staying friends with a LD ex??

[angelique]

hey all
I've been dealing with a recent breakup with my long distance bf, he broke up with me over email. we were together for a year. He says he still wants to stay in contact as friends. I'm just wondering if anyone on here has tried staying friends with a long distance ex, or if its even worth it? I haven't seen him in 4 months, and his military job makes it tough to communicate regularly. any thoughts are appreciated.
thanks!

[Jazi]

Welcome to LFAD

I don't really do the whole 'friends with the ex' thing, I personally feel that it just doesn't work. You need time to heal and move on, being 'friends' doesn't really give you the space to do that. It might be possible to be friends later down the track.. but right now I think you need to focus on you, you two aren't in a relationship anymore and you are allowed to be as selfish as you like with what you need. He broke up with you, he has no right to be upset if you don't want to stay friends.. He can't have his cake and eat it too..

[dragonlady]

depends most of my ex i dont want nothing to do with, but me first Bf is my best friend. depends on how you feel about it!!

[LittleBox]

I just broke up with my ex of a little over year too, the distance was overwhelming for him. We had always talked about remaining friends if we ever broke up and honestly its been difficult. I'm hoping that in time it will get easier. With your ex in the military, he probably needs your support as a friend. If you split amicably then this should be doable.

Good luck!

[Moon]

You can only do that if you no longer have feelings for each other. If you're still in love with him, a "friendship" is a really, really bad idea, you'll only end up hurt and angry.

[ST25]

You can only do that if you no longer have feelings for each other. If you're still in love with him, a "friendship" is a really, really bad idea, you'll only end up hurt and angry.

^ THIS, THIS, THIS. I cannot emphasize what she said here enough. If you still have some leftover feelings for him, don't go for it. You NEED to take the time for yourself to heal from it. Take as long as you need to for you to move on and enjoy yourself. Trust me, LD friendships with an ex - if you haven't taken enough time to heal from it - can open a whole can of worms to deal with. It can leave whatever connection you have with him burning and wounded. If you feel like you can still be friends with him after the healing, then go ahead. Otherwise, be careful and tread carefully with it.

[rubydissolution]

Ok so I'm friends with about 3 of my ex bfs, including my LDR ex. The million dollar question you have to ask yourself when approaching this friend situation is simply this, "When (not if) he gets another girlfriend, do I have it in myself to be happy for him and not jealous?" If you can't be happy for him then the friendship isn't going to work out because you still have feelings for him. That makes you defensive and means he can't talk to you about his new relationship without upsetting you. Or you'll give him advice to mess up this new relationship. When the answer becomes "yes I can be happy for him" then maybe you can approach the friendship.

I tend to keep my distance from my exes until I can say yes to that question. My favorite part about becoming friends with my now LD ex was actually telling him I didn't give a crap about his girlfriend and I didn't care if he told me her name or anything about her. I didn't mean that in a bad way, he simply thought I was going to go investigate her on facebook...and I coulda cared less at that point. Our relationship now, is more or less texting each other every other week to see how the other one is doing. Occasionally when something big happens there will be a long phone call, but that's really about it. GL!

[aniay]

will repeat after others, it all depends how you FEEL about it. I couldn't talk with my first LDR BF for few years, we are friendly now, Other guy... we didn't work out IRL, started as friends, ended as friends, CD exboyfriend kept being my friend instantly after breakup because we realy worked best that way... One guy... I had to cut contact with alltogether, I was too crazy about him.

So it depends, you might need a break to get over him or just slide easily into friendship. It's dooable if you want it and feel like it.

[Arrow]

Impossible for me, but might be possible for you. I'unno you, so I can't say for sure.

[maybe__someday]

It hasn't worked for me. But I don't think it's impossible. I think it really depends on how strong the connection was to begin with; all you'd need to do is take away the romantic connection you had previously, if feelings still aren't involved, and keep the platonic connection you both started off with. Some people never really connected deeply to begin with, so when the relationship ended, so do all contact because it just wasn't worth it anymore. Though some people still feel that deep connection, just on a different level, after the break up...again, if feelings still aren't hangin' around.

[differentcountries]

The simple answer is that you can be friends if you feel friendly feelings and act friendly, and get the same in return.

With one ex, we tried to be friends first, it did not work out, then we cut contact for a while, now we are friends who occationally talk and stay in contact, I would be truely happy for her if she remarried. Another ex, I don't want to stay in contactright now because it is too painful, in time it might change. I do need a cool off period where I don't see them.

[Elizabeth123]

This thread is over two years old

[hmrambling]

If the relationship was unhealthy, then it's in my best interests to cut ties. At the end of the day, I have to take care of me. I have plenty of friends out there and I don't need to keep exes around for friends.