• ABOUT
• CONTACT
• SUBSCRIBE
• HOME

Monday, January 8, 2007

HOW TO: Be Friends With Your Ex

filed under: Dating 2.0, HOW TO: by Lux Nightmare

(Welcome to Sexerati’s new contributor, longtime future sex mover and shaker, Lux Nightmare, with this first of our weekly HOW TO guides on hacking sex & relationships. - ed.)

We’re sitting in Union Square, leaning against the base of one of the park’s many concrete statues, and he looks at me and says, “I think it’s for the best if we’re just friends.”

And it hits me like a slap in the face: because, of course, “just friends” never means quite that. “Just friends” is code for “I used to want to fuck you, but now I’m over that. Please don’t hate me.” “Just friends” is an attempt at softening the blow of rejection, a way to end a relationship without coming across as too much of an asshole. But what if the intentions behind the statement are sincere: is it possible to salvage a friendship once the relationship has gone south?

I want to say yes: and indeed, my experiences in the dating world have shown me that sometimes you get lucky and do manage to maintain the emotional connection you’ve created even after the sexual connection has died away. But sometimes (in my case, far more often), the baby gets thrown out with the bathwater, and you end up losing everything you had, all at once. So how do we avoid that pitfall? How do we hold on to the good parts as we transition into something new?

An informal survey of my friends suggests that the conditions of the break up have a lot to do with whether a future friendship is really in the cards: if your significant other ends things by cheating on you, you’re unlikely to trust him or her enough to want to stay friends. If, on the other hand, you really care about each other, but both feel that the spark has gone out, you might have a chance at maintaining the love while jettisoning the sex.

Likewise, the conditions of the relationship may dictate the likelihood of remaining friends: for some people, it is far easier to turn a casual fling into a casual friendship, while a serious relationship can only end in earth shattering demise. Of course, for others, the exact opposite is true: a casual fling might not have enough of a nonsexual basis to sustain a friendship, while a serious relationship is built on a connection that’s strong enough to outlive the death of its sexual component.

No matter the situation, whether you’re ending things with a partner of ten years or ten days, there are a few simple guidelines that can help the transition from lover to friend:

1) Time: When my best friend and some time lover broke my heart by falling in love with another girl, we tried to stay friends right from the start. It didn’t work out too well. In fact, it took almost year of not speaking before we were really able to be friends again. During that time I was able to get over him, to heal the emotional wounds and move on, and he was able to develop a sincere appreciation for the connection that we’d had. When we reconnected after that year, it was because we actually wanted to be friends again – not simply because we were used to being in each other’s lives.

2) Chastity: Wanting to fuck a friend can be hot, wanting to fuck an ex who is now your friend is not. If you’re feeling needy, emotionally raw, and more than a little horny, it can be all too easy to turn to your most recent sexual partner for comfort. It can also be all too easy to destroy a budding friendship that way. If you want to be friends with an ex, you have to really commit to the fact that you’re going to be friends who don’t have sex. For some people this means friendship might have to wait until you’re both in new relationships, for others it just means waiting until you’ve fully processed the break up.

3) Honesty: Transitioning from lovers to friends is not an easy task, and it’s something you really have to want if you expect it to work. “Just friends” is a hollow euphemism largely because it often lacks the emotional honesty to back it up. If you’re just throwing lines at your soon-to-be-ex, you can’t be surprised if those lines don’t pan out into an honest to goodness friendship.

I didn’t end up remaining friends with that boy who dumped me in Union Square. I tried: for months I tried. In the end, however, I came to realize that he’d dumped me, not because he preferred the non-erotic aspects of our relationship, but because he was ultimately too scared to engage me, period. Our relationship hadn’t been much of a friendship to begin with, and thus when we cut away the sex that had held it together, the flimsiness was revealed and our connection died.

Thankfully, that relationship was not my last, or only, experience with transitioning from lovers to friends: and when the relationship has really been worth it, the transition has – after hard times, weird times, and a little strife – ultimately been a success.

Comments