Just good friends?

Ex: New best friend?

Yes, it’s the easy option at first. After having spent some much with this person, wanting to make them happy, it’s only natural not to want to cut off contact completely. One of you comes out with the “let’s be friends” line (and yes, it normally is a line), and you convince yourself that staying friends is the best way forward. At least you can still see them a couple of times a week, still hang out, just without the, ahem, relationshipy stuff.

I’m sure most people who do the friends thing do it with the best intention, either for wanting to see the best in everyone, or for hope that maybe, perhaps, someday, possibly, there’s a chance that the other person might want to get back together with you.

If you need further convincing, here are a few more reasons why you probably shouldn’t be friends with your ex:

• Chances are, if it was just a line to let you down gently, you won’t see them for dust.

• It’s harder to move on if you are going to be seeing them on a regular basis.

• Eventually one of you is going to move onto a new relationship, and is going to have to tell the other about it. That’s not a conversation I’d want to sit in on. If you’re particularly close friends, you will no doubt be hearing more detail about said relationship than any self-respecting pair of ears would wish to have imparted on them.

• Unless the split was extremely mutual and amicable, there is probably going to be a “wanted” and “wanter”, as a friend of mine put it, whether you are both aware of it or not-one person wants the relationship to start up again, the other doesn’t. And so ensues continual heartbreak, violins, and if it’s a particularly tragic story, perhaps a wailing banshee.

• You’ve seen each other naked. Enough said.

On the arguments in favour of friendship side of things, number one reason has got to be if they have any ‘intimate’ pictures of you. At least keep them on your good side until their hard drive is safely in your hands. Or the lake.

Ask yourself this; were you friends before you got together? If so, then maybe you can be friends successfully. If not, or if you were just in that pre-emptive friends-but-you-knew-that-one-day-you-would-be-more-than-friends situation, then it’s unlikely to work, so do yourself a favour and cut it off now. Because let’s face it, how many good friends would drive you to consuming your own bodyweight in Ben and Jerry’s?

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