Should I Hook Up With My Ex?

If you’re on good terms with your ex and in a position where you can hook up with your ex, you need to know that sleeping with your ex won’t fix the situation your relationship is in. It will make you feel better in the moment because it will satisfy you sexually and emotionally, but broken relationships need much more than sex to be saved.

They require ex-couples to improve themselves and their perceptions of each other. That’s the only way exes can overcome old issues and have a new beginning.

Hooking up with an old flame doesn’t do that. Apart from satisfaction, it provides nothing of actual value. Sex helps couples bond, but it doesn’t bring them back together. Not permanently, at least.

This is because dumpees still have feelings for their ex. They value their ex wholly whereas their ex only wants them sexually. Due to different cravings and intentions, dumpees and dumpers can’t get the things they want and eventually encounter problems.

They usually start to argue because their expectations aren’t met.

So if you’re thinking about whether you should hook up with your ex, know that hooking up with an ex you recently broke up with will cause more problems than it will solve. It will make the dumpee extremely excited and hopeful about reconciliation at first.

But when the dumper gets comfortable, he or she will feel overwhelmed and start distancing himself or herself.

You must remember that as long as you or your ex have feelings for each other, there should be no friendship or friendship with benefits. You should leave each other alone and work on detaching and healing.

One day (probably a year or two later), you’ll have accepted and processed the separation and stopped caring about what your ex is doing/feeling and who your ex is seeing. You’ll have realized that the relationship needed to end and that you’ve moved on for good.

At that point, you’ll be ready for friendship and hooking up. You’ll be ready for what you thought you were ready for right after the breakup.

The question you’ll be presented with is why you should be friends with your ex and hook up. What are the benefits of getting involved with your ex in such a way?

If you left your ex, you’ll probably realize that by sleeping with your ex, your ex could redevelop feelings for you and want to be with you again. That could put you on the spot and make you feel guilty and overwhelmed.

However, if your ex left you, your ex could trigger your processed or semi-processed cravings and romantic expectations.

Either way, you need to be aware of the dangers of bonding with your ex or you could complicate an already complicated situation.

If you still have feelings for your ex and are thinking of hooking up with your ex to make your ex love you again, you need to know you’re playing a dangerous game. You’re thinking about putting your heart on the line for a small chance of your ex improving his or her thinking patterns, disassociating negative beliefs from you, and falling back in love with you.

Sadly, the odds of that happening aren’t very high. As much as sex brings couples close, you need to remember you’re not a couple. You’re exes who with underlying issues. As long as those issues remain, hooking up with your ex is only going to make you more anxious and desperate for reconciliation.

That’s because it will increase your obsession with your ex and decrease your ex’s interest in you. You probably won’t sleep together more than a couple of times because your ex will start questioning his or her decisions and the things he or she is getting out of it.

When that happens, your ex will say that this friends-with-benefits situation isn’t working for him or her and that you should focus on yourselves for a while. In other words, your ex will feel swamped with unwanted emotions and show you that nothing has changed since you hooked up.

The only time you can (but probably still shouldn’t) hook up with your ex is when many years go by (you’re over each other) or when you broke up amicably and mutually. That’s when you can safely and without any expectations be friends with benefits for a little while.

I don’t know how that’s going to affect your dating life and if your future partner will respect you for it, but that’s something you need to figure out now that you’re thinking about sleeping with your ex.

While you’re evaluating things, try not to get confused by this mutual breakup situation I just described. When both parties suggest breaking up, it doesn’t always mean that both parties are willing to break up. Some people merely bring up breaking up mutually because they’re not getting enough effort and love from their partner.

Such people are actually dumpees in disguise as they still have strong feelings for their ex and want their ex to turn back into the person they fell in love with. It’s extremely dangerous for such love-deprived people to get sexually involved with their ex.

Sex makes them bond and can seriously mess up their recovery process.

There is nothing casual about hooking up with an ex when someone still has feelings and suffers immensely. I don’t want to sound too traditional, but sex is meant for couples to connect on a deeper level. It’s not meant for exes who have disconnected and don’t see a future with each other.

There is no point in sleeping with someone who might already be sleeping with others. Think of sex as a reward for when two people have committed to each other and enjoy spending days (not just nights) together.

In this post, we discuss whether you should hook up with your ex for fun, to reconcile, or for some other reason.

Should I hook up with my ex if I left my ex?

If you left your ex and got an opportunity to hook up with your ex, I strongly suggest that you don’t do it. Sleeping with your ex won’t help your ex deal with the post-breakup blues. You may not see that your ex is struggling, but the majority of dumpees do.

Some people are just better at hiding it than others.

When you broke your ex’s heart, you triggered his or her separation anxiety, crushed your ex’s self-esteem, and impeded your ex’s ability to focus and be with someone else. You essentially stopped your ex from moving on and being happy.

If you sleep with your ex while your ex is feeling down, your ex will most likely think you’re coming back around and get his or her hopes up. That will make it extremely tempting for your ex to stop processing the separation and trying to find inner peace.

In other words, your ex will stop healing, improving as a person, and finding happiness without you. Don’t do that to your ex just to satisfy your sexual urges. It will have devastating consequences for your ex.

Instead of hooking up with your ex, either figure out how your ex is feeling or just give your ex space. Do that even if your ex is pursuing you hard and telling you that he or she has no intentions of getting back with you.

Your ex must understand that the relationship has ended and that you’re not contemplating giving the relationship another chance. Some dumpees think that by hooking up, their ex will lower his or her guard and let their ex back in.

They don’t take into account that their ex is exhausted from trying to make the relationship work and that there will be no reconciliation on their terms.

The dumper will come back when or she sees the dumpee differently long-term, not just during sex.

Sex doesn’t bring back feelings of love because love develops when couples bond, plan the future, invest and take from the relationship, and fear not having each other in their lives.

Therefore, you should hint at getting back together only when you actually want to get back together. That’s when you can say you made a terrible mistake and that you’re ready to prove how serious you are to fix the mess you’ve made.

Until you know your ex is the one for you, let your ex rebuild his or her self-esteem and not worry about impressing you and winning you back. Your ex deserves peace and stability and won’t have it if you hook up with him or her from time to time and string him or her along.

Should I hook up with my ex if my ex left me?

Hooking up with your ex won’t help you get back with your ex or get over your ex. Breakup pain can’t be dealt with just by sleeping with the person who dumped you and invalidated you. You can’t get rid of attachment by doing things that make you even more attached.

It’s the other way around. You can move forward with your life by refusing to stay obsessed with your ex.

You can refuse to bond and get obsessed and attached by:

• staying off social media or unfollowing your ex
• avoiding your ex’s breadcrumbs and false hope
• saying no to friendship or friendship with benefits
• not listening to friends who tell you to take charge of the breakup and do something to make your ex want you back
• deleting your ex’s pictures and throwing away your ex’s gifts

The sooner you distance yourself from your ex, the quicker you’ll take back control of your life and recover emotionally. As tempting as it may be, don’t convince yourself that your ex will come back and that you can help your ex realize your worth by hooking up.

A hookup is just a sexual experience. It doesn’t knock any sense into your ex and make your ex regret leaving you. It can’t do that because dumpers don’t appreciate easy things. They need to work for things in order to respect them and value them.

The harder a person is to get, the more respect he or she demands. This doesn’t mean you should play hard to get, treat your ex badly, and try to manipulate your ex into feeling unworthy, jealous, and easily replaceable.

Mind games won’t work on someone who has detached and stopped seeing your positive traits. They’ll only work on a person who wants to be with you.

So forget about playing dirty and avoid hooking up with your ex to get back with your ex. Instead, remember that hookups severely impact your growth, healing, and well-being and that your job as a dumpee is to get over your ex rather than get back with your ex.

When you’re over your ex, you’ll see that sleeping with the dumper is self-degrading and that you should be with someone who respects you, deserves, you, and actually wants to commit to you and grow with you.

An ex who sleeps with you just for fun isn’t that person. He or she is someone who uses you to get what he or she wants.

You don’t want to get taken advantage of. You especially don’t want that to happen when you’re the most vulnerable. What you want but may not realize at this point is to protect your heart and get over the breakup as fast as possible.

Hooking up with your ex obviously won’t do that. It will make your breakup experience more difficult than it has to be.

With that said, here’s what hooking up after the breakup does to dumpees and dumpers.

When can you hook up with your ex?

You can sleep with your ex if you and your ex are over each other and in a state of not wanting to date anyone. If you just want to keep each other company and part ways afterward, you can agree to a friends-with-benefits relationship.

Just don’t do it long-term because it could make you dependent on each other and make your new dating partners weirded out by the whole situation.

Exes aren’t supposed to stay or become good friends or sexual friends. In most cases, it makes future relationships a living nightmare because their partners don’t want to date someone who constantly interacts with their ex and reminds them they used to be intimate.

They want peace of mind. And they can have it when you respect the relationship and their feelings.

Don’t pretend like it’s okay to be really good friends with an ex. Deep inside, you know it’s bad for the dumpee and perhaps even worse for the person you and your ex date. You should consider all parties involved and even those you don’t yet know.

So if you’re thinking about hooking up with your ex, consider how it’s going to affect the most vulnerable people involved in this whole ordeal. You may not have met anyone yet, but that doesn’t mean your new partner will be okay with it and that it’s perfectly fine to open a chapter of your life that was supposed to close when you broke up.

If you’re a dumpee, it’s best to work on accepting the breakup rather than looking for ways to hold on to hope and delay healing. And if you’re a dumper, you should keep your ex’s health in mind and do what’s best for your ex, not just you.

You can hook up with your ex only if it’s been a long time since you broke up and/or if you’re both okay with the breakup and with the hookup/s. Feel free to hook up with your ex if you and your ex are taking time off from dating and if you think that you could both use some company.

You also shouldn’t sleep with anyone else while you’re hooking up.

You don’t have the right to pass on STDs and give people hope and hurt them afterward. They don’t want hope (even if they think they do)—and they certainly don’t deserve pain. You must treat them fairly and do what’s best for everyone.

Did you learn if you should hook up with your ex? What makes you want to hook up? Let us know in the comments section below the post.

And if you’re not sure what to do yet and would like our opinion, sign up for coaching with us.

Zan

My name is Zan and I’m the founder of Magnet of Success. I enjoy writing realistic relationship and breakup articles and helping readers heal and grow. With more than 5 years of experience in the self-improvement, relationship, and breakup sphere, my goal is to provide advice that fosters positivity and success and avoids preventable mistakes and pain. Buy me a coffee, learn more about me, or get in touch today.