The Various Degrees Of Being "Over" Your Ex
You don’t love the idea of them moving on, but you’ve started talking about how miserable their next significant other will be as opposed to thinking you’re going to get back together...
When you still sleep with them. This is the phase at which nothing has really changed except you both finally came to the conscious realization that it’s dead in the water, and because of this development you think you’re ‘totally fine’ still hooking up with the person. In other words, you’ve lost the title, commitment, and/or stability of a relationship but one or both of you still want the affirmation (/orgasms) you can only get from someone you’ve known for awhile.
When you hyper-communicate. You’ve realized sleeping with each other after your break up is not a great idea. Maybe you don’t even want to any more because you’ve realized withholding it gives you the upper hand, or maybe for some less vindictive reason. However, you still feel jealous about who they’re spending their time with, and now that you aren’t keeping the other side of the bed warm, you’re wondering who is. So rather than outright ask them about it, you text, chat, and talk for like 18 hours a day, because if they’re communicating with you, they can’t be banging someone else, right? (Or at least we’d hope not.)
When you hate them. At some point you will allow yourself to admit both to yourself and others that the other person was pretty awful to you and didn’t treat you very well. It is likely you kept this to yourself because you didn’t want to tarnish their reputation or admit it to yourself. Eventually you’ll realize it’s far enough in the grave that it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks of the person, and you’ll open the verbal floodgates. This is a step in the right direction, but indifference is better than hate.
When you’re mostly indifferent. Next comes the point where you kind of don’t really care what they are doing on Saturday night or feel particularly moved by a passive-aggressive text message. You don’t love the idea of them moving on, but you’ve started talking about how miserable their next significant other will be as opposed to thinking you’re going to get back together. You no longer feel ill when they add a new Facebook friend of the opposite gender. Sort of over it.
When you forget they exist. This is the monumental, climactic moment where you wake up and it’s like 11:30 a.m. before you remember the person exists. I don’t care if that sounds creepy, because it’s really important. You might not realize it but when you’re emotionally wrapped up in a person they tend to consume your every waking thought. I dare you, wake up tomorrow and see how long it takes before you’re thinking about the person you’re not over. When you can finally be a real human being for a few hours without worrying about what they’re doing, you’ve turned a corner.
When you fall in love again. Like they always say, the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else.
When you feel a subtle sense of longing as you drive past their house. Unless the person totally ruined your life and you’ve had some sort of psychotic break where you’ve blocked their memory altogether, anybody’s bound to feel a bit of nostalgia every so often. This doesn’t mean you’re not over it, it means you’re a human being. If you don’t feel pressure to throw things or burst into tears or call the person, you’re probably legit over it. 