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Today I've heard someone complaining about her ex. They broke up a long, long time ago, and still, there was so much hatred in her voice. It was not the first time I heard a person talking about their former lovers with nothing but contempt and pure hate. Thus the question.
Feel free to share the reasons, too.
| none | 24 | |
| 1-2 | 33 | |
| 3-5 | 5 | |
| 6 and more | 3 | |
| other | 7 |
Anger? A few times when I realised I was dating an asshole.
Hate? Only one. And I pray to god I never see him, or if I do that someone is there to keep me from killing that bastard.
Never, really. Sometimes it's turned into an intense feeling of not wanting to have anything to do with that person, but it usually passes. Only twice did it stick around, but those two really stung me badly. I'd be a better person if I'd met neither of them.
I'm glad you said that last part. People like to say that bad experiences make us better people, but they don't always. Even when they do, it's not always worth it, and that kind of "all for the best" attitude strikes me as really insensitive to people who've really suffered and not got much out of it.
I did wonder whether to admit to it, but I know it's true. They made me harder and more cynical and much less eager to trust unconditionally. One also left me so much in debt that it took me five years to get straight.
I don't know if I'd be a better person if I'd not met my two worst exes. I understand and empathise with some things now on a deeper level than I did before. I can try to help other people that way. But I lost so much to give so little.
It wasn't worth it.
I suppose in any situation there are some positives, though, even if the overall picture is negative. One positive is that I recognised I was attracting a certain type of person and I now have a little alarm bell that rings where previously I had a "Oh, she seems nice" internal voice.
None. Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.
Threeish. There are two who I suppose I hate, and one who I have bitterness towards but don't exactly hate.
Mind, when I say I hate two, I don't want them to live terrible lives, but if they came to my house, I'd answer the door with a hammer. Or call the police, I guess. That would probably be more practical.
The one I have bitterness towards was manipulative and controlling. I got together with him at the end of my senior year of high school, and dated him for about a year. When I went to college, he didn't want me to leave the dorm by myself. Ever. He didn't want me to go to concerts. Whenever I wanted to spend a weekend doing homework or with my friends, he insisted that I wasn't spending enough time with him (even though we spent the entirety of almost every weekend together, plus some weekdays). When I tried to put my food down about anything I wanted, he would get manipulative, crying and asking me why I didn't love him. He'd keep me on the phone after I'd taken my sleeping medication, even though I told him that it was physically painful to stay awake.
I think he saw me as a damsel in distress, both because of my disabilities and my past. He came into my life thinking he would be my white knight, my protector. He actually asked me out shortly after I confessed that my ex-boyfriend (one of the aforementioned other two) raped me when I was 14. I was still recovering from the trauma and dealing with symptoms of PTSD. At first, I suppose he was reasonably understanding, but soon, I think it became clear to him that they weren't something he could control or fix.
After we'd been together for only a short time, he started making the trauma and my symptoms about him. I understand that helping a loved one with something like that can be very difficult, and I encouraged him to talk about his feelings about it with me or a therapist at his college. He refused the therapist and my attempts to sit down and have a talk about it. Instead, he talked constantly about how angry he was at my ex, and how he was going to murder him. I made it clear to him that that wouldn't help. He got very, very angry talking about it, which was very frightening to me when I was willing to listen to him talk about his violent thoughts, but I was not willing to plot a murder with him. He didn't listen, and started pressuring me to help him track my ex. He also started yelling when I had flashbacks, which made things much, much worse.
He also became extremely overprotective. He knew some martial arts, and he acted like he was in a movie all the time. He was constantly pointing out "dangerous" people to me, and they were always black or latino men just minding their own business (he was not pleased when I pointed this out to him). I mentioned earlier that he didn't want me to leave my dorm alone or go out. He threatened to break up with me if I dyed my hair or got piercings. He didn't want me going to the Collective (the club for LGBT people and people who were interested in LGBT rights at my college), because he didn't think I should be bisexual anymore if I was with him. He tried to pressure me to get engaged to him.
ANYWAY, uh, there's like two pages of me complaining about my ex boyfriend. Enjoy?
Believe it or not, my hatred for ex #1 isn't strictly because of what happened when we dated. It's because of his behavior over the course of the relationship AND our "friendship" that followed. (We actually tried to stay "friends.") Basically, he was either a compulsive liar, or crazy, or both. Whatever the reason, he was full of surprises, and not the fun kind.
I think my hatred for him, though, mostly comes from how embarrassed I am over how gullible I was. He told me ridiculous stories about how he'd supposedly had twelve near-death experiences. He claimed to care so deeply about me, and feel so bad that he was "in love with two people," and was the "nice, understanding girl" who didn't get mad. He told me he was having auditory hallucinations, but could totally handle them without professional help, and his grandma was a professional shrink who told him they were normal. I spend months worrying about him, thinking he was going schizophrenic. And maybe he was. But it's clear now that whatever was wrong with him, he didn't want help from anyone; only attention.
Well, by the time he was announcing his decision to get a sex change, I realized that he had no idea what the hell he wanted from his life, and was just jumping from one drama-queen "revelation" to the next. It's really humiliating, how slow I was, and how long it took for me to realize that this asshole was so full of shit. I hope his flair for the dramatic lands him in a nuthouse.
I feel indifferent about most of them.
But one guy I almost hooked up with was a lying douchebag. He lied to me about everything...I knew him for a few weeks and we nearly had sex but then I found out he was engaged to a pregnant woman and he also had 2 kids from a marriage before (he told me no kids and never been married). He was kept me from his job because he was a lying sack of doggie doo. Even after I talked to his pregnant fiancé (who amazingly didn't seem suprised that other women were calling him) he randomly phoned me a month later just to see if I was "still mad" and wanted to hook up. Creep.
None. But I've only had one girlfriend. I feel anger towards a few of the mistakes she made but nothing overly major happened between us so there's no need for the hate. I hope she feels the same way...
There's one I still have a lot of bitterness towards. I sometimes think about doing something to hurt him back, but I like to think I'm a better person than that.
I'm trying to let go. He's not worth it :)
I am the person who started this particular conversation with you. But there are many conversations; only this one is with me.
Do one-sided crushes count?
I have nothing against most guys I've liked in the past. There are two main ones I dislike, but not hate to the point where I think about it excessively. One told me I "freak him out," which was a very rude way of saying "sorry, I don't like you as anything more than friends." And one was obsessed with some trashy celebrity, and he lied about being gay so it would be easier to avoid me. I don't hate him mainly because I'm still friends with his sister and I wouldn't know her if it weren't for him. Plus he's the one who got me into Bayside (the band). Who knows, maybe he's grown up since then, I wouldn't know since we haven't talked recently. I wouldn't pursue him in that way again, but if he's matured since then and became nicer I would forgive him.
Its amazing how with the swing of emotions love can turn into hate that quickly.
None for me, but then again I have to question did I really love them, OR was I in a relationship and dating because its what you are "supposed" to do?
Just the one who pretended (very well) to be "normal" for about a year then turned out to be lazy and very emotionally/physically abusive. My last words said to him were, "May your joy vanish and evil be with you." His life has been pure hell since I left, as I supported his leeching lifestyle, and he pissed off everyone else he could turn to for help. That amuses me alot more than it should.