Can You Be Friends With An Ex?
July 14, 2009 
32 Comments
This is a very interesting topic, and one people have asked me over and over again to write about here in the blog. Can you be friends with an ex?
Can you be buddies with someone you were formerly intimate with for five years? Can you be really good friends with someone you were formerly living with while simultaneously moving on with your life?
Can you really tell your ex that you are dating somebody else and remain friends? Can you actually help your ex find happiness by being their friend and still keep the good relationship with your current significant other?
You spend a lot of years with someone, and you build an unbelievable friendship during that time. You are learning everything about that person from months (and years) of talking to them, living with them, taking vacations with them, being completely intimate with them, and sharing tons of magical moments with them.
Why would you want to throw that all away? You’ve developed such a great friendship with someone through sharing all of these other parts of your former relationship with them.
So if a relationship doesn’t work out (which, by the way, a lot of them don’t), then what are you going to do? You have this person with whom you had a great friendship and relationship. The relationship part — whether because you stopped communicating sexually or on an emotional level — didn’t end up working. Are you just going forget about the friendship, move on and discard that person entirely?
That person is someone with whom you shared amazing things. That person is someone with whom you can continue to have a friendship.
I think ex’s can be friends. I think ex’s can be friends with no problem, in fact, as long as both parties have moved forward and embraced their new lives apart from each other.
If you have communicated with each other in an open and honest manner, then friendship is definitely possible. It is very important to be honest and open. If you are dating somebody else, you need to be able to tell your ex.
If your ex is truly a friend now and you want to get into that “friend zone” with your ex, you need to be able to tell them all the things that are happening in your life (the good, the bad and the ugly). What happens when you do this is you are allowing your ex to be able to clear their energy, and they’ll then be able to move forward in their energy.
If your ex can’t see and meet the person with whom you’re currently in a relationship, then they’re not the friend you thought they were in the first place. A true friend wants to see you happy. A true friend wants to meet the person who makes you happy.
Don’t push your ex’s away. Keep them. Cultivate them. If you have an amazing friendship with one, don’t ruin it because great friends are hard to replace.
You know what’s funny about ex’s, is you have to find new ways to meet to the next ex. Meeting people online, which we never really talk too much about, is a great way to do this . . . if you know the ins and outs of online dating.
There’s things that you have to live with when you date online, like everyone being younger than they actually are. People online never seem to have a birthday. It seems like people who are in online dating never age.
I remember when I was doing online dating, that everyone seemed to be an age that ended with a “9.” If they were actually 33, they said they were 29. If they were really 48, they said they were 39.
That is what makes online dating such a challenge. You have to be able to weed through the liars and the fake personas before you can find the people for whom you’re really looking. For instance, I found that people who really talked about memories in their profile instead of putting lists in them tended to be more receptive to being contacted.
I’m proud of one thing about online dating. I’ve released my first online dating product which shows how to cut through all the bullshit online, and shows men how to connect to a woman’s core.
Really, the world of online dating is no different than dating in the real world. Both require a lot of the same skills. You have to know how to intrigue them, how to weed through the pretenders, and you have to have great follow-up skills. The main difference is how to utilize those skills in the online context.
I found online dating to be really easy when I was doing it, and in my first video product I show men how simple it is to date online and how fun it can be. If you want to check out the special I’m having on the launch of this brand new product in honor of my month-long birthday, then click here. (See I told you guys I was going to celebrate my birthday MONTH this year!)
Just got my first copy, so far its great watching the first video!
Hey Leo- whats going on?
what you think about the product
Doing great Jimmi, so far I love it, i can tell you the rest, when i am done watching them all!
how you been?
oh good good you know, applying all the materials i am learning.
that looks like a really great product i agree, i have to ask David if he offers a former client discount:)
Thanks for clarifying being friends with ex, it was really helpful.
awsoem blog today Mr. Wygant!!!!
jimmi- stop asking for discount all the times just get it if you like it:)
howe you are really funny boy
you know if i ever meet you in person i want to kick your ass that make me so much happy
jimmi- quit showing off to everyone in the blog, you are not that strong ok LOL
ya ya keep on running that mouth of yours
Jimmi and howe- what are you guys like little kids here
I think its really important to keep an open communication and being authentic, some guys just don’t get that, they make it complicated i had to deal with this dilemma in past.
I never kept in touch with the only real “ex” I had. A part of me regrets it, but I also think it was the appropriate thing to do in that particular situation.
David,
I have to ask, as is the case with my ex, do you really want to be friends with an ex that does what s/he feels is necessary to make themself feel better about what happened? My ex lied and cheated on me, and tells people that she did that so that she could end things with me. (My mistake) I didnt when i found out, because I truely loved her. We stopped communicating emotionally long before then (cant say who’s fault that is, as from what I can remember, we both did it at the same time).
But like I said, if that is the type of ex you have, do you really want to continue being friends with him/her?
James Y, obviously the answer is in your question. Sure you wouldn’t want to remain friends with an ex who lies and cheats you and with whom you don’t have a good communication, just like you wouldn’t want to keep in contact with a friend who treated you that way.
I think an important thing to keep in mind is : the friendship is possible IF and only IF both partners have moved on and accept the breakup. A big IF that can take some time and distance in many cases and is just impossible in some others.
My ex and I dated for four years and we’re still friends but I think it always ends up with one wanting the other and the other not wanting it. Did that make sense?
James, I agree with CeCe…The word “friend” means someone who is trustworthy, honest and who values you. An ex who lied and cheated is NOT a friend….
How about dating a man that has an ex-wife that lied/cheated on him several times before they divorced and he STILL rationalizes/defends her previous and current actions (she blatantly cheats on her current husband) and says she is his ‘friend’? He shares things with her about our relationship (3 yrs) that I think are innappropriate (to be shared with her) & accepts that she makes derogatory and mean-spirited comments about me. He travels alot out of town during the week and I have seen text messages in which she encourages him to cheat – “Oh, go ahead & have a good time. You act like she’s no great loss anyway”. She has never met me, although she knows who I am. He says he loves and truly cares about me, but will not commit to more than an exclusive dating relationship – I am just his gf, he does not want to live together or get married ‘right now’. According to him we are ‘on the same path’ but are ‘going at different speeds’. I am starting to think it’s all horses**t. As much as I love him, it doesn’t matter if he doesn’t see us together for the long haul in the same way I do.
So – am I just a fool in love or……..???? Any input from David or any of the guys – & girls – Coach Kimberly? – would be much appreciated. Thanks so much
Horsegirl,
Seems a tad odd his reactions. Don’t get him accepting her coming with derogatory comments about you. When you truly love and respect another person you would not just accepts this kind of talk. I know I wouldn’t and I would tell the person that such comments are out of line and not accepted. Besides it’s like poison what she is saying, not that you can change it.
The problem if he is rationalizes her previous and present cheating he so close to himself thinking that is A Ok behavior. Yes, in a relationship it takes two to cheat for most of the time, but there are people who cheat just for the excitement and that is not justifiable. I just don’t accept excuses or justifications for cheating on someone unless you are a Swinger.
If you are sensing that he is full of Horseshit…that is most likely the truth. He most likely loves you, but if he can’t let go of this ex accepts her behavior towards you, then I think he has some severe conflict issues that really are not healthy in a great relationship.
If you have reached the point where you are looking at his phone….or does he show you her txt then that in it self is not a good sign for you. Being paranoid in a relationship is very draining in the long run.
Have you told him that what he shares with his ex and the txt and mean spirited comments about really bothers you and what was his reaction. A partner builds you up, he does not make you feel like shit.
Good luck
marina, i love your last line! just wanted you to know
What if you have an Alcoholic Ex that used and abused you and now you’re divorced and you can’t shake her loose because she’s totally dis-functional and can’t survive on her own? Do you completely abandon her and let her go live on the street with the homeless? Or continue to pay alimony endlessly until you die of old age? I’m taking a poll!!!
Coach Kimberly,
Yeah, I pretty much came up with the same conclusion.
And while I am still willing to be her friend (but I am leaving it up to her to start communicating her willingness to be so), I know her well enough to know that she will never do it, as she fully believes that she did nothing wrong.
I can debate that, convincingly, with anyone but her.
But thank you for your advice.
Todd,
That’s a tough one. I had a husband that was a recovering Alcoholic and if he began again he would forget about our kids, which he loved unconditionally within a week. She most likely does not even know what she is doing at this point. If she does not want to stop it will not happen. I assume you can’t just abandon her if you pay alimony, but once that is over I don’t see why you should continue. What about her own family don’t they help. But you walking a thin line between hating to see her go homeless and continue helping her, these is only so much you can do to help her change.
Sorry not a clear Yes or No answer, but Alcoholism is really a hard thing to deal with.
It all depends on how and why the relationship ended. In my case, after 25 years of marriage and 2 younger kids, my ex, a teacher, turned her friendship with the school janitor into a love affair. The married janitor knew our marriage was fragile and in stress, due to my depression and her mental attitude, and he went after her, which breaks the rule, “You never mess with another man’s wife.” He had affairs with female janitors in previous years, so he was scummy. So I can never be friends with her after what she did to our family, and I will never be friends again with the scummy janitor who moved into my house the same day I moved out, and while still married. I’m afraid for my kids who I share 50/50. BTW, He struts around outside whenever I pick up or drop off the girls.
If she had done it differently, I would certainly have been friends, after a period of grieving, and forgiveness, and if the new man was someone else.
Exes what would we do without them. But have to watch out when the person you are with gets to thinking that you are still hung up on them. Sometimes we do carry a torch and sometimes we don’t. When I see my first ex husband he has a tendency to stare. I wonder what he is thinking or if he is thinking about the things he gave up. Who knows…Or when I see an ex I am cordial to them depends on how we broke it off. Now my last two exes I would not be friends with for they treated me and my daughters like we were dogs. OOps and the second ex was on drugs and I do not want that stuff around much less around my daughters.
I think ex can be friends… as long as you guys moved on… but sometimes, can you really get over the “pheromone” feeling?
I went back to see my ex in Vegas at the end of May. We both moved on… but I can’t help but still get “that feeling” in my body. Emotionally, I know we are at different places in life… but what do you do about “that feeling”? It’s that feeling that… even though you know you aren’t right for each other, you know you still turn each other on. There’s still a sexual chemistry that you can’t deny… or overlook.
What then?
Ken,
The only thing you can do, is just accept that you still wanna screw her brains out. But you already know that its not good for you.
So you can recognize it, and just not let yourself fall into that trap.
Don’t deny that it is there, just don’t fall into the trap of letting it happen.
I don’t think exes should be friends. Obviously they have to be if there are children and shared custody involved. I don’t think you should be friends with them especially if you were cheated on. I just think people come and go in your life, you learn from each other what you need to and then just let it go. If you are meant to be friends with them in the future, then you will be. I think it gets akward when you meet their new partner and vice versa even if you both have no feelings for each other.