Breaking up is hard. Whether you're the dumped, or the dumper, it can be a slow and difficult transition into living apart. The first hurdle after the finish line is returning miscellaneous items to one another; records, underwear, books, toothbrushes, vases and video games – the detritus of what once was.
Then one member of the band formerly known as "couple" might find some stray merchandise, like a sock, and the fallout can range from a simple discarding of the item, to the formation of a sad shrine in worship of said inanimate object.
Beyond physical objects, we carry traces of our loves with us every day. Maybe we don't realise, but we do. Maybe they brought into our lives a love of sashimi, superstitious feelings towards magpies, or a penchant for Otis Redding. Whatever those things are, we take them with us, mostly unwittingly, into our future selves.
But what of the bad habits we contract that aren't nearly as sweet as knowing all the lyrics to "Try A Little Tenderness"? What about the really terrible habits we pick up from our exes that our mates are too shy, or blissfully unaware, to point out. From smoking weed, to eating in bed and arguing in public, we asked a cross-section of people what they suspect might really be the naughtiest trait they've held onto from a past relationship.
Eleanor, 26: Self conscious about my weight
Two years into my past relationship, my ex-boyfriend signed a huge contract as a male model for a massive agency and everything changed. Not only did he start avoiding carbs (I'd watch him meander around his potatoes) but he'd also check himself out in every reflective surface. Beyond it being entirely humiliating to watch, it was sad too. At first I'd tease him ("My God! Your hair is receding!) then I'd placate him ("You don't need to worry about your weight, you're being silly") then I'd lose my temper: "You're making me feel self-conscious, please stop!" Then I began avoiding carbs. I began to complain of feeling dumpy and my friends recoiled.
One thing he did was lightly pinch his stomach underneath his T-shirt right after he'd finish a meal. He didn't know he was doing it, but I did, and I wondered if anyone else had noticed. Then one day, alone, after lunch, I did it. To see what he was feeling. To try and understand. And, of course being sat down, all I could feel were rolls.
We broke up not long after his modelling career took off (it's now non-existent) but last year after Christmas lunch, my mum took me to one side and asked me to "please stop doing that thing you do where you feel your tummy at the table." I was shocked. I've now asked my friends to elbow me if they catch me doing it.
Sarah, 29: Bad slang
I use words like "sick", "wicked" and "yeah boiii" far too often and have to stop myself from saying "na bruv" in work meetings because of one particular grime-obsessed boyfriend. We used to sit and watch SB.TV for hours on end and talk seriously about people's "flow". He was actually very ahead of his time, since this was 2007 and grime was very much underground. He still sends me youtube links of new grime artists with introductions like "Heat. Draw for da mac, cock back da skeng. Bang corn on da opps. Then 10 toes." I stopped asking for translations long ago.
The inverse happened with my next, very posh and sometimes snobby boyfriend, who would infuriate me by laughing whenever I said "I'm going to the toilet". "It's loo", he would scoff. Now I always say loo, but, it's a fucking toilet.
Lucy, 29: Smoking weed
I met my ex-girlfriend through a mutual friend. The three of us started to hang out one long, hot summer. I knew they had dated before so I was apprehensive about making a move, but I had fancied her for so long. I knew that one thing they had bonded over was weed; smoking in the park, after dinner, on a Sunday, and I felt very left out of those moments. So one day, I just said "yes" when my friend asked if I wanted to join her and my crush for a post-meal smoke, and, well, my friend went home and me and my ex bonded for the first time.
That set the bar then for the rest of the relationship. I recall feeling teenage in the process of coaxing myself into enjoying weed and its effects, but "fake it 'till you make it." Before I knew it I was the one smoking every day after work and buying the stuff. Since we've split, if anything I smoke more regularly now.
Lynn, 35: Drinking every night
My ex-boyfriend was a really brilliant chef and with his love of food, came his passion for coordinating alcohol with his menus. Most nights I'd come home to some culinary masterpiece and a few bottles of booze to match. I used to wake up with a fuzzy head.
The habit formed quickly and, nine months later, if I don't have a drink with dinner, I'm really quite amazed at myself. I know it's terrible and every week I say I'll quit next week. But take this week for example, I've just discovered organic red wines...
Molly, 30: Eating in bed
My ex and I moved in together after about three weeks of knowing each other. He liked indie music, I do not. I like beach holidays, he hated the sun. I love cats, he was allergic. We were, in short, made for each other.
One thing Ben loved was a midnight snack. We'd stay up late, despite work, and watch movies. We had a 24-hr bagel shop on our street corner, run by these amazing old Jewish ladies who knew our order by heart. I think I had about 300 bagels circa midnight four times a week during our happy but eventually podgy love affair. I still love eating in bed late at night, and I miss the bagel shop ladies badly.
Lisa, 29: Eating meat
Being veggie was very central to my understanding of myself and my upbringing. My mother was Singaporean and raised my sister and I on a strict vegetarian diet. We lived in a tiny flat in Manchester, but animals were a central part of my life; we had three cats and two little dogs and we lived happily together.
After I went to fashion school in Manchester, I moved to London, and away from my mum's home cooking. I struggled to find veggie food that I liked and that was readily available on my lunch break, so I just started eating loads of carbs. Then I met a boy, at work, and everything changed. At first when we attended his family dinners, the sight of beef and pork would make my stomach churn, but worse was the embarrassment written on his face when he had to excuse me each time and hand me the cauliflower.
Then we moved in together and the more I protested about the smell of fried meat when I got home from work, the further apart we seemed to grow, We ate separately almost every night and he dismissed my cooking as bland. When our relationship was suffering a particularly rocky patch, I made him breakfast in bed– with bacon, which I ate. And everything changed. I've now shed my boyfriend but gained an insatiable appetite for red meat. Beyond the guilt, I feel like I've lost some independence, and I hate lying to my sister every time I go back up to Manchester and she cooks for me.
Alex, 27: Picking skin
My ex-girlfriend spent so much time in the bathroom that I used to be too embarrassed to knock and hassle her. I mean, like, half an hour in the morning and she'd emerge with no make up on, undressed, slightly covering her face. After sex in the evenings, she'd disappear into the bathroom. It first happened a few months into us seeing each other, in that period where you start to feel relaxed around one another, but it took me about six months to pluck up the courage to ask what she was doing in there. "Picking my skin," she winced. Admittedly, her skin wasn't great, but I didn't care and more to the point, I couldn't believe that that was what she'd been doing all that time. "Why?" I asked. "Because it feels good," she said ashamedly.
In a bid to stop her, I'd let her pick spots on my back (I worked in construction, so yeah, sorry, but quite sweaty work) and she'd happily needle away at my back in bed or on a sun lounger. Then it all just crept up on me and I found myself picking my skin under our fluorescent bathroom light one evening and finally understanding what she meant. This is so awful, but sometimes we'd stand side by side in silence, and pick. I still pick my skin now, mostly blackheads if I'm stressed although I'm getting better and better at talking myself out of it.
Amanda, 56: Arguing in public
Angry is an understatement. We're talking Liz Taylor and Richard Burton levels of pot-smashing, lamp-throwing screaming marathons. At least towards the end of my relationship with my ex-husband.
On the whole I was pretty zen before I met my ex. I knew he had a temper when we married but I romanticised it as a way of him indicating that he cared. I mean, that didn't stick when I recounted the tales of him shouting at traffic wardens, rolling his eyes at waiters and kicking off in shops if he was made to queue. I don't think I realised how aggressive his anger had made me until I got into a new relationship and I found myself crying in the middle of Sainsbury's because my new boyfriend confessed he wasn't actually a "massive fan" of curries. I'd been making them pretty solidly for two months. Now I'm learning to laugh when previously, I'd have thrown a tantrum. Sort of.
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