How to be friends after a breakup?
July 18, 2022 11:02 PM Subscribe
I was just broken up with by a woman who was in my primary circle of friends, then an extremely close one-on-one friend, then a girlfriend. I (also a woman) would like to figure out how I can be friends with her again. Have you navigated friendship after a breakup? How did you do so? How can I continue to be friends with this person?
Right now I am still hurt, upset, frustrated, and angry. There are some perfectly valid it's-not-you-it's-me reasons for us not to be together, but she still handled the breakup in ways that were painful to me. She (the one who was perhaps less invested in the dating part of our relationship all along, and who initiated the breakup) seems very much ready, even eager, to be friends.
She's someone who has been there for me in really important ways as a friend, and I care a lot about her as a person. She is also part of a circle of friends I am very close with, and if I were unable to remain on friendly terms with her it would be extremely inconvenient for me. I miss her a lot not just as a partner but as a friend. Right now I've been taking some time away from her.
How do I transition to being some version of friends again? I've read previous questions on this. I'm especially interested in people's personal experiences of this in queer and/or non-monogamous spaces.
Right now I am still hurt, upset, frustrated, and angry. There are some perfectly valid it's-not-you-it's-me reasons for us not to be together, but she still handled the breakup in ways that were painful to me. She (the one who was perhaps less invested in the dating part of our relationship all along, and who initiated the breakup) seems very much ready, even eager, to be friends.
She's someone who has been there for me in really important ways as a friend, and I care a lot about her as a person. She is also part of a circle of friends I am very close with, and if I were unable to remain on friendly terms with her it would be extremely inconvenient for me. I miss her a lot not just as a partner but as a friend. Right now I've been taking some time away from her.
How do I transition to being some version of friends again? I've read previous questions on this. I'm especially interested in people's personal experiences of this in queer and/or non-monogamous spaces.
Yes to taking it slow. Start with chatting while in a large group outing to somewhere neutral. Make polite excuses for anything that seems too intimate for the kind of friendship you're aiming for, or is too difficult for your feelings at this stage.
There will definitely be weird moments. When they happen, you might like to call them out specifically, like "oh whoops, that got a bit weird there, can we rewind a few minutes and have another go at that topic?". Or "...can we change the subject and pretend we're cool normal people?" Keeping it light and jokey is good.
I only ever successfully stayed friends with one ex (straight couple) and it was worth the effort to push through the awkward transition. It did help that our friends would chime in every now and then with comments like "you two can stop bickering now, you're not a couple anymore". It acted as a bit of a guardrail for when I was getting too intense for the level of relationship we had at that point.
posted by harriet vane at 2:48 AM on July 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
There will definitely be weird moments. When they happen, you might like to call them out specifically, like "oh whoops, that got a bit weird there, can we rewind a few minutes and have another go at that topic?". Or "...can we change the subject and pretend we're cool normal people?" Keeping it light and jokey is good.
I only ever successfully stayed friends with one ex (straight couple) and it was worth the effort to push through the awkward transition. It did help that our friends would chime in every now and then with comments like "you two can stop bickering now, you're not a couple anymore". It acted as a bit of a guardrail for when I was getting too intense for the level of relationship we had at that point.
posted by harriet vane at 2:48 AM on July 19, 2022 [3 favorites]
The best suggestion I can offer is to take some time--how much time is for you to explore--to be completely separated and out of communication with this person. This is how you get to a point where you decide if and how to reconnect as friends.
There's some good relationship science behind taking this kind of an approach. In a neurological sense, a break of sufficient duration in the continuity of contact with someone is a trigger for what seems to be a very foundational capacity for our brains to un-knit our intense feelings of love and bonding with that person. Let's call it the grief response adaptation, if you will. Scientists and therapists and thinkers comment on this in different ways, but it seems sensible that our physiological evolution has developed tools to help us move on from grief after we lose loved ones, or are otherwise separated from them.
A breakup is less permanent than these unambiguous losses. We can stay in contact with people we've broken up with, and that contact prevents (or seriously delays) this mental process of separating from intimate feelings. A breakup is an ambiguous loss, and we have to impose our own approaches to grieving these events. One of the ways we can do that is by cutting off contact for a significant amount of time--several weeks, months, etc. Give your brain a moment to accept that this person is no longer in your life the way they once were. Let that change happen in your mind and attachment. You'll feel it happen, or beginning to happen--there will be a day when you notice it in some surprsing way if you're anything like me. And then I suggest you continually ask yourself if more time separated would be good (there's a good amount of talk about this kind of approach in the literature and therapeutic thinking about approaching ambiguous loss).
Eventually you'll have broken the spell of that attachment, so to speak. From this new place of revised feelings, it's a very different prospect asking yourself how you envision what a friendship with this person could be.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 4:55 AM on July 19, 2022 [11 favorites]
There's some good relationship science behind taking this kind of an approach. In a neurological sense, a break of sufficient duration in the continuity of contact with someone is a trigger for what seems to be a very foundational capacity for our brains to un-knit our intense feelings of love and bonding with that person. Let's call it the grief response adaptation, if you will. Scientists and therapists and thinkers comment on this in different ways, but it seems sensible that our physiological evolution has developed tools to help us move on from grief after we lose loved ones, or are otherwise separated from them.
A breakup is less permanent than these unambiguous losses. We can stay in contact with people we've broken up with, and that contact prevents (or seriously delays) this mental process of separating from intimate feelings. A breakup is an ambiguous loss, and we have to impose our own approaches to grieving these events. One of the ways we can do that is by cutting off contact for a significant amount of time--several weeks, months, etc. Give your brain a moment to accept that this person is no longer in your life the way they once were. Let that change happen in your mind and attachment. You'll feel it happen, or beginning to happen--there will be a day when you notice it in some surprsing way if you're anything like me. And then I suggest you continually ask yourself if more time separated would be good (there's a good amount of talk about this kind of approach in the literature and therapeutic thinking about approaching ambiguous loss).
Eventually you'll have broken the spell of that attachment, so to speak. From this new place of revised feelings, it's a very different prospect asking yourself how you envision what a friendship with this person could be.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 4:55 AM on July 19, 2022 [11 favorites]
Queer and poly person replying here. Good friends with most of my exes. Yes to a period of no contact, although grownups can usually navigate shared friendship spaces without engaging or making drama. Don’t lose your mutual friends while you step back from her. When you stop thinking about her obsessively and with longing (ideally because you’ve now got better things going on in your life) is when you can re-engage in a friendship. That might take 6 months; it might take years.
posted by shadygrove at 5:13 AM on July 19, 2022 [11 favorites]
posted by shadygrove at 5:13 AM on July 19, 2022 [11 favorites]
I am at casually friendly or good friends with the majority of my exes but we needed serious time apart first, including not being at parties together, etc.
A lot of well-meaning people - especially the ones who initiate the break-up - semi-consciously feel that "being friends" will assuage their guilt over the break-up and and make the other person happier. This is not generally the case. They can rush friendship and be excessively intimate - one can have a super-intimate relationship with an ex, but not until the feelings are totally gone. Like, your ex should not be having "dates" with you, basically; intimacy with your ex should not replace intimacy with other friends or new partners, and it will if you let it.
posted by Frowner at 6:45 AM on July 19, 2022 [9 favorites]
A lot of well-meaning people - especially the ones who initiate the break-up - semi-consciously feel that "being friends" will assuage their guilt over the break-up and and make the other person happier. This is not generally the case. They can rush friendship and be excessively intimate - one can have a super-intimate relationship with an ex, but not until the feelings are totally gone. Like, your ex should not be having "dates" with you, basically; intimacy with your ex should not replace intimacy with other friends or new partners, and it will if you let it.
posted by Frowner at 6:45 AM on July 19, 2022 [9 favorites]
I'm good friends with most of my exes. The key is definitely a period of no contact, and the length is highly variable depending on your emotional attachment to the former relationship and how long it takes you to get over any hurtful actions on their part. If your friends are decent humans, they will understand and make space for that for both of you.
At some point, once you have a more objective view of them as a person, friendship can begin again. It will not, and should not, be the same friendship, but knowing this and having Very Good Boundaries, friendship is possible. And be prepared for the emotions to come back if/when they find another partner before you do (or even then, our heart can still ache even if we're into someone else) It's normal. Take another break until you can be genuinely happy for them.
I'm sorry this happened, I know how challenging it is, especially at first. Be kind to yourself and be patient. It will get better.
posted by ananci at 7:04 AM on July 19, 2022 [5 favorites]
At some point, once you have a more objective view of them as a person, friendship can begin again. It will not, and should not, be the same friendship, but knowing this and having Very Good Boundaries, friendship is possible. And be prepared for the emotions to come back if/when they find another partner before you do (or even then, our heart can still ache even if we're into someone else) It's normal. Take another break until you can be genuinely happy for them.
I'm sorry this happened, I know how challenging it is, especially at first. Be kind to yourself and be patient. It will get better.
posted by ananci at 7:04 AM on July 19, 2022 [5 favorites]
Missing someone as a friend in the context of a romantic breakup should be seen not as something distinct from missing them as a romantic partner but as part of that. I say this not to cast doubt on whether your feelings are genuine but because it is very common to engage in a post-breakup internal bargaining process where you say "well, okay, we don't have to be romantic but the feeling of being apart from them is so unbearable that I will accept this lesser state of being friends in order to maintain this connection." There is almost always a degree of self-deception involved here and it is likely that if you do in fact end up being friends soon after this will make you more unhappy than if you weren't friends at all, since ongoing intimacy continually reminds you of what you can't have. (This is also kind of a best-case scenario, since sometimes the other person will violate friendship boundaries in a way that keeps you constantly hoping that maybe after all this will turn back into a relationship again.)
Basically, the reason everyone is telling you to wait is that any actual friendship you might have will have to genuinely start from scratch in the same way you might decide to be friends with a stranger, not as a result of this bargaining process. Only you can decide when that's the case. Be kind to yourself, but also be honest with yourself; this will spare you a lot of pain later.
posted by derrinyet at 7:11 AM on July 19, 2022 [7 favorites]
Basically, the reason everyone is telling you to wait is that any actual friendship you might have will have to genuinely start from scratch in the same way you might decide to be friends with a stranger, not as a result of this bargaining process. Only you can decide when that's the case. Be kind to yourself, but also be honest with yourself; this will spare you a lot of pain later.
posted by derrinyet at 7:11 AM on July 19, 2022 [7 favorites]
Time.
As they say, "Time heals all wounds."
posted by JohnnyGunn at 7:41 AM on July 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
As they say, "Time heals all wounds."
posted by JohnnyGunn at 7:41 AM on July 19, 2022 [1 favorite]
I am friends with some of my exes (the others have just faded). In at least one case non-contact was not realistic for reasons similar to yours and instead I had to go with no emotional contact. We were rigidly civil with each other for about six months — greetings and contributing to the same group conversations — but there was no attempt at a connection beyond that. It was awkward at times but everyone knew what was up.
It was very much an attractive nuisance to have someone I had been very close to that near, but I am convinced that sincere contact would have just drawn the agony out.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:42 AM on July 19, 2022
It was very much an attractive nuisance to have someone I had been very close to that near, but I am convinced that sincere contact would have just drawn the agony out.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:42 AM on July 19, 2022
seems very much ready, even eager, to be friends
So, for a lot of people this is about not wanting to be disliked or the bad guy or have to modify their position in the social group in any way to give you some space and support. It's really emotionally manipulative (or at the very least emotionally immature), especially when it's the expectation of the breaker that the breakee simply have no untoward feelings about the situation because nice people are supposed to "remain friends". A lot of people get really fixated on staying friends because it implies no consequences.
If you want to share the social group, you'll need to figure out for yourself what will work for now, but I would advise that it is not possible to be actual friends for some time after the breakup, so at best you should be civil but in no way more intimate than you would be with an acquaintance in this social group. It'll probably be entirely on you to set and maintain boundaries, and you may have to find a way to express the sentiment "I'm not comfortable with that yet" to enforce them.
posted by Lyn Never at 8:12 AM on July 19, 2022 [5 favorites]
So, for a lot of people this is about not wanting to be disliked or the bad guy or have to modify their position in the social group in any way to give you some space and support. It's really emotionally manipulative (or at the very least emotionally immature), especially when it's the expectation of the breaker that the breakee simply have no untoward feelings about the situation because nice people are supposed to "remain friends". A lot of people get really fixated on staying friends because it implies no consequences.
If you want to share the social group, you'll need to figure out for yourself what will work for now, but I would advise that it is not possible to be actual friends for some time after the breakup, so at best you should be civil but in no way more intimate than you would be with an acquaintance in this social group. It'll probably be entirely on you to set and maintain boundaries, and you may have to find a way to express the sentiment "I'm not comfortable with that yet" to enforce them.
posted by Lyn Never at 8:12 AM on July 19, 2022 [5 favorites]
Slow slow slow slow space space space space time time time time.
I have a couple of very close friends that used be girlfriends. It takes an entire redefinition of the relationship though, and you need to take space to find a different place where that person no longer occupies such a central role in your life - romantically, friendship wise, the day to day interaction.
And then eventually, when you have other relationships that fulfill your social needs, you *might* be able to re-approach and establish a beneficial friendship. In my case, I'd say years. Not never ever in touch, but pretty much out of touch, for a few years.
Also - if she's the one pushing for friendship? Tell her to chill, she's being overly needy and possibly manipulative, and that you need space. Totally your right and need.
posted by RajahKing at 11:06 AM on July 19, 2022
I have a couple of very close friends that used be girlfriends. It takes an entire redefinition of the relationship though, and you need to take space to find a different place where that person no longer occupies such a central role in your life - romantically, friendship wise, the day to day interaction.
And then eventually, when you have other relationships that fulfill your social needs, you *might* be able to re-approach and establish a beneficial friendship. In my case, I'd say years. Not never ever in touch, but pretty much out of touch, for a few years.
Also - if she's the one pushing for friendship? Tell her to chill, she's being overly needy and possibly manipulative, and that you need space. Totally your right and need.
posted by RajahKing at 11:06 AM on July 19, 2022
Gosh I feel like there ought to be a "Can/should I be friends with my ex" flowchart. Maybe I will make one some day. If I designed a real quick one now, it would look something like this:
- Are you still mad or sad with them about something? Y-> no, take more time apart
- Do you still really want to do sexy stuff with them? Y-> no, take more time apart
- Are you in a bad or wobbly place with your mental health? Y-> no, take more time apart
if no to all the above -> yes! why not! just take it slow and keep checking in on the above.
posted by greenish at 7:02 AM on July 22, 2022 [1 favorite]
- Are you still mad or sad with them about something? Y-> no, take more time apart
- Do you still really want to do sexy stuff with them? Y-> no, take more time apart
- Are you in a bad or wobbly place with your mental health? Y-> no, take more time apart
if no to all the above -> yes! why not! just take it slow and keep checking in on the above.
posted by greenish at 7:02 AM on July 22, 2022 [1 favorite]
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My main example is my last girlfriend, now ex (we are both cis women). We were friends at first, then it turned into a relationship, then after about 3 years she broke it off but still wanted to stay friends. It wasn't easy and looking back, I'm not sure what I was thinking. The new friendship was basically like the relationship but without sex, sleepovers and overtly romantic things like giving each other flowers (except for birthdays etc). We still went out for dinner and did lots of things together and talked about lots of stuff, it was a very close friendship. This went on for a couple of years, with many declarations on her part that she wasn't interested in any romantic relationship with anyone at all.
Then she told me she was in a relationship with a man and I didn't take it well. It wasn't the guy, it was that she had seemed genuine about not wanting a relationship and it made me realise I hadn't moved on; the close friendship seemed to still be occupying a relationship-shaped space for me.
We wound up not seeing each other at all for a while, maybe 6 months or longer. I can't remember how we got back in touch with each other but we did. It was more distant. I never met the new guy she was with and after a while they broke up. Anyway we are still friends, but have moved to texting every week or two and catching up less frequently - probably once a month pre-pandemic and pretty haphazardly since the pandemic, as we had very strict lockdowns here.
I'd say she's still one of my closest friends simply because we've been through so much together, but I'm definitely not interested in her romantically anymore, nor is she in me. I have a partner in another country now, she's single and we will still make an effort to be each other's person for things like emergency contact, spare keys etc. But the intense enmeshment isn't there, which is fine.
I guess my advice would be to take it slow. When you feel like you might be ready to do friend type things again, meet in a neutral public location and be prepared for it to feel weird. It may be easier to do this in a group situation so you don't focus exclusively on each other (though if she has a new partner, maybe avoid hanging out with both of them at least at first). It will get easier with time and as you have new experiences together post-relationship.
I also have stories I could tell about poly friend/more/less-ships; memail me if you like as I'm not entirely comfortable going into it all here.
posted by Athanassiel at 1:57 AM on July 19, 2022 [5 favorites]