What Your Boyfriend Really Means When He Says "Let's Be Friends"

It's only three words, but they can spell total doom for many a relationship: "Let's be friends".

When your boyfriend feeds you this universal line, it's only normal to be confused. Can you still see each other? If so, what exactly do friends do together? Is there any chance of repairing your relationship, and transitioning from friendship back to romance? Or are you done forever... never to be boyfriend and girlfriend again?

Most of all, why is your boyfriend asking to be friends with you when he's really talking about breaking up? What is he really trying to say here?

Well, let's start with the basics. A guy will ask to be friends with you for one of only two reasons. The first is the hardest one to recover from: he's using the phrase "let's be friends" as a euphemism for actually breaking up with you. In this case, he's letting you down easy - or trying to at least. He has no intentions of staying friendly with you, and contact will drop off quickly. He was too cowardly to break up all at once, so he's allowing it to happen in stages. Unfortunately for you however, he's sending mixed signals.

The second reason a guy will ask to remain friends after breaking up with you is a lot more common: he doesn't want to lose you yet. In this scenario, your boyfriend is trying to hedge his bets. He wants to go out and look for greener pastures, but at the same time he doesn't want you going anywhere. Why? Because if he can't find anyone better than you, he just might want to continue dating you again. Selfish? Sure it is. But it's what most guys will do when they're looking for a change, but are also not 100% certain they don't want you around anymore.

Staying friends with you is an easy, comfortable way of your now ex-boyfriend keeping tabs on you. As your friend, he gets to call you up and ask how things are. He's privy to any new information about your current lovelife. He also gets the same continued companionship of having you around that he enjoyed while you were going out with him, and the ability to call, email, text-message or ask you anything he feels like.

In some cases the ex boyfriend even gets to continue sleeping with the girl "friend" - especially when she's dying to get him back. This happens more often than you think, because to the girl, having sex with an ex boyfriend isn't all that bad a move. After all, you've done it dozens of times already, and many women think it will help "sway" their ex's decision to reverse the break up and take them back.

So does your ex really want to be friends with you? Not by the traditional definition of friendship. What your boyfriend really means when he says "let's be friends" is "hey, why don't you stick around for a while... I'm gonna take a quick look around, see if I can find anyone better, and if not maybe we can pick this thing up where we left off."

Sound appealing? Probably not. Which is why being friends with an ex boyfriend can actually hinder your efforts to get him back. If you're looking to rekindle old romance and you want your boyfriend back in your arms again, accepting his offer to be friends is not the way to go. You're actually allowing yourself to be demoted to a role of pseudo-girlfriend, where you have virtually no power over the relationship between the two of you and actually have to cater to whatever rules he lays down. And when you want your ex back? Just try launching a romantic offensive from a position of friendship. You'll find it backfires so fast your head might spin right off.

Trying to be friends with an ex boyfriend when you still love him is, simply put, an impossible task. You can't sit back and pretend you don't have feelings anymore, or that you can push those emotions to the side to make room for friendship. You're actually better off telling your boyfriend this, when he brings it up. You could say something like:

"Listen, I love you too much to be 'just friends' with you. If you want to date me, I'm here for you. But if you don't want me as a girlfriend, you need to let me go. I can't hang onto our relationship and pretend I don't have feelings for you. And I certainly don't want to sit around as your buddy while you start going out and dating other girls".

Do this and your ex boyfriend will quickly begin worrying about losing you - as both a friend AND a potential girlfriend. You're forcing him to make a choice - one that he'd rather not make right now, because he's sitting in a comfortable position of power. By taking that power away from him, you're creating an environment in which your ex boyfriend has to face losing you for good. And best of all, this is exactly what you want.

There are 8 Individual Steps that will Get Back Your Ex Boyfriend, so find out what they are! Learn the best ways to handle this exact situation, so you can reverse your break up when your boyfriend says "let's be friends".