A Diva State of Mind

I was talking to a friend of mine yesterday about friends with benefits. He didn’t understand why a situation like that could get tricky.  So I started thinking, do friends with benefits relationships really work?

A lot of people at this time in their life are not looking to settle down in serious relationships, but at the same time they have needs that need to be met, so they opt for friends with benefits relationships instead.  Believe me, I understand why. As Queen Latifah said in Brown Sugar, “You get the buddy and the booty.” Who wouldn’t love that? No serious commitment and you don’t have to answer to anyone, allowing you to technically still be single.  Now there isn’t anything wrong with the friends with benefits situation as long as both parties are on the same page, but after being in that situation for months, do the friends with benefits relationships continue to work?

I’m sure most of you know what friends with benefits means, but for those of you who don’t, let me briefly clarify. Those who engage in friends with benefits relationships are currently friends; they chat often through various forms of communication (bbm, gchat, text), they hang out together and in group settings and genuinely enjoy each other’s company. The benefits portion of that relationship would include engaging in physical activities (use your imagination and you’ll get the point) without being emotionally involved.  All of this takes place, but they are NOT in a relationship.

I know a few friends who have jumped into “friends with benefits” situations and while they start off innocent, someone ends up catching feelings.  Now when this occurs, what do you do? The arrangement was to be friends and physical when you wanted to, but the agreement didn’t include catching feelings and actually wanted to be more than friends.

Those who jump into these “relationships” always say “I won’t catch feelings, it’s purely innocent.” But it never fails, someone ends up catching feelings. How can you not? You hang out with them frequently and you get physical. Over time it’s only natural that feelings develop and the nature of the friendship isn’t ever really the same.

I’ll admit I found myself in an unspoken friends with benefits situation in the past and one of us caught feelings. As guarded and hard core as I may come across sometimes, I’m not sure if I could ever agree to be in that type of “relationships” because I don’t want to be the fool that ends up wanting more out of the situation. So I ask all of you, can friends with benefits really work? Is it even worth entertaining this type of relationships to meet a physical need, knowing that the situation could get tricky over time?

This weekend in Pittsburgh was not only a reunion, but definitely sparked some interesting conversations between me and my friends!  Without going into too much detail, the topic of jump offs came up between me and one of my friends.  My friend Kristina* is in a friendship with a male friend and that friendship could go to the next level (no, not a relationship but friends with benefits). Actually, according to many, the friendship should’ve gone to the next level a long time ago, but the point is she is wondering does that make her a jump off in her friend’s eyes.

Most of my female friends don’t put themselves in “jump off” situations, so I wondered would my friend really be a jump off if she decided to take her friendship to another level.  I mean, they are both consenting adults who want to and at the same time, they aren’t looking to be in a relationship (although they have been playing this flirting game for over 2 years so you never know about these two). At the same time, they are friends and do send “where have you been messages” when they haven’t talked or seen each other in a while.  So a true established friendship is there.  So to ease my friend’s worries, I went online and found a blog that talked about the true definition of a jump off.

According to the blog site, a jump off doesn’t have any benefits  outside of what takes place after 12am; meaning you don’t hang out, go to dinner & movies, have conversations about other things than sex etc.  The only thing you talk about is when you’ll be hanging out after 12am again (you get my drift).

Check out http://www.nakedwithsockson.com/2009/02/17/definition-of-a-jump-off/ for the entire blog.

If you’re really unsure what you think you’ll be labeled as, just ask.  Guys will be honest with you, believe me! I’ve learned this from hanging out with my male friends.  Guys are honest; most of the time females just think they’re jerks because they speak the truth and say what we don’t want to hear. In this situation though, Kristina is most likely not a jump off.  If she was, her friend would’ve moved on by now and not care when they didn’t interact as friends.  So who knows what will happen in Kristina’s case; if she does decide to move on to a friends with benefits relationship, she just has to be prepared that the interaction between her and her friend will never be the way it was before.

*Name has been change