The Things That Go Through Your Head When Your Ex Remarries

One of the first things I did when my ex left me was to stop following all of her social media accounts. This is something I highly recommend during the healing process—it’s hard to move on if you’re cyberstalking and watching your ex’s new life unfold. I would occasionally hear something about her from a mutual friend (and never the things I wanted to hear, such as “her life is awful now,” or “she’s gained thirty pounds”), but I tried my best to avoid any mention of her.

When Your Ex Remarries

Then one day I got an email from a friend. I had just gotten to work and was about to start my project for the day when I opened the email. It was extremely brief but powerful. It simply read, “Your ex got remarried.”

That news ruined my day. I was very unproductive. I spent most of that work day Googling her, her new partner, the wedding—anything and everything. I ended up finding a few pictures from their wedding, and it was a strange sight.

It feels weird when your ex remarries. Especially when they do it quickly. Mine only waited a year and a half after our divorce. It made me wonder—how long did they date? How could she move on so fast? Why wasn’t I good enough? Where did it all go wrong?

Then, some thoughts that were more pleasant… She’s making a big mistake. The divorce rate for second marriages is even higher. She rushed into it. It will never last. I stared at those pictures and imagined her new spouse abandoning her at the worst possible time—putting her through the same hell that I went through.

But really, it was none of my business. I spent a lot of that day thinking about it how it feels when you get the news that your ex has remarried. For one thing, you know it’s truly over. They have moved on completely. They have started a whole new life with a whole new partner. You are a distant memory, and that’s what hurts.

So what if she left me just four weeks after we bought a house together? A house that I never got to enjoy for a minute, or even sleep in once. Now she’s living there with someone new. Someone else has slipped into my former life. Someone else is snuggled up with my dogs. Someone else is enjoying the garden beds and the greenhouse that I never got to use. Someone else is sitting with her on my old red couch. I have been cast aside; trapped in a mirror and flung into space like the bad guys in Superman II.

But at the same time, someone else will have to put up with her bullsh*t.

When your ex remarries, you will go through a lot of intense emotions. Then you will let it all go. It’s a surefire way to gain total acceptance of your current state. You are divorced, they are remarried, and there’s no going back.

I may never totally forgive her for what she did to me and how she did it, but I’m working toward that lofty goal of indifference—the true opposite of love.

And it’s not easy to get there…