(A Deep Dive Into Love, Friendship, and the Human Need to Overcomplicate Everything)

Let’s talk about relationships.
Not the fairy-tale ones. Not the Hallmark-card ones.
Not the “we wear matching pajamas” ones that look like a seasonal mental illness.

No, let’s talk about the real stuff: the messier-than-a-grease-trap, emotionally confusing, occasionally wonderful roller coaster we call modern romance.

People today have big questions about love. But there’s one particular question everyone loves to overthink:

“Should your romantic partner also be your best friend?”

And the answer is:
Sure. Maybe. Sometimes. If you’re lucky. Or unlucky. Or delusional.
It depends—on you, on them, and on how much nonsense you can tolerate before developing a facial twitch.

But you’re not here for a polite “it depends.”
You’re here for the real breakdown of why humans keep trying to combine roles like they’re filling out a job description nobody asked for: “Full-time lover, part-time therapist, unpaid chef, occasional plumber, emotional support llama, and also my best friend.”

Congratulations! Love in the 21st century is basically one giant unpaid internship with benefits that may or may not exist.

So let’s get into it.

THE MYTH OF THE “BEST FRIEND” PARTNER

Somewhere along the line—probably in the same era when people started believing juice cleanses actually cleanse anything—someone decided that your romantic partner should also be your best friend.

Why?
Because movies told us.
TV told us.
Self-help books written by people on their fifth marriage told us.

Suddenly everyone believes in this idea that you should have one person to cover every human emotional need from childhood to death.

It’s like we all woke up and thought:
“You know what would make relationships easier? Making them harder.”

In reality, expecting your romantic partner to also be your best friend is like expecting your houseplant to also do your taxes. It wasn’t built for that. It can try, but you’re probably getting audited.

WHY SOME PEOPLE WANT THEIR PARTNER TO BE THEIR BEST FRIEND

Let’s analyze. The people who insist on this “best friend” thing tend to fall into a few categories:

1. The Disney Adults

These folks believe their partner must be their one true soulmate, adventure buddy, late-night confider, and emotional Swiss Army knife. They want a fairy tale with wi-fi.
They want “You complete me.”
They want to braid hair while singing duets.

These people are adorable.
Also, exhausting.

2. The Codependents

These are the folks who treat relationships like conjoined emotional organs.
If the partner goes to Target without them, they feel abandoned.
If the partner wants space, they call it betrayal.
If the partner doesn’t want to hear their 40-minute rant about Karen in accounting, they think the relationship is doomed.

A best friend AND a romantic partner?
Brother, they want a hostage.

3. The Pragmatists

These are my favorites. They’re not romanticizing anything. They’ve just realized it’s really convenient when you don’t have to maintain friends outside the relationship.
They’ve done the math:
One partner + one best friend = double the emotional labor
So they combine them like a cable bundle. It’s efficient. Boring, but efficient.

4. The “My Partner Is Literally My Only Friend” Group

A surprisingly large demographic.
These people aren’t asking philosophical questions—they’re just lonely.

**WHY SOME PEOPLE DON’T WANT THEIR PARTNER TO BE THEIR BEST FRIEND**

Let’s flip the coin.

A lot of reasonable people want separation.
They want categories.
They want roles that make sense.

They want their romantic partner to be their romantic partner, and their best friend to be the person they talk to when their romantic partner is being annoying.

Why?

Because:

Your partner doesn’t need to hear EVERYTHING.

There is value in having a friend you can complain to about your partner without your partner hearing it and starting a three-day fight about tone.

There is value in having a friend who understands that sometimes you just need to vent about life, not find a solution or discuss feelings for six hours.

And there is value—immense value—in having someone who likes you platonically enough to point out your stupidity without it becoming a referendum on your relationship health.

People fear this idea because they think it means their relationship is weak.
No. It means you’re not burdening one person with every emotional itch you have.

That’s healthy.
That’s sane.
That’s how human beings survived for 200,000 years.

THE PRESSURE OF BEING EVERYTHING TO SOMEONE

People today demand too much from their partners.

You want them to:

Be hot
Be emotionally available
Have trauma but only the attractive kind
Be funny but not funnier than you
Be stable but also exciting
Be independent but also obsessed with you
Be supportive but also psychic
Be romantic but not clingy
Be your best friend but also a porn star but also your therapist but also your mom but also your dad but also your personal chef

That’s not a partner.
That’s an entire HR department.

When you expect your partner to also be your best friend, you’re essentially applying the “all-you-can-eat buffet” mentality to human relationships.

Sure, you can load your plate with everything.
But you’re going to regret it.
And something’s definitely going to fall off the side and hit the floor.

**WHEN YOUR PARTNER CAN BE YOUR BEST FRIEND**

Let’s be fair. Sometimes it works.

There are couples who genuinely:

Make each other laugh
Trust each other
Share interests
Enjoy each other’s company
Can talk about anything without someone crying or threatening to move to their mother’s house

These unicorns exist.
They live among us.
Usually wearing matching hoodies.

If you’re in a relationship like this—where your romantic partner actually is your best friend—congratulations. You’ve hit the relationship jackpot.
Just don’t get smug about it.
Nobody likes those couples.

You know who I mean—the ones who say stuff like:

“We never fight!”

“We tell each other EVERYTHING!”

“We’re literally obsessed with each other!”

Good for you.
But the rest of us want our own identities, thanks.

FRIENDSHIP IS DIFFERENT FROM ROMANCE

There’s a big difference between the two.
A best friend brings:

Honesty
Laughter
Shared interests
Acceptance
Low-maintenance affection

A romantic partner brings:

Intimacy
Sexual attraction
Compromise
Emotional complexity
The potential for at least one argument a month about the dishwasher

The problem is that people confuse the intensity of romance with the comfort of friendship.

Romantic partners see you at your worst.
Your real worst.
The “I haven’t slept, I haven’t showered, and I’m eating shredded cheese directly out of the bag” worst.

Your best friend laughs at that version of you.
Your partner questions their life choices.

Different roles.
Different expectations.
Different dynamics.

If you happen to get both in one person, amazing.
But don’t assume that’s the default.

THE DANGER OF LOSING YOURSELF

There’s a big downside to making your partner your best friend:
You risk losing your own identity.

When your partner becomes your everything:

You stop having your own hobbies
You stop having your own friends
You start finishing each other’s sentences
You start dressing alike
You start turning into one of those couples that speaks in plural

“We love Thai food.”
“We don’t watch horror movies.”
“We don’t trust Ben.”
“We’re dealing with sinus issues.”

We?
What, are you sharing lungs?

People who merge too much become less interesting.
They stop being individuals and start being a weird two-headed relationship creature that can’t function without shared opinions.

That’s not romance.
That’s fusion.

THE HEALTHIEST RELATIONSHIPS HAVE SPACE

Here’s the truth nobody tells you:

The healthiest relationships have room.

Room for:

Friendships outside the relationship
Interests outside the relationship
Venting outside the relationship
Growth outside the relationship

People who cling too tightly kill the very thing they’re trying to protect.

Friendship and romance can overlap—but they shouldn’t cannibalize each other.

You need someone who loves you.
You also need someone who isn’t legally tied to your emotional meltdowns.

THE REAL QUESTION: WHY DO YOU WANT THIS?

Here’s the core of it all:
The answer depends on why you want your partner to be your best friend in the first place.

Ask yourself:

Are you avoiding vulnerability with anyone else?
Are you afraid to build friendships outside the relationship?
Are you trying to control your partner’s social life?
Are you lonely?
Are you using one person to cover 20 emotional needs?
Are you romanticizing something that doesn’t exist?
Or… do you genuinely have a partnership that naturally fits the “best friend” dynamic?

Some people want it because it’s genuinely who they are.
Some people want it because they have no idea how to be intimate unless they fuse themselves to someone like two raccoons sharing one brain cell.

Know the difference.

THE NASTY LITTLE SECRET ABOUT “BEST FRIEND” RELATIONSHIPS

Let’s get brutally honest:
When people say they want their partner to be their best friend, what they often really mean is:

“I want emotional safety without emotional risk.”

But friendship has risks.
Romance has risks.
Combining them doesn’t eliminate risk—it multiplies it.

When your partner is also your best friend, a breakup is like losing:

Your love
Your support system
Your go-to confidant
Your favorite person
Your backup babysitter
Your salary-free therapist
The only person who knows how you like your eggs

That’s a lot of casualties for one relationship.

Some people can handle it.
Most cannot.

THE IDEAL: BE FRIENDLY, NOT INFANTILE

Your partner should be someone you like, not just someone you love.

You should:

Enjoy their company
Respect them
Laugh with them
Talk comfortably
Have inside jokes
Feel safe with them

But that doesn’t mean they have to be your best friend.

You can love someone deeply and still need your best friend to tell you,
“Yeah, you’re being dramatic. Drink water and stop texting them paragraphs.”

That’s the beauty of friendship—it balances the madness of romance.

THE BEST FRIEND TEST

Here’s a simple test to figure out where you stand:

Ask yourself:

“If my partner weren’t my romantic partner, would I still choose them as a friend?”

If the answer is yes—great.
You’ve got something solid.

If the answer is no—
You don’t want a best friend.
You want a lover with built-in emotional labor.

And if the answer is “Oh God, absolutely not,”
then you’re dating someone for the same reason people buy gym memberships—
optimism and denial.

THE HONEST ANSWER: IT’S OPTIONAL, NOT REQUIRED

Can your romantic partner be your best friend?
Yes.

Should they be?
Not automatically.

It’s not a requirement.
It’s not a rule.
It’s not a sign of relationship quality.
It’s not a universal truth.
It’s not something to force.
And it’s not something to panic over if it isn’t happening.

Some partners make great friends.
Some do not.
Some couples have a magical best-friend-and-lover connection.
Some couples have perfectly healthy relationships with separate friend circles.
Some couples start as friends and grow into lovers.
Some start as lovers and grow into people who pretend to listen.

There’s no one-size-fits-all answer.
There’s barely a one-size-fits-one answer.

Humans are complicated.
Relationships are complicated.
Expectations are complicated.

But one thing is simple:

Love works best when it’s not being crushed under the weight of unrealistic demands.

THE FINAL WORD

So should your romantic partner also be your best friend?

Sure.
If it happens, it happens.
If it doesn’t, you’re not doomed.
If you force it, you’re doomed.
If you expect it, you’re delusional.
And if you base your self-worth on it, go ahead and schedule that therapy appointment now.

The healthiest relationships have:

Love
Respect
Communication
Independence
Compatibility
And at least one friend outside the relationship who tells you the truth

Romantic partners can be best friends.
But they don’t have to be.

The real question isn’t:
“Is my partner my best friend?”

It’s:
“Do we actually like each other, or are we just clinging to the idea of what a couple should be?”

Because liking someone—really liking them—is rarer than love.
Harder than love.
More important than love.

If you’ve got that?
Everything else is negotiable.

Should your romantic partner also be your best friend?