Nothing maintains a post-breakup glow better than the updates about your ex’s miserable life. Is he still balding at the speed of a runaway lawnmower? Is his favourite football club still choking in the finals? Has he replaced you with your Lite version? And the most important thing—is he happier than you? Keeping tabs on exes is easier than ever. When it’s not self-sabotaging, it’s as entertaining as chaotic reality TV. Drama is all about him, and you are winning every episode.
This schadenfreude has always been there. What’s different now is the information is available. Good, juicy information. And all the time. Everywhere on social media and WhatsApp status updates. And all you want to know is whether your ex upgraded or downgraded after you.
Even the most evolved women who end relationships and situationships with the semi-hostile “good luck for your future” text can’t resist the urge to stalk their exes once in a while. When you dodge a bullet, it’s only natural to check where it eventually lands. If an old boyfriend starts sporting a hideous mustache after the break-up, you must force yourself to look at it once so that you don’t ever miss him. My college mate regularly reads her ex’s newsletter to cringe at his wanna be musician cum new-age philosopher personality. Another girl keeps checking her ex’s Spotify playlist. Then there is the intelligent woman who has mugged all her exes’ phone numbers only to share them with random restaurants and marketing hawks. A sweet revenge.
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Some people can’t move on to better things—they don’t just lurk on their ex’s Instagram stories but even those posted by the guy’s friends, cat, siblings, colleagues, and flatmates. One comrade had befriended her ex’s trusted grocery vendor to stay on top of things.
And one Rebecca Bunch-like Crazy Ex-Girlfriend I know moved cities to watch over her old boyfriend. Breakup wasn’t enough, now she is aching for a restraining order.
Checking LinkedIn profiles, tagged pictures, scrutinising tweets and comments on Facebook and Instagram posts are the regular ways to update yourself about your ex’s new life. But if you are supposed to be practising no contact—a recommended digital detox to get over a dead relationship—you need to go stealth mode. Cuckoo ex-lovers create fake accounts to re-enter the former home turf, watching from the sidelines which new or old player is scoring all the attention. And if you can’t get through to your ex, you can easily track down the one he is currently dating. As a wise woman once told me, for easy access to tea keep your ex’s partner closer. I bet it’s delightful to know how your old trash is stinking up new people’s apartments.
And if you find an old lover more successful and less toxic than you left him, you can always credit yourself for it. After all, you laid the groundwork—and he’s only thriving to impress you still.
Also read: Before a relationship becomes official, it enters a sacred place—the group chat
My 35-year-old aunt, who is occasionally happy in her marriage and busy cleaning up her toddler’s YouTube algorithm, felt a sudden curiosity about her pre-med boyfriend on a random Tuesday. The old romance that once thrived on PCO calls was now to be tracked down through 15 different apps. Fortunately, her Gen Z niece (me) came to the rescue. After scouring friend lists of mutuals and alumni pages on Facebook, resurrecting long-dead WhatsApp groups of college friends and tracking phone numbers on Truecaller, we landed in an unlikely place: the official website of Lucknow’s King George’s Medical University. There he was, the former long-haired scrawny biker dude, now sporting a stethoscope and a dad bod. “Thought so,” said the aunt with unexplained smugness and moved on without rewarding the private investigator. She was relieved that he doesn’t look cooler than her.
The creative ways people track down their exes should be studied by psychologists. In a viral tweet, a guy wrote how he created a fake company profile on LinkedIn, offered a job to his ex and even scheduled an interview with her. Poor thing would have burned the midnight prepping for the interview only to walk in and find her ex waiting to prank her.
When I was still interested in knowing what my blocked ex was up to, I forbade my friends from unfollowing him on Instagram. Each new screenshot they sent me of his grid informed me of just one thing—I won the breakup. It’s not pettiness; it’s self-affirmation.
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(Edited by Humra Laeeq)
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