How to remove elements after an element in JavaScript [duplicate]

Question

In my current project i am getting xhr requests and i am placing them after an element like with this: el.insertAdjacentHTML('afterend', "foo bar"); but i haven't found a way to remove everything after the given element, otherwise the markup will fill over.

I could wrap another container around it, but i am trying to use as less dom elements as possible for performance reasons.

I found several solutions with JQuery, this is not an option either, because its too huge.

Let's say i have a nav element which is on top one its parent container and i want to place stuff after it, but before i have to remove the stuff which exists before.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance

searched the web and here, just found jq solutions, no vanilla js.

JS

    el = document.querySelector("nav.mainNav");
    el.insertAdjacentHTML('afterend', "foo bar");

HTML

    <div>
    <nav></nav>
    <nav></nav>
    <nav class="mainNav"></nav>
    {...CONTENTSHOULD BE PLACED HERE, PLACING WORKS, REMOVING NOT...}
    </div>

JSII - I am experimenting with something like this, but it seems that it does not select all elements. Suggestions?

    var el = document.querySelectorAll("html > body > 
    nav.mainNav + *");

            for ( var i = 0; i < el.length; i++ ){
                el[i].remove();
            }

I found my own solution, thanks four assistance!

var el = document.querySelectorAll("html > body > *:nth-child(1n+3)");
for ( var i = 0; i < el.length; i++ ){
    el[i].remove();
}

Answer 1

An approach to this would be

el = document.querySelector("nav.mainNav");

var insertedContent = document.querySelector(".insertedContent");
if(insertedContent) {
    insertedContent.parentNode.removeChild(insertedContent);
}
el.insertAdjacentHTML('afterend', "<span class ='insertedContent'>foo bar</span>");

Simply place the content within an element, and remove that element when you wish to replace, if it exists!