Can you be friends with your ex?
by Christopher DeLorenzo

Last year, my ex-boyfriend Ricky came to visit after living in Germany for three years. I was excited to see him and glad that he contacted me, but I'll also admit I was hoping we might get ... reacquainted, so to speak.

It was one of those times in my life when I was dating infrequently, and I was lonely for that kind of affection. But I had to remind myself that the main reason I love Ricky is not because we had great sex together, but because I always had fun with him. Ricky engages me intellectually and really hears me; he also makes me laugh.

As we sat in my apartment, listening to music and catching up, I caught a few glimpses of his flat, smooth stomach (he was wearing a tight, untucked shirt), and although I found that slightly erotic, something in me shifted that night: I discovered that I would always find Ricky attractive but that I didn't want to love him that way anymore.

We had made a conscious decision to be friends, and I didn't want anything to jeopardize that.

Can you ever truly be friends with an ex?
That's what my friend Suzanne has asked me several times. And she doesn't mean in the superficial way either; she's talking about deep, caring friendships. And I think you can. It depends, of course, on how deeply you were involved and also the circumstances surrounding your break-up.

I will never be able to be friends with some of my ex-boyfriends (you know who you are) because the elements that are necessary for a friendship never existed in our intimate relationship. Those elements are trust, compassion and mutual respect. Without them, you have a connection based on lust, superficiality or dependence, and that is not the recipe for a healthy relationship — and certainly not a friendship.

Crossing the line
Now my friend Jerry has quite a few friends with whom he has stepped "over the line." These are men whom I've met, and many are still his acquaintances — some are close friends.

"It just didn't work out that way for us," Jerry likes to say, and for him, that's the whole story. He was able to say, "Let's be friends," before anything got out of hand. I admire him for it. Honesty has been the foundation for these friendships, so they started off on the right foot. It also explains why so many of his friends are so attractive, but that's another story.

For me, Jerry's experience proves that you can cross back over the line of intimacy and return to friendship if you have established a friendship in the first place. Some of my most intense intimate relationships should have been friendships only, and if we had truly been friends first we might still be friends today. Terry reminds me it's a conscious effort, and Ricky reminds me it's possible. It would be nice if it just wasn't so damn hard sometimes.