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Have any of you encountered someone who’s insisted on keeping their exes as close friends, or closely involved in their lives in a way that just doesn’t feel quite right? My boyfriend makes a deal out of staying friends with all of his exes and brags about one in particular as though she’s the most amazing person on earth.
I’m not trying to suggest anyone who has an ex in their life is automatically abusive, but I was just wondering whether it’s a common for abusers to keep their exes around as close friends in a way that doesn’t feel like a genuine friendship?
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I am still good mates with one of my exes. I haven’t stayed over at his since we broke up though. I probably would now, if I was in his city for another reason – he lives several hundred miles away and I don’t know anyone else where he lives. But we broke up a good number of years ago, have both dated multiple other people since, and were always better friends than lovers… And I sure as hell wouldn’t brag about him.
Your guy sounds more like, as KIP said, that he is trying to make you jealous and insecure. And also like he keeps a string of exes to fall back on if his current relationship ends.
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You’re both right. I think most abusive people have their own methods of trying to keep control through creating feelings like insecurity and jealousy, some tactics being more common than others.
I read an article online some time ago about exes being used as an emotional abuse tactic so I thought I’d ask whether any of you had experienced something similar. It might specifically relate to partners who are more (detail removed by moderator) I think.
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Hi my childs father’s ex told me that they were a family and that I was now part of their boo boo when I met my last partner. They had a child together and it seemed that this meant she could phone at any time and we should drop things and plans to go pick up their child or drop things off etc. If we tried to say no she would say he was putting me before their child apparently. We had child every weekend whist she was with boyfriend. I wanted bit of time as a couple and you wud think i had asked to cut his ex’s arm off. He didnt want to and said we cud do every thong with his child there. I was selfish to want any couple time alone… She would write on his Facebook with kisses everywhere and on his families Facebook calling them mum and dad. It felt like she was still acting like his girlfriend. He agreed with her that they were a family and yet denied he said that down the line when his ex basically became the reason we would separate..when she had another child I had to go in the room where she had just given birth and he couldn’t understand why I wasn’t happy about that. She approached me and asked me when I would call her as I had voicedf my discomfort with her behavior and she always insisted he go to Her’s to talk when she insisted. I said no and she stood up and shouted that if i started she would kick off anfd told my then partner to sort this, meaning me. I said I was uncomfortable with it all. He had pic of her, him and child in living room and loads of her stuff I didn’t want to see. I had to pick his child up. If I said no I WS selfish and his ex would say I was step mum and should and he would agree. She then said I had no rights when I sugezxted child had test for asthma, which she now has. She called me trouble causer and he agreed. He said I was insecure, jealous, paranoid when I said I felt put after his ex and who was he in relationship with? He called me an awful Woman, I was sworn at, shouted at….emotional ly and psychoically abused. I didn’t know what was right and what wasn’t anymore. He told me how i felt was rubbish and pathetic and that I was destroying everything he had built. If I had known I was entering into a relationship with his ex as well as him I wouldn’t have gone there in first place, although I have beautiful child from it. Its been a nightmare and he still blames me for her behaviour and his own as well as mine. Basically its all my fault. He’s angry and aggressive with me now and wants all on his terms still and still same with her. She would get upset if he didn’t send birthday cards from him to her and she wud send from just her to him, even tho both had new partners. So to me yes, it can be an abusive triangle….I still feel its my fault now as I should have accepted more but I Also think he could have put our fa mily first and he didn’t and yes that created loads of in security etc ….for which he abused me for.
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Thanks. I am trying. I have feelings which is mad isn’t it. He has met someone now so it’s hurting but its gonna make it easier for me to move on now I think. Hes just constantly angry at me and is purposely horrid to me regarding our child to make a point to me that I thought him and his ex should have been less like they were. So again its like I was making something out of nothing with him and his ex and now he will punish me for trouble I caused….
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Hi Shimmy,
I read an article that said these types of people are more likely to keep multiple exes as ‘friends’ because they like to have a harem of people they can return to and people they can triangulate others with to make themselves feel good. I am personally not friends with any of my exes because I feel those relationships are best left in the past and also I know it always creates drama for new partners. I think it’s possible to be friends but it has to be very boundaried and respectable and not confusing ie randomly sleeping together in between other relationships.
It sounds like your boyfriend might be triangulating you with other women to make you feel bad and jealous. My ex was really possessive over his phone and had a lock on it and didn’t like me picking it up, but I remember one time he almost made a show of very slowly scrolling on a social media site then leaving the screen on the page of this sexy sports/glamour model and tilting the screen towards me then he sort of titled his head to see my reaction! I felt jealous and upset about him following this woman on social media and brought it up with him later and he had that thinly veiled gleeful look in his eye as he enjoyed seeing that his trick had worked and made me jealous. He also used to talk all the time about a woman at work and said he had to be in the office if she was there (even though he could have worked from home) and used to like telling me about how is running partner was a woman. I later found evidence of him cheating on me with what I think was multiple woman so take a step back, make note of everything and trust your gut. A caring partner doesn’t want to make his partner jealous, he wants her to feel secure and happy with him.
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In my personal experience, it is not good to stay friends with exes. I had a sugar daddy, he played me, I thought he was my friend, he was not. When I stopped the arrangement, he was pushing me back, and then I was not realising, he is not a nice man, he is a controlling. with the a mask on his face, with lies, with manipulation, he made me to open up about my new affection and then sabotage it. I was easy led, he made me very emotional, and drove me to the multiple break downs, so he can be in a control of me. And this is all happened when I was believing he has my interest in his heart. He did not have any consideration about me, about my feelings to someone else. He had only his own selfish agenda about keeping me in his pocket. With my abusive boyfriend at least there were more obvious signs of abuse, which you can spot it fast. with this man -I genuinely was in the belief, he is my friend. By words LET ME HELP YOU, i’m the man of great knowledge and experience… I know all much better than you, trust my expertise. As he is very very successful, he was using that as a convince. LET ME HELP you actually turned out – LET ME CONTROL YOU, LET ME PLAY WITH YOU LIKE A DOLL ( emotionally + physically too) I remember many occasions now when he forced himself on me sexually. When clearly i did not want, and it was not suitable. By telling me – how much he loves me and how i drive him crazy – and he can not hold himself in front of me, he would just have sex with me, and it did not happen once. Then he becomes super friendly, giving expensive gifts and lives like it is totally fine. Or there is other words – like he was explaining to me, you are too beautiful, you have the body, like no man can control it the urge. I’m constantly having a hard when around you.
What a disgusting thing to say?
One time he really drag out of me to say and to write to him – the words I love you. Which I never had for him. He was pushing me and pushing me, like I’m so ungrateful, selfish, disrespectful woman. He also put on me his suicide attempts, blaming me, and again it was one trick to push me to say that – I love him. He was asking me can you do it at least once.
Really forcing me.
Remember he is out of your life for a reason. By being your friend he does not want to let you go. When both of you need to move on. By being a friend it means he wants to know what is happening in your life. For what?
What this is going to do with him?
Do not worry, there would be other friends in your life with time.
I do not know what guy he is, who wants to be friend. But when they insist on being friends, it is alarming. At least to me now.-
Completely agree with sunshinerainflower. A loving partner wouldn’t want you to feel insecure of their love for you. If a partner is getting off on you being jealous and he’s using his ex to do this…..then bells should start ringing. They will for me in future. Worst thing is, they blame u and make u think your the one with the problem for not accepting this obviously innocent ‘friendship’….
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Idon’t know where to start really, I would just like other people’s opinions on my current situation. I feel so confused I feel as if I am going mad. I don’t know whether this situation is all my fault, I am only partly to blame or I am being toyed with. I have lived in the same street as this man for a good few years and have always liked him but I was too shy to talk to him. We would say hello but that was it. He used to talk to and help out my dad and my dad thought a lot about him.
However, after my dad died (detail removed by Moderator) we started to talk to each other and got on. He was very kind helping me clear the house and doing jobs for me. We started going out with each other and it seemed as if we were falling for each other fast. It turns out we had both liked each other for years but didn’t dare say anything. He was kind attentive and loving very caring. I told him about my ex who was nasty to me because of my weight and my disability and he told me about his ex partner. I am looking after my elderly pd mother who made things difficult for us causing rows and being horrible to him. He took her out and was kind to her however. He had a similar upbringing with pd mother and father who split up so he understood.The only problem was his friends (detail removed by Moderator). We have had countless arguments over them and now unfortunately he has finished with me . He wonÂ’t speak to me and is very angry. I doubt very much if he will ever talk to me again. I accept that it is over but I canÂ’t just leave him as he is. He wonÂ’t listen to me but I continue to worry about him. His teenage son has a friend and the parents have been close friends with my ex for about (detail removed by Moderator) years. I have talked over my concerns with a friend of mine and she is of the same opinion as me and does not think I am over reacting or imagining things. She finds the situation strange too. I have never come across anything like this before.
The couple both work and at the start of the week the mother texts my ex to say what days she needs lifts to and from work depending on when her husbandÂ’s shifts fall. He sometimes takes her little girl to school and picks her up. He takes the children to their grandparentsÂ’ house and collects them. Her father is housebound, ill living in a hoarder’s houses, really filthy, and my ex goes to help him. He empties a bucket of urine, makes the old man breakfast, cleans up after his dogs, does the old manÂ’s shopping and goes to the chemist etc. He also feeds his (detail removed by Moderator). The female friend the mother takes her washing down for my ex to dry, he gives them food sometimes and they are on his (detail removed by Moderator). They donÂ’t give him any money for diesel or electricity. He takes her shopping, and has taken her to the dentist and the hospital. Often my ex has gone without meals and has been ran ragged doing jobs for them. They are constantly ringing and texting him every single day. He never gets a minuteÂ’s peace they are always wanting him to do things.One day he had been at hospital with his mother all morning , then he had been at the old manÂ’s, had to pick the woman up and then she claimed she was ill and he had to go to the hospital.He was there until late and had nothing to eat all day. We had a row about it, as she claimed her husband wasnÂ’t able to come out of work to take his wife to hospital. My ex was ill the next day and had a pain in his chest. My ex is very kind but I feel they are taking advantage of him. He always says yes to them no matter how tired or poorly he is. He has depression and takes medication for this and is quite vulnerable. It is as if he is brain washed, he talks about them non- stop and thinks they are wonderful. I used to get told off for fussing but I cared about him I loved him. I could not decide if he had a crush on the woman, they were his support and he needed them, or if he was frightened he would lose their friendship if he said no. Sometimes the jobs arenÂ’t urgent or important and sometimes itÂ’s as if they just make them up just to keep him there.
When we first got together, we went to pick her up. She got in the car. I said hello to her three times, she never answered yet and just looked at me. It was my birthday and we went to a supermarket to get me some flowers. I stayed in the car and there was silence. She eventually spoke and said they couldn’t do without him and she said he was a “gentle giant” which I didn’t like. The next day he took her shopping and she said she didn’t have any money left but she had seen some flowers that her mother had liked, so what did he do he bought her some the day after buying me some. I thought that was weird.
One evening we were together at his home when the phone rang, they wanted him to go and (detail removed by Moderator) as the husband had forgotten that day and now had had a drink. My ex was annoyed but went anyway. Another time we were together in the house and the woman came down to collect her drying saw us together got a strange look and started to fake cry about how she needed help for her dad the next day. She knew that we spent certain days together. Of course, we had another row. To me her behaviour is very childlike like histrionic personality disorder with npd traits. She is acting like a jealous girlfriend and was manipulative and devious.She kept saying to him that he needed a hair cut and she would cut his hair. She did this twice in (detail removed by Moderator) months.I had said to him I liked his beard and she made a point of trimming his beard. I thought this was too personal too intimate. I felt as if she was just doing this to get at me and to upset me. One day I was crying about my mother to my ex. He told her this and two days later she cried about her father. One day she had said that no one had been to help her dad and he was ill because of it. My ex had been with me that day. If we were kissing he would break off to answer the phone to them and she used to phone him when she knew he was with me. One day I was in a cafe and I asked him do you fancy her. He said no. I said does she fancy you he said I don’t think so. Right on cue his phone rang and it was her asking him if he was busy. He said no I am in a cafe. She wanted him to pick her up early from work. He got out of it. My friend thinks she was ramping up the demands and becoming more manipulative because she knew I could see through them. My ex would arrange to see me then if they wanted something he would cancel. The whole situation made me ill and depressed and I felt as if I was crazy. I could not reason with him. I kept trying to explain to him that they were using him and they were treating him like an errand boy.We had agreed to go to the cinema but the next day he said he had changed his mind because I would only shuffle about in my seat and not sit still. I had been watching tv with him the day before that and I was trying to cuddle up to him but he was sitting at an angle and the cushions on the sofa went quite a way back a deep width and it was difficult for me to get comfortable because of my shorter legs.
I had been shopping and he had to stay at home due to a maintenance man coming. I thought oh I will get him and his son (detail removed by Moderator) for their lunch as they could not get out to get anything. I thought it would be nice. So I texted him to say what I had done. The response was “fussing again babe.”
He wanted me to go and watch (detail removed by Moderator) up in the countryside. It was with his friends I didn’t feel comfortable with but rather than say that, I said I didn’t want to go because of the cold and because I couldn’t get down to sit on the ground and that there was no where to go to the toilet. He said “my limited mobility missus”. When he got back he said how he had told his friends that they should have brought their grandfather’s commode for me. He also told me that his female friend had laid down on the ground to watch (detail removed by Moderator) and she had gone in the bushes for a wee.
One time we had gone to see a medical practitioner about (detail removed by Moderator) for me, the man was really unpleasant to me. I mentioned this to my partner and he said no no he wasn’t. Also just remembered this he came with me to a benefits appointment which was nice to have the support. When he needed to go to something similar i offered to go with him but he said no we would get wet if you came, meaning because I take longer to walk we would get wet in the rain. I had told him at the start of the relationship that my previous ex used to make remarks about my disability and not being able to walk properly
Do you think this was all part of the start of devaluation. I am absolutely distraught about the end of this relationship and its getting worse not better. I lost my dad (detail removed by Moderator), had to deal with my ever difficult pd mum who is showing signs of dementia but who has cheerfully admitted that she went out of her way to destroy the relationship, she was vile, she swings from being confused to downright evil and manipulative. I was stressed to hell with her throughout the entire relationship she would be screaming at me I would be hysterical crying not a good start to any relationship. At the start he would come round and see me on a morning she acted up so that was spoiled and I used to invite him and his son over for meals and she was so horrible that stopped too. She lives with me. It just felt as if my mother was trying to stop the relationship and his friends were too. But I am unsure if they were maybe its me maybe I over reacted, Maybe I was seeing things that weren’t there because of the stress. Maybe he was just trying to help his friends because her father was ill and now I know was dying. I am torturing myself with the thoughts of me being horrible for no reason. I wish I had handled things differently. Maybe if I had not been constantly complaining about his friends and nagging him and tried to be more reasonable mature and understanding and tried to be friendly towards them I would not be in this mess now. I am chewed up about this .I want to talk to my ex and say how sorry I am for not being understanding. He has been so hurt in the past and he trusted me to be caring and understanding but all I did was argue and shout at him. I think my experiences in my first relationship may have tainted my view of things, The first pd had a controlling mother and sister who tried to stop me being with him and were horrible. I thought I could see the signs again, but maybe there were no signs and I am just crazy.I thought I was being horrible but I did consider there had or is some sort of sexual relationship going on they were too close, I thought they were involved in drugs,or maybe the little girl was his. If I said something to my ex e.g I used to sing to the dog, a few days later he would tell me his female friend had been singing to her dog. I said I will stay here and look after your dog I will dog sit. Again a day or so later he would say I am at my friend’s dog sitting. There is a local beauty spot where couples are supposed to go and view others if you you know what I mean. I told him this and a few hours later he said his ex had asked him to do that. His friend had said something about a relative and then my ex said the same about someone else. I said this woman’s house is like a palace. The next day he said his house isn’t a palace like yours.
Its as if you give him an idea, he likes the words and uses them.
It just feels a bit weird hearing your own words back. Is it just me?I remembered as well that I said to him my friend was (detail removed by Moderator). A while later he said his ex was (detail removed by Moderator). I wonder if she really was. Also he used to tell me stories about things his female friend had said, I wonder if this was true too. My ex also said he told his female friend that we had been watching a programme together and she had said she liked it and that me and her should watch it together. I didn’t like her and I am sure she didn’t like me, so I am now wondering how much of that conversation was true/or actually happened.He used to talk about his female friend all the time. It would be she did this and she did that. About what she usually wore, about her children about her holidays, about the fact that he told her she didn’t need to lose weight even though her husband said she didn’t. My recent ex used to phone and text her everyday, and he used to tell her where we were going, where we had been and what we would talk about. He would tell her about what we had been watching on TV and about any meals out we would have.
that she . Maybe I am reading too much into it but that fact that I am doubting everything shows how confused he was making me. I had been relatively ok in the (detail removed by Moderator) years between getting out of the first relationship and this one. I had started to feel the same as I did back then, so maybe it isn’t me and they were both the same?
I had an upsetting dream about him last night where he was ill. I saw him out this morning with his dog and I shouted hello, he ignored me and so like fool sent him a text asking if he is ok, and this is what I got back ” (detail removed by Moderator)“.Things came to a head one evening when we had made plans then he sent me a text to cancel because she needed a lift home, and then he had to collect her children from their grandparents and do shopping for her father. Her husband was taking her father for a (detail removed by Moderator). I asked if he could come round later but kept saying they may need him. My pd mother had been ranting all day and I had been relying on him to bring a take out home for our meal. I was demented and I blew up and got angry saying that they always came first. He immediately shut down saying leave me alone and for the (detail removed by Moderator) will not talk answer texts or the door. I have been trying and trying to say sorry but he won’t listen all he says is that i reacted badly to his friends and was horrible to them. To make matters worse the woman’s father has died. I have sent sympathy cards everything and nothing. I guess what I would like to know is what other people would have done, how would they have reacted to this situation and if there is possibly more than depression going on with my ex. A pd possibly. Do other people think it was excessive every day doing jobs for them and why did he allow this?
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That’s do similar to what I went through. U know what, when I left he just went back to doing exactly same for ex before me. She rings and he drops everything. It hurts cos he don’t do that for me but….I can see how it was always him.he had a choice and if he wanted to change the situation he could have but they don’t want to. They like it that way too and must get off on being needed like that. They want us to fig in around it all and accept that we come 2nd basically, well that’s how it feels…I don’t think its normal. I still have resentment and anger and some bitterness and who wants that with them so its best to heal and not key those negative emotions get any bigger than they all really are….x
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I also think he was manipulating u to make u think u were one with problem by not acceping this behavior but it isn’t normal. He is then punishing u by refusing to speak to you because you challenged him about what he was doing. You are always left upset whilst the other party gets all of their demands met. So you are made to be the problem and the fly in the ointments as it were. No, its just to try and make u think what they do is normal and it u but it isn’t u. Its 100% them.
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My ex had me go into room where this woman had just given birth!! She didn’t speak to me. Would demand I go meet her and then when I did she didn’t even speak to me….rang valentines night about homework, rang for things dropping off. Would change plans with child at drop of a hat and no questions could be asked, we just had to change our plans to suit, rand for lifts, called me trouble causer and mixed things by saying really manipulating things that made me look like a problem, as if they had relationship and I was interfering on that but it was her interfering on ours but he wouldn’t have it and just kept saying it was me with issues, not her. What can u do in that kind of situation ? Your self worth gets pulled down and u feel less that this other woman in his life. That’s not true and if he was a good partner that would never happen in first place xx h
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Hi Shimmy,
Mine wouldn’t stop texting his ex, he said she was lonely and its almost like he had a hold on her too. I think he liked the attention from her and my jealousy. I spoke to another of his exes once and she had said she had to move away and cut him off to get him out of her life, I stupidly didn’t take that as a warning sign at the time but he always spoke really badly of her and blamed a lot of his issues on her ‘abandoning’ him. He always used this as a way of then manipulating me – saying I couldn’t ever leave him and asking if I’d abandon him like she did. Deep down I knew she had to do that to stop him from harassing her too and that he didn’t like the loss of control over her. I think you are right that their relationships with exes are not genuine.
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