She's An Ex For A Reason: Why It's Impossible To Really Stay Friends After A Breakup
Breaking up with a significant other on good terms is unrealistic. Think about it. If the two of you figured out how to exist together, while maintaining terms that were “good,” you probably wouldn’t have broken up in the first place.
Significant others are a lot like Wes Anderson films – you either love them or hate them, and with the passage of time, you sort of just say, “f*ck it,” and accept the fact that you wasted your money.
You know that old saying that's used to describe weather in March, “it goes in like a lion, and out like a lamb”? Well, relationships are pretty much the opposite – they go in like a lamb, and out with your ex-girlfriend flashing newly discovered side boob in Instagrams. (I said, "pretty much.")
In other words, relationships just sort of have this tendency to start with love and end with hate. I'm not exactly sure why this happens to be the case, but it's just the nature of the business.
Relationships are the products of intense emotions. These emotions don’t dissolve after time. They just linger idly in a different form. Love and hate are often two sides of the same coin or, in our case, the same emotion.
In theory, staying friends after a relationship comes to a smoldering end, sounds great. However, the real life application of that concept proves to be nearly impossible. The sooner you accept the fact that past flames belong just there -- in the past -- the sooner you’ll begin to focus on what’s important: the future.
However, in case you were curious, here are the 10 reasons you’ll never be able to stay on good terms after a breakup.
10. You’re having sex with other people
Things just tend to feel a little, I don’t know, awkward when you realize you’re both having sex with other people. Especially when your once longtime girlfriend is now hitting you up to "get coffee" and "catch up."
Like, sh*t, we used to do that together, exclusively, for the past two and a half years – and now we’re sitting here eating bagels, lying about how happy we are for each other.
9. Jealousy
If you gain 35 pounds, she wins. Even if you choose to call it “mass.” If she gets rejected from her dream law school, you tally one in your own win column.
Exes and jealousy go together like Kanye West and his own self.
8. Your only communication is in the form of drunk texts
It’s difficult to construct any type of platonic friendship when every Saturday night you and your ex recreate the adlibs from Marvin’s Room over iMessage – then wake up the next morning and pretend like nothing happened.
7. You hate your ex
Unlike Drake, most of the time you won’t need your ex to make you start hating. You’ll start hating, regardless. This is just the very essence of breakups.
There’s a reason you two are formally removing each other from your lives.
6. But you still low-key love your ex
It’s tough to do “friend-sh*t” like watch movies – while keeping your hands to yourself, and get coffee, when you’re still very much in love with an ex.
If you ever want to get over your ex, it would probably behoove you to just cut her off.
5. Keeping good terms means you care, and caring means you’re losing
Ask Herman Edwards, “You play to win the game.” By caring, you all but assure to your ex that you’re content with losing. C’mon people, play it cool. Focus on yourself, it’s probably been a while since you did, anyway.
By worrying about the terms of your now shattered relationship, it’ll become more of a neurotic obsession than anything else.
4. You’ve got a new bae
One of the best ways to move on after a bad relationship is to find a new one. Your new love will hopefully replace your tainted old memories with newer, (hopefully) better ones.
Before long, the terms of old relationships will become forgotten. Relationships that are currently existing require too much attention for you to be concerned with those prior.
3. They distract you
Given the amount of memories you have with that person, it really isn’t a good idea to toy with the aspect of friendship. While bad terms aren’t optimal for anyone, good terms will always provide that glimmer of hope that a future might still be salvageable.
That same glimmer of hope can go on to torment you and prevent future relationships.
2. Every conversation ends in an argument
Every conversation may start like, “Hey, I’ve been thinking about you, how’s everything been?” But it’s going to end with some grotesque name calling and perhaps a death wish or two.
It’s difficult to talk about lighthearted stuff when you and your ex still can’t agree on what technically constitutes cheating, and every conversation leads to that.
1. You just want to move on
Exes are always representations of bigger conflicts. Maybe you allowed yourself to love someone because you were going through a rough patch in your life, and desperately lusted for companionship.
Perhaps that person hurt your self-esteem so much that you felt held down the duration of your time together. Either way, relationships end for a reason, and I can’t stress that enough.
If you truly love someone, and value that person in your life, you’ll do whatever it takes to ensure that. It won’t always be easy, and it will certainly require effort, but ending a relationship just does that – it ends a relationship. Nowhere in that description does it entail good terms. It’s just an end.
With every end should come a new beginning. Not someone you’ll want to check in with after months of absence in your life. Focus on people who matter now. Not yesterday.
Photo Courtesy: We Heart It
