From Her Perspective

By Kati Cawley
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Breaking up is hard to do. It really is. Nobody likes doing it. If it were fun, it would be called something else. But in the majority of the relationships we have, it’s inevitable. Most of them are going to end, and it’s usually not a mutual thing. Someone has to take one for the team and just do it.

So, if she’s not The One, and you know she’s never going to be, you’re probably thinking it’s time to move on to greener pastures and hotter chicks. Life is too short to spend time with someone you know isn’t right for you, right? And it’s not fair to either of you to be in a relationship that’s not making either of you particularly happy. These are great rationalizations, and some of them are probably even true. But let’s face it, when you know a relationship is going to end, you’re itching so badly to get out there and slut around with all the chicks you couldn’t get with while you were with this girl that you want to get out of it as fast as you can. That’s okay. It’s to be expected. Better to end it now, while you’re only thinking about hooking up with someone else than to wait until it’s already been done and now you have to bring cheating into the mix. And that’s never pretty. But I’ll get into that later.

Lots of relationships end badly because the dumper is either nervous about hurting the dumpees feelings and drags the whole thing out for too long or is so overly-ready to be out of the relationship that the other person ends up feeling badly about themselves. You may say that there is no good way to break up with someone. Of course there isn’t. But there are a few things you can say and do to make the break-up as painless as possible.

When you know you want out of a relationship, chances are that the other person (we’ll assume the other person is a girl for our purposes) knows. She may say this whole thing is coming out of left field, but most likely, she has figured something was wrong for a while. She may not have thought things were so bad that you were going to break up with her, but it’s rare that your unhappiness will come as a total shock. The trick is to not let yourself get so unhappy that you start treating her badly. You probably don’t want to break up with her because of something she did, so don’t make her feel that she’s a bad person. Neither of you are. It just didn’t work. Feel free to reiterate this point until you are blue in the face. It may not register at the time, but eventually, she’s going to get it and she’s going to believe it, too.

Whoever said honesty is the best policy was mostly right. Usually, it’s best to be entirely truthful with someone during a break-up. Maybe you tell her, “I fell out of love with you.” Yes, it hurts but it’s something you can deal with and eventually get over. This is not the time to throw in details involving the girl’s appearance, sexual techniques, family or friends. You’re getting out. She doesn’t need to know you always hated that she doesn’t dress sexy enough or that you think her mother is a joke. You may think this is a good time to let it all hang out, but trust me, it’s not. She’s going to feel bad enough and end up focusing on these stupid details instead of working through her pain. Just let it go.

If you don’t want to be friends, say so. There is nothing worse than thinking its okay to call an ex to hang out if they want nothing to do with you. It’s really embarrassing. But if you dump someone and tell her you’d like to be friends, she’s going to hold you to it. And if she still has feelings for you, she’s going to try to win you back, no question. If you’re relieved to finally be done with her, tell her it’s too hard for you to be friends and wish her the best of luck. She may be angry, but at least you won’t have to have that awkward conversation six weeks later that you don’t think her showing up at your house every night, trying to sleep with you is a good way to be friends and maybe you shouldn’t see each other for a while. It’s too messy. Keep it as clean and simple as possible.

Never, never, never use cheating as a way out of a relationship. It will mess her up so badly that her next boyfriend will have to do some major damage control before the relationship has a hope of going smoothly. Being told that you’ve been cheated on as a reason for breaking up basically means that I don’t love or respect you enough to tell you that I’m unhappy, instead I’m going to have sex and feel good for a night and then tell you about it so I can feel better by being honest with you while you can’t leave your bedroom for six months afterward.

Try to be mindful of her whereabouts for a couple of months after the break-up. You may say that it’s your life and you can go wherever you want and hook up with whoever you want and it doesn’t matter what she thinks, you’re not her boyfriend anymore so you don’t care. First, that’s really disrespectful. Obviously, if you dated this girl, you cared about her at some point and you wouldn’t want her to do that to you. Second, if you go somewhere you know she’s going to be and you’re with another girl, it’s just going to be a headache for you. Either she’ll confront you or one of her friends will confront you. It will be incredibly awkward, sad and frustrating and you’re going to wish you had never run into her in the first place. So cut out the middleman and stay the hell away until she’s had some time to forget about you. And don’t worry, she will. She’ll be fine. She just needs some time.

Like I said, breaking up sucks. But if you’re as clear and mindful of her feelings as you can be, chances are you won’t have to change your name, address and phone number, you’ll just end up being the great guy with the huge… um, heart who it just didn’t work out with. And there’s nothing wrong with that.