We know that the most difficult part of a sensitive breakup is the pain that the relationship has ended and that unbearable exchange of amenities to return such as the novel he lent you or the toothbrush you left in his apartment.
However, in addition to how frustrating these compulsory chapters can be in which you have to meet up with your ex- to return their unique edition of Star Wars and recover your favorite sweatshirt.
There is the annoying feeling of having no idea how to treat this person now who until so recently meant so much (and surely continues to be) to us.
We do not want to show too much interest because it is very possible that we are hurt or angry, or that we really do not want to resume the relationship.
But we also do not want to be rude or cold because it would give the feeling that all the time of relationship did not mean anything.
Likewise, at the moment when an ex is too affectionate, he confuses us regarding his claims. And if it’s too cold it can hurt us because let’s face it, there is still a certain kind of affection.
In addition, as much as we are aware that the relationship ended, it is very possible that it bothers us to see how our ex-partner is beginning to resume his life and perhaps other relationships.
Because as you are not going to lock yourself in a monastery or take a vow of chastity, neither is the other party, and you may have to face situations that can be really uncomfortable in the future.
In the event that for one reason or another you must continue treating and frequenting your ex after a relationship, you will probably have to deal with a lot of doubts and contrary feelings.
On the one hand, that apparently non-existent balance between cordiality and disinterest that we should theoretically project onto our ex-partners. On the other hand, breaking your head trying to interpret what the other person’s attitudes mean, which are not always and in all circumstances very clear.
And finally, handle the anger or anxiety that can cause you to see him resume his loving life with someone else.
But this does not mean that all is lost. With a certain level of maturity, honesty, and goodwill on both sides, 2 people who were once a couple can become best friends.
In fact, quite a few people come to accept that they fare much better as friends than as a couple. And although this is not so usual, you can make sure that at least your relationship with your ex-boyfriend or your ex-girlfriend is not an absolute nightmare.
What the relationship with your ex-partners affirms about you
People are very often surprised when I tell them that I am great friends with most of my ex-.
In fact, I often interact and hang out with a lot of them on a regular basis. Too often, we tend to accept that ending a romantic relationship with someone means that we will never be able to see that person again.
It’s understandable, really. Breaks literally hurt. Researchers at the University of Michigan found that tears activate exactly the same parts of the brain that feel physical pain.
Regardless of the circumstances in which the relationship ends, it continues to be a painful experience and the associations you had with that person are now interspersed with the feeling of pain.
It is no surprise, then, that after that you do not wish to have any contact in an attempt not to recall that pain again.
But before you transform that person into the number one public opponent, tear up the photographs, or pretend that they never existed in your life, you must remember that pain does not have to last forever.
Likewise, there was at the time a good reason why your ex- and you were together. And from that reason as a general rule always and in all circumstances, pleasant memories can be derived, even if the relationship has ended.
Also, unless they have very different lives or that certain 2 have moved to another country, there is a good chance that you will find your ex- sometimes.
Even if there is a job in common or children in the middle, you should continue to see it on a regular basis.
And I’m sure you don’t want those occasions to become emotionally unmanageable or suffocating, right? So we need to tuck in our pants and deal with the situation as adults.
This is also not to say that it should be, at least initially, an awkward and strange experience. In truth, it is proven that the better you can handle a breakup with an ex-partner, the better your future relationships will tend to be.
After all, your past relationships and the way you handled the rather difficult moments are going to tell your future partners a lot about the kind of person you really are.
Take into account that the greatest common denominator in your relationships is yourself.
Someone who claims that they have nothing but “crazy psychotics” in their history, surely does not see the problem from the right angle and is going to be sending the message to a hypothetical future relationship that their heart is either deeply broken or good. It sucks with relationships.
Someone who allows his heart to be broken over and over by “soulless harpies” would surely need to check for what reason he is making exactly the same mistakes over and over again, and if not himself who is demanding too much.
On the other side of the coin, someone who maintains cordial, but rather friendly relationships, with each and every one of their ex-partners, is generally someone who can handle the moments of noticeable difficulty of a breakdown in an affirmative way.
And that is being aware of their failures and the quality of other people regardless of their unrealistic hopes. In addition to this, he proves to be a less spiteful person and prone to apologizing and letting go.
Now, to be fair, we must accept that one or two breaks will always appear in all circumstances that are too painful to aspire to a next friendship, or that still make any kind of contact unacceptable.
Nobody claims that you are obliged to be close for the whole life of an ex-partner, and if it is not functional on a sensitive level or that person proved to you that it is not worth it, then it is the healthiest thing to let it go.
But if instead, you cannot let go of sadness or resentment, although you accept that the other person is well worth it in your life, although no longer as a couple, you can begin to estimate the possibility of rebuilding a good friendship relationship without so much drama.
Understanding the “nuclear” option
One of the most essential and misrepresented aspects of restoration after a break is the “nuclear option”, which means: cutting all the knots and ways of contact with your ex.
The objective of this strategy is not to pretend nothing happened, and clearly, it is not about closing your eyes, putting your fingers in your ears, and singing very loudly so as not to be able to perceive or meditate on the other.
These actions are about taking a healthy distance to give our hearts time and space to heal. Let go of sadness and anger and transform ourselves back into people ready to love and be loved.
A relationship that ends will always hurt and in all circumstances, and it is a better idea to try to deal with the pain and overcome it than to pretend nothing is happening.
In fact, if we cling to suffering, or try to ignore the sensitive impact that the break had on us, we will most likely end up achieving very poor results in the medium term.
Pain and anger will find some way out. You can even get to somatize them through suffering and illness.
And let’s not chat about what would happen if you run into your ex by chance. You are not going to be even minimally in a position to deal with that situation.
Another bad option is to play at being more mature than we really are and consider being great friends of our ex-right after a breakup.
Space and time are always and at all times precise so that the two people can return to meet each other without intense feelings in between, whether of frustration or sadness, and are able to continue forming a part of the life of the other.
Because fully apologizing, and apologizing to ourselves, is essential in order for this to be achieved.
Even if you genuinely want to sustain the friendship after the courtship is over, it will take a long time away. How long? It depends on how long the relationship lasted.
The specialists affirm that the duel lasts a couple of months for all the years you spent with that person. It is enough to do the math.
As essential as the distance is to the sensitive healing process, it is to have the possibility of regaining friendship at some point. Or at least a cordial relationship.
Taking some time apart allows the relationship to make the change to what it is going to be in the future and not get stuck in what it was before. It is something like resetting the relationship.
Understand and let go
Being able to have any kind of non-hostile relationship with your ex-, means that you had to process the reasons for the breakup and take responsibility for those that corresponded to you. Only in this way can we suppress grudges.
Basically, it is going from a “we ended up because the other person is (enter here a very long list of defects), too we ended up because we both made mistakes and our personalities were not very compatible, but he is a person that I affect and with whom I learned valuable things”.
Being injured after a break does not necessarily mean that one was good, and the other bad.
In fact, things are never black or white, there are hundreds and hundreds of grayscales, and admitting it is considerably more profitable to mature than continuing to insist on resentment or guilt. What happened, happened, and you can no longer do anything about it.
What you do have control over is what is going to happen later and in what way you are going to handle things. The faster you understand it, the faster you can let go of all those harmful feelings.
No matter how angry or hurt you are, maybe even insulted, let’s be frank, what good is holding on to that kind of feeling? Do they make you a better person? Do they give any kind of added value to your life? The answer, a thousand times, is no.
Many times, we take the grudge personally, and instead of understanding that it is a temporary defense tool, we cling to it and also interpret any attempt to let it go as a betrayal of ourselves.
Forgiving someone else is never going to be an act of treason against oneself, it is, rather, one of the most enormous acts of kindness that we can give ourselves.
Negative feelings have a function in our life, like everything else. But not letting them go is equivalent to carrying a burden that becomes heavier and heavier and absorbs our energy and the will to live.
Being able to put the past behind us, forgetting what we can forget, and sincerely apologize for what we cannot forget, is a key element not only to maintain good relationships with our ex-partners but rather to maintain good relationships with ourselves.
Admit it’s weird
Unless you were maintaining a long-distance relationship or if certain 2 have left the country, at some point (probably before you feel ready), you are going to meet your ex-, and unless you want to do a huge absurdity, you will have to admit it and act like an adult.
And by “acting like an adult” I mean really acting from maturity. Don’t pretend to an indifferent or a cordiality that you don’t really feel, because that is one of the first things that is appreciated.
I have seen people leave department stores because they suddenly recognize their ex in the distance.
In more serious cases, stop going to people and places that you like only because there is the possibility of meeting your ex-partner.
We know that these situations are uncomfortable. Always and at all times they have been, and always and in all circumstances, they will be. Especially if those casual reunions are accompanied by our ex’s new partner.
But you have 2 options, either you let anxiety win you, or you learn to handle it in an affirmative way. And “managing it” clearly does not mean “avoiding it”, so we discard that alternative.
Unless there’s a restraining order in the middle of your ex is a psychopath who swore to set you on fire if he saw you again, there should be no reason why the two of you can’t stay in the exact same room and act. in a cordial and civilized way.
It is perfectly valid that you do not want to see how that person who meant so much to you seems to be having a great time with someone else 15 meters away, but it is not like something has prevented you rebuild your life and become a functional person again.
Also, it is giving too much power to the breakdown and the bad things in the relationship, when we could be concentrating on the fond memories.
So to summarize, you need to admit that it will be strange and also uncomfortable, but only in the beginning, while you adjust to the situation and begin to handle it with ease.
In addition, it is also good that you give yourself the opportunity to approach with caution, but with the best pretensions, to make it clear to that person that you no longer feel resentment and open the way to a relationship without hostilities or superfluous discomfort.
You may find yourself with a pleasant surprise when you realize that your ex is in exactly the same predisposition, or with a disappointment if his answer is not what you expected. But still in this way, it will not have remained in you.
By the way, something that is never enough to clarify: If you find your ex- in a celebration or social assembly, DO NOT drink, really, DO NOT do it. This is precisely the kind of situation that with alcohol in the middle can get very bad.
Don’t try to manipulate
There will be times when you feel a bit tempted to try to get some sort of psychological advantage over your ex. Singularly yes that person was the one who finished you.
It is something to the natural perfection because we are human and we have a natural tendency to revenge. With what you do not feel bad from there, but also do not let yourself be carried away by fantasies.
The show business and pop music are full of these revenge expressions that go from the tone “I’m much better off without you.”
There are people who, along exactly the same lines of not being able to understand and let go, far from avoiding their ex-partner, appear “casually” in places where they know they will be and try to pretend that they have never been. rather, in an attempt to make the other party feel bad.
And well, unless you have very few interesting things to do and are a teacher of deception, this is not going to work, and surely it is going to look pathetic.
It’s pretty obvious the moment you start playing the old “I’m over you” game, and it’s pretty embarrassing.
All you do is shout out to the planet that you haven’t really gotten over anything and that instead of processing it you’ve dedicated yourself to obsessing over the breakup and in some way making your ex feel bad.
In the first place, that you are happy would not have for any reason you annoy absolutely anyone, less your ex-, who, theoretically, is a person who at least at some point had affection for you. We already know that things as a general rule do not go this way, but they should, right?
After a break, it is best to make certain personal improvements authentically and for our development, not to prove anything to absolutely anyone.
Doing things based on what we think or not is not the best we could do either.
As you can see, both not being able to be close to our ex-, and doing the impossible so that he notices our presence and how happy we are now without him or without her.
They are diametrically opposite ways of doing the same: getting stuck and not appreciating letting go of negative feelings. If you want to stay friends with your ex after a breakup, you have to be honest.
Remember Why You Were With That Person In The First Place
Regardless of whether you sincerely want to be friends with that person, or whether you just want to move on with your life, it is essential to remember why you and your ex-partner ended up together in the first place.
Yes, it is possible that the relationship is not only deceased, but you cannot imagine that it was ever alive, but that does not mean that there were no good moments. Rather than have you forgotten them.
Trying to emphasize fondly remembering the good things makes us less prone to resentment and also allows us to put ourselves in the other person’s place to understand our failures.
You do not have to become the best friend or the best friend of all the people with whom you establish a loving relationship.
But deep down inside you, you know perfectly well what people you want in your life, regardless of whether things have worked out or not for 2.
It takes a lot of maturities to admit that although love is ending, friendship has no reason to leave and that this is still a not abominable kind of love.
Learning from past experiences and considering them as learning, instead of transforming them into a burden, opens the door for us so that each time our interpersonal relationships are somewhat better.
