6 Ways To Handle Your Breakup With Your Ex If He’s Part Of Your Friend Group

There are about a thousand good reasons to date someone in your friend group.

For one, your people are his people. You don't have to worry about the awkward introductions to your crew — you already know they love him.

Also, when you date someone in your friend group, you start off on a solid foundation of mutual interests and things to talk about. Wins all around, right?

Well... that's only true if you don't break up!

If you do break up, it can seem as though you're completely up shit creek. Who gets the friends? What is everyone going to think? And now, you lost someone who was more than just a lover — they were a friend, too.

Likely, the first thing that comes to your mind is how you're going to deal with seeing each other when you have so many mutual friends.

Well, it is possible for you two to stay civil without adding drama to your clique. Here's how to stay friends with your ex without making things awkward with everyone else.

1. Don't talk trash.

This puts your mutual friends in a really tough spot and makes you look immature and low. You were friends with this person first after all, so there has to be something good about them.

Your friends aren't going to buy it when you trash talk their taste in movies and places to go out. This puts your friends in a position to “take sides," which totally sucks and has the potential to divide your entire group.

SO DON'T DO IT.

But if you must talk trash, do so with an outsider.

If you must talk trash, do so with an outsider.

Call your mom if you have to, or invite random girlfriend outside your friend group for drinks. Do whatever you can to keep your own negativity and hurt away from the group.

2. Fall off the grid for a little bit.

Re-engage with what makes you happy outside your beloved friend group. Go on a weekend trip, meet up with an old friend whom you haven't seen in a while or pick up a new hobby. Do your own thing.

Distance and time really do work wonders on a broken heart, so going off on your own will be in your and your mutual friends' best interest.

3. If you see/hear of them talking trash, ignore it.

My father always told me, “Ignore a baby, and they'll stop." If your ex doesn't have the courtesy to respect you, it means they're the baby, not you.

You don't need to stoop to their level. Respect yourself, and don't dignify this behavior with a response. It will only further the drama.

4. Don't play games.

The tricky thing about mutual friends is that whatever you share with them will inevitably trickle right back to your ex. So don't make this situation worse by trying to make your ex jealous or bragging about the new guy you're seeing.

It will all work out as it should, so don't bother trying to manipulate it to change it.

5. Accept and respect his relationships within the group.

Hopefully, your ex will recognize the sticky situation with your mutual friend group and also fall off the grid for a little.

But what do you do if he's out every night with them, Instagramming away and thinking “he won” and it's “his" friend group now?

Those posts might make it seem like the whole group is now out to get you, but remember that these are also YOUR friends, too.

Just because he's out with them, doesn't mean he "won" anything because friendships are not competitions.

Friendships are not competitions.

If something he's doing bothers you, talk to your closest friend in the group and share how it makes you feel. Focus the conversation on your feelings, though, not his behavior.

If the friends don't start taking you into consideration when he's blowing up their phones, then were they really good friends to begin with?

6. Be respectful and honest.

All breakups are suck, but the ones involving a tight-knit friend group are even harder. If you handle your words and actions in a respectful way toward your friends, your ex and yourself, no one can make you look bad.

Honesty is the best policy here. Sometimes, things don't work out between two people. It doesn't make you a bad person; it just means it wasn't meant to be.

If you're completely honest about the situation, then you can move on knowing you honored yourself and your friendships the best you could, even though it was the harder path to take.