Passionate Living Coach Abiola Abrams gives love, dating and self-esteem advice on the CW’s Bill Cunningham Show and all over the web through her hit web series AbiolaTV. Now she wants to help you keep things spicy and fresh between the sheets. Are you in need of an intimacy intervention? Just ask Abiola!
Dear Abiola,
I keep sleeping with my ex. He was my first and I’m ready to move on but I just can’t. We have been best friends since childhood, so I never thought he would treat me this way. He’s driving me crazy! I thought we were soulmates.
During our six years together, there was so much infidelity. He got married to someone else behind my back even though it was not legal because his divorce was not final. He was living with me for 11 months when he left the house one morning to get married.
Every time photos of him with other women pop up on my Facebook timeline I go crazy. I have gained weight, I’m depressed and in a rut. Now I just started having sex with him again and I don’t know why.
Help me get out of this situation.
Signed,
Ex-hausted in Ex-cruciating Pain
Dear Ex-uberantly About to Move Forward,
My goddess sister, it is time for an ex-orcism. First of all, you have my deepest sympathy. I say that because the only way to get past this is to grieve the death of the relationship, as off-base as it was, heal your self-worth and move forward like the queen you are.
He is not driving you crazy, sis. You are willingly showing up in your party pants and paying for the bus ticket to get there. You’re not alone. A recent YourTango Breakup Survey shows that more than half of single people say that thinking about their exes keeps them from finding new love.
“Sleeping with” with this man is only ex-acerbating the situation. We are creatures of habit but to put it bluntly, having sex with this ex is like eating your vomit. The meal might have tasted great at one time but now it can just make you ill.
Time to abruptly ex-purge. Cut off contact. Unfriend him on all social media. You don’t need to see “Loser is now in a relationship with Rachet” pop up on your timeline.
Here’s why you are having trouble walking away: when we are sexually intimate our brains blast us with feel-good chemicals like oxytocin, dopamine and endorphins. Your adrenaline also starts going. As women, we can find ourselves deluded about the prospects of a defunct relationship because we have recharged our attachment bonds. Every time you are intimate with him and your body hits you with more oxytocin, you reinforce this. If you are trying to move forward, romping with him keeps you stuck in the same place. It’s a matter of physics and inertia. You can’t evolve while still actively engaged with someone who continues to treat you like less than a person.
Your ex is an unscrupulous human being. I’m sure both of his wives would agree. You cannot be soulmates when one partner is lacking a soul. A relationship works between two whole healthy people. This “man” is neither whole nor healthy. You are trying to make right with your body what you could not make work with your clothes on. You need to rebuild trust in yourself by making better choices because not only has this man betrayed you, but you have betrayed yourself. Take full responsibility for your actions. I say this not to beat up on you, but if you make only him responsible, then only he can fix it.
The main issue is what I like to call “deservability.” You deserve much better than to have a man who would leave your house to marry someone else. That is emotional abuse. It’s time to woman up and become your own best friend. Breakup pain is awful but there’s no getting around that. On the other side, there is wholeness, healing and freedom, I promise. The only way to reclaim your joy and power is to go through the fire, love and forgive yourself, learn the lessons and then move on.
One day you’ll look back and wonder, what was I thinking? It’s okay, princess. We all do.
Passionately yours,
Abiola
Abiola Abrams is the founder of The Bombshell Academy blog, online school and web series over at AbiolaTV. Follow her on Twitter to continue the discussion about this week’s hot topic, and then email her your burning questions now. Anything you send will be posted anonymously, promise.