Why Friends Don’t Want You to Get Back With Your Ex
Not surprisingly, the divorce rate among Americans is 50% for first marriages, an even-higher 67% for second marriages, and a whopping 75% for third marriages. Evidently, the third time is not a charm when it comes to matrimony. Despite these discouraging figures, more and more people are getting married. And when the inevitable break-ups occur, family and friends often discourage you from trying to get back with you ex, opting instead to coach you through surviving the separation and moving on to finding someone better. Now, despite how it may sound, friends and family are not entirely to blame for helping people push those divorce rates higher. They are just giving bad advice based on details that have been provided to them.
When was the last time you have approached your friends and relatives and sought their advice and they told you that it makes perfect sense for you to get back with your ex? This happens rarely (unless it is a longer-term marriage involving children). In fact, your trusted allies will usually bring up some forgiven problem from the past, hug you, and say things happen for a reason. Some might even suggest they saw the end coming. There is an abundance of reasons for their response. First off, it’s much easier to suggest the path of least resistance. Secondly and more importantly, they remember the last fight, the last time you had your heart broken and weren’t thinking clearly. Thirdly, and equally important, is that nobody wants to see you return to a situation where you are vulnerable to further heartbreak. They give their “things happen for a reason” response because they love you.
Just as people are more likely to complain about bad service than they are to talk about great service, we are more likely to complain about the bad aspects of our relationships. It seldom happens that we commend our partner’s attentiveness and our superior treatment in everyday conversations with friends. The reason is that most of us do not like to brag about how perfect our relationships are. Additionally, we often come to expect appreciation and above-average treatment from our partner, so when things happen as they should, we don’t discuss them. Plus, arguments have far greater entertainment value, but as a result our friends typically only hear about the bad things (even if they see how well we interact on a regular basis, our “confessions” of the arguments get ingrained in their memories). So when a break-up happens, we cannot really fault our friends and family for encouraging us to move on, can we?
As an aside: Ever notice how everyone will complain about the high divorce rates quoted in the opening paragraph? Of course, nobody likes to see such a national problem, yet why are we often urged to move on and forget rather than fight to get back with an ex? It’s nearly paradoxical…
With these realities in mind, hopefully you now understand (even marginally) why people argue against your trying to get back with your ex. Does that make them right? No, it makes them good allies — why would you want someone who likes to see you hurt time and again? But does it make you right for wanting to get back with you ex? That all depends on several factors, including whether the relationship was generally healthy (in other words, no abuse, no cheating, no lying, etc., etc.). If the problem that led to your break-up was one of misunderstanding, then chances are you can make things work in the long-term. The key word here is “long-term” as any relationship can be repaired in the short-term.
Typical misunderstandings would include arguments of finances and other value misalignments like promising to meet somewhere at a certain time but failing to do so. Of course, these problems are always trivial in print or when coming from a third-party, but internalized they create great tension in a relationship and are often cited by therapists as the reason for break-ups. With a bit of accommodation and compromise, everything is work-able.
With break-ups rarely being a permanent solution to a relationship, you can definitely succeed when trying to get back with an ex. Using the virtues of patience and objectivity, the resulting, refreshed relationship should gain in momentum and strength. Therefore, the final thought is that friends and family do not like seeing you in emotional pain; their advice to you is often not based on all of the facts and their aim is help you avoid getting hurt in the future. The only way you can know whether you should get back with an ex is through your own feelings. But, statistically speaking, it makes sense for you to strive to keep your relationship together.
Tagged with: break up • Dating • divorce • get back with an ex • get back with ex • get back with your ex • how-to • Marriage • relationships
Filed under: Marriage
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