A ‘rebound’ is one of, if not the first, really serious relationships you’ll have after a divorce. Rebounds don’t typically have a high success rate and this is because after usually starting off at a blistering pace, with plenty of excitingment and romance, the reality of the rebound starts to become more and more apparent. How long the rebound lasts is different for everybody, but you can expect that after the first couple of stages, infatuation and intense sex and then falling in ‘love’ the relationship with inevitably transition into a stage of turmoil, where the decisions around how often to see each other, who’s house to sleep at and how and when to introduce your children to each other will come up. You’ll also realize that although the attraction and connection are very real, there is also a question of shared values and personal boundaries. This is where things get complicated.

Most adults post divorce are in need of time to evaluate who they are as an individual and clearly understand what their core values are now that they’re in a position to figure that out for themselves. This can involve self-exploration, self-awareness and ultimately self-growth and can be facilitated by reading books, working with a counselor, and also just spending time alone and in self-reflection. Unfortunately, for most newly single divorcees, this is not the most obvious path at first, when the instinct is to ‘get yourself out there’ and test the waters to see if you’re still attractive in the eyes of the bachelor’s and bachelorettes of the dating app world.

Although I encourage this form of exploration I’d urge caution when wading into these waters. The reasons for why someone could be looking for a relationship after divorce are varied and there are some traps that you don’t want find to find yourself in, such as the ‘mark’ who’s only job is to make an ex-partner jealous as part of a trick to try to win them back. Or the sexual conquest, or the next husband, or the filler until someone better comes along. All of these and many more are always part of the dating world, but can be a huge slap in the face when you’re been out of that world for a while, and you’re vulnerable due to recent heartache and trauma cause by your separation and/or divorce.

A rebound could involve two recently single individuals, but it could also be imbalanced, with one person having experience in the dating game and one being new. This can also be challenging to navigate as the experienced one knows what they’re looking for and what they want and the inexperienced really has no idea other than to know that they want to be wanted. This can lead the inexperienced person to allow themself to be manipulated and make compromises to their values and changes to their personality in order to fit exactly what the more experienced person is looking for. For those more seasoned daters, they’ve seen and sampled much of the available ‘fish’ that meet the criteria in their desired age range, and the newly single is ‘fresh meat’. As much as both people might recognize this imbalance and potential lack of fit, the desire to make it work will be strong for both parties who are in the throes of being desired, showered with praise and compliments and given every example of why they’re the ‘one I’ve been waiting for’. I recommend reading Attached by Amir Lavigne and Rachel S.F. Heller if you haven’t already. There is a disproportionate number of anxiously and avoident attachment types in the adult post-marriage dating pool and this book will help you determine what attachment style you have and even more importantly, what style you are looking to avoid.

My personal experience with a rebound relationship was both a heartwrenching mind-fuck and the most wonderful and fulfilling love affair at the same time. The push and pull of trying to be everything my partner wanted me to be, in order to earn her praise and acceptance was at times a 24/7 stress-fest but the reward always made it worthwhile. Even after quarrelling over an obvious misalignment of values the passionate love make up sex and pillow talk about lessons learned and good communication made it seem like it was an ‘evolved’ state of relationship, much advanced from my previous marriage. While this may very well have been true, it wasn’t until the realities of the rebound surfaced that it hit me. The relationship wasn’t going to work in the long term, even though so much of it was amazing and fun and rewarding there was too much compromise needed from both of us to make it work. Although we’d pledged ourselves to working to be, and stay, together we each felt as though we’d had to give up big and important pieces of ourselves.

My family saw the values misalignment, but they were kind in that they let me organically progress through the relationship, and the inevitable stage of heartbreak. In the end, although I was terribly sad and thought about my lost rebound partner everyday for weeks and months afterwards, I was also clear-headed and determined to find out more about myself and be in a better position to be fully open to loving deeply in my next experiences.

In no way do I consider this rebound to have been a bad thing or a failure. In fact, I don’t think it would’ve been possible to get where I am now without having the experience and spending a year of my life with that wonderful, amazing and truly special partner. She was a teacher and a mentor to me in many ways, she helped me become more free and confident as a man and as a sexual being. I believe she also learned from me and from the experience, although only she could say if this is true, or what knowledge about herself and her relationships she gained.

Who knows how it might have turned out had we both been in a different place already when we met, but of course thinking about that is pointless. We met at a place and time in our lives and had we not met then, it’s almost completely unlikely that we would have ever even crossed each other’s paths. Does she also feel like the relationship was a success, a learning experience and time well spent? I’ll likely never know, since I haven’t spoken to her since we mutually and amicably parted ways. In my mind, I think we both got exactly what we wanted and needed from the experience at that time in both of our lives and are better

off for it.