Did the ex bruise my heart or my ego?

Ego problem, moi? Oh no, no, that’s for rock stars, politicians and chefs. Think a shirtless Putin holding aloft deceased fish, strutting Cristiano Ronaldo or deluded Kanye West (‘I am Shakespeare in the flesh’).

They need to be the loudest voice in the room, praised and worshipped. I really don’t think that’s me, but a few things have shown me that my ego looms larger in my relationships than I thought and it’s potentially problematic.

It was only at the end of my marriage that I realised how much of a role my ego played in my relationship. The revelation came when I had to ask myself: how much of my total devastation around our split was based on losing the love of my husband and how much was the injury to my ego? Answer: the latter was more significant than I’d care to admit.

Ego, noun: a person’s sense of self-esteem or self-importance. Your ego is all about your self-perception – the story you tell yourself about you. And it’s central to how good you feel. If you regard yourself as, say, clever, and then someone threatens that, you react strongly.

And if a lot of your self-worth hinges on being lovable (erm, that’ll be me), then when your partner says ‘thanks, but I’ll pass’, your world falls apart. You drop into an abyss of devastation; hit an existential crisis.

I realised that the ego offence caused by my ex wanting out was in large part why I was so desperate to save my marriage. I’ve since learnt about ‘ego offences’ – they are slights or attacks that tap into your biggest insecurities. If, for example, you felt abandoned as a child, then you will react violently to someone threatening to do the same in later life. Or perhaps you felt out of control at some stage in your earlier life and so you’ve created a world of tight order. Now anyone who threatens to disrupt it, or call it into question, will trigger a violent ego reaction.

I’m just coming to understand that our ego is different to our value system. You may hold kindness and compassion as important but if someone threatens your ego, those values get jettisoned as you try to protect it.

The ego is strong. The devil on your shoulder. An example? I think back to when

I was younger: I used to love it if boyfriends stepped in to defend my honour. It pleased my ego no end. My reasoning was: they love me enough to fight for me. But now I can see that this went against my values of peace and understanding. And that actually their reaction was less about love for me and more about protecting their own egos (‘You disrespect my missus, you disrespect me’).

When you’re in a newish relationship, as I am, and stability is less, it’s more challenging for the ego. If, for instance, my partner expresses regret over the way a past relationship ended, my values mean I should empathise. But in the past my ego would go straight to thinking he must miss his ex so therefore want her back – and when your ego senses a threat it goes into defensive mode.

I know that when my ego is threatened I either a) withdraw to limit emotional damage, b) feel destabilised, which tends to translate into anger at some minor thing or c) become needy.

I think we can all agree none of the above is ideal, but I am getting better at emotional self-regulation.

My boyfriend once said that if he thought there was a chance of me rekindling things with my ex (there isn’t!) he’d step aside because that would mean sacrificing his own happiness for four others to find theirs.

My ego screamed – you’d be prepared to lose me? You don’t love me enough to fight for me? But I soon realised that he was putting his values above his ego. Which, on reflection, is a whole lot more heroic than throwing a punch in a pub.

I USED TO LOVE IT WHEN HE STEPPED IN TO DEFEND MY HONOUR