How To Help Your Friend During A Breakup

Do you ever wonder how you can help your friend during her breakup? Me too.

Confession: I like making everyone happy. And when one of my friends is hurting due to a situation that I can do nothing to fix?

Well, during those times I tend to ignore the fact that I can do nothing to fix the problem and go a little crazy trying to do things to cheer them up:

Jump through hoops.
Attempt to juggle.
Tight-rope walk.
Join a circus ;)

But in all honesty, I know there is nothing I can truly do to make my friend feel better.

In the realm of friends and break-ups, this is especially difficult.

One of my friends broke up with her boyfriend a few weeks ago and I found myself at a complete loss at how to comfort her.

I have never gone through a break-up. The only knowledge I have about how to get through a break-up is from watching the TV show FRIENDS, and that probably isn’t the most reliable source…

So I googled, “How to help your friend during a break-up” and nothing good came up. Especially nothing that addresses helping your friend through a break-up from a Christian point of view.

Great. I sighed. How will I know how to help her?

When I drove to my friend’s house the day after she and her boyfriend broke up, I prayed the entire way. I asked God for wisdom. And I asked Him to comfort my friend.

Exactly one week later, I got a phone call from another one of my friends.

She hesitated for a moment and then told me that she was going to break-up with her boyfriend the following week.

If you’re doing the math, that equates to two of my friends breaking up with their boyfriends with in a two week period. It also equals on very confused and very sad Kara.

I’m sorry to say that I have yet to figure out how to take away the pain caused by a break-up. However, by walking through these hard times with my friends, I have learned a little bit about how to comfort them during their heartbreaks. 

And today I’m sharing what I’ve learned with you :)

How To Help Your Friend During Her Breakup

1. Pray for your friend

An easy way to help your friend during her breakup is to pray for her.

When my friends were going through their breakups, I recognized right away that I had absolutely zero power to make them feel better and to take away the pain that their breakups would bring.

In fact, I wrote a letter about that the other day.

However, I knew there was Someone who could help my friend and comfort her and give her peace during this time. That Someone is God.

So, when your friend is going through a breakup, pray for her. Pray that God would give her peace and comfort during this time. Ask Him to help her work through the pain. Ask that He would help your friend feel His presence.

If possible, pray with your friend. When one of my friends was going to break up with her boyfriend, I was fortunate enough to see her earlier that day. So, I was able to pray with her before she went to meet her boyfriend to break up with him.

If you’re not able to physically pray with your friend, you could always call her or FaceTime her to pray with her beforehand. Or just shoot her a text saying that you’re praying for her after you pray for her.

Simply cover your friend in prayer. 

Related Post: 7 Ways To Pray During A Breakup

2. Be there for your friend

Another way to help your friend during her breakup is to simply be there for her. Call her on the phone. Text her and ask how she’s doing. See if she wants you to come over to be with her.

Just be there for her. 

When I went over to my friend’s house a few weeks ago (the first friend who broke up with her boyfriend), I didn’t know what to bring. I texted my friend and asked her if there was anything she wanted me to bring, and she said a few movies would be great.

I grabbed my big duffel bag and threw in about 20 different movies. (Hey, I didn’t know what sort of movie she’d want to watch!) I also packed several coloring books and crayons in case she wanted to color.

Well, we watched a few movies and talked a lot. I don’t know if any of it actually helped my friend, but she did tell me that having me there with her did make her feel a little bit better.

A few days later, I read the children’s book My Friend is Sad by Mo Willems. That book reemphasized everything I had learned so far about friends and breakups.

From this book, I learned that the things I might try to do to cheer up my friend probably won’t help. BUT by simply being with my friend and sitting with her during this time? That could mean the world to her.

So when your friend is hurting, pray for her and be there for her.

These are the two best ways to help your friend during her breakup. Bonus points if you do both at the same time ;)

If you’re the one who’s going through a breakup, check out my letter to the girl who’s going through a breakup.

Let’s be Instagram friends! @joybecausegrace

Posted by Kara Beth & filed under Friendship. This post has 3 comments.