Ohh the Facebook relationship status. Seemingly innocuous, but in truth, there are all sorts of dangers that come along with making your relationship Facebook official. I was previously unaware of this. In fact, the Facebook “In a Relationship” Club was something I desperately wanted to belong to. So last year, when for the first time ever, my page actually said something other than “single,” I was the happiest girl in the world. What I failed to realize is that making it Facebook official adds a whole extra layer of stress to the relationship.
Here are three reasons to consider skipping making your relationship Facebook status official:
1. Having the conversation sucks.
It is challenging enough having the whole, “Hey do you want to only date each other?” talk or asking the “Can I call you my boyfriend?” question. But having to ask that special guy if you can make the relationship official on Facebook just seems silly and trite.
The conversation should be approached with caution, especially since guys tend to be much less interested in broadcasting their new-found love to their mom, grandma and high school friends. But don’t wait too long to have it, or you may find yourself justifying why it is suddenly so important to share it on FB (“No, I swear I am not insecure about that beezy writing all over your page…”). I actually recommend having the ole’ Facebook talk at the same time you have your original boyfriend/girlfriend chat. That’s what I did with mt boyfriend and it worked wonderfully. I explained to him that even though he wasn’t uber into Facebook, it would mean a lot to me to put our relationship on there. And so we did. But really, anyway you slice it, asking to make your relationship FB official is awkward.
2. You now have to worry about proper girlfriend Facebook protocol
When you were just casually dating, you couldn’t write all over homeboy’s wall or you would look like a crazed, desperate chica. However, you could leave a comment or two without everyone on FB scrutinizing your interactions. But now that your little picture is prominently displayed next to the words “in a relationship with” the game changes. It’s hard to walk the fine line of making your honey feel like you are paying attention to them on Facebook and laughing at all of their funnies, while not appearing to pee all over their wall. Nobody likes a Wall Pee-er. And they’ll be vocal about it, so watch out.
3. But the absolute biggest reason to avoid making your relationship Facebook official is the Facebook Break Up.
Things get pretty confusing. Fast. When I broke up with my boyfriend, I immediately went home and changed my relationship status. In my mind, I was sure we were done and thus didn’t see a point in wasting anytime. In hindsight, perhaps that was a little hasty/insensitive. Turns out he waited until three full days later. Three days that were full of angst for me wondering why he hadn’t changed his status yet.
When he did finally get around to changing his status, he didn’t have the common sense to remove the update that read “X is no longer in a relationship.” So I got to watch as all these girls “liked” his status and wrote comments about how they should go get drunk together. Hi, knife in heart.
The entire experience was stressful and I can tell you this much, I won’t be jumping into any more Facebook relationships anytime soon. Should you be in a relationship that is reaching this level of seriousness, I caution you to tread lightly. Making it Facebook official makes things just a bit trickier and the last thing any of us needs is something to make dating more complicated.
