Ex Relationship... Kinda Messy?

[Indives]

Hi all! Loving the new boards. Very jazzy! I was a member aaages ago but I forgot my username!

So, I'm having a bit of a situation with my ex-boyfriend.

We broke up about 6 months ago after a year together. I initiated it, but it seemed amicable at the time and it felt a long time coming for me. There were heaps of reasons (things he said to me at times included) but he lived on the other side of the country and I couldn't take the long distance thing anymore. I was getting more and more anxious and depressed as it went along.

We sort of made an agreement to stay friends, but we didn't talk for a couple of months to cool off. We've since re-made contact - the first time, he took a joke in a message I sent the wrong way and gave me a bit of attitude, so I didn't respond. We made amends a few weeks later and went back to just casual interactions on Facebook.

Since that, we gradually started exchanging niceties again. I helped him out when he needed some computer help, and we got talking. I was feeling good about it, thinking maybe we could wind up as friends after all, given that we have a lot in common.

We share quite a few mutual friends/acquaintances, and he mentioned that he noticed I'd added a guy and a girl he knew on Facebook. I responded and mentioned I'd met them through another friend. His response was really jarring and made me feel kind of upset (I'm paraphrasing):

"Just so you know, that girl [you added] is the one I had kind of a brief thing with a couple of years ago. I think I told you about this though. We're just good friends now."

My thoughts were:
1) Wow, how irrelevant and unnecessary.
2) Pretty sure you never told me about that when we were together.
3) This is a girl whom you called "Gross" to me, so I was under the impression you weren't really that close.
4) I'm really confused and uncomfortable now.

So, I'm not really sure what to do here. I mean I'm not surprised, he's always said little things like this and I'm sufficiently over him not to let it get to me (I'm seeing some other people now so he's basically ancient history to me).

But I just want to know what I should do -- should I just ignore his message and him generally, or reply and just tell him I'm really sick of the yo-yo nonsense?

Also: am I right to feel this way about what he said? Was that a crappy thing to say? What's going on with this guy?

[Onionpie]

Hi Indives! Welcome back to the boards

I don't think any of us can tell you one way or another what to do in your interactions with this guy -- in the end, it's YOU who's interacting with him, so you get to choose what you're comfortable with or not. We can't tell you what you are or are not okay with, you know? But do know that even if you have initiated contact again, there's definitely no obligation to be friends with him. I know sometimes people can feel like they should be friends with an ex so they don't seem petty, or something, I have no idea if you feel that way at all -- but just wanted to say that, if you did feel that sort of pressure, it absolutely is a valid option to just drop your ex out of your life forever if that's what you want to do. What you "should" do, or what people expect you to do, or "but he isn't a bad guy at all!" or any of that, doesn't matter if YOU don't feel right about it.

That said, I know that *I* would feel uncomfortable with the comment he made -- it seems totally out of left field and completely unnecessary. But, you know, even if I didn't feel that way, your own feelings would still be totally valid. We all get to feel uncomfortable with whatever happens to make us feel uncomfortable. You seem to say that he kind of has a habit of throwing in little comments randomly that make you feel really uncomfortable -- is that correct? If so, have you ever talked to him about that at all? Do you feel like that's something you're comfortable bringing up with him? If he has done it frequently in the past, then it's pretty clear that this is something that's going to keep happening unless you say something about it. So you get to decide that you don't want to have to deal with those comments, and cut off contact with him, or you can confront him about it and see if he stops making those comments. Otherwise, if he keeps making comments like that, it sounds like you will be pretty uncomfortable, and that's never something we want in a friendship. So, clearly something's got to give here for you to feel comfortable in this friendship/in your interactions with him. Am I making any sense here?

[Indives]

Hi Onionpie! Thanks for your response! Yes, you make perfect sense.

During our relationship, I tried to make him aware of that habit quite a bit. He'd always apologise but it would happen over and over again. Besides the distance, it was the other major erosion factor in the relationship. I don't feel any pressure to keep him as a friend or keep in touch, but since we had really similar views and stuff we share, I felt like it would be good to catch up now and again.

Complicating things is his mild autism; he was diagnosed two years ago. As my trust in him withered away though, I came to feel he used it as an excuse and it's always a factor in his apologies.

It would be a lot easier if I knew what I felt I wanted to do, but I'm conflicted: one day, I want to give him the flick, the next day, I'll be glad I didn't. I guess I just need to talk it out and make sense of it so my feelings can go one way or the other.

I don't want to keep someone around who's just being a hurtful dweeb, but I'm not sure if that's what he's doing here. It's all a bit murky.

[Ruth]

Given that you've said that it was one of the major factors in the dissolution of your relationship, and that calling his attention to it doesn't seem to have made a difference, do you think you may just have to decide whether or not this uncomfortable behaviour is one you're willing to put up with? While his autism may be a reason, the fact is that if it's making you feel uncomfortable or unhappy it is not an excuse, and therefore it shouldn't really be a factor in your decision here. Even if he's not being deliberately hurtful, if you're feeling hurt then that's important.

I understand that you're feeling confused - is there anything we can do to help you make more sense of things?

[Indives]

Thanks Ruth, that's a really good point. If the comments are coming at random like that; you almost can't relax around him or tell him too much and that's pretty lame.

Is it okay to just keep on ignoring that last message and forget about him? If I unfriend him on Facebook, a few of our mutual friends are going to notice and it's going to make things really awkward. I'm also not sure if I want to go that far; it seems harsh to me right now, but could that just be me not wanting to let go?

[Onionpie]

I totally understand what you mean about comments like that keeping you from being able to relax; it can be really emotionally exhausting and put you on edge if someone constantly just randomly throws out kind of a nasty comment.

It's totally up to you what you feel is the right way to go about this, so if you feel like just ignoring the message, that's totally fine. And if you don't feel like unfriending him right now, then you don't have to You might feel best doing what Captain Awkward (an awesome advice blog) has dubbed the "slow fade" in which you... well, slowly fade away! You can just answer non-committally and not-in-depth if he ever contacts you, but just stop contacting him yourself, and let it just kind of fade out. It's all about the way you feel like dealing with this. Whatever you're comfortable with

[Indives]

That's a really good idea Onionpie Thanks for your advice, I'll try it.

I was under the impression that the slow fade was a wimpy way to go, but maybe it might be the best thing to do here.