Staying in touch with exes via social media

post reply Forum Index » Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)

1 2 3 4 5 ► Go

Go to page...

11/25/2015 21:34

Subject: Staying in touch with exes via social media

quote

Anonymous

I know I am going to get questions about our ages/maturity levels so here goes: we're well into our 30s.

I've been dating someone for 6 months. We're committed, and exclusive and have discussed that we don't intend to date any longer than 18 months prior to an engagement. We've met each other's immediate family and friends, and within the next month b/c of the holidays we are supposed to be meeting colleagues and extended families at Christmas parties. Overall, our relationship is excellent.

Here's my problem: I'm uncomfortable with his FB. I'm very private online. I have always said that I won't change my relationship status unless I'm engaged (and I haven't, though he has changed his, but not tagged me in it at my request). I'm not FB friends with any guys I've dated except those who turned into long-term friendships. He has, literally, more than 3 times the number of FB friends that I do. He was a bit of a ladies man in the past (and like I said, we're not kids, so his "number" is relatively high) and several of his FB friends are past FWBs, flings, etc. Like more than 30 of them.

I know what his past is, and I've accepted it. He was upfront about it. I'm not jealous, and I trust him. But, I don't want my coworkers or cousins seeing a FB friend of his after the holiday party and asking their friend about him and finding out he slept with them a couple of times. I think that when a person is in a serious relationship, one needs to minimize the presence of their past "dalliances" out of respect for their current partner. I'm not suggesting that he de-friend anyone he's actually still actively friends in real life with, but anyone he's not, to my mind, should go. Girls he hooked up with in university, or only dated a couple of times, etc. As I said, he's got way more friends on FB than I do, and is obviously way more casual about who he friends at all.

I've kind of nudged casually at the subject, and in addition to just being way more into FB than I am, he's also quite proud of the fact that he wasn't a "player" to these women and they still want to be his friend. Oftentimes, the women were connected to his social group in some way (friend of a friend) so they were casual friends before sleeping together for a bit, and he uses this to justify it, too. Ironically, he's quite nervous about my family/friends liking him/thinking he is good enough for me.

I don't want to give him an ultimatum, or make him do anything he'll resent me for down the road. But I also feel strongly that if I'm serious enough about him to bring him around my extended family/coworkers (I haven't taken a date to a family party or work function in more than 5 years) he should be serious enough about me to clean up his profile (there are some pictures on there, too, that don't indicate "serious adult man in a relationship" but he's shown more willingness to remove those when I've nudged at it) and his friends list.

Am I slut shaming him? Or is it reasonable to expect that when you're in a serious adult relationship, you don't stay connected to half the people you slept with via social media? I'm not being hypocritical - I have no one on my FB that was a romantic/sexual relationship that I'm not actually friends with currently. I don't want people I know, who I have managed to keep my own personal life very private from, having the potential to find out all about his, for no good reason except that he likes having a lot of FB friends. Any men want to weigh in on how I can explain this to him so he understands where I'm coming from? Obviously, being I value privacy, I can't talk to anyone in my day-to-day life about this, so I came to DCUM.