The Ex Boyfriend Recovery Podcast

If you’ve ever heard of the crappy childhood fairy then you are in for a treat. I had the pleasure of interviewing Anna Runkle who is the founder of the very popular YouTube channel, We talked about all kinds of amazing things, Intro to the crappy childhood fairy. 0:03 Complex post-traumatic stress disorder. 3:28 What Is abandonment? Melange? 7:54 How to deal with emotional flashbacks? 11:13 Rec repetition compulsion and repetition compulsion. 15:59 Dealing with the fantasy element. 23:01 What does limerence feed off of? 25:53 Twin flame and codependency. 31:04 The importance of telling your story. 33:32 How she changed her approach to dating. 38:45 Dating a man who met her. 41:45 The difference between value and value in relationships. 46:47 Important Links Mentioned In The Episode The Crappy Childhood Fairy YouTube Channel Crappy Childhood Fairy Website Buy Her Course On CPTSD Take Advantage Of Her Free Tool On Daily Practice Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:03 Today we’re gonna be interviewing Anna Runkle, who has perhaps one of the most clever names or monikers she’s known as the crappy childhood fairy. So if you’re not familiar, she literally runs this YouTube channel called the crappy childhood fairy that has over half a million subscribers. So I just want to say thank you so much for coming on and doing this, there’s so much I want to ask you. But perhaps we can start a little bit by giving me the origin story about how this all came to be. Anna 00:36 Where I’m, my channel has so much to do with relationships. That’s why I’m really excited to be talking to you. And I think we talk about a lot of the same things. And I talk about it from the angle of people, mostly women, who went through abuse and neglect as kids, which really affects the way we have relationships. And I learned about this through the school of hard knocks, I grew up in a commune with a drug addict, alcoholic mom. And a lot of the stuff that just goes with that with having a alcoholic family, the like cars in the yard and poverty and you know, nobody really looking out for you and nobody supervising. And so I had really common symptoms for kids who grew up that way. But when I was growing up, and even as even 10 years ago, people didn’t really know a lot about this. They knew that kids who had a rough childhood were prone to depression and anxiety. But gradually, the research has been coming out that there’s so much more to it, that there’s a neurological injury that can happen when kids aren’t taking care of properly, when especially the emotional neglect, like we know that physical abuse and sexual abuse are horribly harmful. But there’s this specific thing that happens in all of this. And especially with the emotional neglect, where there’s a the there’s a glitch in the neurological development, and actually connecting with people, you know, and this is where it really does affect romantic relationships to connecting with people feeling a sense of calm in your body, instead of like too agitated, or just completely bla, all of that stuff gets thrown off, it also throws off your immune system, your hormones, your, your heart, your lungs. And so gradually, it’s coming out that chronic chronic disease, the risk of it goes way up, if you were traumatized as a kid. So there’s a lot of research going on on this. And it’s sort of all over the place. And a lot of people say, Oh, I’m trauma informed. But I always say, you know, this is a really emerging science. And so what what I really recommend for people who have been through trauma and feel like it’s affected them, is to really be in charge to be their own researcher and to be sovereign over their own healing. And if they’re trying something that doesn’t seem to work for them, or they don’t feel like the big problem in their life is getting recognized. That’s how I used to feel, it might be time to find a different approach a different therapist or a different approach. So I’m not a therapist, I’m somebody who didn’t benefit from talk therapy. As it turns out, I thought there was something wrong with me. And it turns out, that’s a really normal thing for many people who are traumatized as kids that talking about it kind of makes it worse. And so there’s ways that you can process your feelings and your memories, and then get on with changing your life. And that’s the most important thing is changing your life. Chris Seiter 03:28 So what was interesting is when I was going through your website, specifically, there were two things that stuck out to me. I’m just going to kind of follow my my intuition here. So the first thing I did when I’m with your website is I’m looking at you know, like the little sidebar or whatever, and it has this term called CPTSD, which I believe is complex, post traumatic stress disorder. But I started reading a little bit it seems like you kind of created your own childhood Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, do you want to talk Anna 04:05 about PTSD, it’s sort of a colloquial, colloquial term. Everybody understands what I mean when I say childhood, PTSD, PTSD, we know what that is. So from childhood, that makes sense. And technically what it’s called is complex PTSD, and which is not only from childhood, but it’s the kind of PTSD that you get, which has it has a slightly different set of symptoms from say, straight up PTSD, which might be a combat veteran who went through this very bad couple of days, you know, or somebody who had a card car accident. Complex PTSD comes from chronic ongoing exposure to stress when it goes on all the time, like trauma is going to influence your body, your brain, your memories, all that stuff. When it goes on all the time, it starts to kind of get in there and affect how you develop. And so it has a slightly different set of symptoms. And a lot of people are walking around with it right now. Chris Seiter 05:00 Yeah, so I actually think this is completely relevant to our audience. Because one of the things that I research a lot is breakups, right? And breakups can be quite traumatic. And what’s interesting neurologically or neuro chemically is that cortisol shoots way up. You know, cortisol is a stress hormone. But, you know, on average, if you get stressed throughout the day, it should take around three to four hours for your cortisol to kind of come down to normal, but to your point like this, this constant complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, if you’re engaging in activities, or you’re obsessing about your ex, you’re looking on social media, and today’s day and age does not make it any easier. Cortisol has a tendency to stay elevated. And if it stays elevated for a long period of time, it can take as long as six months for it to level out. So I think even the science is backing up what what you’re saying here? How do you think, oh, sorry, you go ahead, Anna 06:00 I was just gonna say there’s a real disadvantage for somebody who was going through all that cortisol and a lack of like mirroring and touch and everything when they were little kids. And so already, there’s a, you know, that’s what that’s where the neurological dysregulation stems from, is, you know, you know, mirror neurons, I’m not a neurologist, but mirror neurons, they develop in response to, you know, meaningful connection with your mom with your caregiver. And if you were neglected, there’s part of your brain that can’t develop. And it might, you know, some of the symptoms of C PTSD, in some ways look like autism, it’s not autism, it’s a very different cause. And, but there’s some symptoms in common. And it might, it would be like difficulty connecting. And so that anxious attachment that you teach people about so much, so often goes along with neglect from childhood. And it’s not just psychological, it’s neurological. Chris Seiter 06:57 So a lot of times when we’re looking at the attachment styles, specifically, the anxious attachment styles, I try to give people like the Cliff Notes version, like I try not to overwhelm them with too much. But one of the things I always harp on is this idea of core wounds. And specifically, the core wound of an anxious attachment style is someone who is terrified of being abandoned. But I guess what you’re arguing is that even you know, it’s all stemmed from childhood and the mirroring neurons and the lack of it, Anna 07:27 well, not all of it, but it’s, you know, it sets you up your brain is developing your body and brain and, you know, intrinsic, we can’t develop in a vacuum, we develop in the arms of the people who love us, and through their talking with us and working with us and guiding us. And so like the way I grew up, for example, my mom, when I was a month old, she just took off with some new boyfriend, and my dad was stuck by himself. And he was working and he had to hire somebody to come in. And I don’t remember any of this. But this happened again and again. And it starts to explain a lot of stuff that I struggled with later, which is extremely anxious attachment, horrible abandonment wounds. What Pete Walker calls abandonment Melange, which is kind of like a special intense emotional cocktail, that not everybody gets. When you know, when abandonment occurs, when the end of a relationship occurs, even thinking about ending a relationship with somebody I couldn’t stand would like, set me off, and then I wouldn’t do it. So the the attachment with the insecure attachment kind of drives people who would that childhood trauma, it can drive, it’s this is nothing is across the board. But it’s a very common trait, to go rushing into relationships, sleep together real fast, how that whole bonding thing happened, you know, and then like two days into the whole thing, you’re just like, Oh, my God, what am I done? I don’t even like this person. But the abandonment wound is there to go, but don’t you leave because if you leave, you’re gonna get thrown into the worst depression that you’ve ever known. And so people are lik

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of interviewing Julia Kristina, a registered clinical counselor based out of Vancouver. We talked about all kinds of interesting things related to breakups and codependency. What is codependency? 0:03 Avoidant vs. codependent attachment styles. 5:43 The yearning for connection and codependent relationships. 11:10 Setting boundaries in a codependent relationship. 16:25 How long does it take your brain to reset? 23:43 Setting clear boundaries about not contacting your ex. 28:19 How to set boundaries. 33:34 Setting clear boundaries. 38:33 Codependency and codependency in relationships. 41:45 Masterclasses and resources. 47:10 Important Links Mentioned In The Episode Work With Julia Kristina Join The “Shift” Society Contact Julia Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:03 All right, today we’re gonna be talking to Julia Kristina who holds a master’s degree in counseling in psychology. She’s also helped hundreds of men and women break through their biggest struggles with anxiety, worry, low self esteem, self doubt, I got this, this list just keeps going on through. But today, we’re gonna basically be talking to her about codependency how to improve your communication skills, or basically the boundary setting abilities that maybe you feel like you’re lacking in relationships, but I just wanted to say, thank you so much for coming on and doing this. It’s such a pleasure. Julia 00:35 It is my pleasure, Chris to be here and having this conversation. Thanks for having me. Chris Seiter 00:41 Okay, so the first thing I typically do when I have interview kind of coming up, I always like to do a little bit of homework, you know, a couple of hours before I come on, so I’m going through your YouTube channel and you have like 300,000 subscribers so it’s, it’s not like one of those small YouTube channels, you’ve got a pretty large audience, but the one video that stuck out to me was basically your so like, Do you ever do that thing on YouTube where you go to someone’s YouTube channel and you always just like, sort it by the most popular videos. Were totally sponsored other videos is about codependency and I immediately clicked with this one because I think it’s a perfect topic to talk about. So why don’t we talk a little bit about how to identify if you are in a or if you are basically in a codependent relationship or you are codependent yourself? Julia 01:32 Oh, gosh, I mean, it can look a lot of different ways. So to talk about what codependency is, I think first we need to talk about that more what codependency isn’t and what it looks like to not be in a codependent relationship. So the opposite of codependence isn’t independence. The opposite of codependence is interdependence. So when we are in an interdependent relationship, it means that both people are there for each other. And both people have a secure sense of self within the relationship. So both people do need each other has to be a certain element of needing the person in your life or else what’s the point? You’re just living parallel lives, as opposed to interdependent lives? And so yeah, just really think about that. What does it mean to be interdependent? It means that I need this person in certain aspects. So I just got to throw a frog in my throat. Chris Seiter 02:37 You know, it’s a good, it’s a good, it’s alive, we are alive. Julia 02:42 We are not we are not this is not AI. Chris Seiter 02:45 Unfortunately, or fortunately, rather, it’s not it’s not AI. Yeah. Julia 02:52 And so really just looking at how do I be dependent on this person, but also be dependent on myself kind of in that same mix. And so what codependence is, is it’s really becoming overly dependent on someone else, for our sense of self. For our identity, we think that somebody else is going to sorry, Jerry Maguire, but you were wrong, complete us. And so we go, and someone’s gonna solve the right thing, right, and we think someone’s going to someone is going to solve our problems and make everything better. Interestingly enough, research shows that people who are in a relationship are only Contrary to popular belief, slightly happier, overall, in general, than people who are single. So that’s just a stat which basically tells us that just sort of, in general, people who are in relationships in like a committed relationship are, in general, are happier, but not as much happier as we thought because no matter where we go, that’s where we are. We bring ourselves into any circumstance or situation. And so you’re gonna bring yourself into a relationship, there’s certain things about being in a relationship, they’re going to make your life better, you’ve got a built in friend to do things where if you’ve got someone to plan with, you’ve got someone to, you know, go through life with the person to talk about the mundane mundane things about your everyday life with. But then you also have someone to navigate and negotiate and problem solving someone else’s schedule and someone else’s preferences and someone else’s ways of doing things and like all of the other stuff that comes with it. So you kind of get you know, you get the pros and the cons. Same with being single, you get the pros and the cons. So they can really just look at that. When people think about being codependent. They’re convinced that they need this person in their life in order to be okay. And that’s just not true. And I think Chris Seiter 04:59 That is where most of our audience is, you know, I I like to run polls with the audience. So one of the big things that we’re we look at is the attachment styles of individuals. So we asked our audiences like, hey, what what is your attachment style and overwhelmingly the attachment style they had was anxious, preoccupied, but I also asked them hey, what do you think your exes attachment style is? Because most of the people here are going through breakups. And they said overwhelmingly, like 70% said, their ex is a dismissive avoidant. So you have that anxious pairing and that dismissive, avoidant pairing, which I would assume is kind of a breeding ground for these type of codependent relationships. Do you think you could talk a little bit about that? Julia 05:43 Yeah, so it’s like it’s almost like this thrill of the chase, the more unavailable something is, the more you want it, and the other side of codependent so there’s a one side of codependence where you kind of rely on someone in need them. But then the other side of the codependence is if you’re someone who needs to be needed. Right. So So one person is the needy one, right. So that would be the anxious and then one person is the needs to be needed, which would tend to more be the avoidant where they want to be needed, but then end up feeling suffocated and then push that person away, which causes them to feel rejected, which cause brings out more neediness. And so the dance kind of goes on where there’s a lot of push pull, where you might want to be you know, you need to be needed, you need to feel important, you need to feel essential in someone’s life, like you are the strings that are holding that person together. But as soon as it gets to be too much, you push them away, and the more you push them away, the more their neediness flares up, and it becomes this sort of this sort of dance of a push and pull. And so that’s that’s often how that can show up with anxious and avoidant attachment styles. And also understanding that avoidant attachment is also an anxious attachment. Right? It’s a different iteration of anxious attachment attachment. It’s more the anxiety of letting someone get too close. Because, you know, there’s a whole bunch of experiences and ideas and stories about what that means if we let someone get too close to us. So all of us desire closeness, but then there can be fear that shows up and prevents that from happening in a healthy way. Chris Seiter 07:23 Well, you know, what’s really interesting about that is your like the third psychologist that I have a I have interviewed that has said that the avoidant sort of attachment style stems from anxiety, and it doesn’t make so much sense because you know, that whatever avoidant mechanism that comes into play usually is coming during some sort of trigger point where their independence is feeling threatened and they grow anxious, and their avoidance is just basically a symptom of that anxiousness. Julia 07:54 Right. It sounds good. Chris Seiter 07:55 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, what I find so interesting about it is to me, so I’ve interviewed a lot of people. And that’s like a common theme that keeps popping up. But it seems like the literature that is online when you read like a Psychology Today article never really mentions the fact that there’s this really intricate connection between dismissive avoidance and the anxiety. They just talk about dismissive avoidance and black and white terms. Julia 08:27 Yeah, I mean, dismissive, avoidant, all just really understanding that when it comes to human behavior, all of it is purposeful. Right? All behavior is purposeful, there’s always a reason why someone is doing, what they’re doing acting, how they’re acting, interacting, how they’re interacting. And so what the research shows that people who have more the avoidant personality or sorry, avoidant attachment style, is that they were, there was a lot of emotional neglect, or even physical neglect as a child. And so as children we are, we need attachment, like we need to attach to our attachment figures. That’s why they’re called attachment figures. And this is where so much of this stems from, we need that secure attachment. But in the absence of that secure attachment, little brains are so incredible, the way that they will adapt, the human brain is built for survival. And so if you are not able to depend on someone, if someone is not there for you, when you need them, if they are not able to meet your emotional needs, then that part of your

This is Tati Garcia, She is a licensed professional counselor specializing in helping individuals with high functioning anxiety. What’s high functioning anxiety? Well, I had the pleasure of asking her myself: One of the primary distinctions is that someone experiencing high-functioning anxiety may appear to be doing well externally. This could be someone who is successful, able to maintain a job, and can handle their day-to-day tasks efficiently. However, internally, they are grappling with anxiety. The symptoms can be consistent across different types of anxiety, such as overthinking, excessive worrying, and feeling constantly on edge or tense. Honestly, Tati is a perfect guest to have onto our podcast because not only is our average client anxious, But she gave some incredible advice on how to cope with the anxiety you may be feeling after a breakup. Important Things Tati Talked About On This Episode What Is high functioning anxiety? 0:03 How high-functioning anxiety is related to attachment styles. 5:34 How to label your emotions? 11:42 Redirection technique to help with anxiety. 15:31 How does one manage to control anxiety? 25:04 Has anxiety gotten worse with the advent of technology? 30:07 How to deal with stress and anxiety. 36:58 Important Resources Tati Talked About Tati’s Website High functioning anxiety quiz Tati’s Course Coach With Tati Her Podcast Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:03 Today we’re gonna be talking to Tati Garcia, who is a licensed professional counselor and coach specializing in high functioning anxiety. She has 13 years of experience in mental health. And she runs the very popular YouTube channel slash podcasts calmly coping. So I just wanted to say thank you so much for coming on and doing this because we have a lot of anxious listeners, and I’m sure you can give them all kinds of tips. Tati 00:27 Yeah, thank you so much for having me here. I’m excited to get into it. Chris Seiter 00:31 All right. So high functioning anxiety, how is that different than just normal anxiety? What are like what, what’s the distinction between those two? Yeah, so Tati 00:41 one of the main distinctions is somebody who is experiencing high functioning anxiety, if they appear to be doing well on the outside, so maybe somebody who is successful, who’s able to hold a job who is able to go about their day to day and often do it very well. However, on the inside, they’re really struggling with anxiety which you know, the symptoms can be similar regardless of what kind of anxiety is but it’s, you know, BB overthinking things worrying a lot, feeling on edge, and tense. Assuming the worst case scenario and situations, there can be a lot of physical symptoms that go along with that, like digestive issues, tension in your body headaches, shaking, and you know, it can, you know, the main difference is that with anxiety, just in general, it often tends to hold people back in avoidance. And so, you know, people, if there’s something in particular that you’re feeling anxious about, you might tend to avoid the thing and not want to do whatever it is that that thing is. So if it’s, you know, public speaking, you’re gonna want to avoid public speaking. But with high functioning anxiety, the fear and anxiety actually propels somebody forward into taking action, and into oftentimes overachieving or busyness and difficulty with relaxing. And so you know, somebody who has high functioning anxiety could potentially meet the criteria for a mental health disorder, but many times they because they are like, on the outside appear to be doing well. And other people may not recognize what they’re going through, it can be more difficult for them to seek out help, and they may not feel as understood. Chris Seiter 02:40 So what’s really interesting as you were talking, so last night, I was doing, you know, the whole scrolling through Netflix looking for something. And I stopped on this documentary about this professional cyclist named Mark Cavendish. And he’s, like, known as maybe the greatest sprinter and like the Tour de France, like he would just went all the stages. 03:01 But he was doing really incredibly. Chris Seiter 03:07 But then something, something happened, he got some sort of like endurance disease, I forgot the technical term for it. But he just continued, like, spiraled and pretty much exactly what you were talking about what the high functioning anxiety was, like him to a tee, to the point where he was avoiding getting any kind of help, he would just sort of double down and try to, over achieve to to accomplish those goals. So I’m kind of curious, like, this high functioning anxiety that you’re talking about. It’s not like someone just like wakes up and you know, maybe you’re like an anxious person to begin with. But is there like a slow progression toward the high functioning anxiety? Or is it just like, like a switch, like a light bulb? Going off? Tati 03:52 Yeah, that’s a good question. I mean, that’s something that’s hard to say I what I’ve noticed in the clients and students that I’ve worked with is that there tends to be similar characteristics and personality traits that those with high functioning anxiety have, like, you know, being somebody who is hard working and somebody who is reliable and persistent. And so the kind of those traits that will result in like continuing to take action and keep going. However, you know, they’re like, any other personality trait or like any other mental health disorder, like it falls on a spectrum. And so, you know, there can be differing degrees to which people experiencing it, experience it and there can also be different contributing factors. So it could be you know, the way that somebody was raised, and you know, they were maybe in school did really well and we’re a perfectionist and focused on getting the best grades and then you know, kind of continued with that approach into adulthood. You know, it could be something that is gradual. I don’t know if there’s necessarily like, kind of a flip switching overnight. And oftentimes, it is the thing where many people don’t really recognize that they’re struggling with it, because they just feel like, well, this is just the way that I am. Because this is how they’ve lived their life for, you know, whatever period of time. Chris Seiter 05:34 So, in our coaching practice, we study a lot of attachment styles, you know, we look at the kind of behaviors that people’s exes are exhibiting and the kinds of behaviors that our clients are exhibiting. And what’s really interesting is something that you said about the high functioning anxiety is they tend to avoid confrontation or things that I think will trigger their anxiety. But I’m curious, does that have anything to do with you know, like, typically, with the insecure attachment styles you have, like the dismissive avoidant, and the priyad, anxious, preoccupied, you know, the fearful avoidant and everything? Do you? Do you like tend to find that people with high functioning anxiety or avoidance or preoccupied, like, have you done any research on that? Or is that just there’s not enough? Tati 06:24 That I’m not aware of? And I and I think that as far as I know, now, I’m no expert on like attachment styles or anything. But the way that people behave in relationships is oftentimes, like there can be parallels, of course, but you know, I think that it’s it’s not necessarily correlated with the types of personal or individual mental health stroke struggles somebody have has, of course, I think there can be contributing factors and reasons as to why somebody behaves a certain way in a relationship, but I think it’s it’s really rooted in like, you know, attachment theory says, In those early relationships, yeah, that somebody has with a parent or caregiver or, you know, other adults in their life. That’s going to result in, you know, the way that they are experiencing other relationships into adulthood. Chris Seiter 07:39 Yeah, I mean, that that seems to track were one of the things we notice is that a lot of the exes that we study tend to have very avoidant approaches to the breakup. Whereas a lot of our clients tend to be on the other end of the spectrum where they are just trying to problem solve. A lot of times you have to get them out of the mindset of, hey, I want my ex back and start like saying, like, hey, stop being so codependent, let’s work on you being sort of independent. So I’m curious, someone who has high functioning anxiety? What are some of the tips or coping mechanisms that you often work with? Like if someone were if I were to sign up? If I have high functioning anxiety? Let’s say I do I have high functioning anxiety Totti? Fix me what what are the top tips that you would give me? Tati 08:31 Yeah, so first, it’s addressing like the underlying root causes, and and looking at what is getting you in this place and keeping you stuck here. And a lot of times, that’s going to be emotional awareness, and just like a general understanding and recognition of how you’re feeling. You know, many people, unfortunately, it’s not something that we’re like, taught in school or educated on how to recognize and process different emotions, and especially if somebody’s going through a breakup, there can be a lot of emotions present. And it can be very challenging and destabilizing and unsettling. And, you know, studies demonstrate that just the act of labeling your emotions actually helps to deactivate the, how strong you’re experiencing them. So there’s a part of the brain that’s called the amygdala that’s responsible for you know, the anxiety reaction, but also for strong emotional reactions. And so when people just are able to name an emotion that they’re feeling, it actually how strongly the amygdala is activated in the brain decreases. So that is kind of like one small thing that seems like might not make a big of a deal but in the long run that can really help Just in general,

I had the pleasure of interview Lee a few days ago and I was blown away at her approach to her breakup. Not only did she really buy in to putting the focus on herself (as opposed to her ex) but she absolutely KILLLED IT during the texting phase. Check out some of the things we talked about in our interview, The beginning of the breakup. 0:02 Getting back into the game after a breakup. 3:35 No contact for 45 days. 7:41 How she got into the coaching world. 11:57 Coffee grinders and coffee. 17:12 The importance of the internal part of the process. 23:40 Not cool things that were not cool. 28:54 There’s no such thing as an innocent cup of coffee. 33:40 The most important epiphany she had. 39:23 Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 All right, today we have a another success story. We have Lee here who is going to tell us all about her situation. And specifically, she wanted me to highlight the importance of the work she did during the texting phase. So I’m eager to get into that. But thank you so much for coming on and doing this. Lee 00:17 Oh, thanks for having me. Actually, thank you very much for creating this program. I purchased. Probably all of the programs I could think of five, perhaps in addition to yours, so Chris Seiter 00:31 yeah, you were saying that, you know, the big ones. Lee 00:33 The big hit heavy hitters, Chris Seiter 00:36 right? You always you always I find it’s like sometimes people, you know, they just jive with different things better than than others. But I’m, I’m blessed to have you here. So, again, thank you for doing this. Why don’t you take us back to the beginning of men? I don’t know, if you want to take take it from like the beginning of the relationship or the beginning of the breakup. One. I’ll just leave that to you. Lee 01:02 So I had met my significant other online. We had a long texting fees. About three months before we met in person. The first time around, we call that the first relationship. And then we met, it was like a fireworks type, relationship and person. Things were really heavy. I had had a surgery, he was there for me. He met my son, he was in my family. He started living with me, but he still had his own apartment, which is a very avoidant thing to do. Chris Seiter 01:46 So did you guys move in together? Like, way too quickly? Like how long did that take to unfold? Exactly? Lee 01:53 Well, so we’re in our mid 40s, he’s a year and a half younger than me. So I mean, I would say about 45 minutes, 45 Chris Seiter 02:01 minutes, 45 minutes. That’s the Lee 02:05 relationship. He was there No, five months. And it was, um, you know, he was here all the time. But he wasn’t like, contributing as much. And we had problems, but I was afraid to broach the topics. Um, he had sort of done this. He had had kind of some money relationships with his, his ex wife and I have a son. So it’s like, I have a co parent relationship that I also needed to kind of work out the kinks with. And that sort of, I think kind of gave him some Chris Seiter 02:41 pause difficulty. Yeah, I mean, especially so you mentioned that he might have been dismissive avoidant. How did he handle that? Okay, sure. Okay. Well, so he, so how long did it take him to actually start running away? And what was his reasoning during the breakup? Lee 03:01 So the first time I think he technically ran away, he helped his ex wife move across the country, and I had a very anxious reaction to it and, and pushed him away. So out of like a protest behavior. Chris Seiter 03:16 I mean, you could easily argue that’s not anxious behavior. That’s normal behavior, but okay. Lee 03:22 Yeah, no. Well, yeah, I mean, I had some. Yeah, I mean, that is normal behavior. I was like, What is this? Yeah, there were things that were chipping away at my security throughout the relationship. And that had kind of driven me toward, like, these points of feeling very anxious. In the so when then November, I think, so we had met in June, was when he first broke up with me. And I, like begged and learned him back. Second time, was in December, and I had purchased this program and another one, and I had read that other one, and then I had gotten him back. And then in April 29 of the next year, I so we had been together for 11 months, we’d had a couple blowouts and one of which I had like a kind of like a meltdown in public and I had lost a lot of emotional control. So two weeks after that I came home from work and all his stuff was gone. Chris Seiter 04:39 No explanation at all just like the actual ghosting there in person for you to see. Right. Okay. So I just work texted, I Lee 04:54 netted or you know, I was like, are you why are you doing this to us like what the hell Oh, and what am I gonna say to my son? And like, you’ve left a family basically, like you became a part of a family, and then you left it. So like, what’s up with that? When, and I saw him and brought all of his stuff. And he said that he never wanted to see me again. And he never wants to talk to me again. He was like, smoothing out his clothes. Like, he’s obviously still attracted to me. You know? Yeah. Chris Seiter 05:26 I’m very nervous in this moment. Lee 05:29 Yeah. And I did not bring any peace. Probably what I should have done in retrospect, is just not say anything. I can give myself some time to calm down. But I did not. And I kind of like went after that situation to the very anxious thing, which is like, what are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing? But knowing that, you know, he had already made up his mind. And so Chris Seiter 05:59 he’s left you, you approach him at his work very anxiously. You do everything basically, you’re not supposed to do. I’m assuming this does not work out well, for you at first. Lee 06:10 No, it doesn’t. He just pushes me away. And then yeah, I’m like, Well, can we talk about this in seven days, you know, this is like, an from another program that I read, it’s like, okay, now you’re doing damage control, you know, you’re trying to like, reestablish trust. And ultimately, what I didn’t realize is that, like, both of our nervous systems were on like, super high alert. And like, I really should have just backed off. And let it kind of smooth over because I had heard through his roommate that he was really hurting in May. And if I had done the, the break, and like, let myself calm down and not not and just let him do it, probably things would have gone a different course. However, what I feel this program did was forced me to look at myself with like, the ungettable girl content, doing the Trinity. Just sort of like applying these things. Because it’s very easy to just like, sort of like, focus everything out on them and say, Oh, well, this is them. And that’s their fault. And that’s what they did wrong. But at some point, I had an epiphany of like, oh, this is what I’ve been doing wrong. So Chris Seiter 07:36 at this point, when you’re focusing on this stuff, have you already implemented like the No Contact Rule. Lee 07:41 So I went into the No Contact Rule. And then, about 12 days after I sent like a goodbye, text, and vacated with music. I just start the No Contact Rule all over again. Chris Seiter 07:57 Alright, so you made it 12 days, you sent the way you said, like, you communicate with like, some sort of music video or something like that. So I sent like a Yo, La Tengo song that was very sad. And like, you know, where are your emotions on your sleeve? Like? Lee 08:13 Yeah, you know, thank you so much. And I hope you find all the happiness you’ve ever wanted, okay. And I found like, myself on the anniversary of our, like, the, the day that he told me, he loved me, which was the third of July, I found myself calling or no, the second of July I like, called him and totally just was like, I’m doing great, and Chris Seiter 08:43 overcorrecting is the correct term there. You know, overcorrecting, trying to be like, Okay, and how does that go? How does that how does that approach work? Lee 08:54 Horribly, he’s just like, I can’t be with you. And, you know, he told me that he couldn’t see me and that, you know, I was being silly by thinking he didn’t love me. But he just, you know, and he doesn’t have any social media. There’s no way I can really keep in contact with him. There’s no way he can really keep tabs on me. He’s kind of atypical in that way. So yeah, that was a big thing for me. So I’m like, Alright, no contact for 45 days. Chris Seiter 09:29 So you’ve had maybe a couple of false starts during no contact? Yeah. Is this the one that kind of like sticks? Lee 09:37 Yes. Okay. So then, you know, I do the things and I look at me and I go to therapy and I look at myself and my anxious behavior. I try and pick apart him trying to figure out a is this is am I in a narcissistic situation like, is this you know, and I kind of like distill that it wasn’t which was good. I kind of ruled out that he didn’t have any mood disorders or anything like that. He is a slightly neurodivergent or both have like tinges of ADHD I have a diagnosis of ADHD. So yeah, me too. So it’s like, I have some workarounds. But you know, the things changes, you know, as you know, and with a kid, it’s like, oh, but yeah, I spent a lot of time being pretty sorry for myself and feeling like the victim, and then, you know, having to re empower myself and feel better about myself and surround myself with people that understood. So the community was super helpful, because I wasn’t killing the resources that were around me as far as friendships with constant, like conversation about him. Yeah. So the battle battle buddy aspect of this program was super helpful. And, you know, I met some friends. And I was able to utilize that resource. And that was super helpful. And then, I guess what, like, you know, working this program in the sense of, like, keeping with the battle buddies keeping, it was like an exercise in self control. Like, I have to wait until I have the a

I had the pleasure of interviewing “So.” A member of our community who has just gotten her ex back, In the interview we talk about things like, The breakup that led up to the reconciliation. 0:01 Meet the woman who got back together with her ex. The dark times. The first Christmas apart from her boyfriend. The first serious boyfriend. The grieving period before moving forward. 3:32 Being kicked out of the house. The grieving period after the divorce. Crying, ice cream and watching movies. How long it took him to give it his all. How did you find out about the other woman? 7:22 He got back in contact in January this year. He wants to change relationship dynamics. Being kicked to the curb again. How to cope with the no contact situation. What were you doing during the no contact? 11:35 No contact, meetup groups, gym, therapy and therapy. End date for no contact. Breaking the no-contact rule three or four times. Building up a relationship. How to deal with the fear of rejection. 16:00 Mentally and emotionally affected by the cycle. Holding boundaries for yourself. Cold turkey, no contact, no explanation. Fearful avoidance, anxious and avoidant responses. What happened with the other woman? 19:27 What happened with the other woman. How his ex is handling his grief. Holding boundaries and not ignoring calls and texts. No contact for 45 days. Setting the boundary on no contact. 23:22 Breaking up with her boyfriend. No contact, no contact and no contact. Coming out of his shell and asking for her back. Being upfront and honest. Holding boundaries and setting boundaries. 28:54 Hedging his bets with probing questions. Lying on the hook for a bit. The fear of loss aspect worked on him. The difference between this and the previous go-around. Advice on how to get help. 32:16 Getting professional help to make the relationship stronger. Taking responsibility for the relationship. The most important tactics that got her to success. The no contact rule. Interview Transcript: Chris Seiter 00:01 This meeting is being recorded. All right, today, we have a very amazing success story we have. So who has been kind enough to come on here and basically give us the rundown of her entire situation on how her and her ex have gotten back together. So thank you so much for coming in doing this. Yeah, cause so is this is this pretty recent? Like I noticed, like a day ago, you posted in the community? Like, yeah, I got back. He wants to like go seek professional help to kind of work through things. So is this like, are you still riding high? A little bit on on it? So 00:44 Yeah, no, but yeah, it was. Honestly, very unexpected. And you’re literally right, a day ago, pretty well. So. Yeah. Chris Seiter 00:55 Okay. So I mean, why don’t we go back to the dark times? Can you can you kind of take us through the play by play of the breakup and how that went down? And everything that kind of led up to this point? So 01:11 Yeah, so it was Oh, my God, like, honestly, reality TV drama, almost the Ricoh it was, it was a border poll, a lot of things. A lot of it was just arguments, not even getting a relationship. It got to a point where my partner was unemployed for a couple of weeks. And obviously, finances not a great topic for you know, potentially relationships that are breaking down, you got into that topic. And it was just explosive, and just kind of walked away from that. And that was back October 2022. So that was quite a while ago. That was all going on. So yeah, that did mean that like for majority, I think of like Christmas time and everything. It was just first Christmas without him, which was very weird. But Chris Seiter 02:04 How long had you been together before that point? So 02:06 Three and a half years. Chris Seiter 02:10 Okay, so And how old? Are you? So 02:14 So I’m 2222. Chris Seiter 02:15 So, like, was he like your first serious boyfriend? Yes, yes. So so that first Christmas apart must have been really, really difficult. So 02:29 Yeah, yeah. I mean, I just yeah, it was not a great point. I mean, luckily, obviously, you have family around me. So that was pretty nice. But yeah, it just felt so weird. Cuz another factor was our family’s live, like five minutes away, driving time. So it was just kind of knowing the fact that he was so close five, but obviously, you know, we’re not in contact. And that’s the breakups happen. So it’s this kind of single family thing. Chris Seiter 02:59 Yeah. So he initiates the breakup. What does he actually say during that conversation? How does he do it? So 03:08 Um, yeah, so that was very spur of the moment. It was very much we got into an argument about finances and how it’s not marrying up. And it got to a point where he literally talked me out of the house, because we were living together and he was just like, pack of things and go, and I was like, Oh, Chris Seiter 03:28 right. Oh, man. So 03:31 I mean, obviously a lot more upset. I was, yeah, it’s kind of tearing up. I was like, Okay, I got my sister’s picked me up and just Chris Seiter 03:38 Batman. So alright, so you guys have this argument about finances, which obviously, is such a huge stress for not just, you know, like a young couple, but even like married couples, and you know, that, that, that almost always seems to be a huge, huge point of contention. So anyways, you’re kicked out of the house, your sister picks you up? What happens next? Do you immediately start thinking like I want to back or is it more of just a grieving period before you get there? So 04:10 Um, so for that, yeah, for me, it was a grieving period because it was so another thing, it was my first kind of proper relationship as well. So it was kind of understanding where my headspace was that and kind of experiencing actually kind of always being single for like, the first time in quite quite a while. But yeah, my headspace was definitely just kind of like just keep away focus on yourself. Focus on friends and family and just Yeah, hold your head above the water as best you can. Chris Seiter 04:44 I imagine that must have been really difficult, though. To do that. Did you have any like big setbacks? So 04:51 Um, yeah. So I mean, I wasn’t. I think the setback for me was that the house you were in was actually over. by his dad. So it meant I had to be back with my parents, like, time. That was kind of a setback conspicious obviously, not particularly one thing that I think it’s also just, for me, it was just kind of privacy in the sense of like, I want to grieve. But obviously, you know, parents as much as I love them, they kind of want to pry. So your cadence is like I am, but I just need this time to grieve myself and just get out of my system. Yeah, there was a lot of days of like crying and like Ben and Jerry’s ice cream watching movies. Chris Seiter 05:36 All right, we did the whole Netflix thing. So what point do you I’m assuming? So you mentioned to me off off air that you you listen to the podcast? Is that was that like, your entrance into our community in our space? Or was it mostly just like a Google search that that led you? So 06:03 It was a bit of both. It was a bit like I was listening to the podcast, and also some days by you do I do the whole like, Oh, I really wouldn’t back and kind of Google search it. But I think in both those times, I was trying to be as hard as it was, I was trying to be kind of logical and say like, just take a step back, see how you’re feeling. And if you want to do this, do this, but do it for yourself. Not for like anything else, do it? Because you’re nervous, right? And that’s something you really want. And I listen to the podcast really helped with that kind of understanding my mindset and kind of initially being like, Yeah, I do want this. And I think it’s something that we could work through. Kind of Chris Seiter 06:51 so so basically, you’re listening to the podcast every once in a while you’re kind of doing the Google search thing. Do you have any idea of like how long that went on? Before you were like, Okay, I actually want to give this my all. So 07:06 So there, I was kind of initially searching, I probably should preface this by saying this was a very long process. So in terms of Christmas time, December, when all of that was happening. It was back in January this year that he got back in contact, and was like, Hey, let’s have a relationship again. And I was like, at this point, I think I’d signed up to the course I looked through kind of a few of the classes by hopefully, like gone right into it. So I was, at that point, I probably I probably should have been like, let’s just, like, slow it. But I was just like, Yeah, I’m ready. Let’s go on in. And Chris Seiter 07:53 oh, my God, this is like, wow, this was easy. I didn’t have to do anything. He comes back. And I’m assuming it does not end well. So 08:00 No, no, no. So it was quite a weird one. It was He wants you to change the relationship dynamics. We know from relationship. The person that he was kind of in this other relationship with didn’t want to know for relationship. I made that very clear. And that is some awkward times where essentially, he definitely for her. Chris Seiter 08:27 Oh, did you find this after the fact? Did you find this out after the fact? So 08:33 Yeah, so it was it was a weird one where I have a kind of inclination. And yeah, he just just outright he said to me, Oh, I’m leaving you for her. And I was like, wow, Chris Seiter 08:48 my gosh, okay, so So let me get this straight. He breaks up with you in before Christmas, last year. You’re grieving. You’re kind of like in and out of the podcast. At some point, you sign up for the program, like right after you sign up for the program, boom, like a bolt from the blue. He comes out and he’s like, Hey, let’s get back together. And you think like, oh, yeah, absolutely. But then he drops another bombshell which is saying like, hey, I want an open relationship. And then you’re like, No, I do not want

Today I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. John Garrison. A clinical psychologist and body language expert who runs the YouTube channel Dr. G explains. In our interview we discuss, How do you know when someone’s behavior is Ocd? What it means to be caught in the honeymoon period. Understanding body language at its core. How to identify if someone is lying The body language of someone in love with you. How you decipher the body language of aggressive people How can you tell if someone is being serious Understanding narcissistic traits and narcissistic personality disorder. Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:11 so today we’re gonna be talking to Dr. Garrison, who has an MBA and Doctorate in clinical psychology is considered a body language expert and specializes in took specialized training and counterterrorism. His work has been featured in numerous media outlets, including Business Insider, Forbes, vice, Huffington Post, Yahoo News, real, some real simple and fatherly. I mean, I was just sort of like stumbling over myself with how how often you’ve been featured places. Thank you so much for coming. Dr. G 00:40 I’m super happy to be here. Chris Seiter 00:42 So we were talking a little bit before we actually started recording a little bit about how you have a background in diagnosing clinical disorders. Like, I guess, specifically, what I think is interesting to me here is the narcissistic personality disorder. And little bit of the, let’s just talk about the narcissistic personality disorder first, because I have noticed a lot of people in our community will say, Oh, my ex is narcissistic, but I’m not actually convinced to that. I think they just have some narcissistic traits not sure. Can you maybe speak to that a little Dr. G 01:16 bit? Sure. So to make sense of that, I’m going to try to explain what personality disorders are because personality disorders are a little bit different than mental illness. And the way we differentiate that is something like depression, anxiety. The more common disorders that we hear about those are considered mental illness. A personality disorder is a dysfunction of the personality, they’re missing parts of their personality, that allow them to be a whole person to learn from interpersonal interaction, to get better to have a full satisfying life. So people that are missing these parts, they’ll have one part that is very dysfunctional, and it dominates their whole personality. So for a narcissist, for example, for someone with narcissistic personality disorder, grandiosity dominates their entire personality, they are genuinely pathologically grandiose. Historically, people have said, now it’s low self esteem being masked, it’s like no, they have pathologically high self esteem. They genuinely believe if someone is an actual narcissist, they genuinely believe they are better than other people, and other people are there to serve them in a very real way. So when we throw around the term narcissist, I think that can be used as a late term, it can be used casually, but oftentimes, it doesn’t actually mean narcissistic personality. Chris Seiter 02:23 Yeah, I mean, we still, you know, obviously, we’re dealing with a lot of people who are heartbroken. So you know, there’s a lot of blame going on the other side they’ve been broken up with. And sometimes when I’ll talk about narcissists, I’ll talk about how they almost have like a supply Rolodex, where they’re just going from person to person getting their supply, and then moving on to the next person and kind of just they always have like someone for the different areas of their life that they need their, quote unquote, supply for, but I think people will sometimes take it too far and don’t under understand or differentiate that aspect of it. Dr. G 02:58 Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of people and I think fairly so will describe someone as a narcissist, just because they seem focused on themselves. They don’t have good empathy. They’re not caring about their partner or former partner’s feelings. So I get why people use that term. I use it sometimes to describe somebody even if they don’t literally have narcissistic personality. So, you know, I think it’s pretty common that we use that term and I get why people use it. Chris Seiter 03:20 Yeah, Yeah, same. So the other really interesting thing, or at least one of the things I wanted to ask you about is we talk a lot about attachment styles when we’re trying to diagnose or at least like take educated guesses on like, Hey, this is why we think this x is acting this way. And after polling our community most of our community believes that their ex has an avoidant attachment style, but there’s a there’s I think it was like 60% believe that their ex has an avoidant attachment style and then around like 25% believe that their ex has a fearful avoidant attachment style. But everything that I’ve read about fearful avoidance and understand about fearful avoidance, this is incredibly rare. And sometimes it can be mis classified as multiple personality disorder. Kind of just curious want to get your take or thoughts on that. Dr. G 04:06 So when we talk about and I’m not a specialist in attachment theory, but I’m familiar with it. So you know, if we may discuss this a little bit more as we go with when you think about avoidant, avoidant is anxiety really, because anxiety is built around the concept of avoidance, we can’t be anxious and not avoid it just comes with the territory. So someone like a narcissist, they’re not anxious. So if we see someone that we think of as being a narcissist, and that we think that there have avoidant attachment, that’s actually I mean, it’s possible but that’s typically not what we would associate with that. Same with, when we think of the fearful avoidant, there’s a lot of people that think of that as being closer to borderline personality disorder, which is an unstable personality, like that’s the characteristic of borderline personality, this most prevalent is the instability because they struggle being proportional and stable. That’s the challenge there. So actually, though, Even though people oftentimes think of that, because I’ve discussed this with people, borderline personality actually, if that’s Take this too far sideways is actually more of the preoccupied anxious, preoccupied style of attachment because they get obsessive and preoccupied with things. 05:15 Okay, so can you maybe even like talk a little bit more about that or dig a little bit deeper for me about that. That’s interesting, because most of the people that we’ve polled in our community, not only they believe that their ex is avoidant, but they believe that they’re, they’re anxious and preoccupied. Anxious. So like, can you maybe even just talk a bit about that multiple personality disorder aspect from the anxious perspective? And like how that stir of it, I guess, Dr. G 05:40 definitely. Okay. So. So, when you’re talking about multiple personality, are you talking about somebody who is kind of like Jekyll and Hyde, who was like, nice, one minute, and me the next or someone who literally has multiple personalities, just to be super clear on the fact. Chris Seiter 05:53 Okay, so I want to dive into both. But I will say this that most of the time, what our clients would be really interested in is understanding whether X X Hot one moment cold the next moment, got it. So I guess dive into both. Dr. G 06:07 Okay, so. So I’ll talk about the diagnostic piece first, because this is what I’m sure is a little bit less relevant to your listeners. But for someone who has multiple personalities, we call it dissociative identity. It’s where they literally phase between different personalities that don’t recognize each other. I mean, it’s a really serious diagnosis and a very rare with so probably not a lot of Chris Seiter 06:28 people. Have you ever met someone with multiple personality disorder? One that Dr. G 06:32 claims to have it so whether or not I’ve ever met an authentic person with it? I can’t say I’ve, I’ve, I’ve evaluated one person that claims to be experiencing that. But I couldn’t even really fully get clarity on whether or not that was legitimate. So it’s pretty rare. It really is. But but as far as, like someone who is hot, one minute cold the next. So just to get some clarity from you, would it be like that? One minute, they’re, they’re caring and close? And then one minute, they’re angry and aloof? I mean, is that sort of what you’re talking about? Chris Seiter 07:10 Yeah, usually it’s, you know, they’re doing something that makes the client believe, Oh, they’re interested in coming back. And then, and then, I mean, I certainly have my own thoughts about like, why this is happening. But I’m just curious, and I don’t want to like, infect your your thinking at all. But basically, they’re doing something that makes the client believe like, Oh, they’re interested in coming back, and then all of a sudden, they disappear, or they even just lash out and grow angry. Dr. G 07:37 So one of the things that can make somebody do that? Well, it’s kind of okay, so here’s where I’m struggling with this. Because I’m thinking about this, as we’re talking, I see a lot of couples, and there’s always there’s so many reasons for people’s behaviors. But one of the reasons that we see when someone is hot and cold like that, it can be because they’re manipulative, and because they want to have control. So they want to maybe throw some strings out and lead people on. For some people, it’s because they are anxious, and they just don’t know what to do. So it really depends so much person to person, but there’s there really is a wide variety of, of behaviors that can explain what we’re talking about. Chris Seiter 08:14 Yeah, I think I think the context here would be going through a breakup. Okay. So the way I’ve always kind of tried to explain it to people, and maybe you would just sort of correct me if I’m wron

Today I have an amazing success story of one of our clients who rebuilt herself and as a result got her ex back. Meet Ashley! Her situation essentially ran the gamut on “ex back scenarios.” I mean, just listen to this: She was high school sweethearts with her ex She lived together with him The bought an entire restaurant together He blocked her after the breakup That’s essentially half of the most difficult situations all wrapped up into one. Here’s how she got him back. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Interview Transcript: Chris Seiter 00:02 Okay, so today we have a another success story interview. Today we’re gonna be talking to Ashley. And the interesting thing about Ashley is I know probably as much about her situation is you listening to this? So this is gonna be an awesome interview. But thank you so much for doing this actually. Ashley 00:21 Yeah, of course. Chris Seiter 00:23 So like, why don’t you just sort of take us back to the beginning and tell us like a little bit about your relationship and your breakup? And what happened after that? Ashley 00:32 Yeah, so um, we were together for 206 years at the time that we broke up. So we were together for quite some time, literally, since end of high school senior year we’ve been together. And we’re kind of Chris Seiter 00:49 going so you’re like, high school sweethearts? Yes. Oh, that’s awesome. Okay, sorry. 00:58 No, it’s okay. And we are going through a transition in our life to where we, we bought a restaurant at a time, we both pretty much quit our jobs to do that, we had to move at the same time. It was also the time when the market was going crazy. So while we were trying to find a place near the restaurant, we were staying with his family. And I’ve always been on my own, so kind of been with, like, confined like that. I guess it just, I didn’t realize I would take a toll on me as well as our relationship. But once that started happening with the stress of the restaurant stress of being a whole new environment just being so when I felt like constricted, it puts so much tension on our relationship, and just ourselves as individuals. And it just kind of spiraled out for the both of us. And for his way of coping things as he’s from what I read from your program is a distance. avoidant or Chris Seiter 02:14 dismissive. Yeah. But, you know, I could see, you know, the distant, dismissive, you know, same depth, right? Ashley 02:25 Yes. For me, I was an anxious attachment. So, when there was conflict, I would be the one that was like, Okay, let’s, let’s figure this out. Let’s figure this out. And then my nerves will get high. Meanwhile, he would just shut down and be like, No, I don’t want to talk. And he would go days without talking. Meanwhile, I’m like, suffering in silence. Yeah. So I knew that that wasn’t good. Dynamic, ended up, blowing up. And I went and stay with some family out like two hours away from where we were, and for the weekend, and when, during that time, I was staying with them. He pretty much was like, come get your things. I’m gonna I’m gonna leave them on the side of the road. Like, I want to, I want you out. Like, now, and I, at that time, and these were all text messages. So I, I couldn’t even fathom just reading them. So I had my, my family. I was like you, you read them? And you tell me if I need to, like, do anything. And they were pretty much were like, yeah, so we got to figure something out. So I went and I picked up all my belongings, and I Chris Seiter 03:47 like he literally kicked you to the curb. Like even your belongings. Yeah, everything. Well, yeah. Okay. Ashley 03:54 So, yeah, so it was it was not, oh, it was not good. I like, and at that time, I didn’t have a place to go. So I was bouncing. Back from my family. I was two hours away and staying in my brother’s place. And by this this same time, like we had already given the keys back for the restaurant, because it was just, there was too much drama with that. And I was reminded, Chris Seiter 04:22 do you mind if I ask you a question about that? So you guys, yeah. Did you sell this restaurant back? Or like, how did that dynamic work exactly with buying this restaurant? Yeah, Ashley 04:31 we pretty much we were like in a contract before because it was already in a lease with the previous owner. And so we were in a contract with her. And at the end of that lease term, we were going to pay the remaining off of the restaurant and resign everything into our names. So at that point, it was just conjoined ownership with the previous owner. Right was signed as like a silent partner. But she wasn’t very silent. So we were like, okay, they’d never open. She wouldn’t let us. Yeah, she wouldn’t let us hire people or anything like that. And when we walked in there, it was just me my other half, and then we had one, one server. So we had a lot to build up on. Chris Seiter 05:24 But and so obviously, that creates a very stressful environment. Ashley 05:29 Yeah, especially when he has one way of thinking, I have one way of thinking when it comes to business. So very two different entities. But it was just too much. And then the landlord on top of it was just seeing too much. So we’re like, you know what, here’s the keys. Good luck, have fun. So I decided I was going to take some time away from work and go back to school full time, because I took time away off from school, to run the restaurant. And so I didn’t have a job at the time that I was kicked out, I also didn’t have a place to stay. So I had to, like rebuild everything. Which helps me in the time of not communicating, not reaching out, it was really hard to not reach out because I just kept questioning in my head like how, like this is it? This isn’t like him, like this isn’t his character? Why? I just, you know, I had so many unanswered questions. But I just kept religiously, just going through your podcasts and reading everything trying to keep my mind occupied. And then on top of that, I had to focus on school, I had to focus on finding a place and everything else. So that was kind of a little bit of a distraction. Yeah, but it was pretty strenuous. Chris Seiter 06:55 So. So you’ve obviously kind of come into the orbit, you started learning about the No Contact Rule and the attachment styles, and you’re listening to podcasts and everything. So you’re, you’re kind of implementing what you’re, you know, the no contact at this point of the story, right? Ashley 07:11 Yes, yes, I was actually implementing it prior to being kicked out. I did. I was reading things prior. So I had an idea, but I was also kind of being forced into it, because he wouldn’t talk to me, and we were under the same roof. So I did the best I could to not cross paths with him. While like I was staying in a completely different room. And whenever he would come home, I, I wouldn’t be seen I would be in my room. And when he left and as typically, you know, I would try my best to not cross paths. Now there was a point in time it was I was doing the no contact before I actually discovered your program, because I was just doing research of like, how can I get myself like, in a in a better spot with when, when there’s like kind of a breakup, essentially, it’s what it was at that time. And I heard the No Contact Rule. So it’s like, okay, you know what, let me just create this distance, because we’ve never really had that distance. And it was a fun day. I think like 16 the first time. Before I got before I left the house. We actually crossed paths in the gym. And he, like I’ve never said anything I didn’t even turn around to acknowledge him. I just kept going on walking into the gym, and I was doing my thing. I had a hair appointment later that afternoon. And shortly after that, he texted me saying, Hey, can we talk? And it took me a few hours respond, because I didn’t know if I wanted to respond yet. And he just he sent me like question mark. So I’m like, holy can’t keep ignoring him. Chris Seiter 09:04 So you broke you broke down on day? 16? Ashley 09:08 Yeah, yeah. So I broke down day 16. I said, Yeah, we can talk. So when I came home, we did talk and he was saying how he didn’t want me out of his life, things like that. But shortly after that, it’s all rolled out. And that’s when I started back on the no contact. And me being out of the house definitely made it so much easier to not be able to do that. He also had blocked me on social media. So it wasn’t, I couldn’t reach out to him. Well, it’s Chris Seiter 09:43 interesting. You’re taking off so many boxes here. I have your high school sweethearts. You worked together. You live together. Now you’re telling me you were blocked. Yes. And you kind of you kind of got it seems like to me, you kind of got like minigames get back together. After the 60 days, he kind of asked for you back, but then that obviously didn’t last. Is that accurate? Ashley 10:06 Yeah, it was not entirely. He was pretty much just saying that he needed to figure themselves out. But he knew that he didn’t want things to end maybe to just slowly, like get back into. Chris Seiter 10:21 Oh, so he’s keeping you on the hook, essentially, then Ashley 10:24 yeah, that’s exactly what that was. Yeah. Chris Seiter 10:27 So okay, so you spiraled out of control. Now, you’re telling me that you’ve moved out? Yeah. Ashley 10:34 And from that point, I just, I kind of just had in my mind that I needed especially with all the anxiety that I was struggling with, I knew even from prior to that, that I wanted to get rid of this anxiety there was, it was not how I was prior, I was like, this isn’t who I am, I need to change this. So taking that separation, I start focusing back on school, like I said, I was finding a place I did fin

This is a complete breakdown of the major reasons why walking away is so powerful. In all, my team and I have found seven distinct reasons that we’d like to talk about today, Allows You To Take Them Off The Pedestal The No Contact Triad Success Stories Consistently Cite That “Outgrowing An Ex Is Key” Gives The Avoidant A Chance For Nostalgic Reverie To Kick In You Are Setting A Firm Boundary You Finally Have Space To Heal You Are Removing Yourself From A Potentially Toxic Situation There’s quite a bit to cover today so I’m just going to dive right in! What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Reason #1: Allows You To Take Them Off The Pedestal A few weeks ago my wife and I partnered up on writing an article about codependence and noticed that many of our clients exhibit codependent tendencies. Basically their entire world revolves around their breakup, their partner, or their ex. This creates what I call the pedestal effect. Here’s a video I did on it, So what we’re always trying to caution our clients against is the idea of putting your ex or partner on a pedestal. You want them to be equal to you or perhaps a little bit below. The goal is not to punch above your weight class, so to speak. However, in some codependent relationships, things can shift. What might have started as you being above or equal to them on the pedestal can change. Suddenly, you find yourself below them on the pedestal, and you have placed them above you on your own pedestal. Essentially, by walking away, you can attempt to reclaim your position and knock them off that pedestal, so that you both stand on equal footing. Reason #2: The No Contact Triad One of the things we always recommend to our clients after a breakup is to implement a period of no contact, which can also be interpreted as walking away. This can be scary for a lot of people, but what many don’t realize about the no contact rule is that it incorporates three specific strategies: The theory of reactance The informational gap theory The Zeigarnik effect Let’s do a quick breakdown of these. Theory Of Reactance The theory of reactance is based on the psychological principle that people don’t like it when their behavioral freedoms are taken away. You can read more about it here. When this happens, they are more likely to respond in a way that seeks to regain that freedom. By initiating the no contact rule, you are not engaging in communication with your ex, effectively taking away their behavioral freedom to converse with you. This can trigger some exes to take actions to regain that freedom, sometimes resulting in unexpected reactions. Like this, (Yes, this was a real screenshot from our community!) However, it’s important to note that most exes don’t reach out at all during the no contact period. Thus, reactance actually does seem to be the exception to the rule. Information Gap This suggests that what your ex doesn’t know about you creates curiosity and prompts them to seek answers. They may not directly approach you, but instead, observe from afar or even enlist friends to gather information. This has happened to me. Back in 2008 when I was around 18 years old, I went through my very first breakup. During that time, I used to never talk to my ex’s best friend. However, all of a sudden, the best friend started calling me and probing for information about “how I was doing.” It turned out she was doing so on behalf of my ex, trying to gather details about how I was doing. All because of the information gap. Last but certainly not least is… The Zeigarnik Effect This states that people remember interrupted or incomplete tasks better than completed ones. The desire for closure or to finish unfinished business can become a strong driving force. By denying your ex the opportunity to gain closure, the unfulfilled task of achieving closure can upset them and potentially increase their desire to come back. Reason #3: Success Stories Consistently Cite Outgrowing Their Ex As Key It’s often said in the breakup industry as a cliché that if you should “Just move on from your ex.” Do that and they’ll come back… Simple, right? Well…. Ironically, this cliché is often proven to be true. One aspect I take pride in, particularly within our community, is making the interviews I’ve conducted with success stories readily available for listening. During these interviews, my main goal is to uncover what strategies worked for them. It doesn’t matter to me whether they used our program or not; I simply want to understand what led to their success. Over time, I’ve noticed consistent themes and patterns that emerge. The no contact rule is a major theme in every success story I’ve interviewed. While it’s possible that this emphasis on no contact is because of our influence in their lives, we can’t ignore the fact that implementing no contact and walking away appears to be crucial. However, the larger theme that I’ve observed is that those who are able to successfully outgrow their ex reach a point where they question whether they even want their ex back. It’s at this stage that things start to fall into place for them. Outgrowing an ex becomes a pivotal factor in their journey. Reason #4: It Gives The Avoidant Nostalgic Reverie A Chance To Kick In I want to bring up coach Amor here because she raised an important question that her clients often ask her when she tells them to outgrow their exes. The question was, what if walking away makes your ex give up on you or forget about you, or it makes them move on because they can sense you’re moving on? My response: You actually want them to think you’re moving on. Statistics and internal polls within our community indicate that many of our clients have avoidant exes. Avoidant individuals typically don’t allow themselves to miss someone until that person becomes unavailable, once they’re out of the relationship. The code is essentially this: once you have moved on to a point where the avoidant thinks they don’t have to worry about getting back together with you, that’s when the avoidant starts experiencing nostalgic reverie. I basically made an entire video on my YouTube channel arguing this singular point: Ironically, it is during this period of nostalgia that the concept of the phantom ex comes into play. It serves as a mechanism for avoidant individuals to maintain distance, avoiding commitment while engaging in daydreams from a safe distance. As strange as it may sound, we have discovered that the reason outgrowing your ex is so effective in breakup scenarios is due to the avoidant aspect. When you outgrow your ex, they perceive that you no longer desire them. This realization can trigger a sense of longing and daydreaming about you, resulting in that nostalgic reverie. This state of nostalgia often leads to a specific action that we frequently hear about: when someone has moved on, found happiness in a new relationship, and suddenly their ex, whom they once wanted back, starts texting them. However, the irony lies in the fact that, by that point, you no longer have the same desire for them. Reason #5: Setting Firm Boundaries Once again I’d like to bring up that article that my wife and I worked on together, we discussed codependency and the struggles individuals with codependency issues face when it comes to setting boundaries. This is particularly evident in on-again, off-again relationships. The on-again, off-again cycle occurs because one person walks away, and the other person chases. By setting firm boundaries, you prevent this cycle from continuing. I understand it’s easier said than done, but often the reason boundaries aren’t firm is due to a lack of accompanying actions. To use an analogy, it’s like rewarding a dog with a treat after it bites you. If you have an ex who consistently mistreats you and behaves poorly, why would you continue chasing after them? Instead, set the boundary and back it up with action. Let them know you won’t allow them to treat you that way, and instead of telling them the consequences, show them the consequences. Often, the consequence is walking away and being okay with it. Reason #6: It Finally Gives You Space To Heal By starting the no contact rule, walking away, you get out of the picture and gain a clearer sense of what has really happened. It doesn’t mean you’re going to be totally okay afterward or that your feelings will vanish. It’s not like that, but you will become less emotional about it. It will be easier for you to establish a new routine if you stop talking to the other person because you’re not really helping yourself start over if you keep doing what you used to do, if you keep talking to your ex and placing yourself in the friend zone. When you keep talking to them, you’re giving them your attention and time, which are two of the most valuable things you can give to another person because time cannot be retrieved. It’s literally the most valuable resource you have. That’s why, when it comes to commitment, I believe that the most important aspect of gaining a commitment from someone is obtaining a share of their time. This is a concept I’ve talked about in my commitment guide. If they invest a lot of time and energy into you, giving you their attention, it usually indicates they are more invested because we want our time to be used wisely. Reason #7: It Allows You To Remove Yourself From A Toxic Situation There are countless ways to approach this, but the prevailing thought that comes to mind is that many people come to us believing that our sole purpose is to help them get their ex back. However, that’s not entirely true. What we’re actually trying to do is help you get yourself back. To go from this: To this: My team and I are not going to sit there and encourage y

This is a complete guide to the major stages of heartbreak after a breakup. In this in-depth guide, you’re going to learn, About the science of heartbreak What I believe to be the 8 stages of grief after a breakup What the most challenging stage is after a breakup How long you can expect the typical heartbreak period to last So, if you’re ready to learn about the significant stages of heartbreak, this is the guide for you. Let’s begin. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz The Science Of Heartbreak The first thing you need to understand is we need to set the stage for what’s going on inside of your body. And to set the stage for what’s going on inside your body, we need to look at the various chemicals or, rather, the various players. And ultimately, those boil down to: Cortisol Dopamine Norepinephrine And Serotonin. All right, so a quick crash course on each one. Cortisol is considered a stress hormone. So often, you’ll find that it’s exceptionally elevated during breakups. Dopamine is actually associated with pleasure, reward, arousal, and desire. We often see this often with the honeymoon period at the beginning of a relationship. Norepinephrine is about increasing memory for new stimuli, but it just makes you extra excitable. Once again, very common to see this during the honeymoon period. And then, finally, we have serotonin. Serotonin is cortisol’s foil. So cortisol is the stress hormone that makes you almost obsessive-compulsive after a breakup. Serotonin is considered a mood stabilizer, and it helps stop OCD from occurring. Okay, now that we have sort of the stage set, let’s talk about what happens at the outset of a breakup. So at the very beginning of a relationship, a lot of the chemicals your brain will release into your body are elevated. Cortisol will be slightly elevated, but dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin are significantly elevated. And this is what creates the euphoria of a honeymoon period. In the middle of a relationship, those various chemicals come back down to normal levels. Heartbreak is a little bit different. When you go through a breakup, dopamine, norepinephrine, and, most importantly, serotonin go way down, and cortisol goes way up. This is important because cortisol creates a potentially significant issue for you when it becomes highly elevated. So one of the best quotes I’ve seen on cortisol after a breakup happened was from this particular man named Jamie Lee, who was featured in an article for bodyandsoul.com. He argued that, on average, it can take three to four hours for your cortisol levels to return to normal after a stress response. So let’s say you get into an argument or have a high-stakes meeting, and your cortisol shoots up, but after three or four hours, it returns to normal. But if your levels have been high for some time, it can take up to six months to balance them out. On average, it’s only supposed to take you three hours. But imagine you’re going through something so stressful that it keeps cortisol in this elevated state. In that case, the cortisol takes so much longer to level out. And this is the core foundation for why people struggle so much during breakups. The breakup is obviously stressful. It triggers cortisol to stay in that elevated state for an extended period. And if it’s in that state for a long time, what happens? You will be very, very stressed for the next six months. There’s just no way around it. Let’s move on to the eight stages of grief after a breakup. Understanding The Eight Stages Of Heartbreak After A Breakup This one requires an introduction. I was inspired by this article I found on Psychology Today, written by a clinical psychologist named Susan Lachmann. She argues that we always know the five stages of grief after a breakup. But when it comes to breakups, she claims there are seven grief stages. And I’ve written about this in the past, but the more I’ve sat and thought about it, the more I would like to alter her stages. It’s not that I disagree with them. I actually do agree with them. I just think they’re not ordered correctly. And there’s one stage that is missing. So to give you a reference, her seven stages are as follows, Desperate for answers Denial Bargaining Relapse Anger Initial Acceptance Redirected Hope I love these stages, but for me, there are eight stages. So, here are my eight stages. Desperation Pain and Guilt Bargaining Anger Depression Initial Acceptance Relapse Actual Acceptance So let’s take a moment and go through each one of these because I feel like each one merits an explanation. Stage #1: Desperation So stage one is considered the desperation stage. This is where you are desperate for answers after a breakup. The most common marker you are in this stage is frantically going to Google or YouTube to search for breakup information. Why you’re feeling, what you’re feeling, how to get your ex back, ways to trick your ex back, You find yourself typing into Google all these things that you would never have thought you were capable of typing. And it’s all just because you’re desperate to understand what happened. Here’s the funny thing. My team and I have found that most of our clients have anxious attachment styles. And the fascinating marker for someone with an anxious attachment style is they are very big on trying to solve problems. And it fits, you know, if you’re desperate for answers, you’re going to Google or YouTube to solve a problem. So that’s the desperation stage. Stage #2: Pain And Guilt This will be where you start to notice many of those anxious triggers coming into play. Desperation Fear of abandonment Begging Pleading Seeking re-assurance But more than anything I want to turn your attention to what I consider to be codependent shaming. So my wife and I recently wrote this great article on how to handle codependence after a breakup. We personally believe many of our clients tend to be too codependent. And as a result, they shame themselves and have these negative self-beliefs that they trap themselves with. And this is pretty common for someone who is codependent. They rely too much on that particular relationship for their well-being and self-esteem. And when that relationship ends or that specific person who their entire world revolves around leaves them, They find themselves dwelling on every perceived problem they believe is their fault, consequently driving their anguish and guilt to unbearable levels. The emotional aftermath of the breakup is excruciating; they’re grieving, deeply immersed in the mourning process. They’re laden with guilt over issues that may not even be their responsibility. Stage #3: Bargaining The third stage is where you enter into my orbit. This is where you determine that you will get back with your ex. You think to yourself; I’ve been doing all the searching. I’ve read Chris’s stuff. I’ve listened to his podcast. I’ve listened to his interview success stories. And you know what? This is possible. I can do this for myself. I know the path forward. This is the bargaining stage. Now, it’s not to say that you can’t succeed. I’m not insinuating that at all in this discussion. I’m just working through the journey that most of our clients typically go through. So this is where you are set on returning with your ex. Simple as that. And then, of course, at some part, stage four is going to occur. And that’s anger. Stage #4: Anger If I’m candid with you, I put anger in here because it is a normal part of the grieving process. But a lot of times, I find that our clients do not get angry with their exes. As I mentioned earlier, most of my clients find their way to me during the bargaining stage, typically when they’re trying to reconcile with their ex. For many, the perspective is not that their ex is incapable of wrongdoing but that they harbor no significant resentment towards them. The onset of anger usually emerges when their initial attempts to win back their ex prove unsuccessful. This is a common experience among those who seek my guidance. Then they get angry, not at their ex, but at the situation. They lash out. Sometimes they blame me. Recently, there were a couple of examples in our community where I didn’t get back to people quick enough with answers, and they grew incredibly frustrated. I see this all the time; it’s pervasive. And I don’t even take it personally because I understand everyone’s going through this. Stage #5: Depression I don’t know if I should go deep into this because you need to understand the roller coaster someone is going through up to this point. They’re incredibly desperate initially, so they’re at a negative. Then they feel pain and guilt; they’re even more negative. Then they enter that bargaining stage. As odd as it sounds, bargaining gives them some hope. They start looking online and at stories of people who have succeeded in getting their exes back. So that is looked at as a positive. And then anger occurs, which is in between a positive and negative because there are instances where anger can make you feel better. But obviously, it’s not great as a whole to live in this angry state. So after that roller coaster comes depression, and what I’m finding at this point is that your cortisol is incredibly elevated, as we talked about in the science of heartbreak section of this discussion. And one thing we know about elevated cortisol is it makes you so much more susceptible to depression. So one of the jobs I’m constantly working on with my clients is helping them find ways to lower that cortisol because we don’t want them in a depressed state. Stage #6: Initial Acceptance The stage of initial acceptance essentially arrives when you decide, “I’m not sure I can get them back anymore.” Th

This is a complete list of the top female behaviors after a breakup. And no, the items on this list weren’t randomly chosen just because we felt like it. Each and every one of them was either experienced firsthand by me or one of our coaches, or I actually found research to back it up. Here are the common behaviors females are likely to exhibit after a breakup, More susceptible to anxious behaviors Are better at emotional expression End up recovering more fully after a breakup Won’t go on the rebound as often as men The glow down phase The glow up phase Getting stuck in the relapse stage Let’s dive right in What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Behavior #1: More Susceptible To Anxious Behaviors So, the first thing I’ve noticed is that women tend to exhibit more anxious behaviors or engage in certain actions. While researching for this article, I realized that I hadn’t answered a fundamental question about attachment styles. It has always been apparent that most of our clients have anxious attachment styles, while their exes tend to have avoidant attachment styles. Anxious client, Avoidant ex, However, I wanted to explore the breakdown of these attachment styles based on gender roles. Do women tend to have more anxious attachment styles compared to men? I delved into research and discovered that it argues, Women indeed tend to have more anxious attachment styles than men. This finding sheds light on the next aspect we’re going to discuss, which further supports this notion. Women, especially after a breakup, tend to display more anxious behaviors. If you aren’t familiar with what that looks like then allow me to give you a quick crash course, They’ll seek constant re-assurance Become overly clingy or dependent Constantly fear you’ll abandon them Get jealous Become possessive Overanalyze Be quick to emotional fluctuations But by far the biggest thing I’ve witnessed women do after a breakup is exhibit what I refer to as “Gnatting” behaviors, which is an acronym I came up with for G.N.A.T. (Going Nuts at Texting). G- Going N- Nuts A- At T- Texting But this leads me to my next question: Why?  Why are women more susceptible to anxious behaviors? Behavior #2: Women Are Better At Emotional Expression Is it the concept of the core wound? Well, ya that’s part of it. But I also believe another factor is the second significant behavior we’ve noticed women experience after a breakup. It’s the fact that they are generally better at emotional expression. Women tend to openly express their feelings more compared to men. Consequently, after a breakup, they often discuss it with their friends or family members, which can aid in processing their emotions and facilitating a quicker healing process. On the other hand, men have been socially conditioned to suppress their emotions, which can prolong the healing journey. Interestingly, a study conducted by Binghamton University in New York sheds light on this phenomenon. The study revealed that women experience more pain during a breakup but eventually achieve more complete recovery. This finding, to me, highlights another significant behavior exhibited by women. They may initially feel greater distress, but ultimately, they recover more fully. Behavior #3: Women Recover More Fully After A Breakup What’s fascinating about these first three behaviors in women is the synergy that exists among them. Think of causality. The cause and effect of the situation. Females tend to be better at emotional expression. (which leads them to) Exhibit more anxious attachment behaviors (but because of that outward expression) They tend to get over breakup more fully. Have you ever come across that meme depicting how men and women handle breakups? It portrays men being initially ecstatic and women in tears, but then it reverses as time passes. Surprisingly, there is often some truth to these memes. The Binghamton study suggests that because men internalize their emotions and lack open communication and support systems, as dictated by societal norms, their healing process is prolonged. In contrast, women feel the full spectrum of emotions, possess better emotional expression, and have support systems in place, leading to a more thorough recovery from breakups. So, while they may feel worse initially, the positive aspect is that they tend to overcome it more completely. Behavior #4: They Tend NOT To Go On The Rebound (Men Do) The next significant behavior I’ve noticed among women after a breakup relates to their tendency not to engage in rebound relationships, whereas men often do. I came across an intriguing divorce statistic that argued, Men are more likely to seek rebound relationships following a divorce, while women generally do not. This observation has been consistent in our coaching practice as well. Although we don’t encounter many women or men attempting to recover relationships after marriage, it has occurred. However, when it comes to breakups, we have frequently seen female clients implementing the “being there” method. The “being there” method is a strategy we developed for situations where one’s ex has moved on to someone else. Interestingly, we have noticed a higher number of women utilizing the “being there” method compared to men. I believe this relates back to the fact that women tend to refrain from entering rebound relationships as frequently as men. It’s not to say that women never engage in rebounds, but men appear to do so more often. I attribute this pattern to the avoidant cycle, which I often discuss using my “avoidant death wheel” model consisting of eight stages. As individuals progress through these stages, the avoidant (who we often find to be the exes of our clients) reaches a point where they start missing their former partner, and the grief from the breakup begins to surface. At this juncture, they have a choice: either confront and process their emotions, something women tend to excel at, or distract themselves. Rebounding is often a way of seeking distraction. We have observed that fearful avoidants are more susceptible to rebounding, although avoidants in general may also engage in this behavior. Interestingly, according to the research, rebound relationships tend not to last very long. They have a relatively low success rate, with only 19% of rebound relationships lasting beyond two years. So, in the long run, a rebound relationship is unlikely to endure for an extended period. Nevertheless, men are more inclined to pursue rebounds as a means of temporarily forgetting or processing their grief. Behavior #5: The “Glow Down” Phase Now, the next two breakup behaviors exhibited by women are closely interconnected. The glow down phase The glow up phase They care considered separate, but they can almost be combined into one simple behavior if that makes any sense. To truly understand this, we need to explore a crossroads that individuals face during a breakup. At this crossroads, one can either experience a “glow down” or a “glow up.” Let’s first discuss the glow down phase. What is the glow down phase? Essentially, it’s when someone reaches a crossroads and allows the grief and trauma of the breakup to negatively impact them. They may engage in unhealthy behaviors such as excessive drinking, smoking, or seeking validation through multiple casual encounters. Ultimately, these behaviors serve as distractions. Similar to men who may be inclined to pursue rebound relationships, women also resort to unhealthy coping mechanisms to deal with the pain and trauma they’re experiencing. Unfortunately, they neglect what we refer to as the Holy Trinity, a concept we emphasize emphatically here at Ex Boyfriend Recovery. Instead of actively working on improving different aspects of their lives, they engage in actions that may provide temporary relief but do not contribute to long-term growth. For instance, Coach Amor (in the podcast attached to this article above) shared the story of her friend on our podcast, who thought drinking socially would help her relationships, but it ultimately influenced her social circle negatively and hindered progress in other areas of her life. This phase, known as the glow down, worsens one’s situation as it involves engaging in behaviors that do not lead to genuine improvement. Now, let’s turn to the other side of the coin, the glow up phase. Behavior #6: The “Glow Up” Phase Coach Amor made an insightful point during our discussion about this phase. She mentioned that sometimes one has to go through a glow down before they can experience a glow up. It’s about allowing yourself to be broken by the breakup, hitting rock bottom, and then beginning the journey of self-recovery. This is where the glow up phase comes into play. During this phase, individuals wholeheartedly embrace the Holy Trinity concept. Amor herself generously shared her own breakup experience, describing how she initially went through a glow down phase, engaging in negative behaviors and neglecting the Trinity, despite being aware of its importance. However, once she reached rock bottom, she shifted gears and decided to rebuild her life. She focused on balancing different aspects of her Trinity, creating momentum that gradually gained strength. Ultimately, her self-confidence grew. This is the key we strive for when assisting our clients through breakups – helping them reach a point where they are not only okay with their ex, but also content with being single. They become confident in the knowledge that a successful relationship awaits them in the future. This is the essence of the glow up phase. By working on oneself internally, positive external changes begin to manifest. Finally, let’s address the last significant behavior, Behavior #7: Getting St

Today Coach Amor and I will be breaking down this concept of pushing and pulling during a breakup. More specifically, We’re going to define it Show you our push pull equation Look at the healthy way of utilizing push/pull Look at the toxic ways in which it’s utilized Show you how to implement it during the rapport building phase And most importantly have you sign up for coaching with Amor! There’s a lot to cover here so let’s jump right into it. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Interview Transcript Summary SUMMARY KEYWORDS pull, give, push, people, response, toxic, mirroring, negative, strategy, love, ghosting, positive response, implement, girls, pace, reach, move, argument, bare minimum, interesting SPEAKERS Amor, Chris Seiter Chris Seiter 00:00 ready? Okay, today, a more and I are going to be talking about the push pull method of flirting as it relates the breakup situation. How are we doing today? We’re Amor 00:17 doing great. I’m excited for topic today. It’s very interesting. Chris Seiter 00:22 So I want everyone listening to this to know that more, and I spent an hour. And I literally, I don’t know if you know this more, but I timed it. You can see my screen here. I timed it below. It’s an hour and five minutes. Yeah, this outline. We barely have anything. No, I’m just kidding. Amor 00:40 We had a lot of arguments. We did. Chris Seiter 00:43 We did. And actually, what a great segue. Our very first argument was revolving around defining push and pull. Yeah. So so we had a fundamental difference on what push and pull meant. So I believe I think you need to Amor 00:59 adjust that. Okay. Some people might have the same idea as I did. Chris Seiter 01:05 Yeah, you know, it is kind of confusing because of the way they I’ve also heard it referred to as rubber banding, which might actually be an accurate way of looking at it. But of course, push and pull is the keyword people type into Google. So that’s the one we got to play with. Anyways, basically, this is funny, this is the big argument that I’m worn, I had basically for like 15 minutes. And I think I won the argument after I pulled up like multiple references, or at least a reference. But basically, I believed that pushing was essentially the kin to ghosting someone or avoiding someone and pulling was kind of like love bombing or showing a lot of interest. But a more had this wacky other way of thinking about it. And now tag your it because I don’t even know how to explain that. Amor 01:53 In my point of view, when you push, it’s not your it’s your time of giving so much investing so much giving attention, you know, texting a lot, calling a lot, showing up a lot. And then when you pull, you suddenly take it all back. It’s a very toxic way. But that’s how manipulators do it in their mind. They’re investing investing, investing in the receivers point of view. That’s the push and when they pull away when everything is gone when they’re bread, crumbing or ghosting, that’s the pull away stage. That’s actually yeah, I realized that’s wrong. I mean, that’s not the right definition. I just really did it that that. Chris Seiter 02:35 So the thing is, I see what you’re talking about. But for the purposes of this discussion, we’re gonna go with my definition, since I think that’s probably the most accurate one. Not to say you’re wrong, but you’re wrong. Amor 02:52 I am wrong. Okay, but defeat. Chris Seiter 02:55 Finally, God only took an hour. Okay, so basically, for the purpose of this discussion, push is going to be ghosting. Polling is going to be kind of love bombing. And we kind of came up with this fun little equation about really, I don’t know, maybe if equation is the right word, but basically a frame of reference to look at pushing and pulling. And, and it was actually a Moore, who had this really intriguing way of looking about how girls and guys kind of handle relationships. Yeah, so why don’t you go ahead and take that. Amor 03:33 I used to hear this a lot from other women. not that old, but since high school. And you know, how, you know, how is the courtship starts with men pursuing the flirting stage. And we don’t know this that, at first, the guys are, sometimes they’re always into it, like, they move too fast. They give everything and when they’re excited, you know, they want to do everything they plan everything they want to see you always what the girls are not aware of is that the guys set the direction of the relationship or the courtship stage, but the girl should be the one that’s deciding about the pace of how, you know how everything goes, That guy set the direction the girl set the pace. So in that way, you’re both incorporating the push pull equation, because if you’re, but most of the time, girls are not aware of that. They just let the guy pursue and pursue and then in some cases, if if the guy is toxic, if the guy is manipulative, they know that the more they invest, they’re gonna, they’re gonna hook you in and then that’s when they ghost you or they read Chrome, you now you’re confused. There’s only one person is implementing the push and pull. The guy is setting the direction and he’s also setting that He’s so yeah, just to share girls, you need to be aware of that you should be the one setting the pace. And I think you gave a better example on how to implement it equally, because I didn’t I wasn’t even. I didn’t realize that we can. You know, the guys are the one that’s the guy should allow the girl, I think you need to talk about that more. Okay. Chris Seiter 05:27 So yeah, I mean, believe it or not, I’ve been doing this for 10 years. It was the first time I had ever heard this take on relationship dynamics, and I loved it. So Amor 05:37 I think it’s more of a cultural thing. Because in Asian, you know, in Asian culture, the guy should be the pursuer. It’s not encouraged for the girls to pursue. You’re allowed. Chris Seiter 05:51 Yeah, yeah. I mean, I can’t tell you how often people want to crucify me for saying like, Oh, yeah, no, you reach out first, especially if they’re women. They’re like, No, but no. So I don’t necessarily think it’s just Asian culture. I think it’s almost as a universal thing. But yeah, so Amor 06:04 basically, your wraps in the topic of, you know, feminine and masculine energy. right into that. Chris Seiter 06:12 I think they are Amor 06:13 interrupting you. Okay, good. Chris Seiter 06:17 So yeah, basically, the argument you were making is like, Guys, in general, in relationships, they’re thinking about the direction you know, where to go, what to do natural. So like, they have this, this natural inclination to want to move really fast. They, they’re kind of in love with this pursuit stage. Whereas girls, on the other hand, they’re all about the pace of the relationship, which I really love that you talked about that. So like, you know, oftentimes they’ll say, you know, that date doesn’t work for me, or I’m not ready for that. So they kind of dictate the pace, but Amor 06:45 we’re worried about it, but we love it, that you move fast, but we are worried about it. Chris Seiter 06:51 You’re kind of like slow down their head honcho? You know, we’re not, we’re not quite ready for that yet. But yeah, more than I had this really another one of the big debates we had when we were kind of like outlining this topic was the healthy ways of push pull, and the toxic ways of push pulling. And I think that was that was an idea that came up with you. So basically, like, she was asking me like, Hey, what is the healthy way of of implementing this push pull thing, and I was arguing that I think there needs to be a reset in the way that we’ve looked at pushing and pulling, you know, we often look at the pushing and pulling as his way of manipulating this person to feel a certain way about us. Instead, I think a more healthy way of looking at it is the mirroring approach, you know, so when they pull back, you pull back. And what often happens in healthy environments is guys, they’re allowing the girl to set the pace, and girls are knowing when to set the pace. So oftentimes, this push pull mechanism, these two elements are present. But on the other hand, a more was talking about this toxic way of pushing and pulling. And we actually had a really long spirited debate about like, Okay, well, let’s define what the toxic way of pushing and pulling is. And the toxic way is, basically you’re trying to manipulate the person with selfish intent, so you only care about what you feel. So you’re kind of like in love with this high being chased. And we see this a lot with guys specifically, who are not allowing a girl to pace and girls not knowing that they are allowed, they let the guy dictate the pace. And these are kind of like the this, if you look at this equation of like, Okay, girls, set the pace, guys try it or think about the direction. And if that is present, you tend to have a more healthy way of looking at this push pull. But on the other hand, it’s very toxic. If guys are setting the pace, or yeah, basically, guys are setting the pace and direction. So to kind of bring this back to that masculine feminine energy or a yin and yang, both of these elements need to be in place for a healthy relationship to potentially develop. Yeah. And I do you want to take the implementing the because really, you so I want Amor 09:15 to be more clear that go over I know, I mentioned this earlier, but if the toxic way is leaning more on what the intent is, for example, if it’s a long term relationship, and just like what we talked about, once you’re bored, you pull away everything, just because you’re bored. But sometimes, you know, I don’t know how you would react to this stress, but sometimes a little bit of that

Ready to learn about the basic male behaviors you can expect after a breakup. In this in-depth guide, Coach Amor and I are going to answer, Why there are 7 stages of grief that men will go through after a breakup The 10 most common behaviors men typically engage in after breakups How men show their emotions differently than women after a breakup Why some men move on quickly after a breakup whereas others struggle to let go. There aren’t too many areas of the male psyche that Amor and I are going to leave uncovered in this one so buckle up. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz There Are Actually 7 Stages Of Grief When It Comes To Breakups I mean, we’ve all heard of the five stages of grief, right? Well, according to Suzanne Lachmann Psy.D., there are actually 7 stages to grieving a breakup, Desperate for answers Denial Bargaining Relapse Anger Initial acceptance Redirected Hope To be honest with you I did a blow by blow of these seven stages last week in this article and in this video, So if you want understand how those seven stages work then definitely check out those resources (cause lord knows I don’t have the patience to write another 800 words describing the stages again.) I bring this up though because really the meat of this article is the typical behaviors that men will “show” after a breakup and each of those behaviors fall into one of the seven stages of grief above so I feel like having at least a working knowledge of those seven stages is important. Thus, do your research ladies (or gents.) Alright, let’s get to the reason for why you’re actually here. Here’s How Men Typically Behave After A Breakup Below is a list of the 10 most common behaviors we have observed men exhibit after a breakup. Distract themselves Separation Elation Social Media Creeping Self Destructive Behaviors Uptick In Social Media Posts Trying To Make You Jealous Going Back To The Phantom Ex Ask for you back (Bargaining) Angry (Lash out) Your fault (demonize you) Let’s start from the top. Behavior #1: They Distract Themselves It is common for men to distract themselves, whether they are the ones who ended the relationship or the ones who ended things with you. Some common examples of post-breakup behavior that I have observed in men include, partying excessively playing games (both mobile and PlayStation) and spending a lot of time with friends. Interestingly, some men may not post much on social media. Still, when they do, they almost overcorrect as if trying to “prove that they are ok.” The reality is that they may have spent the whole day playing games or going to a party for only an hour but made it seem like they were out all night. By focusing on other activities, they try to avoid feeling the pain of the breakup. Still, they may also need to hide their emotions from others Behavior #2: Separation Elation God I feel like a broken record. I swear I have talked about this everywhere on the website but perhaps none more famously than this video and article, As you probably know by now most of our clients believe that their exes have an avoidant attachment style, Which means that most of our clients exes probably experience some variation of the following cycle, This is the relationship death wheel of which there are eight main stages, I want someone to love me I found someone my troubles are over I’m noticing some worrying things I’m thinking of leaving I’ve decided to leave the relationship I’m so happy that I left I’m starting to feel kind of lonely Why can’t I ever find the right person It’s really that sixth stage that concerns us here. The whole “I’m so happy that I left” stage. This is known as “separation elation” or as my favorite avoidant resource, Free To Attach likes to put, After a relationship ends, people with an avoidant attachment style tend not to show much anxiety or distress, often feeling an initial sense of relief at the relinquishing of obligations and the sense that they are regaining their self-identity, and not tending to initially miss their partner – this is “separation elation” as the pressure to connect is gone. So, all those times that you are worried about your ex boyfriend looking happy without you, well, it’s real. But in almost every case it doesn’t last because stages seven and eight of the death wheel are right around the corner. Behavior #3: Social Media Creeping Let’s talk stats. According to the Veronica Lucaks and graduate student who conducted a study on Facebook creeping as part of her Media Studies Masters thesis, Close to 90% of exes admitted to “facebook creeping” So yes, your ex will probably be spying on you post breakup. If you want to know how you should be handling that I recommend you check out my social media guide. But ultimately the question almost always turns to some variation of, Well, my ex is different, they’d never do this. (Yes, yes they will, the statistics bear it out.) Or my personal favorite, Well, my ex isn’t even on social media. (I have heard DIRECTLY from exes in success story interviews that they either used a friend or signed up JUST to spy.) Behavior #4: Self Destructive Behaviors I’ve been playing around with Chat GPT lately. (Don’t worry I’m still writing my own articles.) But I got curious about it’s ability to find me research to back up my points and it DID. Problem was all the research it “found” was made up. But the one consistent thing that it would always relate to breakups and men is that they are very prone to exhibiting self destructive behaviors. See for yourself, It’s actually pretty accurate. Substance abuse Reckless behaviors Isolation Avoidance Promiscuity But the real problem with chat GPT is that it usually spits out generic information (right now at least.) So, allow me to add my own spin to destructive behaviors. All throughout my life I always wanted a tattoo. My mom said no. My dad said no. My very first girlfriend looked disgusted when I told her I wanted one. Hell, even my best friend didn’t look all too pleased when I dropped a hint. Well, during my very first breakup ever to my first girlfriend in my anger and grief I decided THAT was the best time to get a tattoo. My way of rebelling was to get this tattooed onto my left shoulder,   It means freedom. Behavior #5: You See An Uptick In Social Media Posts This one is kind of interesting and it has a direct connection with separation elation. Basically when a guy is “feeling himself” after a breakup one of the behaviors you’ll notice that he engages in is that he’ll start posting on social media, a lot. Yes, sometimes they can be posts like this, But very often they won’t be direct “call outs” about you. It’ll just be an increase in posting frequency. Maybe your ex would post once a month on facebook or instagram when you were together but now they are posting almost every day. The question is why? I think there are many possible explanations, They feel lonely Trying to make you jealous by “winning the breakup” But for me the most likely reason is that they like the attention from other people. There has been a lot of research lately, That finds that receiving likes on social media can activate the brain’s reward center, similar to receiving a monetary reward. However, this effect was stronger for likes received from friends compared to likes from strangers. Thus, as a way of “self soothing” or making themselves feel better after a breakup by relying on the attention of others. Behavior #6: They Are Trying To Make You Feel Jealous I’ve talked a lot on this website of this childish concept that men often fall victim to, winning the breakup. I mean, they’ve even made entire movies about this concept, One look at our community is enough to see how many exes can fall victim to this behavior. But really “winning the breakup” boils down to, One person looking more successful after a breakup than the other. As you can probably tell this behavior is correlated to the one above it. Usually exes who are posting on social media a lot are doing so because they want to “win the breakup.” Which is why I chose to place the two behaviors together. Behavior #7: Obsessing About The Phantom Ex Now we get to the crazy stuff. Alright, if you want a full breakdown of the phantom ex and how that works I suggest you read my article on it or watch this video, But basically avoidant exes will often fall victim to something called “a phantom ex.” Officially, the phantom ex is a past partner that you can’t seem to stop thinking about. Instead, you hyper focus on them and romanticize your time together. Even when that time together wasn’t all that great. But one of the things I’ve noticed that almost no one seems to talk about is how often your ex will start obsessing about their “phantom ex” while they are still with you. And this is really on brand for avoidants. For them, the ideal relationship is one where they don’t have to fully commit. One where they can daydream from afar. And sometimes the pull of this phantom ex is so strong that they find themselves actively trying to re-pursue this person only to lose interest with them when they finally DO get that person And around and around we go. Behavior #8: They Try To Ask For You Back Do you remember when I said that all of these behaviors can be linked to the 7 stages of breakup grief. Well, this one is firmly linked to “bargaining.” One admission, this one tends to be rarer but it does happen. In fact, every once in a while during my interviews with success stories you can find that an ex will ask them back during that no contact phase like in Jenny’s situation below, Essentially she didn’t even have a chance to complete a full no contact rule because he showed up to her porch and basically begged for her

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing Chris (yep, she has the exact same name as me.) Her situation was really intriguing because she actually met a new guy during the no contact rule and decided to pursue him. Of course, as these things typically go, right as she gets the new guy the old one comes back. So, if any of this sounds interesting to you, A unique look at how our program can work on people who aren’t exes What being unblocked by an ex usually looks like How to thrive during no contact The importance of letting go of an ex to get them back Then you are definitely going to want to listen to this interview. Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 All right, today we are talking to Chris, which is funny. But Chris, Chris has kind of a unique success story. She came through our program. I don’t know too much about her situation, actually, which is, which I think is gonna make for a great interview. But from what I understand she came through our program to get an ex back about a year ago, and decided that she didn’t want him back anymore. But now he’s blowing up her phone. Do I have that? Right? Yeah, absolutely. Okay, interview over let’s we’re done. Yeah, right. Worked. Follow the program. Yeah, right. Okay, so why don’t you take us back to the very beginning and, you know, take us off, I was devastated. I dated this guy for Chris 00:47 three months, it seems like a short amount of time, but it really felt like we were moving in the right direction. And then one day, after we came back from a short, like, vacation, he broke up with me, and then blocked me on his phone. And I went all like emotional on him, you know, last night, etc. And went to his house and was like, What’s going on, and I don’t get it, you know, and just didn’t feel it anymore. And didn’t think he could be the guy I needed him to be and all of this. So I was like, okay, and I left and was devastated and was looking for something to help me get through it. But at first looking for something to help me get him back. And that’s when I stumbled upon your program, and started learning. Chris Seiter 01:39 Okay, so he basically breaks up with you after this vacation, right? And doesn’t just break up with you, he blocks you. On the phone, I couldn’t text him. And then he dropped me on Facebook, and he just dropped me everywhere. I was like, What is going on? It was so odd. That’s intriguing. Okay, I mean, that’s not that’s obviously horrible and everything, but it’s intriguing, because we know where we’re going to kind of end up right. And lately, for some reason, in the community, I’ve noticed a lot of people panicking because they’ve been blocked on the phone. So I feel like your story can help those type of individuals. But so you go and do kind of the typical thing. You go to Google, you go to YouTube, you start searching frantically for how to get your ex back, you somehow stumbled into our ecosystem? Did you stumble into any other ecosystems and try any other programs first? Um, no, I didn’t really try any other programs. Chris 02:36 I think I think what I liked about your program first is that you had that Facebook group that I could kind of kind of like sit in and kind of hang out and just watch everybody else and kind of what they were doing and then then jump in, you know, what else I liked about your program was the audio. I could listen to your audio books. So I’d be like, you know, getting ready listening to yours for the day listening to your stuff, or in the car driving listening to your program. Chris Seiter 03:02 It’s kind of cool. Yeah. Did you listen to the podcast at all? Now that you’re on the podcast? Chris 03:09 Right. Um, actually, I listened to one I think, that wasn’t like, mostly it was the books that I was listening to. And the Facebook group, Chris Seiter 03:19 for sure. Okay. So you’re kind of one of those those lurkers in the Facebook group that took a while to get your toe. Right, you know, dipped in, but obviously at some point did you dip in did you get like a battle buddy? Did you do I did. Chris 03:35 I got a battle buddy. She was great. Um, then I actually somebody else latched on to me through the group, and then we became messenger, you know, Facebook Messenger, buddies about it. And so the community is just really great. And being able to tag people on Facebook when you have a question. Yeah, have them answer you right away and help you through it. All of that was key, for sure. Chris Seiter 04:03 Okay, so obviously, we’re skipping over some important stuff. You’ve, you’ve resolved to get your ex back, you’ve taken the step of getting the program you’re in the community. But you’re blocked. So what is your no contact look like? Do you how do you text him when that that kind of goes about why don’t you take us through that? Chris 04:25 So um, after I had looked into your program, I was deciding okay, I need to, I need a 30 to 45 day no contact because I lost my emotional control on him. I went to his house. He was still texting me a couple of days after that, but it was very, like blah. After he unblocked me, so he blocked me and then unblocked me the next day. Chris Seiter 04:51 Okay, so it was kind of a quick unblocking walk you again at any point, Chris 04:55 um, you know, I don’t remember if he did I know he did. didn’t block me on Facebook. He just unfriended me. And I know from my brief history with him, that he was somebody who checked other people’s Facebook pages, because he was like, Oh, check on the plane home from this vacation. He was like, Oh, check that person out, you know, because I think I’m blocked. And it was just one of our mutual friends or whatever. I was like, okay, so I checked it out. And he was like, oh, there’s always a way to just so I remember him mentioning, there’s always a way to find things out. And I was like, okay, so I knew he would be checking out my Facebook page. Yeah. And he tipped his hand to that too, because at the end of March, and we had broken up at the end of February, when I had just started a new job and inland a huge deal. And I posted about it, and he did reach out a day later and texted me and said, I saw you got a deal. Congratulations. And I was like, Chris Seiter 05:54 even though you’re not friends on Facebook at this point. Right. Yeah. Just I just heard through the grapevine. Is that is that the whole the whole show? Chris 06:02 No, I would I just assumed, you know, I was friends with his son’s girlfriend on Facebook still. So I don’t know. You know, he, I guess you could have heard it from her. Chris Seiter 06:15 But he could have, he could have taken her phone and looked it up just yet. Right? Chris 06:19 No, I think he, um, I was still open. I didn’t change anything about my Facebook, kind of like your program said, don’t make any huge changes. Leave things the way they are. And my Facebook was never like closed, it was open to friends of friends. And so if his son’s girlfriend was a friend, he had access, and I knew that so I was going to be as big as I could be throughout this whole thing. So you basically are going through the No Contact Rule? Did you struggle at all with that? Absolutely. Because he reached out, you know, he texted me. And I was like, oh, you know, I want it so bad to text him back. I mean, I did goof up at one point, in the very beginning, it was probably two days in. And I just basically said thanks to that text, write about the deal. And then after that, I was like, Alright, I can’t do that anymore. I had to restart. I had to restart the whole nine, no contact thing. And then I was good. But it was hard. I’m glad I had the battle buddy. I had, I’m glad I had the community to fall back on because I could, you know, go on there and say, oh, you know, he texted me and everybody’s like, no, no, don’t text you back. You know? Chris Seiter 07:43 So. So that’s interesting. You basically said you were kind of doing a 30 This 45 day, no contact. He reaches out to you day two of that you say thanks. You started over from the beginning. Did you end up breaking it again? Or did that support system of the battle buddy or the community kind of helped bring you through that? Chris 08:05 Yeah, I didn’t break it again. So I was pretty proud of myself at that point. Chris Seiter 08:09 Okay. Did you what kind of changes do you feel like you made during the no contact? Chris 08:15 Everything I was, I was bound and determined to get my life in order and to be somebody who would be attractive not only to him, but just anybody. I was still going to go date I decided I needed to date other people, just to kind of distract me. From the whole thing. Was that pretty horrible? Chris Seiter 08:39 Most people say it’s horrible. Chris 08:40 To date. It can be I mean, I did. So fast forward, I ended up finding this great guy, Chris Seiter 08:46 right. But initially afterwards, did you struggle with it? Yeah, Chris 08:50 I did. I mean, it only took me a month to meet this great guy that I thought was great and start falling for him. But he was also one of those that was kind of off limits, not sure what he wanted. So this whole program helped me you know, kind of keep myself from texting my ex ERP, but also helped me on the other side with being really emotional and having emotional control. And not being pushy. And being very patient on the dating side, too. So okay, great. Chris Seiter 09:27 So this is interesting. So you’re basically saying you met the new guy, like a month after no contact ended or like right when no contact right when no contact ended? Chris 09:39 Oh, actually. Actually, I met him. I gotta say I met him probably two weeks after we broke up. So I met him during the no contact phase. And things just maybe started amping up. Okay, as a contact. Chris Seiter 09:55 Did you like meet him at a work function? Chris 09:58 No, I met him online. I met him Man online dating to me that was like the, that was the thing that I needed

I had the pleasure of interviewing Nina. A woman fresh of getting her ex back. What’s really interesting about her situation is that she ended up using our program to get not one but two of her exes back. Believe it or not this isn’t uncommon. Sometimes we’ll have someone come through our program and either succeed or fail, ultimately move on and then years later they’ll come back into our orbit after they’ve gone through another breakup. But what really struck me about Nina was just how patient she was throughout the whole process. In this interview you’re going to learn, Nina’s story with her first ex Nina’s story with her second ex Ultimately what she believes the optimum way to get an ex back is Being wary of this idea of immediately wanting to fix things How she got through the holidays Letting the universe dictate your texting reach outs Looking at if her ex had the grass is greener syndrome Pinpointing exactly how long it took to get her ex back Let’s dive in! What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 Okay, today we have a another success story with a really interesting woman named Nina, who not only, I mean, you originally came on here to tell me about the 1x, you came back, but then I get on here, you’re telling me you actually use the program years ago to get another ex back. So we kind of got to to one special here. But thank you for doing this. Nina 00:25 Yes, of course, happy to be here. So I’m not sure Should I just start from like, the first year, I’ll try to make, Chris Seiter 00:32 it was literally about to ask you like, how should we tackle this? I think maybe just going back to the very beginning with the very first success story, and then kind of taking us through that first. Nina 00:44 So my first ERP, we dated for like, a year and a half, and things were great. And then out of nowhere, he kind of had like a commitment issue. He freaked out a little bit on me. And what space? Chris Seiter 00:56 Hmm, how long did you? Nina 00:59 Yeah, or like a year and a half? Okay. Chris Seiter 01:04 What space after a year and a half? Nina 01:06 Yeah. And then like, like a year and six months. And then he got a little bit scared of a commitment. He needed time for himself and his hobbies. He’s just like those guys that have a million things going on at once. And he had space. And he kind of wanted a break. And I said, I don’t do breaks, you’re either in or you’re out. So I was pretty determined in that sense. I’m not going to stand in limbo. So he said, Well, I need space. And I said, Okay, we’re done. I was a little drastic. And he freaked out a little bit on me. But we still broke, we broke up. And I didn’t, but I still obviously loved him. I didn’t want to end things. But I wanted him to be sure. So that’s when I looked online ways to get your boyfriend back. And then that’s how I found ERP. But I didn’t join the group or anything. I just listened to the podcast. And I found out about NC, no contact and this whole process of working on yourself and giving it space, the situation the relationship him. So I follow through it. I did 30 days. But the thing is that he reached out to me, like consistently, he would text me he would call me well, he didn’t call me right away, he would just text. And I wanted to respond. But the program said not to. So I didn’t. And it was hard because he was pursuing me a lot. Like I want to talk I want to know how you’re feeling I miss you. I didn’t want to break up I wanted to break. But I stuck to no contact. And then after 30 days, he called me. And I didn’t pick up. Because I mean I still wanted to do more. I didn’t just want to call it wasn’t gonna be that easy. And then he sent me a message saying, Hey, can you pick up the phone? Because I want to get together with you to talk because I want to get back with you. It was very straightforward. So I was like, Okay, that was fine. I can I can Yeah. Right. And it was, I mean, he pursued me for like a month. And I was like, Well, okay, so I gave in, we talked it out. When we got back together, then COVID happened, and we realized we weren’t a good match. So we broke up and I didn’t pursue him anymore, but it worked the first time. Chris Seiter 03:04 So basically, what you’re telling me is all you really did was a 30 day No Contact Rule. And that Yeah, didn’t come back. Yeah, that’s amazing. But Nina 03:13 yeah, but the thing is that usually people don’t do no contact, like it’s it’s easy to fall back into the Oh, okay. Let’s talk about it again. And again. What like, what did we do wrong? How can we fix it like, it’s normal, everyone wants to talk it out and see if you can figure it out by talking more about it. But sometimes you don’t have to talk, you have to let the other person figure out what they want on their own. So I’m definitely a fixer. Like, if problems happen, I want to talk about it. And I want to fix it now. But no contact forced me to let him really make up his mind. And he did. So it worked. So then, two years later, I have my current ERP. And the relationship was very healthy. I’m from South America, and he’s also from a neighboring country in South America. So we have the Latin American culture in the sense that we speak Spanglish to each other and it’s great. And then we reached the year we had a very healthy relationship, no really big problems. And he freaked out another one with commitment issues, which I seem to pick without realizing Chris Seiter 04:19 was there was there like Okay, so this is interesting to me. You have two guys, both of what you got back, both of which are starting to pull back around the same time, you know, like a year and a half of the first one a year. Yeah. Second one. Was there. Like, were you trying to push for a bigger commitment, like moving in together getting married? Things like that? Oh, actually, Nina 04:40 not at all. I am old now. I don’t know if it’s relevant. I’m 31 back with my other europei I was 2827. But I never really pursued any type of bigger commitment. Obviously, I would like to get married at one at some point, but I was never pushing for that or living together. I’ve always been very independent. But I think, I don’t know, maybe they can sense that I’m more ready in a way. That’s what, that’s what my europei from now told me. That’s why he’s kind of Chris Seiter 05:08 like it was just like a inherent feeling that like, Oh, she’s more ready two years. Okay. 2129 You said you’re 31? I’m 31 Nina 05:20 I mean, there’s still a big difference. I felt different at 29. Chris Seiter 05:24 I mean, when I turned 30, my whole body broke down. So that’s how I knew I was. Nina 05:29 One has to go to bed at 1030. And I’m already hungover the next day. It’s It’s terrible. Yeah. Chris Seiter 05:36 But okay, so commitment issues from the current ex boyfriend. Does he immediately break up with you? How does that work? You said, You’re a fixer. Nina 05:47 Weird, because last last year, which is our main year together, we traveled to Europe two times I went to visit his country two times, he came to visit mine. And we both live in New York. So it was it was big moves. And we were always great visiting each other and like, it was never a problem. And then last year around like Halloween, he told me he wanted to go to go back home to his country for the summer as in like our winter because he’s remote and I’m not. And he’s like, I want to go back and work there. And I said, Well, I can’t because I’m not remote anymore. And he said, Okay, well, I’m gonna go. And I was like, What? What do you mean, you used to have you bought a ticket, or you just bought a ticket so clearly had Chris Seiter 06:28 been on his mind without not assaulting you at all just kind of sprung it? Yep. Nina 06:32 He’s like, I’m gonna go to Argentina. Oops, the country, whatever. Chris Seiter 06:36 You do Latin American country. Well, yeah, we’ll have to tag this. Yeah. I told you, I told you need to happen. Well, so Nina 06:50 he got a ticket. I was in shock. And I was angry. I because he did this out of nowhere. I was like, You should discuss this for a couple. And then he’s like, Yeah, about that. I feel like you’re in a different stage in your life you want, I feel that you are ready. And if things go well, in a few years, you would expect the ring or marriage. And I’m not ready for that. I always imagined myself settling down at 38, which would mean I’m 40. And yeah, I was like, what, and I never discussed this. And he’s like, and I’m just scared because I feel like you’re ready. And I just I’m not I’m not ready to plan my life of someone. I just want to do what I want to do. I was like, Okay, why didn’t you ever tell me this before? He’s like, I don’t know. I never really realized until now, because I don’t know. It just all. It was little things that just kept packing up until he just exploded and he bought a ticket home. And he’s like, I’m leaving in two weeks. And I was like, wow. And he’s like, I have doubts. And I said, Okay, well, I mean, I was shocked. I really thought this was it for me. Because we had a very healthy relationship. And I went, I remember reading back in ERP, I was like, you don’t nag you accept that? And I said, Okay, you want to go you have doubts. You can go, obviously, it was really hard. We cried. We both sad because he was still like, I love you. But I have so many doubts. And I feel like I can’t be with someone when I have doubts. It was hard. And so we were still together for those two weeks. It was weird and miserable, because I would have like crying attacks randomly during the day. And then the data he left we say goodbye. And that was it. And I stuck to no contact. But days again to reach out. Which h

Today we have another success story hitting the presses. I’d like to introduce you to Stacia! She has one of the more interesting situations I’ve encountered. Her ex literally ghosted her and when I say ghosted I’m not doing it with “air quotes.” I mean, he straight up ghosted her out of the blue with no explanation for two months. Here’s some of the things we touched on in this interview, Stacia’s story (from start to finish) How she got back on speaking terms with her ex The one thing she did to get through the contentious time Our shared love of running Dealing with death during a breakup What it was like when he was away from her What she believe is the key to her success What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 All right. Well, today we have another success story with someone with perhaps the most unique name imaginable. This is Stacia, which is kind of a mix between Stacey and Alicia put together. But yeah, she’s got one of the more interesting success stories. I kind of don’t know much other than a few briefing points that I’ve been given. So I’m just going to be exploring as you’re listening. But thank you so much for coming on. And doing this. Stacia. Stacia 00:32 Absolutely. Thank you for having me. Chris Seiter 00:35 All right. Let’s go back to the Dark Ages. Let’s let’s let’s go back to the sad stuff. Can you take me back to before you found the program before you entered into the community breakup? Just catch me up to it. Your floor is yours. Stacia 00:51 Okay. Um, I had had our son, Chris Seiter 00:56 July of 2020. Obviously, that was just a horrible time anyway. Um, because I was like, in the midst of it, too. Stacia 01:03 It was it just was one of those like, Chris Seiter 01:06 so you gave birth at the hospital during the day, they make you wear a mask? Because my wife was not wearing a mask. She was in a lot of pain when Stacia 01:16 it didn’t make me but I had friends at other hospitals that did and I Chris Seiter 01:20 was terrified. Yes, well, you made it through. I did. And unfortunately, we’re about to hit with something even worse. Stacia 01:30 He was there through the birth. He took a new job that started like, right, as soon as the school year started, so we were both like in education. And the new job didn’t really pan out, well, he’s a coach, so they let him go. before the school year was even halfway done, he knew that he was gonna have to look for a new job. And so he kind of went down depressive hole. There was no pulling him back in new dad and just lost a job. And he just kind of shut down. He disappeared, changed his number. I didn’t hear from him for two months until I was served with custody paperwork for our son at my friend door. Chris Seiter 02:12 And were you guys married? engaged at the time? So? Yes, yes. So you’re engaged but not officially married yet? Right? Do you kind of think, like, okay, new. So, you mentioned you have other children as well? Or at least off camera? Were they all his? Or was it just this one? Stacia 02:37 No, man, two daughters was my ex husband, and it was his Chris Seiter 02:42 first child. So we have a first child for new time dad, which is pretty scary. I can attest to that. And then getting laid off all happening at once, not to mention during COVID and everything. And you think that’s like you kind of skipped over what I feel like it’s an important thing. So he just leaves no explanation. Did he block you? Did you did you try to reach out to try to figure out what the heck is going on? Stacia 03:09 I did. It was May 22. I only remember that because it was my grandmother’s birthday. And I was waiting for him to come celebrate with us. And he said that he was on his way. And I never heard from him again for two months. He shut down his number obviously tried reaching out but his phone number was gone. And he was not at the address that he had, you know previously live because he had moved into like a rental for the new job that he had taken that I did not know about. So he’s off the grid. Completely Mia, he did not have social media, any sort of contact at all. Chris Seiter 03:48 Okay, this this is a good story. We don’t really get we don’t really get like a successor that comes on that as this far. Like, I don’t know if blocked is the correct word to say it was like cut out and like ghosted to the extreme. Had did this happen before the birth of the child her Stacia 04:12 after, after our son was almost one. Okay. Chris Seiter 04:17 So he had been a new dad for almost like 1112 months. Yes. So that 1112 month period was were there any like signs leading up to this at all? Did you notice anything? Stacia 04:34 Yes. He was obviously avoidant, and he would pull away. He started staying with his parents, because where they lived was much closer to his work like 10 minutes as opposed to 45 and they’re much they’re much older and in really bad health. I mean, they’ve only given us dad like another two months possibly to live so it’s been hard with that situation going on to on top of everything else. I Um, that he started staying over there. And I would notice that he would cut his phone off as soon as you would get back from either, you know, practice or work or whatever it was. And he would not answer were call me back until the next morning. And I could just tell he was pulling back. He didn’t seem as interested in coming around and seeing the baby. Even had convinced himself that there was a possibility that it wasn’t his child and had served me with like DNA paperwork to later when we find Chris Seiter 05:32 out the first time I’ve heard that one. Unfortunately, I have heard that one before. Stacia 05:37 Yes, it was it was mortifying, because I mean, I’ve never stepped out of our relationship. So understand his whatever was going on in his head at the time, probably chemically imbalanced. But yeah, he he just went off the grid, and did not I did not hear a word from him until I had paperwork on my front door, stating that he wanted to go to court for a DNA test and custody pending the DNA test. Chris Seiter 06:06 Geez, it’s always really difficult when you hear stuff like this, because, you know, the the innocent, that’s getting hurt is really the kid. Fortunately, I mean, 11 months old, you’re not going to really remember too much of that rocky time in the life. Okay, so he serves you these papers. He doesn’t think the kid is is he wants to go to the DNA test court thing? What is your next step? Do you go to a lawyer do you like? Or do you just go to Google and fix something? I don’t know. Stacia 06:43 I did have an attorney for my, for my divorce for my ex husband. So I just went to him. He was all I knew. And I handed him the paperwork. And he was like, Okay, I mean, he was just as in shock as everyone else was. And he got in touch with his attorney. But there was still no getting in touch with my eggs. There was like, still this gap there. And even with the DNA tests, like I could not get in touch with him to schedule it. And of course, I would email my attorney and he would email back like, this is something y’all need to get together about. And I was like, Well, I can’t get in touch with him. So can you ask his attorney to please let him know that you need do Chris Seiter 07:24 number? You didn’t even have like an email or anything like that? No, I did not. Who doesn’t have an email nowadays, he had Stacia 07:34 stopped using his previous like, went from like Gmail to Outlook or something like that. changed it so that I can get in touch with an old account that he wasn’t checking it. That I know of? Chris Seiter 07:46 Yeah. So very hardcore, dismissive, avoidant tendencies here. All right. So your lawyer basically helps in that weird regard to get in touch? I’m assuming? Stacia 08:02 Yes. And no, I love my attorney. But he was just kind of more like, he’s very much a dad, too. And he didn’t understand the situation. He was like, but he’s the one that wanted this. So why is he being difficult to work with? And he just, he took like, those two months off to just disappear, and I guess, find himself or whatever it was, or hit rock bottom, whatever he went through during that time. Chris Seiter 08:27 So does he eventually reach back out to you? He Stacia 08:30 does, um, only because I had a friend who was she was crazy. They called the new school that they found he was at and pretended to have a son that was interested in football. And he called her back on his personal cell. So I called his cell and reached out, and I guess I probably shouldn’t have done that and let him come to me. But that kind of got the ball rolling. And I just kept it very nonchalant. Like, hey, you know, we need to get together over this DNA test and our court, you know, you’ve served me papers, so we need to figure this out. Chris Seiter 09:07 You did. You did need to figure that out. Like legitimately, you’re in a lot different of a situation than the average person who’s just trying to like get their ex back. You know, you haven’t. You were engaged. You’re sharing a child together. He’s not talking to you. He just serves you papers, your lawyers doesn’t seem to be able to get them on the phone for you. It seems just incredibly difficult. And what you’re saying is you had to have the trusty old friend go undercover for you to cultivate the phone number and then you you basically just call it out of the blue. Stacia 09:43 I did, I was at work and I I blocked my number. He knew it by heart, so I knew he wouldn’t pick up and he answered, and as soon as he heard my voice, he was like, oh, no, but he was like, I was gonna call you sooner or later. Okay, well and easily sooner because we’ve got to get this

I had the pleasure of interviewing Kelsey who had a pretty intriguing breakup story. Basically her ex gave her the whole, “I have a lot of love for you but I’m not IN love with you.” So, for those of you who have ever had an ex say that or, “I’m not sure I see a future together with you” Then you’ll want to pay attention to Kelsey’s success story. Summary Of Our Conversation Kelsey’s Personal Story How She Found Out About The Program The End Of The No Contact Rule The Food Delivery Aspect Of The Breakup How The Breakup Changed Their Relationship How She Got Her Ex Back The Issue Of Codependence How To Be Content With Not Getting Your Ex Back Skipping The Value Ladder Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 All right, today we have another success story. This is Kelsey. So thank you so much for coming on. First off and doing this, Kelsey. Kelsey 00:11 Thank you for having me. Chris Seiter 00:12 All right, so let’s kind of roll back time and go back to the beginning. Why don’t you give us kind of like a breakdown of of your situation? Okay, Kelsey 00:23 yeah. So this started last year of 2022. And me and my ERP ex, at the time, were together for about two and a half years. And so we broke up on February 1. And pretty much like I was pretty, really confused at what the reason was the time and obviously, I was in a very emotional state. And I wanted to know why. And the only answers that I kept getting were like, Oh, I just, I have a lot of love for you. But I don’t feel in love with you, those type of things. And like, I don’t really see a future with you anymore. And so I was just like, panicking on the inside. And I went home after the breakup, and I tried to look up things online, just like some tips on how to get your exes back and stuff like that. And then I came across the ERP, the Ex Recovery Program. And I thought it was so interesting, because the layout was so different than other websites that I looked at. And it was actually really easy to navigate as well. And it showed a lot of the success stories on the page. And I kept reading that and, and it gave me hope. And I was like, maybe I can check this out and see if it works. So I signed up for that I took the quiz that it has on the website, and I think I got I think it was 80% something like that. Chris Seiter 02:02 Turns out it was a it was 100%. Kelsey 02:07 Exactly, sorry to interrupt. Oh, no, no, that’s fine. But yeah, it gave me a lot of hope that it would work out. So I was like, why not, I don’t have anything else really to do. Because it was I had like spring break coming up at the time, too. So I had all this time to just do all this research and stuff. So one thing too was that I didn’t want to talk too much about it with my close friends, because I know that they have very strong opinions of like me getting hurt. And obviously they don’t want that to happen. But at the same time, I still wanted to get him back because I knew that there was something special. And that’s something that nobody else could understand other than me. And so I was just starting the program. And I think I did a 30 day no contact, I tried that. First, I was still very new to it. And I was like I don’t know if I’m doing this right at all. And one thing that was different from a lot of the other stories that I saw was that I would actually see him every week, like once a week at church. So it was a lot harder for me, Chris Seiter 03:23 even though it’s kind of like a limited no call. Yeah, type situation. Yeah, Kelsey 03:28 yeah, exactly. And so I was just trying to figure out how to deal with that, because it was definitely pretty difficult seeing him and having all these emotions. And I actually set up an appointment with Anna, who used to be part of the program. And I had, I think it was an hour appointment. And she was talking to me about it. And she gave me this whole plan. And she suggested that I do a 45 day limited no contact. And basically, the value chain was very different for me because of that. And so like there was no display starting off with like texting, and then phone calls and stuff like it was a little different because I already see him in person. So I started off with just like the smiling and the waving. At first he avoided me at all costs. And that made me feel even worse. And it was really hard at the time. But I had faith in the program. And I had actually two battle buddies that I talked to at the same time, which helped me a lot. And I really appreciate the Facebook group for the program. And I’m still in it and I love just looking at other people’s stories and just reading what they’re going through as well because I totally understand now. And so it really helps me talking to other people going through the same situation. And so yeah, we started off like smiling and waving and Let it got to like saying hi to each other. And then he, oh, yeah, in the, in the 30 day no contact. Before I talked to Anna, he would he reached out to me like, I think it was four days into the no contact. But I knew that I couldn’t respond, because obviously I not supposed to contact him at all. So I didn’t, and I, I just saw the message. And then he messaged me like three other times after that. And I was really surprised, because I didn’t think he would message me at all. So that happened. And then when it got to the end of the no contact period, I replied, I can’t quite remember what I said. But it was just a short reply. Like, I think he asked me how I was doing. And I kept it neutral. And I was like, I’m good. How are you? Something like that. And and then he was a lot different than I planned, because he asked to meet up and just talk about what happened and how things were. I agreed to meeting up with him. But I was really cautious about talking about the relationship, because I know that when I watched your videos before, I think in some of them, you advised us to like, try to avoid talking about the relationship. And so if he brought it up himself, like I would just answer him was like a short answer, but I would kind of change the topic, redirect it to something else. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And I think he noticed that a lot. Because he just kept asking more deeper questions like, oh, because I never, I never knew if he ever, like thought about me, because he kept ignoring me all the time. I never knew how he felt. I thought he was like, completely over me. And then he would bring it up himself and be like, oh, yeah, I watched I always watch your stories. And I saw you went to this place. And I was like, Oh, I didn’t know you paid attention to that. But it really proves that they do pay attention when you post something online. It may seem like they’re not looking, but I feel like they right. Chris Seiter 07:20 I try to tell people in the group that all the time and it’s like, in one ear out the other. They don’t really believe me, but having you come on and say it. Yeah, I think that’ll be helpful for them. Kelsey 07:32 Oh, for sure. I’ve like I 100% thought he did not care what I was posting. So to hear him say like, oh, yeah, I remember. And he would remember little details to like, I remember you went to this park. And so I was really amazed. And I was like, Oh, wow, he actually pays attention to my stories. So yeah, that was really great. No, and after that we would. So he over here, so I live in Vancouver, BC in Canada. And so like it’s been a really big thing with food deliveries and stuff with like, us, like skip the dishes. Uber Eats. I don’t know if you’ve heard of that. I don’t know what it’s like. Yeah, I Chris Seiter 08:15 mean, unfortunately, I feel like I live on that much. I’ve had to cut back. Yeah, yeah. DoorDash is pretty popular here. Not so much. Uber Eats DoorDash GrubHub. Okay, okay. Yeah, guys have that up there. I’m sure, right. Kelsey 08:30 Yes. Yeah, we do. Yeah. So with the food deliveries. I thought there were definitely like times where it was on and off when I would see him and he would be the complete opposite of like, being really happy to see me he’d look like kind of depressed. And he would tell me Oh, I don’t think we should hang out or be friends or something like that. And I was like, Chris Seiter 08:55 hot and cold. Yes. Yeah. Go from like meeting you in person saying like, Oh, I’m watching your stories to just sort of like giving you the brush back. Kelsey 09:05 Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it was so annoying at times, because I was like, I don’t know where this is going. But I have to like respect what he’s asking. So I don’t want to push too much. So can Chris Seiter 09:18 can ask a clarifying question. Yeah, yeah. Where? Where does the food delivery aspect come in? Kelsey 09:24 Oh, yeah. I was just getting to that. So he so he would be like, Oh, I don’t want to hang out as friends or anything like that. But he would find a way to hang out with me somehow. And that’s where the food delivery would come in. Because he would be like, Oh, I think we could deliver food together and it came out of nowhere. Because, ya know, it was even work. I know. It was so weird because, yeah, because he would usually deliver food like in his spare time on his scooter. But like he wanted to deliver food with me in my cars. I see. Okay, Chris Seiter 10:05 so he works for like a DoorDash GrubHub Uber Eats type thing. And he would invite you along to as you go on the runs. Ah, yeah. Okay. Now it makes sense. Kelsey 10:17 Yeah. And at first I was like, oh, maybe he’s just being friendly. But I would like talk to my battle buddies. And they would be like, No, I think he just wants to spend more time with you. Because it wasn’t just one time. Like, he would always ask, Oh, let’s let’s deliver this day. And then he would want to always meet up like every single day. And there would be a point where I’d have to be like, no, because I don’t want him to get used to me being available all the time. So yeah, so but it was really interesting, becaus

Today’s success story is going to be unique. Avid listeners of the podcast will have probably heard me say, On again/off again relationships are among the easiest situations to succeed in but one of the hardest situations to keep together Well, my interview with Kimberly today kind of proves this as she takes us through what it’s like to be in one of these situations. So, what starts as a success story kind of ends up as a pseudo coaching session by the end as we go over how to prevent an “off again” phase from happening. Summary Here’s a quick summary of our conversation: The breakup and how she got her ex back Rekindling the relationship after the breakup Going over the factors that drew him back in The on again/off again experience Setting boundaries Mystery vs. stability Planning a spontaneous family outing The importance of being ungettable Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:02 All right, today we have a success story interview with Kimberly. Kimberly ended up. I don’t know how we found you. Exactly. I think my wife found you instead of the interview between us. Yes, she did. Okay, so somehow my wife found Kimberly. So I’m just for the state of honesty here. I’m coming into this completely blind. I don’t know anything about Kimberly success story. So that’s gonna make for an excellent interview. But I just wanted to say thank you so much for coming on and doing this Kimberly. No problem. I’m excited. All right, so let’s go back to the Dark Ages back when you’re going obviously, through this breakup? Can you give us a little bit of a background on the breakup and how you came into the Ex Recovery orbit? Kimberly 00:45 So we broke up and it was pretty bad one. I did the netting a lot of probably for about a month before I found the program. And I was just online looking up, you know, ways I could progress myself so that I could get him back. Or ways I could, you know, it was more manipulation, trying to get him back type thing. But I found the group or found the program I paid for it joined. And then immediately, well, within like half a month, maybe within joining the group, I went into no contact, I didn’t do very well with it, it was not a very good experience for me, I will get several times Chris Seiter 01:28 how many is several times Kimberly 01:31 I think it was three. Oh, since I joined the program. But it was within a short period of time. And the last time that I broke it, he actually put another girl on the phone who told me that she was his girlfriend, which I later found out she was not that he just did that to get me to leave him alone. But that’s kind of put it into it for me. And I was like Okay, so I’m going to I’m going to finish my new contact and I did the Trinity. I did the calendars. I had a calendar right next to my Work calendar, and I would do all the activities I put on it every day. I actually forgot to do my reach out. It was time for my reach out. And I had drafted it, put it in the group. But I was so busy doing stuff that I just completely forgot. And then I did it. He didn’t respond. I waited the time did another one he didn’t respond. And he and so I just decided not to do it any anymore. after that. I just I went you know without moving on. Chris Seiter 02:37 Gave up base. Yeah. Do you? Do you recall what the reach outs were? Were they kind of like the ERP type reach outs or did you put your own? Yes, Kimberly 02:45 they were the ERP. And they were his top interest it was in regards to recording music. Because he’s a DJ or he does DJ and does music. But I didn’t know he did not at all. I don’t know if he I don’t even know if he changed his number. At the time. I didn’t even know if he changed his number because I was hard blocked everywhere. I forgot to say that I was like everywhere, like tick tock, Snapchat, everything. He bought me everywhere. So he Chris Seiter 03:15 blocked you. But you still felt like you had the phone. He didn’t block you texting wise. Kimberly 03:23 He did. But I thought that maybe after all that time past, it was possible that he unblocked me. So I went ahead and did my reach outs via phone. But I could tell from other places that I was heart blocked. So I didn’t do it that way. I just did it over the phone. But he didn’t respond to either one. And then within like two months, he just reappeared. He was like, Hey, how you doing? You know, like, I just disappeared for eight months. But hey, so it was just kind of interesting, because that was the first time and then we broke up again. And I kind of messed that one up. I didn’t follow the Chris Seiter 04:06 let’s, let’s hit the let’s hit the brakes here for a little bit. So he he basically has you heard locked everywhere. You’re not even sure if he even got the original DJ type text messages. And then after a couple of months, he just reaches out to you and you’re able to rekindle things and get back into a relationship. Yes. Okay. And then he breaks up with you again. Kimberly 04:29 Yes. And he admitted that he got my texts. We did. Okay, so we’ve got my Chris Seiter 04:35 blocked on the phone, you know, we kind of assumed correctly. But did he give any insight about why he didn’t respond to the texts? Kimberly 04:45 He told me that he didn’t feel like he was in a good place to talk to me at the time. I think that his life was just going downhill. And he didn’t feel adequate enough. I guess he didn’t really say that but just the way that he told me If that’s what it seemed like, and then I gave up, and he told me that he could feel that pull away because of the fact that I reached out. And he didn’t respond and I stopped reaching out. Chris Seiter 05:15 Were maybe in the past you had done that just came. Kimberly 05:20 In the past, I was constantly like trying to get a conversation over with with him. Chris Seiter 05:27 Okay, so obviously, you’re back together, yay. And then how long does that relationship lasts before you kind of hit the off again phase Kimberly 05:34 that lasted four months, the first time we lived together the second time we did not. We took it, I took it a lot slower the second time. Not in the beginning. I didn’t, but we kind of slowed it down. And he actually wanted to take it slower as well. But I don’t know if he had some things going on in his life in the background that I didn’t know about. Because one day he was just like, this is way too much for me. And again, Chris Seiter 06:02 any signs at all that you kind of picked up on or what for you? Was it out of the blue? Kimberly 06:09 Yeah, there were signs he started pulling away, he started not wanting to see me or canceling plans. He started not really talking as much because in the beginning, he was very much wanting to rekindle things and then he would kind of fall away. Chris Seiter 06:27 How did you personally react to that? Were you did you kind of fall back into the anxious tendencies when he would pull away like that? Kimberly 06:36 Sometimes I did. And sometimes I really stuck with being more secure and just let him have a space. It really depended on the issue. Like sometimes he was a little jealous about things, and then I would kind of get more anxious. But if it was just like, hey, I’m busy. I really can’t deal with this right now. I would give him a space. Chris Seiter 06:59 The irony of the guy who put the fake girlfriend on the phone being jealous is funny to me. Yeah. Kimberly 07:05 He’s an ironic man, for sure. Chris Seiter 07:09 Okay, so basically, you’re going through another breakup, you’re kind of back to where you started again, what happens next. Kimberly 07:16 I immediately when I went in, and a contact, he actually broke up with me over Facebook Messenger. And I didn’t actually get to see him. Because the first time we broke up, I physically saw him and we talked about it. But the second time, he was just completely in avoidant mode. And he just did it over text and blocked me immediately. So I didn’t try to reach out, I just left it at that. And we immediately went into no contact, did the process all over again. Did my reach outs I did to reach out, he didn’t respond. And this time, I think he changed. So it’s deja vu, right. And it’s kind of funny, because we were together eight months, the first time and apart eight months. And then we were together for months and apart for months. Chris Seiter 08:02 Okay, you’re saying this guy’s got a pattern Kimberly 08:05 he does. He definitely has a pattern. Um, but he didn’t reach at it and respond to either one of those, as well. And then he reached out to me within because it was added a month, no contact, and with it. So within three months, because we were apart for four months, he reached out to me from a different phone number, didn’t identify himself. And I think it was a burner phone number or like a text now phone number because I have a friend who has one of those apps that can pull it up. And it wouldn’t pull up who the owner was, while two days later, I didn’t respond to that. Two days later, he reached out again with his actual phone number and told me who he was. And then he Chris Seiter 08:51 wanted to ever get some insight into why he did that. No, Kimberly 08:55 I didn’t. I didn’t even ask him about it. Because I didn’t want to assume that it was him. But just the fact that he reached out two days later. Just told me it was him. So yeah. Chris Seiter 09:09 He’s thinking about you for sure. So obviously, he reaches out. I’m assuming you begin to rekindle things from there. Kimberly 09:18 Yes. And we are together right now. But we’re still we’re still having a lot of problems. Chris Seiter 09:27 Okay, so this is interesting. So basically, you are together. How long have you been together? Kimberly 09:34 We got together right after Thanksgiving. This past Thanksgiving. Chris Seiter 09:39 So you’ve been together a pretty longer stint this time than last time. Yeah, the last off again face. So before we kind of go into the problem areas,

Most of the time when I conduct one of my success story interviews it’s with someone who worked the program and got their ex back. But I define success with our program in multiple ways. For me, deciding NOT to get your ex back and moving on to someone else is every bit of a success as actually getting an ex back. Especially if moving on to someone else causes you to realize just how poorly your ex was treating you. Such was the case with Ellen in my success story interview with her. Not only did she move on to someone new but, She realized that her ex was a hardcore narcissist She found a life long friend in our battle buddy program She gained more confidence Listen to her story in our newest success story! Interview Transcript Chris Seiter 00:03 All right, today we’re gonna be talking to a really interesting success story. This is Ellen, who ended up posting in our community last week or sometime around there. But she’s not your typical success story. She joined the program to originally get her ex back, and then decided that Well, I guess she found a better guy. But thank you so much for coming on and doing this. Thank you. So why don’t you take us back to the beginning of when you’re going through your breakup some of the emotions that your feeling and kind of what led up to you moving on and finding someone Ellen 00:42 different? Okay. It was like, one year and three months ago, it wasn’t the beginning of Yeah. To to make 22,002 is Chris Seiter 00:57 like a pretty long time ago. 01:02 And we actually broke up with me, I think it was last Saturday, and he texted me, it was a really bad breakup. Chris Seiter 01:15 What did he say exactly? In the text? 01:19 He didn’t want to meet me. And I asked him why. And he said that he wanted to break up with me. So was nothing more than that. But he called me and we talked about loss really bad. Because I have been with him for four years. was out of the blue. Sort of a Chris Seiter 01:48 out of the you didn’t like notice any signs about him becoming distant up until the breakup? 01:54 No. Nothing like that. No, no, so much. Chris Seiter 02:00 So obviously, he breaks up with you. And then I’m assuming you go to Google or YouTube or wherever to try to find ways to get your ex back. And is that pretty much how that went down? 02:11 Yeah, that’d be I looked up. Almost every video you have on YouTube Chris Seiter 02:19 every day. That’s like 600. Ellen. 02:23 Yeah, almost every. Chris Seiter 02:28 So eventually, you come into the program. And you start, I guess, the program to try to get your ex back. How did that go? 02:41 It didn’t go good at all. I was too anxious. So I couldn’t handle it. And I needed more time. And he wasn’t nice to me. So we started to fight all the time. And he started to date another woman. Chris Seiter 03:01 So he’s, so he starts to date another woman. I’m assuming at some point, you do like a No Contact Rule. To them. Do you remember how long you made it? 03:15 60 days, I think both 60 Chris Seiter 03:17 days you did 260? Day in Hong Kong? What was the thinking behind doing that? The 60 days? 03:25 was the longest time you can do according to ERP. So I did it, because they Chris Seiter 03:31 did. So you did a 60 day No Contact Rule, which is actually a little bit longer than we recommend. But what’s what’s interesting is, I’m assuming you kind of broke it prematurely a few times. Yes. What? So how many times or what was what prompted you to break it a bunch of times like that? 03:58 I was sad and anxious. That’s all it was really hard to stay away. Okay. Chris Seiter 04:06 So, so you you break the No Contact Rule? I’m assuming it doesn’t go well. 04:11 No, it didn’t answer or he told me to stop writing or Yeah. Chris Seiter 04:17 Okay. So what do you do after that when he tells you basically, like, leave me alone? Stop writing. What what’s your approach after that? 04:27 I left him alone for like, one week, and then they wrote again, he did it again. Yeah, I did all the mistakes. You can you can do. Chris Seiter 04:39 So like at some point, I think you decide to give up, right. Is that is that kind of what ends up happening? 04:47 We’ll see. You during Christmas. Last year. I applied for a job at a big bank in Sweden and he worked there and When I told him about it, he threatened me and was really angry. You told me around you? Yeah. Yeah. He told me that. If I started working there, he will quit his job and he will sell his apartment and move in with his parents and everything is my fault. Chris Seiter 05:22 I see. Yeah. I assume did you end up taking the bank job? No, 05:28 I didn’t take it. But it was. It was too much for me. He even blocked me. So I think he was too immature. I mean, Chris Seiter 05:38 yeah. Okay, so So basically, at that point, that was the last straw for you, the straw that broke the camel’s back, so to speak. 05:47 Yeah. I couldn’t talk to him after that, because I was blocked almost everywhere Chris Seiter 05:52 and everywhere. Are you still blocked to this day? 05:55 Yes. Not on Facebook, but everywhere else. So. Chris Seiter 05:59 So he still wants a small window into your life on Facebook? Yeah. But what’s interesting is, the story is about to take a good turn. So eventually, you meet this new guy, you basically give up on that axe and start moving on. 06:15 Yeah. How did that happen? I actually got a lot of help from my battle, buddy. I have one from the ERP group. And she helps me a lot, and also the group read almost everything in it. And I think it’s really good for mental health. And I wanted to meet someone better, someone which I can have a family with. So I started to date, but it was not a good in the beginning. I had Tinder, but it’s not that good. Chris Seiter 06:54 So you tried Tinder, it didn’t work out so well. 06:59 So I actually downloaded a more mature app. And a guy brought me and we saw each other after like three days. Chris Seiter 07:10 Do you remember what the app was called? Yeah. match.com. Oh, match. Okay. 07:17 I’m sure it’s an international app. I guess. Chris Seiter 07:21 No, no, we have match.com here in the States. It’s just not as popular. I guess. Tinder got the dating market share something. But I remember match.com. And it was going on. So eventually you you meet someone on match.com. 07:36 And Chris Seiter 07:39 and how did that go? 07:41 Well, he was really nice. And he’s actually a gentleman. It’s not that common. It’s pretty rare in my age, and he actually holds every door for me. And he pays for me when we are out and eat at restaurants and even holds my bag. He does everything for me. It’s Chris Seiter 08:06 so I’m assuming your ex boyfriend did not do those things. 08:11 And maybe it didn’t even buy me a Christmas present or what? No Christmas presents? No, it was really mean to me. Chris Seiter 08:22 So that’s interesting to me. Why do you think it took you so long to get to that place where you’re like, you know what, I deserve better? 08:30 I think it is because you have a vision. You can see a future retirement, really liked his family and his friends and his life. I wanted to be a part of it. But you don’t see the bigger picture. You don’t think about it in that way. It’s more like a dream. And it’s hard to lose that. I think that’s Chris Seiter 09:00 disappeared. It looks like we’re having some technical difficulties. And my back. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, I think that was a really poignant way of putting that, that you kind of like, hold on to that vision. And you kind of don’t want to let it go. Obviously, we’re doing this interview to kind of really speak to people in the group and show people that there’s light at the end of the tunnel, even if you don’t get your ex back the way you want. What would you say to someone listening to this, that struggling? Holding on to that vision? What what what are some words of advice from because you’ve already made it through you’ve made it to the promised land so to speak, what do you tell people who are struggling? 09:52 Give it a lot of time. It took me over one year and do things you like for example Meet new friends and start a hobby. For example, I started training at a team, and the new guy even trains with me and I have a new friend, which I trained with. So do things you like and meet new friends and just keep busy and try to be patient takes a lot of time. And I think almost like 80% of the people in the group deserves so much better. Yeah. It’s really important to look after red flags and be and don’t use Tinder, for example, you can use it but you need to be very, I don’t know, either. really careful. And Chris Seiter 10:55 well, let’s talk a little bit about that. You say you need to be careful on Tinder. What’s what’s informing That? That? Words, 11:05 a lot of guys. They only want sex. So they do will say whatever they want. They try to make you think otherwise. So you think they want a relationship or a future with you, but in and when they get six, they disappear. So I think you should. It’s actually my battle buddy. From ERP, she actually taught me this. She actually made me wait a long time and to look after more serious guys and Chris Seiter 11:42 older guys. So I guess essentially, the battle buddy. So when you look back at your experience in, in the community, you would say probably your connection that you made with the battle buddy was the most impactful aspect of that. 11:57 Yeah, she’s a friend of mine. Now, we talked a lot, so she helps me a lot. Chris Seiter 12:05 So that’s interesting. Are you guys both nearby each other? Have you ever met in person yet? 12:11 No. She’s in Switzerland. So it’s no, yes. I think it’s Switzerland. So it’s not here, but it’s in Europe. So it’s the same timezone. So that’s the same Chris Seiter 12:23 timezone. Yeah, for sure. So you meet the new guy. Things are going really, really well. And by comparison, I guess it feels like, Oh, this is what a relationship is supposed to b

Let’s talk about how to convince your ex to meet up with you. It’s funny, when researching for this article I had a ton of trouble finding examples in our community of people spilling details on exactly how they got their meetups. Alas though, after half an hour of searching I found four real life examples of people who successfully convinced their ex to meet up with them. The Well Timed Facebook Post The Damsel In Distress Meetup Just Simply Trusting In The Value Ladder You Simply Initiate A Low Investment Meetup However, before we really take the time to get into the examples I feel its important to cover the basics of why exes can say “no” to a meetup. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz The Most Common Reason Exes Say No To A “Meet Up” This is the process we teach our clients, I call it (drum roll please) the value ladder. A step by step process for re-establishing contact with your ex and communicating in a way that makes reconciliation more likely by strategically making your ex recognize your value for themselves. The way it works is simple. Before moving from one stage to the next you must first build up enough value. It’s similar to a video game in that regard. You have to complete the level you are on first before moving on to the next one. Except instead of dodging bad guys or obstacles like in a typical mario game you have to build value. The #1 reason that exes will say no to a meetup is if you try to advance to the meetup phase by skipping the climb up the value ladder. It’s too fast too soon. Though lately I’ve been noticing an interesting phenomenon where exes will say yes to a meetup but only cancel at the last minute. Ok, so with that explanation out of the way I think we can move on to the real tactics that clients have used to get their exes to meet up with them. Real Examples Of Tactics Used To Get Exes To Meet Up One quick note though before we get started. I like using real people from our community to prove my points. In pretty much every example I’m going to use to prove my points today the community member didn’t rush the value ladder. The results were only possible because they slowly, methodically worked their way up the ladder. Think of it as the pre-requisite that must be met before you can try any of these tactics. Ok, with that out of the way let’s begin! Tactic #1: The Well Timed Facebook Post I’m pulling from one of my clients a few years ago for this one. On our coaching call she mentioned that she really wanted to meet up with her ex. She was having a work interview in his home town (they were kind of long distance) but she felt a bit awkward outright asking him to meetup. I suggested that her best approach would be to post something on social media about it and find a way to combine his interest. Thus, my next question was, “Well, what’s he interested in?” He response was quick and authoritative, “Game of Thrones” To which I responded, “Well, this may sound kind of corny but what if you were to have someone photoshop you on the back of a dragon riding in to his town.” This was the resulting post, Here’s the coolest part though. She posts this to her Facebook Account and within an hour her ex had commented on the post and then even privately messaged her that they should catch up. This worked for a few reasons. Yes, it was an interest based approach where you are engaged in your exes actual interests but the more relevant part is that she actually had an interview. She didn’t make that up. She was authentically working the trinity and making big strides. Tactic #2: The Damsel In Distress Meetup One of the most popular text messages that our community likes to use (especially women) is the damsel in distress text messages. You know the ones, they look like this, You have this burning question that only your ex can answer. Well, it turns out that the damsel in distress approach can also work for meet ups. In talking to a moderator of our community they had this to say about what worked to get a meetup for them,   “I also used a damsel in distress in this case. I told him I needed his expertise in making a certain pool shot and of course he wanted to help me.” What I find really clever about this approach is her damsel in distress approach actually had an embedded meetup included. Tactic #3: Just Simply Trusting In The Value Ladder This one might be a little self serving but I promise it does work. When searching through the community looking for exact examples of tactics used to secure meetups I noticed a trend. Most people would talk about what happened on the meetups but not necessarily talk about how the meetups were secured themselves. And it dawned on me that most of them probably didn’t have to do anything. By simply trusting in the value ladder their ex would initiate the meetup, It’s that last phrase mentioned that I really want you to pay attention to. This program really works. Stick with it, work on yourself first, do the no contact, the texting phase, the phone call phase, the meetup phase… do it all, take it slow… it works! It goes back to what I was saying that if you skip the value ladder or advance up it too quickly you tend not to get the results you want. So yes, sometimes all you have to do is just stick to the approach and your ex will ask for a meetup themselves. Tactic #4: You Simply Initiate A Low Investment Meetup Of course, sometimes no matter how patient you are during your climb up the value ladder your ex won’t ask for a meetup. Sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands. “I think it’s ok to initiate the first meetup. Then you want to see that they are at least talking about meeting up again and making plans with you.” I’ll preface this by saying that this technically only works if you’ve done what I’ve been saying all article long and slowly worked your way up the value ladder. How do you know when the right time to ask is? I think by simply looking at your progress in your climb is a great indicator. If you are talking on the phone and texting pretty much every day it’s time to move to the next stage.The post How Do I Convince My Ex To Meet Me first appeared on Ex Boyfriend Recovery.

Today I’d like to talk about what to do if you took a risk and asked your ex to meet up with you but they said no. I feel like the best way to tackle this is to divide the article up into two distinct parts. Talk about why this exes usually say no Talk about how to handle it if it ends up happening to you So, I don’t want to beat around the bush. Let’s just get right into it. What Are Your Chances of Getting Your Ex Boyfriend Back? Take the quiz Why Exes Will Usually Say No To A Meetup Do you see this graphic right here, This whole graphic might actually be the reason for why your ex says no. It’s called, “The Value Ladder.” I think I’ll actually let my official guide, The Ex Boyfriend Recovery Program describe what it is, The Value Ladder (Noun) A step-by-step process for re-establishing contact with your Ex and communicating in a way that makes reconciliation more likely by strategically making your Ex recognize your Value for himself. Put simply, it’s the slow methodical approach to getting an ex back. Now, I’ve been on record saying that most of our clients have an anxious attachment style. If you don’t believe me take a look at this poll, And the thing about extremely anxious individuals is that they tend to be extremely desperate which causes them to try to “jump” the value ladder. Let’s take a deeper look at the ladder, Now, the point is to stairstep your way up to the top. You can’t advance to the next level until enough value has been provided at the level you are currently at. The mistake most anxious people meet is they jump the ladder all the way to the “meetup phase” without actually having provided any value in the texting phase, phone call phase, etc. Usually when an ex says no to a meetup it means you’ve skipped the value ladder. You’ve rushed the process to see them before they are probably comfortable seeing you. And it can be soul crushing to be told no. It can feel like a mini breakup is happening all over again. The question now becomes… How To Handle It If It Happens To You So, story time. If you didn’t know I’m actually married to the woman of my dreams but I want to go back in time to when we weren’t married. I want to go back in time to when we weren’t even dating. We were still in that fun “talking phase.” Let me give you a little on the logistics of our situation at the time. I lived in Texas She lived in Pennsylvania Which meant that in order for us to officially meet in person one of us would have to go to the other or both of us would have to meet in a neutral location. Maybe a few weeks into “talking” my soon to be wife suggested that we meet up at her parents beach house in Florida. I said “no.” Why? It was too much too soon. It was scary. I had known her for two weeks. So, how the heck did she end up bagging this guy (I’m pointing at myself here.) Well, she basically went back to the beginning of the value ladder and worked it. She went back to basics. And that sets the stage for the process that I think you should be doing if you find yourself in this situation, Actually go out and do something on the planned meetup. Preferably with someone else (Friends for non jealousy, Other person for jealousy) Wait a day and then post about the great time on social media Then you would continue to act normal and unbothered (work your way up the value ladder) Let’s start from the top. Actually Go Out And Do Something On The Planned Meetup You ask your ex up for a meetup and they said no. Sucks, right? Want to know what 99% of my clients end up doing? Nothing. They sit at home, feel sorry for themselves. Maybe order an ice cream. Want to know what they should be doing? They should be going out on the exact day they were going to meet up with their ex and actually doing a fun activity. This leads me to my next point. Preferably Go Out With Someone Else Don’t go out on the planned meetup alone. Go with someone else. But who? Well, you really have two options. If you don’t want to make your ex jealous then pick your best friend If you do want to make your ex jealous, you need to go on the date with someone else By doing this you are going to accomplish a few things. You will show that your time is valuable and that you are sought after by other people. Take Pictures Of You Having Actual Fun I mean, we have to capture the fun, right? Here’s my best tip for this. The pictures you take with whoever you bring to wherever you bring them need to be authentic. Don’t fake it. Go out and actually have fun with them. Wait A Day And Then Post About It On Social Media Statistics have shown consistently that close to 90% of exes will be stalking your social media accounts. Thus, it’s highly likely that your ex will be encountered with the opportunity cost issue. They chose to not go out with you. So, instead they are forced to see someone else go out with you. Thus, they can literally see what they are missing out on. You can prove that the missed opportunity to go out with you was something that they may regret. I want you to wait a full day before you post any pictures though. You need to not seem like you are trying too hard. Continue To Act Normally Towards Your Ex And Rework The Value Ladder This is another area I see people in our community going wrong. People fall way too much in love with the no contact rule and while it’s great. It’s not always the answer. Sure, if you haven’t even done a no contact rule then that’s probably something you need to do right away but most of the time the people who are in our community are falling victim to an ex saying no to them after they get out of a no contact rule. If they reject you the worst thing you can do is act bothered by it. It just shows your ex that you still want them. The smartest thing you can do is just simply rework the value ladder and almost act as if they didn’t even reject you in the first place. Which I realize sounds a little ridiculous but if you really think about it, it kind of proves to your ex that you are so confident in yourself that you don’t really care about their opinion of you. That you have the confidence to invest in yourself. And to me, that’s what truly makes someone ungettable.The post I Asked My Ex To Meet Up And They Said No first appeared on Ex Boyfriend Recovery.