I’m a 31-year-old guy. I tend to keep mine at arm’s length. Other than a very few select photos (meaning, less than two dozen), the only physical reminders of any woman I’ve ever seen naked (including my ex-wife) amount to formerly shared kitchen utensils (along the lines of “Hey! Let’s make potato chips! Better go buy a mandoline, black rabbit”) and boxer shorts. The post-amicable breakup relationships tend to amount to a friendly nod when we run in to each other and the occasional thumbs up on Facebook, for those handful that I choose to remain Facebook friends with. When I refer to them in the third person for the first time, their names are usually preceded by “my ex-girlfriend” or “this chick I hooked up with.”
My girlfriend of six months, however, tends to keep hers pretty close. She regularly wears a watch that her second-to-last boyfriend (whom she has drinks with maybe twice a year) gave her. She has a cache of objet d’arte and other mementos from various other dudes. This weekend, she embarked on a scanning expedition of pictures from a decade-old road trip at the request of a guy who she dated in college who she’s recently become reconnected with via Facebook. When she mentions a guy, he’s always her “friend,” whether she’s slept with him or not.
I can’t help but admit that this is starting to bug me. It feels like she has a whole stable of guys in the bullpen on the off chance that we break up. Meanwhile, she’s asked me to pretty much purge all vestiges of former relationships from my public and our shared sphere of communication. I don’t mind doing it, but the continued and obvious double standard is beginning to tweak either my spidey sense or my inner neanderthal just a little bit.
What say you? Both personal anecdotes and opinions on my current situation are welcome.
Disclaimers of course apply but, we women tend to be more sentimental about things and we like our mementos.
I am friendly with almost all of my exes. The only exception is my son’s father, I’m civil with him and we talk in a friendly way when dealing with our son, but I don’t consider him a friend as I do the others. It doesn’t mean I ever want to go back to any of them though.
The most reliable method for determining which reminders of your ex-wife you should keep around and which to toss, is to aquire a new wife.
She will provide you with guidance in the form of helpful tips that may be phrased like this:
“You are not keeping her shit in my house!” or in the form of a question like this: “Do you ever expect to be allowed in our bedroom again?”
This eliminates having to put much thought into the sorting out of what stays and what goes.
Your Spidey Sense is right to be tweaked. It is a bad sign if your partner is imposing a double standard in your relationship (unless she is holding herself to a higher standard).
I am still friends with many of my exes (most, actually), and Oni no Husband is only on speaking terms with one. And like your gf, I tend to refer to them all as “friends” regardless of whether they are friends-only, former-boyfriends, or former-flings. Mostly because I tend to choose my lovers from among my set of friends, so even if X and I dated for a year and a half, we were friends first and afterwards we were friends again; the friendship is the important part, not the time while we were bumping uglies.
However, Oni no Husband would never think to ask me to stop seeing my male-friends-I’ve-seen-naked, nor ask me to purge any pleasant mementos. The fact that she is asking you to do this while refusing to do it herself is VERY problematic, and I suggest that you talk to her about it.
Agree that there’s nothing wrong with being friendly with exes, and nothing wrong with keeping mementos of them around – but the double-standard thing won’t fly. She can’t place restrictions on you that she’s not subject to herself.
twicks, who’s doing dinner and a movie with a guy who’s seen her naked (though not in the last five or six years) later today
I’m friends with lots of people that I’ve slept with, dated, and been in relationships with. IMO, the difference between a “friend” and and “ex” isn’t whether you’ve slept with them, it’s whether your relationship is defined by having slept with them. It’s pretty easy to tell the difference. Anyone you spend time with socially when you’re NOT sleeping with them is a friend. Anyone you can’t imagine hanging out with if you’re not gettin’ some is an ex.
And it’s ridiculous for her to expect you to purge your past while she scrapbooks hers. Just don’t do it, and tell her why. I will add a potentially helpful note here though, that you might try referring to the other women in your life as “friends” instead of “chicks I hooked up with”. I suspect it might affect her attitude toward them, and their stuff.
I probably phrased the bit about the double standard badly. I think it comes from her latent insecurity rather than a conscious demand that we pretend that I’ve never dated or been married to someone else.
It’s not like I feel compelled to run out and start corresponding with women I used to date to even things out. I tended to avoid dating in my social circle for just this reason - because I don’t like having reminders showing up at my various watering holes, while she’s never looked very far afield.
I dunno. I guess I’m going to resolve to quit letting it bother me, unless she asks me to unload something that I’m truly attached to.
I’ve had bad experiences with my ex’s remaining “friends” with their exes. In both instances, they ended up cheating on me with said exes. Now, consciously, I know that these two particular exes were just assholes and would’ve cheated anyway, ex or no. Subconsciously, however, the hairs always stand up on the back of my neck when I hear a boyfriend is still “friends” with an ex girlfriend. That doesn’t mean I would never try to tell a boyfriend they couldn’t remain friends with an ex, because it’s simply not my place to tell someone who they can and can’t be friends with. It would still make me feel uncomfortable, though. Maybe your girlfriend has had similar experiences. Either way, her imposing a double standard on you is unacceptable, and you need to talk to her about it.
Her double standard has a bad smell to it. But, contrasting the advice that has been given, DO NOT have a talk with her about it. She has already spoken. What more will she say? Keep your exes until you tire of them, as she is doing with hers. Either she doesn’t care about your feelings, or she is testing to see if you have the guts to have her separate from potential interlopers. Either way, you are losing, so far.
Yikes! Your spidey senses should be tingling. My ex was almost exactly like this, it was perfectly fine for her to have ex’s as friends and have pictures of them but not me. It’s not like I had them all over the house either, I kept them in a shoe box in my closet. She ended up throwing them all away without even asking me! Some of them were of really dear friends of mine to.
By then though she had my balls in a cookie jar so I muttered something and let it be. The reason I bring this up is that it turned out it wasn’t about jealousy at all with her. It was about control (as I discovered far too late).
I’m just curious if you’ve seen any signs that she may be a control freak? They can be subtle at first if you’re being blinded by the awesome sex.
I also was trying to make a little statement along the lines of letting the past go, really go, and fully commiting to the future.
Prominent reminders of the past are not productive to a new realtionship, and are not productive to moving on, even if you don’t have a new relationship.
I’m still sorting this out for myself. I’ve kept some letters from a couple of older exes in a box, and it’s not a box I’ve never really opened unless I was in the process of moving. I just haven’t been compelled to throw them away, either.
Now, going through a divorce, I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with mementos related to my wife. As I type this, I’m looking at the watch on my left wrist, which was a gift for our ninth anniversary. While I don’t get angry or pissy about the fact that I’m wearing such a reminder, I have it in my head that I want to get around to replacing it. I’m not really interested in keeping it, and I’ll probably sell it or donate it at some point. Likewise with my wedding ring, which I also plan to sell (which I hope will partially fund the divorce proceedings). Less symbolic things, such as furniture we bought together, or utensils, or books she’s given me – anything like that, I’ve had no problem keeping. All of our wedding memorabilia and other photographs related to us stayed at the house with her, and I don’t have any strong feelings about what happens to any of it. I don’t see the point in holding on to it, though.
And I’ll go ahead and chime in with the others that, no matter what the reason for it is, the double standard you’re dealing with is dangerous and is going to lead to trouble.
I generally consider it a warning sign if you are meant to feel like a dumb “neanderthal” for having a normal emotional reaction to what is clearly a shady situation.
It’s also a pretty clear indicator of trouble if you have to ask a message board full of random idiots (IOW, us).
Clearly it bothers you and I don’t see why you should have to pretend that it doesn’t. If she doesn’t like it, give her a freakin snow globe or some other parting gift and tell her to add it to the collection.
Also, I’m pretty much suspicious of anyone who maintains close contact with their exes. But I’ve also seen a lot of shady stuff.
I’ve been married for 17 years; while I’ve not been previously married, I did have two very serious relationships before Mrs. Kenobi.
Ex #1 and I broke up 25 years ago. I’ve had no contact with her for about 8 years now, and even that was fleeting (she and I attended the wedding of a mutual friend). I’m pretty certain she lives in Utah now. The only physical memento I have from her, aside from a few G-rated photos which are somewhere in the house, is a “Doctor Who” scarf which she knit for me while we were dating, and which I wear once every few years.
It’s probably for the better that I have no contact with her, as my wife’s decided she doesn’t like Ex #1, mostly because Mrs. Kenobi thinks #1 used me (she was 32, I was 18, and it was predominantly a physical relationship).
Ex #2 and I broke up 22 years ago. I still do have contact with her, through e-mails and Facebook notes, though we went through a long period (about a decade) in which we had no contact at all, largely due to personal issues that she was going through (and which had nothing to do with me or “us”). Other than a few old photos (again, G-rated), I don’t have anything from her.
She lives about 5 hours away now, and we’ve discussed getting together for a visit, but I haven’t actually seen her in about 20 years. Fortunately, Mrs. Kenobi feels that #2 is probably cool – she and I were much closer in age, and she’s very unlikely to be a threat, as #2 has become an avowed lesbian.
I have so much crap from EXes that I don’t even tell hubby which pieces of jewelry were gifts from an EX or which piece of furniture was lovingly selected by an EX…Hubby is a bit on the jealous side and would prefer I throw out anything from any man before him. My previous wedding jewelry I have saved for my children if they want it, and the wedding mementos are stashed in a memory box along with baby blankets and the like.
I have a bracelet that I love and wear all the time that was given to me by my ex-husband on one of our anniversaries. I love the bracelet and rarely think about how I acquired it- it is just a pretty trinket as far as I am concerned. But my husband would be certain that the wearing of the bracelet means I still harbor feelings for the EX and that I must stare at it thinking of the wonderful anniversary we had… I don’t, so it is just easier to not mention how the bracelet came to live in my jewelry box.
My husband’s EX however, left him with a ton of stuff that was (is) perfectly good and nice, so I have no problems with it being used in our home. My favorite china was actually her wedding pattern at one time. It doesn’ bother me a bit. He has his old wedding ring that he saves for his children and lots of little mementos of their life together. To me it is just stuff- I kept what I liked and threw out the rest (at husband’s urging when he left the task of combining households to my discretion) but I did have to save his old wedding albums from the trash pile. He was going to throw them out, but I think he would regret that, especially when it is time to share them with grandchildren.
Like Hell. All I have from exes are three dolls and a couple of ancient comfy tees, but anybody who tells me I have to toss away my giggling Pillsbury Doughboy on no other grounds than because he happens to be a present from an ex… will rapidly become an ex :dubious: There’s a difference between “honey, I love you, but can we stop talking about your ex?” and “I don’t want any reminders that I didn’t get you in a plastic box to which you were tied with plastic-covered wire!”
