How to Break Up With Someone You Live With: 10 Tips From a Therapist

How to Know When It’s Time to Break Up

There are many reasons why people decide to end a relationship. You have the right to end any relationship that does not feel good, but it’s a decision that shouldn’t be made impulsively. While not an exhaustive list, here are some ways someone will know when it’s time to consider breaking up with someone they’re living with.

Here are some signs you should break up:

• The person is abusive
• You do not feel comfortable in the relationship
• Your beliefs and morals do not align
• They do not support your career or life goals
• Getting your partner to spend time with you, your family, or friends is difficult
• You don’t feel loved or supported
• You are supporting them financially (and this was not the original deal)
• Their family does not know you exist
• They are unreliable or untrustworthy
• You are forced to hide who you are

Preparing to Break Up With Someone You Live With

Once you have made the decision to break up with someone you live with, it is important to create a plan of how you are going to tell the person. If it’s a toxic relationship or if you feel concerned about how your partner will react to the news, decide to have the break up conversion with others close by or on speed dial. If the relationship is abusive, breaking up in a public place might be worth considering.

After you have made the decision of when and where the breakup will take place, it is important to work towards creating a plan for future living arrangements, shared payments or bills, and safety and living arrangements of shared pets or children. Both parties should be part of this decision making, and should work together to create a compromise that works for all.

Steps For How to Break Up With Someone You Live With

There is no easy way to end a relationship and it’s hard to know how to break up with someone. Ultimately, remember why you are having this conversation in the first place, and that it is going to benefit both of you in the long run. Expect discomfort, and allow your partner to have their feelings.

Ten steps to breaking up with someone you live with include:

1. Have Pre-Break Up Conversations

It is important to be certain a break up is necessary. If there is any part of you that wishes to resolve differences or work through challenges, now is the time to do it before a break up. Unless you no longer love the person, or if you feel unsafe with them, trying to improve things could be a respectful decision for both of you.

For many couples, couples or marriage counseling could help resolve differences by improving communication and helping you learn to better express needs. However, couples counseling should never be attempted if there is any abuse in the relationship.

2. Deliver the News Lovingly

While there is no way to deliver the news in an upbeat way, it’s still a good idea to have the conversation in a loving way with the goal of trying to end on a positive, peaceful note. Start with a calm voice, and give adequate time and tone to the conversation. Seeming rushed or annoyed will seem disrespectful or cold.

Taking the time to have a compassionate and kind conversation about why the relationship needs to end will help the receiving party with closure. “Understanding a breakup may lead individuals to find benefits of dissolution such as learning what they can change in future relationships or what qualities they desire in a new partner.”¹

3. Give Each Other Space

It is natural, and even healthy, to allow both partners to take space following a breakup. This is a crucial part of the healing process and should be respected. Giving each other space will be more difficult when you live with someone, so care should be taken to ensure that both parties set healthy boundaries and have their space in the shared living environment.

Sometimes couples decide that one of them will move to the guest room, or one will work at a local coffee shop to give the other space at home. Compromises like these are respectful and healthy.

4. Give Adequate Time to the Conversation

Adequate time should be set aside for this conversation. Attempting to break up with someone before one of you has to leave for work is unfair, the same with trying to have the conversation through text or while distracted such as driving or watching television.

5. Allow Them Their Feelings

Many people are uncomfortable with difficult feelings in others, especially when they may have done something to cause or contribute to these negative feelings. Many will say things such as “don’t cry,” or “it will be okay” but these statements can be taken offensively.

Allow the person to experience their feelings of sadness, anger, loss, and breakup grief. There is nothing you can do to change their feelings, and trying to tell them that they will be okay can be patronizing.

6. Tell Them the Truth

Saying things such as “it’s just time to move on,” is fine if that is the truth. But if there are other reasons, such as different opinions about whether to have children or move out of state, tell them. Telling someone the truth about why you are leaving them will help them understand and may even contribute to self-awareness. “It is possible that emerging adults who are able to come to terms with romantic dissolution by understanding why and how a breakup occurred are learning more than those individuals who are left in the dark as to where the relationship went awry.”¹

Telling someone why a relationship is ending does not mean that it is their fault the relationship ended, but they are owed the truth. It’s better to be honest than to have them find out later that you did not tell them the truth, which will be even more painful for them.

7. Stick to Your Goal

It is normal for the person being broken up with to try to resolve things or bargain to keep the relationship from ending. Do not allow them to talk to you into reconsidering, as this is unfair to both of you.

8. Use Your Support

Use this time to lean on your support system. It is best to seek support from your family and friends rather than mutual friends, due to the potential for triangulation and to avoid making them uncomfortable. Having social support can increase resilience to stressful events.²

Go out to dinner or a movie with friends, call your mother or another close family member, and use this time to seek support from those who are there for you.

9. Be Respectful

Always be respectful in how to talk to and about your ex partner. Bashing them to others is disrespectful and will make you look immature and vindictive. Speak in objective ways such as “yes, we ended the relationship last week,” “I broke up with them, but we are trying to find a safe and fair arrangement for the pets.”

10. Avoid Blaming

Blaming the other person for the breakup will do no good and does not solve anything. Even if it is their fault, such as if they behaved in disrespectful or uncaring ways, blaming them will only cause them to react in defensive ways.

Instead focus on moving forward and not trying to convince them that the ending of the relationship was their fault.

How to Share the Space After a Break Up

Many adults share finances, friends, property, and other things, even without being married.³ Thus, it is common for people to break up while sharing a lease, mortgage, or other financial commitments or assets even without having the legal commitment of a marriage. Sharing the space may be easier if you can be friends with your ex after a break up

Because not everyone has the financial means or resources to end a lease or mortgage in a short time, sharing space after a breakup is often unavoidable, and many couples are left to make these decisions on their own following a split. Following these steps will help you share space with them in a way that is hopefully more manageable.

Tips for temporarily continuing to share a home after break up include:

• Respecting their boundaries and sticking to yours
• Avoid getting pulled back into old relationship patterns
• Decrease expectations of each other
• Be respectful of them
• Allow them time to themself
• Ensure safety of pets, children, and other living beings in the home

How to Break Up When You Have Kids Together

Breaking up with someone you live with is even harder when children are involved.  When parents do not get along during or after a relationship, this affects the children. “Parents who are unable to work together to raise their children either when they are living together and especially when they are not are not able to provide a stable and secure environment for their children. In such environments, children may feel insecure, anxious, and aggressive resulting in more behavior problems.”⁴

Hopefully both parties are on the same page with the goal of doing what is best for the children. There are many ways to co-parent effectively after a breakup, which should be the goal of both parties. Many find that co-parenting counseling can help.

Some tips for breaking up when kids are involved include:

• Decide together what you’ll tell the kids before you talk to them
• Consider living arrangements after the break up
• Engage social supports through mutual and extended family, Godparents, etc
• Seek individual counseling to help you deal with feelings instead of involving or affecting the kids
• Co-parenting with the other parent should be a priority
• Do not speak badly about the other parent to the children
• Be open and honest to the children and allow them to ask questions

When to Seek Professional Help for a Break Up

There are many times that someone might consider therapy as they go through the stages of grief after a break up. Feeling depressed or hopeless, unable to shake the guilt from breaking up with someone, or feeling unable to sleep or eat are some signs that you may want to speak to a therapist. An online therapist directory is a good place to start your search, as they will often list the many online therapy options available.

In My Experience

Many of my clients struggle with guilt and remorse following the ending of a relationship, especially if they were the ones who made the decision to end. Having to end a relationship with someone who shares a living environment certainly adds to this stress. However, if both parties are respectful and considerate, then they usually both grow stronger in the relationship’s end.

However, if someone is leaving a relationship with someone who is abusive, then the breakup frequently changes to post separation abuse.