Welcome to Gaia! ::

A little background: I was in a six year relationship that ended in early March of 2011. We were married, and the marriage was dissolved in October of this year. Three years ago, in November of 2009, he cheated on me with a girl he met online and dumped me for her. There was about a month where we didn't communicate at all, and in that time, I became depressed and suicidal (not just because of what he did, but it was a big contributing factor.) We got back together, made plans to get married, and life went on until I got fed up with his bullshit and left him in 2011. I have never regretted doing this.

Now it's late 2012, and I'm in a much healthier relationship. But last night I had a dream about my ex, Ben and the girl he cheated on me with. In the dream I was still in a relationship with him and very much in love with him. The same s**t happens, except instead of just talking online/over the phone/Skype, they were together physically. In the dream I end up finding them at some sort of restaurant cafe and am heartbroken, and they keep yelling at me (particularly the girl) about how I'm a slut who doesn't deserve someone like him. I go home to the apartment me and Ben share and find her clothes mixed in with mine in the closet.

I woke up this morning really distressed about the dream. The feelings, the missing him, the longing for him, the pain at his betrayal felt so real. But I haven't had these feelings in real life in a very long time. Where is all of this coming from? Is missing an ex long after the relationship's over and you're with someone else normal?

I still dream about my most recent ex-boyfriend, and it's been 10 years.

I always wake up wondering, WTF?

He didn't cheat on me, but he wasn't clear about the break-up, and kind of strung me along for a couple extra years before I finally called him on it.

I think dreams tap into our emotions particularly, even ones we haven't felt for awhile. Maybe it's a sign that you made the right choice in moving on to someone way better for you?

Take care, and keep us updated if you need to. 3nodding

First of all, sorry to hear about all the rough times you've been through. It definitely takes a strong willed person to get through all of that and you have come far.

I am thrilled to hear that you are in a healthier relationship now and I do hope that it will always keep going strong =)

Dreams I have noticed can have a heavy impact on mood upon waking up. I've had terrible dreams about people splitting up me and a person I loved. I'm not sure I've had a dream involving an event that already happened so I may not be able to be of much help here and I apologize if that is the case.

Dreams can feel real and seem so real that sometimes we wonder, "Was that real?" When a dream like that happens - it shows that it is deep in our mind somewhere and that we'll never forget and sometimes it kinda sticked there for a while, I'd imagine.

I remember a friend of mine telling me once when we were talking about ex's, "You can't just stop loving somebody. Even if you're separated and all, you still think about them to an extent." I agree to that somewhat because when I broke up with a guy or they broke up with me - I felt that hurt for quite a while and in my dreams, I was sometimes back together with them and things were all blissful and they had changed and all of that. Then waking up, they aren't there and don't want to be with you anymore - the hurt just attacks you all at once and sometimes you feel a sense of, "I miss them," because you remember all the good about them and the good times you shared together despite all the bad in between. When we love people, it's easy to eliminate the terrible things they may have done and to look past those. It can take a long time to move on from a relationship - especially if it was long-term, or if the knot was tied with marriage and it ended because marriage is a strong bond and I can't imagine how much separating hurts.

It seems normal to me because you may still be trying to move on and there are probably things that you enjoyed about him and remember what it was like to be with him and then to be without him so suddenly and to have hopes of getting back together and then that falling through is disappointing as well.

After I got married, I occasionally had a dream where an ex would randomly show up somewhere in my dream whether they recognized me or didn't recognize me or did something stupid or mean because they had mistreated me in the past. Things like this show up in dreams and to me, it seems pretty normal because it was people you once had a strong association with.