So, you break up and your ex offers you the option to still be friends with them. "Holy! My ex wants to be friends with me and I can still be close to them. This is great" you think to yourself.
Wrong.
Actually, being friends with your ex after breaking up with them is not a very good idea. It doesn't matter whether you want to get them back or whether you want to just stay on good terms with them.
It's really common for your ex to suggest this after a breakup and as I previously mentioned, people usually see this as a good thing.
Why would they want to stay as friends after a breakup though?
Should you be friends with your ex, to begin with?
So many unanswered questions.
Let's answer them.
Can You Get Your Ex Back?
Wondering the answer to that question? I've created a quiz that will tell definitively if you still have a chance with your ex or if you should consider moving on...
Click this link to take the quiz and find out definitively where you stand...
Why Does My Ex Want To Be Friends?
Before we dive into whether you should be friends with your ex or not, let's quickly discuss why they want to stay as friends with you in the first place.
To put it simply, humans are selfish.
I know it might sound really dark but as it has been shown, people usually want to stay as friends with their ex for selfish reasons.
People stay as friends with their ex for far darker reasons than you probably thought,
The harsh reality is that they want to keep you as a backup plan or they want either emotional or physical support from you.
I know this isn't what you want to hear but it's the truth.
Love doesn't make people selfless.
My Ex Wants To Be Friends. Should I Accept?
You know how it goes...
"Hey, even though we broke up, we can still be friends right"?
Those are the words that you have a really good chance of hearing unless your breakup was caused by you upsetting them really badly.
You might think to yourself that "hey, this is better than nothing". But is it really?
You see, I'm here to guide you and what I'm going to tell you might be upsetting to hear...
Unless you are completely 100% over them, you shouldn't be friends with your ex.
Being friends with your ex isn't a good idea unless you are absolutely certain that you are completely over them.
Now, before you click off and start sending personal attacks my way, hear me out and assess this:
What do you want to do? What is your goal?
Are you looking to get over them?
Is your goal instead to re-attract them and get them back?
Do you want anything to do with them anymore?
In any one of the above situations, I wouldn't recommend becoming friends with your ex because one person will have all the power and the other person will always be unhappy.
Let me give you examples:
Trying To Get Over Them While My Ex Wants To Be Friends
If this is the situation you are in, you definitely shouldn't blossom a friendship with them.
Quite simply, you will make the process of getting over them much harder when you start a friendship with someone who you used to love deeply.
You are going to be seeing your ex often and constantly getting reminders of them which will just prolong your recovery period by a mile.
The best way to get over an ex is to completely remove all reminders of them and just let time take care of itself.
Getting into a friendship with them is going to prolong your breakup recovery by a huge amount.
When you get into a friendship though, it's going to make things a lot more tricky in this aspect.
You obviously will not be able to shut off all reminders of them since you are seeing and talking to them on a weekly basis.
So, if you find yourself in the above situation I recommend you to tell your ex that you being friends with them just currently isn't a good idea.
I Want Them Back But My Ex Wants To Be Friends
This is the second tricky situation you could be in.
You want to get your ex back but your ex wants to be friends with you.
To solve this, we need to look at breakups on a deeper level.
Most of the times, a breakup is caused by a loss off attraction.
This could happen for a variety of reasons but losing attraction to your significant other is the single most common cause for breakups.
Losing attraction in a relationship is really common and it's the most fundamental reason for breakups.
There are so many factors that could contribute to this.
New couples always start out with the honeymoon stage. Everything is amazing and you can't get enough of each other.
Then eventually, once enough time passes, one part gets a bit too comfortable.
Perhaps you stop taking so much care of yourself and you start eating worse.
Maybe you become lazy and want to do nothing but lay on the couch all day.
Or perhaps you start displaying some really unattractive characteristics to your ex like being too needy or becoming jealous about every little thing they do.
When you are in a committed relationship, it's so easy to get carried away in being so accustomed to having a partner that you stop taking care of yourself and you get too comfortable.
Whatever the case is, it will bite back quickly.
Then, once you break up with your ex by them just losing attraction to you instead of you hurting them really badly by for example cheating on them, you find yourself in the situation where they want to still be friends with you.
They fell out of love with you and started considering you more of as a friend and now, they are asking you to return the favor.
You start wondering whether or not you should tell them about your feelings.
Related Article : Should You Tell Your Ex About Your Feelings?
If you want to have any chances of getting them back in this situation though, you need to realize that your only option is disappearing for a while.
By employing no contact and not agreeing to a friendship with your ex, you will make them miss you.
Employing no contact is hands down one of the most important steps you can take to get them back when they want to just be friends.
Learning how to make your ex miss you is one of the most valuable tools you could have if you are looking to get back together with them.
You see, in order to get them back by making them miss you, you can't just expect it to happen automatically when you are constantly in their presence.
This will just get you friend-zoned faster than anything and you aren't going to build back any attraction that way.
By disappearing completely for a while, the process of missing you happens automatically.
Suddenly, a person who they were so comfortable with and got to know so well has completely disappeared.
If you remain friends with them and keep talking to them every day, you will never make them miss you.
By doing this you will just become their puppet and give them all the control. You will do whatever they ask because you still want them back, even though you probably know it yourself that this isn't the best way to re-attract them.
They will never be able to develop feelings of missing you when you are constantly around and giving them attention.
Letting them dictate everything and giving them all the power is the worst thing you can do if you still want them to be attracted to you.
You Are Going To Become Their Support Pillar
This is another thing you might not think will happen if you become friends with your ex but trust me, it will.
Your ex will lean on to you for support since they already know you too well. And I'm talking lean on to you for everything.
What happens is they will start to unload their feelings to you and hope and rely on the fact that you can make them feel better.
They will unknowingly start to use you as their therapist who they can disassemble all their emotions to.
You will need to sit there and hear them talk about the new guy/new girl they have found and all sorts of other tough topics you definitely shouldn't be hearing from them right now.
As I already mentioned before, relationships end due to a loss of attraction and when you sit there and listen to them pouring their heart out to you as a friend, they will never desire a new fresh relationship with you.
You will never build back attraction by listening to them pour their heart out to you as a friend.
Also, if you get to the point where you two are friends and they are taking apart their emotions to you, it means that they already see you as someone, not boyfriend/not girlfriend material anymore.
You need to change that fact in their head if you want to get them back.
But how do you actually say NO to them when they ask to be friends?
Well, it's not actually that hard. Just act in the most respectful way possible and tell them that you don't think being friends with them would be a good idea right now and that it would be way too hard for both of you in this situation.
But I Already Told Them We Could Be Friends
This is a tricky situation but luckily for you, it's not actually very hard to get out of.
I have already written an article on how to get out of the friendzone with an ex but I'll briefly cover it here.
Your plan will be to simply start responding to them slower and slower and start ignoring some of their texts and calls.
Now it's time to take action and make your decision about what you are going to do.
Slowly start drifting away until in a matter of a couple of weeks you have completely disappeared. Then, if you wan't to move on just let time take care of things. If you want to get them back though, it's no contact time.
Also, you need to realize that you can still undo this mistake and you can actually do so quite easily.
How To Force Your Ex Back If They Want To Be Friends With You
This is going to be the last, and most important part of this article (if you want your ex back).
Right now, I'm about to give you "the secret sauce" on how you can force your ex to feel so much emotional obsession towards you that they have no other choice but to take you back.
What I'm talking about is an "ex back method" made by Brad Browning that I'm going to link down below for you.
This is a method that has been surfacing the internet for a while already and the track record this method has at practically FORCING your ex to come back to you is insane.
I'm literally not kidding here. If you watch the video below and employ this technique to the tee, before you even know it, your ex will your ex will be pinning you against your bedroom wall, gazing at you with that look they used to give you, and kissing you like you're the last person they'll ever kiss.
Now, before you get excited, I would like to just make one thing clear:
Do not watch this video unless you ACTUALLY want your ex back... Because that's exactly what is going to happen.
If your ex isn't good for you and you know it, you shouldn't get them back using this.
With that being said, here is the link:
Good luck!
Moving Forward
As a quick summary:
You need to figure out what is it that you actually want to achieve.
After that, cutting off the friendship will be your first step in moving forward.
If you want to completely get over them, just let time take care of itself and heal the scars of your breakup.
If your goal instead is to get them back, you need to still cut off the friendship and start employing no contact immediately. The video I linked above will also come in handy during this time.
When you focus on improving yourself and really strive to become a better version of yourself, you increase your likelihood of actually getting them back.
At some point in time after no contact, you also need to re-establish contact with them. Using a texting guide that has been designed for this situation will be your best choice here.
Anyways, that's all for today folks.
Good luck out there!
Got friendzoned by him but after this article I can safely say goodbye to it!! thank you!
Wow! Super happy to hear that!
Actually managed to get them back using this.. Absolutely amazing!
Brought a smile to my face with your comment! Really happy for you!
Thank your for this!
No need to thank me! Happy you found it valuable!
This article is more valuable than gold…!
Thank your for the kind words!
As the above commenter said, super valuable advice and the Ex factor guide was the icing on the cake at helping me get them back!
Happy you found this, and the ex factor guide helpful!