comparing your current date to their exes

[fred123]

has anyone compared their current relationship or their current dating partner with that partners previous relationship to see if they treating u better or worse?  if so what are peoples experiences or thoughts about comparing with previous encounters.

[The Outlaw]

No and I never would. But even the mention of an ex or being friends with an ex raises a red flag for me. 

[d0nnivain]

No.  I judge how somebody treats me based on how they treat me, not how they treated somebody else.  

I have been guilty of comparing how a new person behaves against how one of my EX's behaved.  

[SumGuy]

No and that is a recipe for disaster.

Whatever you think you "know" about the past relationship is hearsay filtered through your preconceptions.  Even if you saw her with him everyday, you still never saw what happened behind closed doors.

Make your evaluation on how you are being treated, not how it is relative to someone else.

[ShyViolet]

No and it's not a good idea.  You are going down an unhealthy road.  Don't compare your relationship to past relationships, other people's relationships, exes.

[basil67]

Yes.   I regularly counted my blessings when dating my now husband compared to what I'd left behind in my previous marriage.    

[fred123]

can it not sometimes be helpful? esp in the early stages of dating. what if you know that they treated their ex better and did certain things they arent or refusing to do with you? wouldnt havning this information help you decide if this girl/guy is generally interested in me or not? 

 

[d0nnivain]

No it cannot be helpful.  In the early stages of dating all you should know is that you are not the 1st person they ever went on a date with.  The minute you start knowing too many details about your new SO's past relationships, you are well into oversharing territory & it's bound to make you nuts. 

Now that I say that I have to retract my statement that I never compared myself to a SO's past relationships.  Several months into dating DH I learned he had been prepared to propose to a prior GF 10 years earlier.  He had the ring in his pocket at dinner when she dumped him for not being committed enough.  He just kept eating, never told her he had a ring & that was the end of that.  As he & I approached what I was anticipating would be him popping the Q, I did think about whether my ring would be bigger then hers.   

But in general that comparison is only going to make you nuts.  

Edited May 18, 2020 by d0nnivain

[Emilie Jolie]

Comparing how they treated their exes to how they treat me? No. Guaranteed to be a minefield of exposed anxiety and insecurities. I don't even know how they treated their exes. 

Comparing how I feel they are treating me to how my exes treated me? Kind of, but all my RLs were different, at different stages in my life, so even that seems a bit pointless. All the past experiences make you who you are today, good and bad.

[chillii]

3 hours ago, d0nnivain said:

No it cannot be helpful.  In the early stages of dating all you should know is that you are not the 1st person they ever went on a date with.  The minute you start knowing too many details about your new SO's past relationships, you are well into oversharing territory & it's bound to make you nuts. 

Now that I say that I have to retract my statement that I never compared myself to a SO's past relationships.  Several months into dating DH I learned he had been prepared to propose to a prior GF 10 years earlier.  He had the ring in his pocket at dinner when she dumped him for not being committed enough.  He just kept eating, never told her he had a ring & that was the end of that.  As he & I approached what I was anticipating would be him popping the Q, I did think about whether my ring would be bigger then hers.   

But in general that comparison is only going to make you nuts.  

 

How ironic , and at times typical , l thought it was more a modern day thing of women shooting themselves in the foot like that .

l dunno whether to laugh or cry for him , ahh, figure of speech. But l suppose it all worked out didn't it for you guys so that was pretty cool. lf he did marry her she probably would've raced off at some other reason and blown the marriage up later on anyway.

 

 

 

 

[chillii]

 

ls she treating you well op , or better than well , does it seem right , is she really into you guys,  or are you seeing she's not quite into it? Like there's a difference between that and what we might've done for ex's , because we've all made mistakes in the past.

Edited May 18, 2020 by chillii

[Trail Blazer]

On 5/17/2020 at 11:04 AM, fred123 said:

has anyone compared their current relationship or their current dating partner with that partners previous relationship to see if they treating u better or worse?  if so what are peoples experiences or thoughts about comparing with previous encounters.

How would one even go about doing this, in practical reality?

[Lotsgoingon]

Your question is an interesting one ... and I agree with others ... that comparing is not the way to go. 

First, you want to tune into how YOU feel, how you feel around this person, with this person. If you feel great, case closed. You don't need to know how they "treated" their previous partner. The problem with comparing is ... let's say your partner did do special things for the other person. That doesn't mean they enjoyed doing so or that they really liked the person. So comparing doesn't get you anywhere. 

Now if this person has a beachside mansion and you aren't invited but they are telling you stories about weekends at the mansion with exes, then sure, you want to note that. Ask about it. But again, could be that inviting their ex to the mansion was a disaster. Scared off the ex. Intimidated him. So the person is moving more slowly with you.

The important task when dating is paying attention to how you feel when you're with the person. Yes, how you feel about the person, but mainly how you feel when with them. 

I'm wondering if you have learned how to pay attention to how you feel. Not whether the person is polite or nice. But how YOU feel. And of course, you want to feel great when with them.