Some time back, I was in the kitchen with my then housemate who expressed his frustration of his girlfriend spending time with her ex boyfriend. He was upset that despite voicing his concern prior to their little adventure together, she still went ahead and did it anyway.

He finished his little rant with something that stayed with me for several weeks:

‘An ex is an ex for a reason. Once that relationship is over, you put it behind you, move on and never look back.’

Now, this isn’t by any means a profound revelation. Of course most people cut their former partners off forever and never see them again. But this was something I was expecting to hear my mother say. Not a friend of who has a similar lifestyle to mine…and ‘lo, to proclaim it with such conviction. Twist!

‘Am I right, Daphne?’

I never answered. I just kind of looked outside and veered the topic of conversation elsewhere. But in my head I was thinking ‘I…guess so?’, it sounded like an accurate enough statement, but if so, why am I still close friends with my ex partners?

I mean, of course, even if the decision to end a relationship is mutual, people still need time and distance to get over it and move on. But at some point, you’ll probably find yourself knee deep in platonic friend-goo with this person again. Maybe it’s the Perth bubble that forced me to see the world this way (At best, you’re going to bump into them at some local gig down the road after a couple of weeks, at worst, they live with your best friend). Maybe it’s the incestuous social circles I find myself part of all the goddamn time. Maybe it’s the parasitic effect of social network madness that bring me and that person back into communication town (population: GTFO). But whatever the reason, I never questioned what the point was for having a former lover as a close friend. Just because it happens all the time to heaps of people doesn’t necessarily mean it’s healthy, right? Why haven’t I ever stopped to think about this?

I guess it’s all circumstantial and everyone is different. Like many of the people I know, I have remained close with most of my exes, and it was something that progressed organically over time, devoid of any real forced intention. It’s not an uncommon relationship between people, so I never really put much thought into it.

For me at least, relationship breakdowns were usually caused by differences in personality or ambitions. We didn’t want the same thing or we just couldn’t see eye to eye on enough to make it work comfortably. I mean, obviously if someone is going to frustrate me enough for the most part of a relationship, I begin to dislike and resent them as a person and then lose interest in them sexually – so there’s not really much left to hang on to when the headfuckery pushes on and banging sessions kind of dwindle away. Argh, but even if I stuck around long enough for it to get to that point, at the end of the day, we broke up because we had deeply rooted issues, rather than just straight up lost interest in each other sexually.

The problem with this particular scenario, is that the sexual chemistry is still there. So while having an ex as a close friend works brilliantly 99% of the time (they’ve seen me naked, at my worst, at my core and they didn’t run away at the time – I mean, I never forget that loyalty so I genuinely feel safe confiding in them and don’t hold back, and vice versa), there is that occasional period where one of us is in a state of vulnerability and while it may not necessarily backfire, it definitely throws me back about a million steps from where I originally was, and that is definitely not ideal. Wow, that was a really long sentence. Anyway, I guess after reading that, it’s the comfort part that makes me willing to keep them in my life this way.

…or is it selfishness?

I mean, that’s all well and good when two people just kind of (and lets be honest here) mindfuck each other, even if it’s only in minuscule amounts. All fun and games, ego boost, safezone, bang potential, whatever ok. But that’s actually really shit if someone is already in another relationship.

Even if nothing was ever going to happen, I would be pretty pissed if my partner was playing around with ideas like that while they chill with their ex. So it’s total selfish hypocrisy that I would feel this way after I just admitted what I did. I’m just thinking now though, that maybe I’m just really deluded and this doesn’t actually happen so often, but you know what? IT DOES!

Ok, so. Stay with me here. I know it might not sound like it relates to my last sentence, but I just need to impart some background (lack of) knowledge so it (hopefully) makes sense at the end. Now I’ve never actually gone so far as to get back with any of my exes. This whole thing is foreign to me. Not that I’m for or against it, I just haven’t really felt that compelled to revisit relationship city with them for whatever reason (well, except one but fuck it that’s a whole other thing that I probably won’t ever get into because crying is strictly reserved for Björk). Ages ago I was having dinner with 3 of my friends. I can’t remember how we got onto the topic but I was the only one to not have dated an ex. “Really Daphne? You’ve never gotten back with someone for even a little while?” Nope. Ok, so maybe 3 out of 7 billion people isn’t the most compelling evidence for this claim but whatever, I just know that it is what it is.

Fuck, I’ve rambled on for over 1000 words and gotten absolutely nowhere. Well, not unlike me I suppose. I guess I should finish up with something. In conclusion, I suppose keeping an ex so close under platonic conditions is probably more effort than it’s worth even if it doesn’t feel like it at the time. Unless you can honestly draw the line at that (which I’m convinced a lot of people can’t), it does slow or even reverse the moving forward process which isn’t actually so good for your soul even if you don’t notice it. Plus, it is pretty selfish because you’re creating a scenario where an innocent party might actually get hurt.  You probably have other people in your life that you can let your guard down with just the same. You just prefer not to.

Damn. Take that Daphne.