Why Does It Hurt Like Fresh Hell When Your Ex Moves In With A New Partner?
In late 2018, I came home after five glasses of overpriced sparkling wine and broke up with my boyfriend of seven years. We’d been rocky for a while, and the booze combined with a pep talk from a colleague somehow gave me the confidence to do what I assume we had both considered before.
Despite the breakup being THE ABSOLUTE WORST PAIN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE, it was very amicable, and absolutely the right thing for both of us individually. Well done us, very mature.
But when he suddenly had a new girlfriend who moved into the apartment we’d spent years in just a few months later? That set me back by a good year.
Thankfully, waiting out time really does work, but I was curious to ask the CEO of Relationships Australia, NSW, Elizabeth Shaw, why it’s so painful when an ex moves in with a new partner. And furthermore, when is the right time to move in with someone?
Shaw says that while it can look from the outside like someone has moved on quickly, they may have actually been processing the breakup or the end of the relationship for a while, grieving it invisibly, while still in it. “And so what looks like a quick re-partnering,” says Shaw, “to them may not be.”
Why Does It Hurt So Much When An Ex Moves On (And In) With A New Partner?
One of the reasons it hurts so much when they move in with a new partner is because it provides you with this juicy opportunity to compare your worth with them and dig up every tiny, unresolved memory to chew over. It can also make you feel erased. “As soon as you see your partner move on in whatever way – and you might have good reasons [to breakup] – it’s hard not to feel a bit obliterated by them being in another relationship that you’re suddenly relegated to the past.”
Shaw says this realisation is another wave of grief to work through, along with facing any regrets from the relationship that might come up. She notes there are so many reasons people re-partner, some complex, some simply just of convenience or opportunistic, but “it’s much better to take that time and fully recover and come to peace with what’s happened than to carry baggage into a new relationship.”
A home is also a place where you build an identity as a couple, that plays into your own sense of self and how you move through and operate in the world, from the way you do your taxes, to the type of stuff you cook for dinner. And a home is a place of comfort, memories, and anchoring. When you lose a home, you have to rebuild your sense of self. (Along with the God-awful experience of having to find another rental, as if breakups weren’t already hard enough.)
Serial Relationship-ers
When we go through a breakup, we might think it was because of them, and ignore the issues with the relationship or our own contribution to its problems. “And if we don’t learn [those things],” says Shaw, “we will keep going into relationships where those things play out, even if we choose a new partner who looks apparently different — we’re still the same.”
And with that, is there any truth to the stereotype that people who jump quickly from partner to partner haven’t actually properly dealt with their shit? It’s an age-old tale your mates will tell you like it’s fact.
“If you don’t give [the breakup] any real consideration,” says Shaw. “You might just choose a very similar partner to the mistake that you just left. You might be just getting engaged in patterns. And also, if you’re not ready, you can really hurt the next person.”
When Is The ‘Right Time’ To Move In?
When it comes to hard-and-fast rules of when you should move in with a fresh beau, Shaw says you want to be “clear from any previous entanglements.” Meet the family, friends, colleagues, at least over Zoom (though that does sound like a very particular kind of awkward), and suss out what they’re like in different situations because, “the stakes are very high… If it’s a disaster, you can be stuck there for weeks or months trying to unravel the commitment that you’ve made.”
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