Written by Katie Muxworthy
Scrolling through Instagram, I spot one of my favourite pages posting a funny meme about a past relationship. A picture of a snake with the caption “who took this candid picture of my ex?”, followed by lots of crying laughing emojis and thousands of ‘likes’ in agreement.
The ‘awful ex’ trope is not uncommon, and getting back with an ex is widely considered to be taboo. But, for me, my ex-boyfriend isn’t a hilarious ghostly figure from my past that I look back on with regret. My ex-boyfriend is the man I’m going to marry.
We met in 2014, after matching on a dating app. It was just before Christmas, and we both shared an interest in the same music and books. We talked for a week or so before he asked if I wanted to meet him for a drink. As it was the festive period I was also going for a few after-work drinks at an awful activity bar. You know the ones with ping pong tables and themed cocktails and communal tables that force you to socialise with Gary from accounts?
Being unorganised and flustered at work in the lead-up to the after-work drinks, I had failed to notice that my phone was running out of battery until it was a little too late. I fired a quick message off to my date, saying I would let him know when I was finished at the awful bar so we could meet.
Then my phone died.
To be honest (and I am aware that this would now put me in potential ghosting territory), I just didn’t think my date would be bothered. I was used to matching with people and either the conversation fizzling out after a day or two, or firing back and forth suitably vague messages about hanging out. Or actually going on a date and then not hearing from them ever again. I had come to the conclusion that maybe my potential dates just weren’t bothered – so what did it matter if neither was I?!
The next morning, with a slightly fuzzy head and a full phone battery, I pulled up my messages and found that he had tried to contact me several times, and eventually, had given up. I felt like shit. I’d been excited about this date, I had enjoyed our conversations, and I had stared at the pictures on his dating profile more times than I cared to admit. So why had I immediately self-sabotaged something through a complete lack of organisation and convinced myself nobody could really care that much about a failed date with me?
I typed out an apology. I told him the truth, that my phone had died, that I wasn’t prepared and that I felt awful. I later found out that he had been sitting with his coat on waiting for my message to tell him to come and meet me.
So begins the first of our many second chances that we gave each other, over the years. And this one might be the one I am most grateful for.
My phone pinged and he replied; “How is the hangover treating you?”
From then, we resumed our daily messaging back and forth. We had both headed back to our family homes for Christmas and spent the period sharing pictures of awful pyjamas and calling each other on long walks around our hometowns.
He told me that if we were to try another date I needed to make the plans, as I still had some making up to do after our first attempt. I agreed and two days before New Year's Eve we met at a local bar.
I ordered a bottle of red wine and we talked for hours and hours. It felt like he was my best friend that I hadn’t seen in a few years, and we were catching up on life. We hopped from bar to bar, in the weird wintery light of street lamps, and ended the evening dancing outside to the sound of the music coming from a late-night club. I looked at him like he glistened and I truly believed he was perfect.
The next 10 months went by very fast. We lived in each other's pockets, existing only until the next time we could see each other. We went to festivals, we travelled, we lay in bed together all weekend, we commuted to work together and we breathed in and out at the same time. I felt like I had found the greatest love of my life. We both ignored concerned friends' and families' comments that they never saw us anymore, or that we were moving too fast. Every waking moment I thought about him.
And then in the September of 2015, as we partied separately with friends, for the first time in a while, he disappeared.
My texts wouldn’t send, his friends ignored my concerned messages, my calls didn’t go through. To cut a long and very hurtful story short, he had gone to meet an ex-girlfriend that he still had feelings for. An ex-girlfriend that I had no idea about.
Our intense whirlwind addiction to one another was suddenly halted by the messy reality of unaddressed feelings. The world that I had made myself so accustomed to came crashing down and we broke up.
For that brief period in time, I guess he did become the ex that I was willing to share spiteful memes about with my friends. I ignored that our relationship had been intense and all-encompassing and unhealthy, and instead shifted the blame to him, his recklessness, his selfishness, and his inability to communicate with me.
He was the evil ex-boyfriend that I could never forgive.
However, (and in every good love story like ours there has to be a however) we quietly and cautiously kept in touch. Things didn’t work out with his ex and he asked to see me and to forgive him and to give things another go.
For months we darted in and out of each other's lives, one night of drunken passion here and there or a fleeting like on the other's social media post.
We existed, like two moons, that remembered the big bang of those first 10 months, the beauty, the harshness, the exhaustive intensity, but for now, we were spinning in different orbits.
It wasn’t until some 2 years later, 3 separate failed relationships, 5 countries travelled separately, that we met once more in a bar. He had become that friend that I was catching up with about life. Yet this time, he wasn’t glistening; I saw him as who he was, all of the wrinkles and creases and mistakes and flaws that we all have.
We talked at length, honestly and openly, about our values and non-negotiables, and how this time we would take things slowly. During the following months, we tentatively met for the odd coffee, a walk on a weekend, or a concert of a mutual band we liked. Sometimes the trust faltered, and we would have long intense conversations about what we felt like we needed from one another. Our friends and families tiptoed even more cautiously. But slowly and surely we began to progress through life together.
It became our new unspoken rule to be honest and open and real with each other. We knew we loved all of each other's best bits, but we both agreed to fall in love with each other's worst bits too.
Three house moves, a relocation, one adopted cat, two new jobs, and a proposal later, we have found our normal. It involves less intensity, but way more honesty, maturity, and communication.
So, whilst our love story might not look like the one they make slightly cheesy rom coms about, it’s still full of all the good stuff it takes to make a relationship last. The friendship, the hurt, the growth, the life lessons that you - really - don’t want to learn at the time, and most importantly the reality of finding what works for you both.
For me, whilst we may have had more than our fair share of bumps in the road, it was a journey that we both needed to go on to get to exactly where we are right now. And, that is currently deciding if we can find a way to get a pizza truck on our wedding day!
The next time you’re headed for your first, or second, or even fifteenth date, try to remember that there are no ‘rules’, when it comes to relationships. It’s about figuring out what works best for you.
Oh, but maybe make sure your phone is charged – you may end up marrying them one day.
