“Videos Of My Girlfriend And Her Ex… How to Forget?” [VIDEO]

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In today’s video, I respond to a viewer who is concerned about “videos of my girlfriend and her ex.”

Read or watch below to learn more about how to deal with a situation involving a “girlfriend and her ex,” and retroactive jealousy.

Zachary Stockill: As we all know, overcoming retroactive jealousy can be tough—and it can get even harder when we come across things we probably shouldn’t have seen.

In today’s video, I’m going to respond to someone dealing with retroactive jealousy around images he can’t unsee.

My name is Zachary Stockill, and since 2013, I’ve helped thousands of men and women from around the world overcome retroactive jealousy and save their relationships.

If you’d like to learn more about my work or are interested in working with me one-on-one, please click here.

The term retroactive jealousy refers to unwanted intrusive thoughts, often obsessive curiosity, and what I like to call “mental movies” about your partner’s past relationships.

You might experience just one of those symptoms, or all three—but that, in a nutshell, is retroactive jealousy.

In today’s video, I’m going to read a comment I received from someone—I’m assuming a viewer of this channel.

This viewer writes that some men have been exposed to actual sex videos of their current spouse with an ex-boyfriend.

These were videos that had been stored in the home and were discovered several years later.

This experience can be traumatic because the images are real, even if the encounter happened long before the current relationship.

Seeing these graphic images can lead to frequent flashbacks of the video that are hard to forget.

There’s no way to sugarcoat this—so I won’t try:

That’s a very difficult situation.

Especially if you’re in the unfortunate position of having seen images—or maybe even videos—of your partner involved, so to speak, with someone else.

I’m not going to sugarcoat it—that’s really difficult.

I completely understand and can imagine how challenging that must be.

However, the first thing I need to say—and I don’t know if this applies to you, but I say it quite often—is that this kind of thing usually happens when the person struggling with retroactive jealousy goes snooping around the house or through their wife’s things.

An iPad, computer, phone, old hard drive, or something like that.

Quite often, this kind of thing happens because of snooping.

Not always—and I don’t know if that’s the case for you—but it often comes up as a result of snooping.

And as you know, if you’ve watched many of the videos on my channel, I have strong feelings about snooping and invading your partner’s privacy.

I’m a strong believer in personal privacy.

I believe that no matter how long you’ve been married—even 50 years—each person in the relationship still has a right to their privacy.

It’s not okay to go snooping through their phone, laptop, or anything like that. You’ve probably heard me say this before, but it’s worth repeating.

So, if part of this issue was, in a way, inspired or caused by your own snooping…

Well, maybe that’s a valuable lesson to never do that kind of thing again, because snooping can often lead to, unfortunately, seeing things like what you’re describing.

The first thing I’ll say is that people often assume—retroactive jealousy sufferers especially—that it’s their partner’s past that bothers them.

That it’s the actual events in their partner’s past causing the discomfort.

And technically, that’s not true.

What really troubles retroactive jealousy sufferers are the stories they tell themselves about what their partner’s past means. It’s the meaning or significance they create around their partner’s past, right?

So yes, no one in a relationship—or at least most people in relationships—wants to see something like that.

They don’t love knowing that their partner was once intimate with someone else. Obviously, most people are going to feel that way.

However, most people in relationships—people who’ve never heard of retroactive jealousy and have no idea who I am—can live with it.

They’ve told themselves a better story about their partner’s past, and they probably don’t even realize they’ve created that story.

What I mean by that is most—let’s just call them “normal” people—don’t overthink their partner’s past.

That might not be the nicest way to say it, but let’s be real—non-retroactive jealousy sufferers tell themselves a story.

As in “Yes, my partner had sex with this person. My partner was once intimate with someone else. So what? Who cares?

“I’m focused on living in the present, and yeah, thinking about it isn’t my favorite thing—but it’s not a big deal…

I don’t love that it happened, but that was then and this is now. All of that—our past relationships—led us to where we are today.

“So I’m going to be present with my partner. I’m going to enjoy the relationship in the moment.”

You get the idea.

Most non-retroactive jealousy sufferers tell themselves some version of that story. And in this case—where you’ve seen things you can’t unsee—it becomes much harder to do that.

You’ve seen graphic images, maybe of your wife.

You can’t unsee your partner being sexual with someone else—but you can start telling yourself a new story about what those events really mean.

Obviously, just to be clear, this is easier said than done. But in this case, it’s really the only option.

Okay, so for example, let’s say you’ve seen your wife being intimate with someone else in some kind of video.

You might be telling yourself, on some level, that your wife is X, Y, or Z.

Maybe you’re thinking she has low morals, or you’re thinking, “I can’t believe she slept with that idiot.”

Or, you know, something along those lines.

Maybe you’re thinking there are all these other things you don’t know about her. Or maybe she preferred the sex with that other guy—yada, yada, yada.

What I want you to do first is get clear on the story you’re telling yourself.

About this situation, or these videos you’ve seen of your wife with someone else.

“How are you interpreting this issue in your mind? What significance or meaning do you believe this situation holds for you?

Which narratives are you constructing about your wife’s past and this particular situation?”

Equally, with the same seriousness and intention, start creating a better story.

The story I always tell, and the one that has helped me the most, is this: I’m glad my partner was with that person because he taught her that I’m a better match for her.

Right now, it’s obviously fortunate when you truly believe that story.

For example, in my life, when I’ve told myself that story about past girlfriends and situations like that, I believed it.

I’m a pretty confident guy, and I believed that story.

Maybe it was always true, but I definitely told myself that story.

And I believed it. Now, you need to come up with a story that resonates with you more, or one that’s a bit more specific to your situation.

But if you like that perspective and think it’s a better one to adopt than the ones you’ve been carrying around, then you can take it.

You can use that perspective too. The point is to get clear on the meaning you’re assigning to your partner’s past.

Get clear on the meaning you’re giving to this situation and start creating a new meaning because the past doesn’t have any inherent meaning.

This is the big secret that many people don’t realize when dealing with something like retroactive jealousy: the past has no inherent meaning.

I’ll avoid the temptation to go on a long philosophical rant, but you get the idea. We are the ones who give meaning to the events of the past.

The good news is that we can give whatever meaning we choose to anything that happened in the past.

If you need help getting started with this issue, or if you’re watching this video and facing a different situation but struggling with retroactive jealousy, I’m here to help.

It’s time to start taking steps in the right direction.

If you’re tired of retroactive jealousy weighing you down, I have something I’d like to offer you. It’s completely free with no catch.

You can sign up for my free four-part video mini-course on how to start overcoming retroactive jealousy.

It’s completely free, with no catch, and it includes videos and content you won’t find on YouTube or anywhere else, so be sure to sign up for my free four-part video mini-course to start overcoming retroactive jealousy.