Ex girlfriend hot and cold behavior is a red flag. Hey guys, welcome back to the Breakup Corner, I’m Andi Galster, and here I talk about moving on from breakups for guys. 

So guys, maybe some of you are new to this channel, so as a reminder, here I try as much as possible to help men overcome their breakups, to move on from their relationships with their ex-girlfriends, and to feel happiness again. That’s the ultimate goal for me because breakups leave a massive hole inside our hearts. Especially severe breakups really make you question your entire identity as a person, and often it can shatter certain views that you have about your life, relationships, fairness in life in general, the decency of an ex-partner, and so on. Sometimes, a breakup can really tear you down and make it seem like nothing makes sense anymore.

And that’s why it’s so crucial to rebuild. You metaphorically have to take the pieces that were torn down, and then you have to reassemble them and create something new. Maybe something better, maybe not. It doesn’t always have to be something completely new. But the bottom line is that after a breakup, you need to create a new foundation to stand on. And that is not always easy when you’re alone, but it gets even harder when your ex-girlfriend is coming back into the picture. Because usually, that happens when you already have done some of that rebuilding process. But often, you’re somewhere in the middle, and that’s when ex girlfriends may come back in an attempt to try to build something new together. And there’s nothing wrong with that. When I first started out with dating coaching, I actually had a YouTube channel that focused on rekindling relationships. I think if you can rekindle a relationship with an ex-girlfriend, that’s great and can lead to a very satisfying relationship, given that you both do the work and are committed to each other.

But what if your ex-girlfriend isn’t really committed to that? What if she is just back to test the waters. Or because it’s convenient for her. Or because it’s an easy backup plan. Or because she just got dumped by another guy. There are many reasons why an ex-girlfriend may get in touch with you and why she wants you, but she doesn’t REALLY want you. She just wants what feels good, which is being loved by you.

And in such a case, when an ex isn’t really serious about getting back together, it hurts a lot. It only confuses you. Perhaps she’s only looking for a distraction. And whether you get back together or not, if or when it happens, it’s not very important to her. Whereas from your perspective, whenever you hear from your ex-girlfriend, you are getting your hopes up like crazy. Every single message received from your ex makes your heart beat fast and you start to overthink every single sentence that she wrote to you, and everything that you could say to her. 

When you’re in that mindset after a breakup, a hot and cold ex girlfriend is usually a red flag. But so what does hot and cold mean? Maybe you know the song “Hot & Cold” from Katy Perry, where she sings…

That song describes a hot and cold ex perfectly. We fight, we break up, we kiss, we make up. You don’t want to stay, you don’t want to go. When your ex is like this, she will come back to you, and often you will make some kind of progress, such as getting closer again… Only for her to disappear again.

Literally right before writing the script for this video I was talking to a friend of mine about the “woman who rises from the dead”, as he called it. Which is, women who just disappear and then come back out of nowhere. This happens with exes, but also with dating in general. But of course, with breakups this is much more painful. It can really destroy your self-esteem. It can confuse you.

I think most men are quite idealistic, committed, deeply in love with their exes. So when they hear from an ex girlfriend, it really means a lot to them. But women often cycle through men based on whomever is the most convenient in the moment. The thing is, the more experienced you become with dating as you get older, the less you really care about these “risen from the dead” type of women. You just move on, and talk to another woman who appreciates you. You simply weren’t attractive enough to her in that moment, she dated someone else, and when she comes back in the most extreme way, where she appears out of nowhere after weird silence, ghosting, after months or years, then you couldn’t care less.

You instinctively know that this woman is a red flag who will never commit to you. She’s committing to what she believes you bring to the table compared to other men who didn’t make her happy, or, who perhaps dumped her precisely because of that character flaw of hers.

But, the problem after a breakup is, even if you’re used to that behavior from women by now, it never stops hurting with the woman you love. You may try to be as rational as possible, and you should, but as the poet Emily Dickinson so eloquently said: ‘The Heart wants what it wants – or else it does not care’

Even at your best rational behavior, your heart wants what it wants. And this is all the more reason to remind yourself of the need for rationality when an ex-girlfriend is hot and cold with you. It is one thing when an ex-girlfriend is trying to be brave and overcome her own ego, fears, insecurities, and is trying to bridge the gap between the two of you. I think there is much to be admired about a woman who acknowledges that she made a mistake when she left a man or a relationship behind.

But unfortunately, not every ex-girlfriend’s desire to rebuild the bridges is genuine. Sometimes an ex-girlfriend only comes back and goes hot and cold because she’s using that bridge as a way to cross over to the next man, and you’re only a stopover so she doesn’t get lonely, sad, insecure, and so on. And in such a case, your hot and cold ex-girlfriend is a walking red flag, and you should tear those bridges down, reject her pursuit of small dopamine hits from you, and instead, keep focusing on your own path.

You are already lacking plenty of happiness hormones due to the breakup, and a hot and cold ex girlfriend will often only make this worse. Your biggest priority is to be happy again. Sometimes, you can be happy again with an ex-girlfriend, but if you can see that you only feel unhappier and more confused after you heard from an ex-girlfriend multiple times without having made any meaningful progress with her, and the relationship hasn’t improved, then it’s time to move forward from that woman for good and dedicate all your energy towards yourself, or hey, maybe that incident will even be a sign for you to move on and find a better woman who wants you 100% without any ambiguity. Because trust me, that woman is out there for you, and the sooner you start looking, or at least open yourself up to the idea of dating a great woman when you randomly meet her, the sooner you will find a woman who makes you happy again. Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for you this time. Let me know in the comments how you feel about your breakup.