Think you know everything there is to know about that ex you’ve obsessed over? Well, authors Heather Belle and Michelle Fiordaliso want you to know that there is so, so much more. (Curses!) The two psychotherapists have both “professional and personal experience with exes.” Some of us could use some pro insight on factors like how to be friends with an ex, whether you should get back together, why you really shouldn’t and, say, moving on. Their new book Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Ex tackles all of this. Anything that helps us step away from the dramz is probably a good thing, right? Read it when you’re contemplating a drunk dial. [Amazon]

Here’s a tragic story. Elizabeth and her boyfriend dated for about a year and a half. They had some pets, and some fights, and one day, sick of him being a total douchebag, Elizabeth kicked him to the curb. A few weeks later, Elizabeth’s ex came knocking, along with his hefty father, papers in hand. After he moved his belongings out of her apartment, he had Elizabeth sign the papers, and in her confusion, she didn’t pay much attention. Later, she looked at what she had signed, and realized it was a bill for every dime her ex had ever spent on her during their relationship, from groceries to Valentine’s Day presents. Of course this “document” would never hold up in an actual court of law, but Elizabeth was pretty sure it would make people laugh, so she scanned and posted it on a blog, where we saw it. All of this got us thinking—while the idea of actually compiling a bill and delivering it to an ex is ridiculous and laughable, we can’t help but think that’s there’s some stuff we’d like to charge our exes for. Actual expenses yes, but also pain and suffering too. After the jump, how much you could feasibly charge an ex, after a breakup.

Several years ago, fresh out of a long-term, live-in relationship, I started seeing a guy I met in a bar who was also on the rebound. I was searching for the antithesis of my ex, and as a well-traveled, charming, cocky med student, he fit the bill perfectly. He, on the other hand, seemed to be searching for someone exactly like his ex, a fellow med student who, I learned, loved strappy heels, expensive boutiques, and spoke with a Russian accent. Much to my rebound’s chagrin, I was nothing like his ex, despite his constant effort to mold me into something resembling her. “You’re totally still in love with her,” I accused him one afternoon for the umpteenth time after he recommended yet another store where she liked to shop. “You’re crazy!” he exclaimed again, something, in my vulnerable state, I was beginning to believe.

Whenever you get out of a relationship, do you think to yourself, “My next boyfriend is going to…” and then start a wish list traits you’d like this imaginary person to possess? For example, in high school I dated a guy who had very small feet and walked with them angled out. After we broke up, I thought, “My next boyfriend is not going to have small feet or walk like a duck.” When you’re with someone, you don’t let yourself think about what bothers you about them, but once the two of you are over, you start realizing what you want that they couldn’t give you. It’s a little thing we do to help us figure out what we want from our next relationship. After the jump, read a few wishes from around The Frisky office, then leave yours in the comments.

When a breakup goes bad (when don’t they?), it’s natural to feel angry. There are the obvious ways to express that emotion—egging his car, throwing his belongings out a window, changing your locks. Or, you could take a more subtle and modern approach through technology. Sure, the following tactics might not be entirely legal, but they should serve as some inspiration.

1. Change the name of his shared iTunes library. You know how when you’re on a network, you see music libraries that usually read, “Sally Smith’s Library”? With a simple click on “Preferences” you can switch it to something nasty like “My Music Taste Blows” or “I’ve Got A Golf Pencil In My Pants”. This actually happened to someone I know. She didn’t realize it until she and her roommates were all sitting around one night working on their laptops and one of them asked, “Whose iTunes is called ‘Cheating Jerk’?”

I only think about my underwear in the millisecond when I yank them out of my dresser drawer in the morning. (Thong or no? Is this going to ride up at the gym?) My bra never matches my out-of-season holiday panties or my cotton boy shorts with a French poodle printed on the butt saying, “Ooh la la!” But whenever I’m in a serious relationship, I give painstaking consideration to my unmentionables. I’ve gotten on a plane wearing an elaborate black-and-pink lace getup under a T-shirt and jeans to meet my boyfriend, and shown up at his doorstep wearing nothing underneath a dress.

Every time I’ve ever had sex with an ex, the results have been nothing short of disastrous. There was the time I had sympathy sex with the guy I didn’t love him anymore (resulting in him being certain I still was); the um, “incident” where I made a complete fool of myself when I gave an ex a blow job even though he definitely didn’t love me anymore (the lowest of low ex sex); and the horrifying moment when I cheated on my then bad boyfriend with the sweet ex that I had dumped for the boyfriend but felt I had almost definitely made the wrong decision. (Hey, it was very, very confusing!)

A lot of people swear by ex sex. Some claim to keep it casual, but my question is, if you broke up it was for a reason that was probably somewhat emotionally charged, how can you ever truly be flip? The bottom line is, someone is still attached. If not, why exactly are you allowing yourselves to sleep together again? Sadly, the answer is that one party is just interested in sex, while the other has a desperate ulterior motive: to convince the former to realize that they should get back together.

A man reportedly broke into his ex-girlfriend’s home and stole the sex toys he had bought for her birthday present when they were together. After making off with the lingerie, gauntlets, shackles, and whip, Paul Ashcroft is said to have sent Claire Bainbridge a text message telling her to check her drawers. She discovered that the items were missing, and two days later they were recovered in Ashcroft’s residence. The judge sentenced him to a two-year conditional discharge, in addition to paying court costs. “This was pretty disgraceful behavior,” the judge said. “There is no excuse for doing what you did in stealing those items. I trust that the relationship has now come to an end. I have been told…each of you now has a fresh relationship. I suggest you concentrate on that.” [News Guardian, U.K.]

He apparently attracts his girlfriends’ ex-boyfriends like the plague. Now he can get you yours! But you’ll have the best results, if you sleep with him. [Craigslist]

Unless you started your new relationship as a virgin, chances are you have some semblance of an “ex.”

So what happens to all the “exes” when you get into a serious relationship? Are they like the Junior absorbency tampons in your multi-pack, destined to go unused for all your menstruating days? And what if you’ve actually developed a “friendship” with this feminine Q-tip? Well, the answer is harsh…but simple. Once you get into a serious relationship, your ex “friends” are going to fade away, and they should. Here’s my rationale:

I’m being kind of stalked right now. Not in a scary way, but in an annoying way. A guy that I had a dalliance with many years ago has made a career change from bartender to candidate for a rather high position in state government. A few months ago he messaged me on Friendster, alerting me to his campaign and checking in on how I was. Ever since then, I’ve been included on his campaign’s mailing list and the emails have not stopped. Nearly everyday I am reminded of how he is a real Democrat for change, but what I’m really reminded of is how I once took him to Banana Republic to help him pick out shoes to wear when he saw his ex-girlfriend again. I am alerted to the five new endorsements he has received, but the real alert is the subtle nausea I feel over the fact that he was uncut. Here is the problem—even though I want the guy to win because his intentions seem good, I desperately want to be deleted from his mailing list so the bad memories from my single life go away. But how can I do that without seeming cruel… or like a bad Democrat? Any advice?