A Guide To Dealing With Social Media After A Breakup

The love may be gone, but the digital imprint your ex left on your life lingers on.

Some take the “rip the Band-Aid off” approach after a breakup, purging their social feeds of all traces of their ex.

Others pick and choose: It’s not going to bother me if I see her Instagram feed, but I really don’t need to know if she’s Venmo-ing some guy named Kevin for “ski trip and vino.”

The central question you need to ask yourself is a simple one: What is going to work for my emotional health right now and help me move on?

Deciding how much you want to pull back can be a bit challenging, though. Below, we weigh the pros of cons of staying connected to your ex on different apps. 

Instagram

There are a handful of considerations to weigh when it comes to the ’gram: To follow or unfollow? If you want to keep them on there but don’t want a full rundown of what they’re up to post-split, consider muting their stories or posts . If you want to see their vacay photos or umpteenth latte art pic, you have the option of visiting their page.

Next, decide if you want to delete photos you have with them on your profile. If there’s no bad blood between you two, or you want to commemorate the good times you had, save the pics. If you’d prefer to keep them private, use Instagram’s archive feature so only you can look at your secret little stash. 

Twitter 

There’s a simple test for this one: Do you still find your ex’s shower thoughts or  hot takes on Trump’s latest gaffe enjoyable and funny? Or at this point, are you completely over their “witticisms”? If it’s the former, continue to follow them. If it’s the latter, press that “unfollow” button, baby. There are plenty of self-impressed blowhards to follow on Twitter no need for one of them to be your ex.

Facebook

Let’s be real here: Are either of you even active on Facebook ? If not, who cares. You might want to clear your “in a relationship” status, though hopefully your nosy Aunt Linda takes notices and doesn’t ask about your ex at the next family dinner.

Just like Instagram, you have the ability to unfollow your ex  on Facebook instead of unfriending them so their updates don’t pop up on your newsfeed. 

Venmo

Ah, Venmo, the most insidious app of all post-breakup. Back in your coupled-up days, you’d use the payment app to split the rent or pay off your side of the Trader Joe’s bill.

Now that you’re broken up, staying friends with your ex on Venmo might expose you to some very troubling activity: Who is Jenna and why is she always getting sushi and going to paint and sip nights () with your ex? You can read between those emoji lines.

If your Venmo creeping is reaching FBI level, your best bet is to remove your ex from your friend list. Here’s how to do that, according to the app’s site.

Snapchat

This one feels a bit intimate, right? You only post things on Snapchat you want your closest friends to see. Chuck them off your friends list unless you genuinely are still friends post-split. While you’re at it, you might want to delete your ex’s friends too. (We know you have eagle eyes and can easily spot your ex in their pal’s videos.)

Spotify

Staying friends with your ex on Spotify poses more problems than you’d think. Are you going to see it as a cry for help and reach out if your ex plays “Nothing Compares 2 U” three times in a row? Are you going to lose your shit if you see them adding songs to their sex playlist ?

On the other hand, if your ex has impeccable taste in music and you kind of enjoy seeing what they’re listening to, leave them on there. 

Your Shared Instagram Account For Your Dog

Ah, so you’re that couple : Well, now that little Daisy the dachshund is a child of divorce, you and your ex have some cold, hard decisions to make about the Instagram account you created for her. Whoever keeps the dog keeps the account. If you’re sharing custody of your pup (yep, couples do that now ), it follows that you both get access to the account. Just play nice: No passive-aggressive posts about how few walks you’ve been on lately with daddy.

Netflix

Hey, this is between you and God. We won’t tell if you still know your ex’s password for Netflix , Amazon Prime, Hulu, HBO Now, YouTube TV, Sling TV or DirecTV Now. You’re on your own though if they catch on when the streaming service tells them too many people are using the account right now.