By EBR Team Member: Ashley

Updated on August 25th, 2022

I’m diving right in today, so I hope you keep up.

Let’s go!

Essentially, yeah, your ex will miss the relationship simply because she became accustomed to having you around. It’s that simple. Even if you were the absolute worst, if you had even one good moment together, this is for sure going to happen.

However, anyone can eventually find peace with any situation if they set their mind to it. I mean we get over things.

That’s life. Right?

What happens if you start a fire and then walk away from it. It might rage on for a bit, but eventually, even the biggest fires burn out if they aren’t tended to.

Consider your relationship. What exactly did you bring to the table?

I meet so many guys that go back to her expecting just to say what he thinks she wants to hear.

If you want her back you need to go back better than who you were in the first few months of your relationship. Because we ALL put our best foot forward then,

I don’t know much about you, so let’s talk about one of my breakups that will help make this easier to understand because everyone sees themselves as bringing more or less to a relationship than they actually do. Your self-esteem can deeply color the way you see yourself, and my guess is that you are going to try and be much harder on yourself that you have to be. So, turning your attention to someone else first might make this easier.

Generally, I’m physically attracted to guys that are tall and skinny. But this guy… he was tall and… not skinny. He had this nasally falsetto that he talked in when he was talking to most people, even though his regular voice was deeper and commanding.

To be honest, when we first met I almost didn’t go out with him again simply because of how grating his voice could be.

I decided to overlook it and eventually I saw it as endearing like he was trying to come off less intimidating or something.

He was pretty great on paper too, which helped me overlook several of his shortcomings.

Things he brought to the table:

  • He was more athletic than I was. Which drove me to be more athletic and strive to be better at things I wouldn’t have tried on my own.
  • He was reasonable about everything, almost too reasonable.
  • He was more social than I was. So I made a ton of new friends and got outside of the normal bubble I was used to.
  • He was responsible, financially and emotionally, when we first got together or at least seemed to be.
  • He was nerdy, which meant I could embrace my nerdiness whereas in other dating scenarios I was more likely to keep that under wraps.
  • He was adventurous. We often made spur of the moment plans to do fun things out of town. So I was never sure what to expect.
  • He was really smart, so I didn’t have to dumb myself down to talk to him or his friends.

Basically, he inspired me to be better than I was.

He added to my life and didn’t take away from it. I’ve always enjoyed being around people like that.

However, as our relationship evolved, I came to realize that he had a wandering eye and the more “in shape” he got the cockier he was. It also became obvious that he was very concerned with the outward appearance of life in general, not just physically. He clearly wanted more of a “trophy girlfriend.

If you’ve ever met me in person, then you know that I am not really dying to be someone’s trophy of any sort. Luckily, I was disenchanted with the person he had become by the time his wandering eye landed on someone new. So, I wasn’t overly broken up about it.

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Suddenly, it was over. He dumped me over text for someone else’s wife. OUCH!

I know. I know. That’s messed up.

Even though I wasn’t really envisioning a future together or anything, it still stung, because inside of our relationship we had built a pretty solid friendship too. And even though we didn’t make a great couple, I valued that connection.

A lot of the people in my life were surprised I was open to staying cordial with him since he handled the breakup poorly. And I had a pretty solid response to that one.”I can be friends with a jerk, I just won’t date one.”

Needless to say, we wound up finding a way to avoid each other. He’s never accepted the fact that I have no intention of telling his new trophy wife girlfriend how much of a jerk he is capable of being. I mean, she already left her husband for him, so on some level, I guess I just figured she could figure that out for herself.

Anyways, the point I am trying to make is that, at the beginning of the relationship, he brought a WHOLE LOT of awesome to the table, especially the fact that he encouraged and inspired me to be a better version of myself. However, at the end of the relationship, that effort we both put into it had dissipated. We had both become different people.

It was a lot like this.

Going in it’s basically all uphill. You both want to show each other all of the reasons why you will make a great boyfriend. Then, you get comfortable and things kind of plateau. You stop trying so hard. Then, you start to let go a little bit. And eventually, you just give up altogether.

That’s the basic cycle for a relationship that comes to an end. Sometimes, it’s a mess when it ends. And sometimes it just fades out.

I wasn’t even super upset when he and I split up. It was kind of inevitable, but, the horrible thing about this is that I had gotten used to having him around. Even though we had kind of lost that romantic attraction, we still had a connection. Laying in bed at night discussing our favorite superheroes. Debating who would actually win in a fight, Superman or Batman. Talking about our goals in life. We were each other’s sounding boards throughout our time together. And suddenly it was just… gone.

It felt like something was missing for a while after we split. Even though he was a jerk and had more than a few prominent faults when we went our separate ways, that didn’t erase the time we had together when we actually had a connection. For months I would go to text him and then realize… oh yeah, not cool.

Don’t do that.

It’s been over a year and I still feel the urge to text him when stuff reminds me of him. I still miss that connection we had from time to time. But those moments are few and far between now though.

But, I have a theory about why No Contact is so effective that I’ll elaborate on later on in this article.

But, first, there are two tactics I want to talk about today that you are going to merge together to make her realize, not just what she had, but what she’s missing now.

Because, like I said before, you have both become different people than you were when you first met. Use this time apart to get your life together and have even MORE to bring to the table. Hell, make sure the entire table is set

Do you want to know a secret?

As a woman, there is nothing that will make me question a breakup more than seeing an ex has grown up and has gotten his life in order, even if it was my call… even if my life is totally awesome right now.

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Every woman I’ve ever talked to about the subject has said the same thing. You could be the crappiest or clingiest person in the world, but that doesn’t overwrite those memories of the times when your connection was strongest.

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Making My Ex Girlfriend Realize What’s She’s Missing

First of all, you need to know that while every woman will miss a relationship after she’s lost it, she will also learn that she can live without it over time. Most of the time, logic prevails and she will get to a point where she’ll realize she can survive without you. So the tactics we are going to discuss today will help counteract the natural dissipation of her feelings toward you.

First, off I want to touch on something I mentioned earlier, my theory as to why No Contact is so effective.

Let’s look at this graph I made for you earlier, but I want to focus on after the relationship, but I want to extend further out, after No Contact.

There are so many ups and downs during this time that it’s a crapshoot whether you catch her in a moment where she’s missing you or feeling confident about the break. What you want to do is make it through No Contact and catch her in an extended moment one or the other.

This is why No Contact works. Our minds tend to hold on to good memories differently than bad ones. Either can be triggered by many different things.

If you are wondering where No Contact falls in the scheme of things… here’s a pretty good idea of where No Contact falls on the full scale of the ExGirlfriendRecovery Program.

It’s the beginning of everything. Without successful No Contact, the rest of the program sort of just… falls apart.

Your goal here is to remind her of the past without actually contacting her. But that is only one small part of getting her back. While you may be focused on the past, focusing on the future is where you should turn the majority of your focus.

You may wonder why?

Think about it this way. When even your mind is turning on you reminding you of good memories when you want to be reasonable or serving reason up when you want to pretend like the past was better than it was, there are two ways your can handle this. You can give in and let someone come in and tell you everything you want to hear or you’ll be on guard and be careful about trusting anyone. The reason so many people try to hurry through or cut No Contact short is because they think that going to her with promises and apologies and tell her everything she wants to hear. They hope that telling her what she wants to hear will bring her back.

But, without taking the time to overcome failures in the past and planning out how you plan to deal with your own shortcomings in the future your chances of establishing a lasting relationship the second time around is less than optimal.

So, you have two moments in time to deal with, the past you have no control over, but the future… well, you can do just about anything with it. We’re here to help your cards right.

Dealing With the Past

It’s always hard to recognize when you are handling things wrong in the moment. I mean there are plenty of ways that you can screw it up.

  • Rewriting the Past – You can allow yourself to dress it up and make it into something you wish it was. Plenty of people use this as a coping mechanism. They can’t handle it so they turn it into something else. This is not exactly healthy.
  • Ignoring the Past – acknowledging a problem is the first step to getting past it. When you put things like the past on hold, you are simply guaranteeing that they’ll be there to smother you as soon as you let your guard down.
  • Denying the Past – This is almost as bad for you as ignoring it. It basically has the same outcome.
  • Re-living the Past – I noticed early on that it was like I kept dating the same guy over and over again, emotionally unavailable and bound to leave me for someone else. It wasn’t until I faced that truth and actively fought against that habit that I stopped the cycle. Learn your habits and make sure they are good ones.
  • Re-gifting the Past – I know a lot of guys that do this. “My ex hurt me. I’m not going to let anyone else do that to me again, so I’m going to beat them to it.” It’s destructive and just ends up making the world an even crappier place. It’s how we end up with dating apps like tinder and bumble. They’re disconnected and makes us feel more in control of how close others can get.

There is only one way to deal with the past healthily and that is to Acknowledge it, Accept It, and Address It. It’s that simple.

If you know that your ex and you fought constantly or had financial issues. You have to be open to acknowledge and accept the issue and then address the way you plan to deal with it in the future.

Planning for the Future With or Without My Ex Girlfriend

Which brings me to the other half of this equation, the long haul.

If you are going to get your ex back, you have to be willing to accept a majority of the blame and be understanding with the areas of fault that lie in her court. Otherwise, you’ll be bringing the past into the future with you.

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If the two of you had financial issues, then you need to come up with a plan on how you are going to address that in your life and then have a contingency plan for when she comes back.

For example, figuring out how you are going to pay off loans or resolve to stop hitting the boats every weekend for Blackjack. And then have a plan on how you intend to explain that process to her when she returns. I always like to write things like this out so I have my thoughts gathered and understandable before the conversation ever happens. In the case of financial troubles I would say something close to this, but only if you are ready to back it up:

Look I want nothing more than for the two of us to be in a better place than we have been in the past.

But I think that the two of us can agree that financially we were a little irresponsible.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m prepared to take responsibility for the part I played in that situation. And I am in no way accusing you of anything. I just want you to be aware that it is something I’ve been trying to address in my own life since we split and I don’t think we should get back together unless we are on the same page in this matter.

Because as much as I care about you and I want us to be together, I don’t want us to end up right back where we are again in a few months. I’d rather go into this relationship as a team.

Trust me. Any woman that hears you say that you respect her enough to put that kind of effort forth on behalf of your relationship will be falling over herself to get back together.

But remember, the follow through is what gets her to stay. If you know you are prone to financial dalliances, do everything in your power to make it easy for you to stick with it.

Dealing With Unresolved Issues You Have With Your Ex 

You also have to take on the mantle of learning how to forgive yourself. I am best friends with an ex and I am quite certain that one day we may eventually give things another go. However, he continuously beats himself up over things he did that hurt me and he is constantly apologizing.

I have had to explain to him over and over again that it was such a long time ago I forgave him. But he clearly needs to forgive himself. You need to learn to forgive not only yourself but her.

It may take a lot of soul-searching, meditation, or even counseling.

But I assure you, this move alone will make your relationship stronger than it has ever been. It may even be the one thing that guarantees you pull this relationship back together. If you must ask for forgiveness, do it once, but doing it over and over again simply proves that you don’t have the capacity to forgive yourself, so why should she?

We all hold onto something from the past, even if we don’t want to.

Learning to let go takes finesse and dedication.

So, instead of bombarding you with tons and tons of ways to deal with it, I suggest you do figure out a healthy way to address any guilt or anger that you might still be carrying around. If you aren’t sure where to start I’d be happy to tell you how I deal with things of this nature. Just keep in mind that not every tactic works for every person the same way.

What I do is I take an hour or two and spend the time considering the emotions regarding the relationship and weigh it in regards to my life in a whole. How important is holding on to those feelings compared to the future I want to build for myself. I find that putting things in perspective like that help keep all of those feelings from overwhelming me.

You’re All Set

Alright. That’s all I have to say today. You now have a solid base for dealing with the past, the future, and anything that might remain unresolved. Don’t let those things fester. Deal with them so you can build a brand new relationship without the weight of the past. We here at Ex Girlfriend Recovery want to help get you that.

But, I’m certain you have plenty of questions. I’d love to hear them. Maybe you even have ways of dealing with unresolved issues that might help some of our other visitors. So, feel free to reach out and let us know!

(Written by Ashley Simmons)

		

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