Should ex-lovers be friends?

Yes

1 of 27

by Corinna Craddock

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Should ex lovers be friends? What differentiates the couples who remain friends from those who don't? When children are involved, they must co-parent friendly ... but can divorced parents really be friends? Should a new relationship tolerate an ex when children are not involved? Are there things to consider that are particular to friendship between ex lovers?

Deciding to be friends with an ex lover is a choice that should be made by people who are able to honesty connect with true feelings about current intentions and future desires, without using denial as a tool to sell current status to others.

Your current relationship is sensitive to the silent hints and nonverbal clues that let people know someone may have feelings for an ex. Immature lovers will argue that they should be allowed to be friends with an ex, exhibiting defensiveness in response to not being trusted. Those accused act outraged at not being believed capable of keeping things platonic with an ex.

But if you secretly have longing for your ex, it will show. Whether or not it becomes a self fulfilling prophesy that follows accusations... and brings you into the passionate arms of your ex lover... that is the game you choose to play when you enjoy temptation under the guise of casual friendship. Are you fundamentally capable of being honest and mature? Or are you just enjoying a naive thrill to feel important, or resolve past issues, at the expense of another?

If you question having feelings for your ex, then you most likely do have feelings for your ex lover. Mature women who have experienced friendship without those secret feelings of longing can tell you that it is possible. Saying you did not have feelings for your ex, after the line has been crossed, is about as statistically possible as a woman saying she did not know she was pregnant until her denial finally gives birth. People who try fooling themselves, seldom fool others who detect motives of denied reality.

So what makes some ex lovers different? Why are some able to be friends?

1) Believe it or not, sometimes it is easiest to become friends with an ex-lover who was once your enemy. Two people who come to mutual understanding that they are a volatile mix are often able to enjoy interpersonal relationships, and to co-parent in ways that they had failed to do when together. At the risk of spoiling objective observation with personal experience, this author can share that, after two marriages ended with two restraining orders and one vacation at a battered women's shelter, co-parenting today is the polar opposite of the verbal and emotional abuse that we exposed our children to when together.

It is something hard to believe, when both are sitting across from a court mediator, that the two will actually one day put hate aside and actually laugh together, but it happens. In the personal case just referred to, friendly co-parenting began with using mother rights to be as liberal as possible with the visitation. It naturally evened itself out, after months of fear and rage on both ends. Four years after the end of the eight year marriage, an eight year old son does not remember a time his parents did not get along. The child does not remember when the police kept father from coming home for six months, or the threats of getting even that surrounded that life chapter.

2) Other friends are born from time. When a couple splits, it takes about half the number of years they were together for both to completely get over the breakup. Ending a relationship hurts. Both hurt when couples split, no matter who ends it. If you do not grieve, you were never really in love. When a marriage of ten years ends, it will take about five years for the past to lose its sting.

3) When an ex becomes part of the family, his role may continue. As family dynamics evolve, some ex lovers become permanent in the extended family. The fact that "Uncle Joe" was Aunt Susy's ex is not something the younger generation is even conscious of; and the fact that each is remarried and the number of cousins has doubled does not cause either of the pairs' new spouses to worry or be suspicious of some old chemistry during holiday gatherings.

Asking if a current love interest should tolerate friendship with an ex lover returns those seeking valid answers back to the introductory question of inner honesty. Current partners will sense the dreams of lovers resting on the pillow next to theirs. They will recognize voice inflections and delays' of eye contact that are just some of the tell tale signs hard to isolate when detecting deception, but that are deception detected none the less.

Error is made by those asked to tolerate their partner being friends with an ex, when suspicion is dismissed as past injury causing current paranoia. Guilty indulgence of the heart is easily visible under the light of gut intuition. Don't let your suspicious heart deny the reality of a friendship that compromises peace of mind.

Instinct should be trusted when questioning to accept the proximity of an ex lover.

When the goal is to sustain friendship positively for everyone involved, there are details that ex lovers must consider:

1. No flirting, no pet names, no sexual suggestion.

2. Ex enemies who manage to become friends never bring up the past. Period. They live each day actively living amends. The only way to erase the injustice of the past without mentioning it is to have an unspoken commitment to only just exchanges going forward. All those buttons that were once pushed to drive an ex crazy, become the buttons you know best how to avoid.

3. True friends that were once ex lovers spend little time talking about the ex not in the room. Individuals who are friends with an ex lover will not be heard talking about the friendly ex in between visits. Not if the visits are casually platonic as claimed. Even when trust is definite, disrespect is the result when names from the past are brought up more than rarely.

In conclusion, none of these observations sought is capable of answering the personal question of friendship. Observations sought to validate the appropriateness of friendship cannot replace the reality of feelings hard to admit, but even harder to hide.

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