Texts From Your Ex: Not Today, Satan

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Not today Satan, not today. These are the words that run through my head every time someone from my past sends me that “I’m drunk, so let me reach out to my ex” text. Sometimes, they aren’t even drunk — they’re feeling insecure or lonely and that’s even worse… because sometimes, those people are married.

Why do exes, be it women or men, feel the need to reach out to someone from their past? Is it for self-gratification? A need to feel wanted by someone? Or maybe just a booty call? I have to admit I am absolutely guilty of all the above, but that was in my early 20s. Being close to 30, I am slowly starting to feel sad for those who still feel the need to resort to that – or maybe I’m just being too judgmental.

When I first started getting these “ex texts,” a part of me felt excited. I kept thinking over and over again, maybe they still love me; maybe they even want me back. Thoughts of how I felt when being with them flooded my brain, and it made me want to feel that way again. Therefore, I’d fall for their boyish antics and find myself looking like the stupid one when asking to hangout, and then getting the ring around.

Sadly, it took me four years to realize how idiotic I was being. The messages started to become redundant; more like old news. What was once an excited feeling was now a daily annoyance. It had come to the point in which I had finally built up the confidence to ask what they had truly wanted from me. To my surprise, I learned that they didn’t want something from me; they needed something from me — reassurance.

Questions such as: Remember how good the sex was? Remember how often we laughed together? Remember that wonderful gift I got you on your 21st birthday? On and on the questions rolled. They needed to be reassured of themselves as a person — looks, humor, basically their personality in general were all being questioned by their own inner thinking.

Upon this realization, I began to pity them, yet also be angry with them. I pitied them for their insecurity and built up anger towards them because of their selfishness. Why use me to make yourself feel better? Don’t you respect me enough to let me go?

It was then that I told myself to walk away – walk away from the endless rants of how they miss me, how they wish they could be young again, how they love whom I’ve become. The truth is, they don’t know who I am anymore, they’re not in love with me; they’re in love with who I used to be and how I made them feel long ago.

I’ve made the smart choice to keep my past right where it belongs – in the past. Therefore, whenever I see a once familiar name pop up on my phone, it is no longer a thought that runs through my head, but a text that is now sent — Not today Satan, not today.