Okay, I do have an explanation for that.
You had one dream with the ex, and woke up like "wtf?!" because dreams about exes make us feel weird and vaguely unfaithful, and occasionally a little sad and/or grossed out. And that feeling gave you a second dream, after which you were like "TWO dreams about the ex - that must mean something!" And then your subconscious tried to figure out the meaning by giving you another one. You can guess what happened next.