Do you believe in life after love?

I know it's the title of a cheesy Cher song but bear with me. Some lucky few amongst us manage to turn their first relationship into their lifelong love and grow old together. But for the vast majority, we must kiss some (or many) frogs before we find our princess.

We spend the time, and the money, share a piece of our soul and get to know someone and in the end, we agree that we're not the one for each other. What now? Throw it all away? Throw away the friendship and companionship just because they can't be salvaged by themselves from the wreck?

If you know the ladder theory about adult relationships (and if you don't, keep reading as I'll do a series of posts on it) than you know the ideea that a man and a woman can't just be friends as he will always think of sex with her. Still, any theory has its exceptions, right?

What if the sex was nice and all, but he and also her have already found someone better and still need a friend to talk to, someone to explain to him what how the opposite sex would see an issue. Would that be inconceivable? Would it be a slow-burning fuse waiting to blow up both their relationships?

Of course, this comes with the caveat of one of the people becoming the intellectual whore as described by the same theory, but if both of them are in the same position and neither is lusting after the other one, surely that cancels out.

In the end, it's human nature to be jealous, it all comes from cavemen and women wanting to ensure the survival of their offspring and not wasting the other's time and resources on another family. It's been 17 years since I first blogged about this topic, and I'm starting to think friendship after love is nothing but a dream. Even if the two involved are perfectly balanced and not in any way inclined to collide back together, the strain on their respective partners may prove too much for the relationships and not worth the risk of making them jealous. What's your opinion?

May you be loved! If the link goes bad, listen to Cher-Believe