Friends with an Ex

So I know this topic has been discussed and hollowed out and everybody has an opinion on it. Still, I want to bring it up again because I’ve recently seen how trying to stay friends with an ex can backfire, and drag down your little group of friends right along with it.

So once upon a time back in university I had a group of friends. We hung out a lot, saw each other all the time. All. The. Time. So once some people in the group started messing around together, it was a matter of time before the whole situation would get messy.

Two of the people in the group got involved. Briefly. They refused to label it, but everyone saw what was going on. Anyway as is often the case, one person was waaaay more invested than the other. So naturally, the whole thing imploded, dragging the rest of us down with it.

Granted, they were never in a full-blown relationship, but still. This made me wonder if you can ever really be friends with an ex. For myself, I know I don’t want to be. Of course there are situations in which it’s better to try your best to get along, like if you know you’ll be running into each other a lot. But stuff like that often can’t be forced.

There’s generally two sides to this argument. Team “Yes we can totally be friends” argues that exactly because you were with this person and they know you through and through, they can remain friends. That makes a little bit of sense, I suppose. They know your favorites, fears, flaws, everything. And after all, they say all relationships should be built on a foundation of friendship.

The crowd on the other side says that chemistry never disappears and looking each other up can only add fuel to the fire that never really died. Either that, or the breakup was so nasty and ugly that the relationship has forever been damaged.

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle. I know that if I look at my past relationships, there’s one I try to get along with now because his sister is still my bestie, but I know we’ll never be as close as we once were. Ugly breakup, no desire to open myself up to him in any way, shape or form. But it’s been long enough for me to not wanna be angry anymore. It’s not helping anybody anyway.

Looking at the other one I know we’re not going to be friends. Waaaay too much damage has been done there. So we avoid each other, and so far that’s been working. Maybe with time it’ll get better, but I have no desire to be friends anyway. And that’s usually what I ask friends who claim they do want to be friends with an ex: whyyyyy? And it’s usually just to keep them in their lives in some form or another, which I don’t think is a good enough reason.

At the end of the day it’s your call and you’re probably gonna have to look at it on a case by case basis. What do you think? Are you friends with your ex(es)? Why or why not?