Can You Stay Friends After a Breakup?
We often claim to want to remain friends, but is it actually possible?
As I’m writing this, I have one ex-boyfriend with whom I am still friends. We were actually really good friends for a few years after our breakup. After losing touch for many years and then reconnecting, it’s now a somewhat awkward and distant friendship, but I’m still glad we’re friends. I’ve always genuinely enjoyed his friendship, both before and after we dated. In fact, we may be a real example of two people who are better as friends than they were as a couple.
There are other former partners who promised me or to whom I promised friendship after our split. We haven’t spoken in years. The words were just empty promises, spoken in the hopes of making the breakup easier or less painful. When I look back on those partners, I can easily see where I no longer liked them, they no longer liked me, or the dislike was mutual.
It’s something we often do. We tell a partner we’re breaking up with that we’d like to remain friends, trying to cushion the blow of telling them we no longer love them or want to be with them romantically. Or they say it to us and we take it as truth, holding it close to our heart to try to staunch the bleeding of the heartbreak.
