How do I tell my blog readers that we've broken up?

September 6, 2011 1:24 PM

I have a sort of popular blog and I occasionally blogged about my relationship with another blogger. We've broken up. How do I handle it?

We broke up last week, it was a reasonably amicable split after we realized there was a major incompatibility. We had been dating since late Dec after we met at a blogging conference. My blog readers and other bloggers were big fans of our relationship and loved the posts and pictures about us. We attended a lot of public events together. People would always say things like "you guys look so cute together" and "someday you guys are going to have the most adorable children." etc. etc.

It hurts because I'm still getting Tweets and emails like "I hope to see you and HISNAME at the so and so conference next year!" And other bloggers keep referencing us as an item.

Should I reveal that this is no longer the case on my blog? Just email the fellow bloggers? Have you seen other bloggers deal with this gracefully?

posted by idle to human relations (15 answers total)

Insert as an aside in your latest post:

"By the way, I know y'all appreciated the pictures and posts about me and CatsRidingDogsDotCom but unfortunately, we broke up last week. It's no big thing and we're still cool."

FIN
posted by griphus at 1:27 PM on September 6, 2011 [9 favorites]

Seconding griphus. Although, if you're both bloggers, you may want to reach out to him to see if you want to do a sort of Joint Announcement thing, so as to stave off any Team you Vs. Team Them sniping in each others' comment streams.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:28 PM on September 6, 2011 [5 favorites]

Pamie (one of the great old-school bloggers) actually wrote a book about this. And then later got married super publicly and divorced super quietly. And then kind of wrote a book about that.

The pattern she followed, which seemed to more or less work from a reader perspective, was to just... drop it. For months if not years. (And of course to milk it for creative material, which definitely worked.) The advantage to that was that by the time she actually talked about it, a) her regulars had pretty much guessed and b) she was on pretty stable emotional ground.
posted by restless_nomad at 1:29 PM on September 6, 2011 [4 favorites]

If it were me, I'd say something like "Other blogger and I have broken up. We just realized it wouldn't work and ended things."

No reason to add a new post just to say it either. Just put it in with something you'd do anyway.
posted by theichibun at 1:29 PM on September 6, 2011

Yes. Make a statement. Withholding information won't help anybody, it will just lead to awkwardness when people assume you're still together. But, you shouldn't publicly talk about the relationship aspect of it, the whos and whys and hows, you should just say that you're not together any more.

Make a post that's at least half about something else, some topic he's connected to, and mention his connection. Mention how you're not dating any more and what a great guy he is for this topic. Show your post to him and make sure he's okay with your talking about him like that. Post it.
posted by aimedwander at 1:31 PM on September 6, 2011

I would talk to HIM first, and then if he's ok with it, why not blog about it? In this crazy world of disposable relationships, it might be interesting and refreshing to blog about your life with the amicable break-up. It could make things more interesting, if anything.
posted by floweredfish at 1:34 PM on September 6, 2011

GET DRUNK AND DRUNK FIGHT ON TWITTER!

No, really, if you can have a polite conversation with him, it would be good to come up with a simple joint statement that you've broken up and post it on both of your blogs, to avoid side-taking. Commenters will probably police/inform each other after you announce.
posted by the young rope-rider at 1:52 PM on September 6, 2011 [3 favorites]

Natalie Tran, the #1 subscribed to YouTube vlogger/director in Australia, recently did the same thing. She normally does comedic videos, so it may have been a bit easier for her to ease into it than it will be for you, but you could check out the comments to see how her followers reacted. There's a lot of empathy, even though she didn't really try to elicit pity. Your followers might surprise you with understanding and support.
posted by desertface at 1:57 PM on September 6, 2011 [1 favorite]

This is how Maggie of Mighty Girl fame handled separating from her husband.

I thought it was a very classy and respectful way to handle it.
posted by Flamingo at 1:57 PM on September 6, 2011 [3 favorites]

Have you seen other bloggers deal with this gracefully?

(self-link alert) I did.
posted by John Cohen at 1:58 PM on September 6, 2011

Just for the record, you don't HAVE to talk about it. Yes, you share your personal life on your blog, but that's not a contract.

If you want to keep it quiet, stop talking about him completely, let some time pass, then just mention being newly single and, if you have a demanding readership, a parenthetical "for those of you keeping score at home, XYZ and I parted amicably two months ago". Once you make it clear that it's old news, it will be much less buzzworthy, especially if you haven't mentioned him in two months.
posted by thinkingwoman at 4:56 PM on September 6, 2011 [2 favorites]

The pattern she followed, which seemed to more or less work from a reader perspective, was to just... drop it.

As I recall, Pamie also shut down the messageboard and comments on her site for a long time (citing spammers).
posted by Gator at 6:52 PM on September 6, 2011

As I recall, Pamie also shut down the messageboard and comments on her site for a long time (citing spammers).

If memory serves, that was more connected to her moving to LA and not having the time than directly related to her love life. The site was basically dead for... a year? Two?
posted by restless_nomad at 7:18 PM on September 6, 2011

I liked these sets of posts. I didn't even know who these people were exactly when I saw one, but I felt for them.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:43 PM on September 6, 2011

She didn't say it was related to her love life, obviously, but the timing fit. She continued blogging the whole time about other things, and she eventually re-opened comments after she finally started talking openly about the divorce after the book came out.
posted by Gator at 7:49 PM on September 6, 2011