How to: Break Up With Someone

Hey there, all you lovely people!  Did you miss me?  I missed you.  I’m sorry for my prolonged absence – sometimes life just does things, you know?

I promise I haven’t been completely ignoring you guys, and I really have been intending to write more posts.  In fact, I have one RIGHT NOW that took me a bit to get together.  It’s funny, a few days ago I got an email from a gentleman who ended up taking my advice, and now he’s unsure about whether the relationship he’s currently in is going to continue.  I want to make it very, VERY clear to this particular dude: this post is a coincidence and not necessarily the advice I’m giving you as per your question.  I need a bit to figure out what I would do and also to get more info.

Without further ado, here’s how to break up with someone!

Let’s get something out of the way right now.  Breakups suck.  There’s no good way to break up with someone, and in my own experience, at least one person ends up being really hurt.  They can be messy, and they can really ruin your day, but hopefully these tips will make it a little easier.

1. Be Direct!  Waffling can only confuse the issue.  If you’re gonna break up with someone, it needs to be a real breakup.  It needs to NOT be friends with benefits, or “close buddies” or “we can still be friends”, because odds are if you’re breaking up with someone, you don’t want to be their friends.

2. ABSOLUTELY NO POST-BREAKUP SEX.  Nothing about this scenario will be good, I promise you.  Post-breakup sex leads to confusion, and confusion leads to awkward situations where you’re not sure what your status might be.  Or, weirder, it leads to that gray area of “are we or aren’t we back together?”  None of these places, none of the confusion or anxiety about that confusion, makes it okay to boink your very VERY recent ex.

3. Stay strong!  You had a reason (or three) for this.  I’ve noticed that, by and large, people don’t want to be dumped.  It’s something about how rejection is awful and hurtful and blah blah blah.  When they’re put in this position, they are prone to doing dumb things, like promising you they’ll change, or that they want to “work this out”, or that they will get back together with you as long as there are other guidelines or rules.  Guidelines and rules in relationships are fine, but if you are setting out specific conditions for getting back with someone, things can get hairy.  They’re never conditions that stick.  That change they promise you isn’t change you can believe in (SORRY MR. PRESIDENT).  Sometimes, your douchey ex needs to stay your douchey ex.  You broke up with them because of something.  Stick to your guns.  Chances are you’ll be much better off for it.

I once dated a lady I thought was the shit, and we hit it off and were very clear that the relationship would be over when she moved away for school.  Well, that plan lasted a whole two weeks after she moved, and then we were long-distancing like it was our job.  That ended in lots of tears and her sleeping with several other people.  It isn’t exactly the fairy tale I envisioned, am I right? If I had stuck to the plan of “no it is totally over and that’s okay”, I would have avoided the ridiculous feelings I had after I learned she was cheating on me.  It’s okay to stay broken up with someone, no matter what they say to the contrary.

4. Be careful with your rebounding.  This might go without saying at this point, but do NOT try to have rebound sex with your ex.  Or any ex.  That shit is WEIRD and it can get really weird.  I don’t recommend it.

Sometimes rebounds can be good, but sometimes you can end up projecting feelings about needing to be with someone (like your recent ex), and then your rebound becomes more of a commitment than you were expecting (or maybe that’s just what I do, but whatever).  It’s okay to be wary of feelings with other people, as long as you remember that even the person you choose to rebound with deserves common decent respect.  Be clear with them about getting out of a relationship recently, I can almost guarantee it will prevent horrid awkwardness and uncomfortable conversations down the road.

4.5 Don’t feel you have to have a rebound.  There’s an odd expectation that getting out of a relationship means you get to run around and have tons of sex with other humans… And then reality happens and most of us don’t get to be that lucky (haha, pun intended).  Rebounds aren’t for everyone, and they’re certainly not something you should feel you have to do.  Nobody wrote that it was required for breakups, and look – I’m writing the exact opposite!  It’s okay to just take some time to yourself without running off to bang someone else.  Trust me on this one.

5. Take some time for you.  This is probably the thing I forget most after a breakup, because I’m usually very worried about what the other person is thinking or feeling or doing (or WHO that other person is feeling or doing, if you know what I mean), so I spend more time obsessing over that than taking care of myself in ways that work for me.  Give yourself room to mourn the loss of a relationship if you need it.  Go out with friends if you need it.  If it settles some part of your soul, go get wasted and sloppy-drunk and pass out on your own apartment kitchen floor.  These things are okay, because breakups suck.  Just try not to make the more self-destructive things super habitual, because that can get very dangerous.

You guys, breakups are the worst*.  There’s nothing fun about a breakup.  More often than not, there’s nothing good (at the moment of breakup) about your situation.  (*Notable exceptions include abusive or awful relationships, in those cases breakups are AWESOME).  There are things that make them easier, and things that make them harder.  In my own experience, doing the opposite of the things listed above make breakups harder.

I hope this helps, if this is what you need.  Be good to yourselves and each other, and keep being safe.