If you’ve lost that lovin’ feeling…

A student brought something interesting to my attention tonight: is there ever a good time to break up with someone? She was struggling to decide whether to follow through immediately after telling her boyfriend that she “wasn’t sure about them.”  She was fairly sure that making any effort to avoid a complete breakup immediately would be dishonest, regardless of any extenuating circumstances.  The timing was bad: she has a life-defining standardized test on Saturday, and he has one the next Saturday. Nevertheless, she was convinced that she had to end things immediately, even if it meant he would be homeless and depressed on the eve of his exam. I disagreed, rather vehemently, and this is why:

This is a no-holds-barred blog, so I’ll be honest: I was dumped this year, rather dramatically. Serious boyfriend decided that it was time for us to be over.  Now, I respect a  man who knows what he wants. I respect a man even more who is able to stand up to his intellectually superior girlfriend and tell her that he’s just not sure about things. I have a lot of respect for him in general, but this, my friends, is a token example of very bad timing.

Now, said intellectually inferior boyfriend decided that it was time to evaluate our relationship while I was on vacation, a few days before my 20th birthday, and on the same day that I was diagnosed with a scary kind of skin cancer, which required surgery on a very visible part of my pretty face very soon.  Facing (pun intended) this terrifying medical problem, the last thing on my mind was my relationship, which had been slowly dying, like unto an old cat,  since its inception.  Also, intellectually inferior boyfriend decided that it was appropriate to have this DTR (Destroying the Relationship) via phone, which only gave me the opportunity to scream frustrations, rather than pound them out upon him physically. Needless to say, despite boyfriend’s intellectual inferiority and the negative light in which his choice of breakup style shone upon his character, I was devastated.

His repeated question to me, the same question that my student asked tonight, was, “Would you rather I have lied to you until the right time to break up came around?” My answer: “YES.”

Why? The ability to deal with one’s emotions and organize them in a way that avoids hurting people is a sign of maturity. Blurting things out as they come to your mind, particularly life-altering decisions (i.e. breakups), is a mechanism of destruction. You’re supposed to learn things from relationships. I learn things from breakups. This breakup definitely showed me that propriety of relationship destruction is key. It really doesn’t matter much if you don’t love them anymore. They’ve probably given you a good few months (or years) of their valuable life, and the least you can do is wait until after their big test or potentially deforming plastic surgery. Unless it’s a boob job. In which case, destroy to your heart’s content. She’ll be happier without you.

Moral of the story? There is a convenient time to end a relationship. Four requirements of an appropriate breakup:

1) It’s in person. Even if you’ve been dating for two weeks, you really want to do everything you can to avoid being compared to Joe Jonas, because everyone loves Taylor Swift. You won’t win any friends by being like the guy who dumped Taylor Swift over text.

2) It’s not within two weeks of any life-altering examinations/dissertation due dates/finals weeks. Even if their snoring is keeping you awake, and the sex has gotten really bad, you can wait at least two weeks. I promise. (Note: intellectually inferior boyfriend dumped me the first time during finals week. Finals didn’t go so well that year.)

3) You don’t say, “It’s not you, it’s me.” It’s them. Just say it.

4) You don’t try to weasel out of it. If you want to break up, break up. Don’t make them say, “It’s over.” Be a big kid. You can do it.