Ex appeal

[Oralee]

A pernicious mechanism that compels one to want ones ex more than one would if [that ex] were a complete stranger, [platonic friend], or active love interest. While some may attempt to explain [ex appeal] in terms of nostalgia or fear of change, the phenomenon remains an anomaly, as it could not at any moment in the history of the human race have promoted survival and so should have been squandered by selective pressures hundreds of thousands of years ago.