What It’s Actually Like Dating Your Best Friend

Dating your best friend comes with a lot of ups and downs. Here's what it's actually like to be in a relationship with them.

Taking that step beyond the friendship line is something that doesn’t always work out. In the circumstances where it does, you are left with the fortune of dating your best friend. What seems to be conveniently left out is that dating your best friend is not always a walk in the park. Despite a great deal of good things it brings to your life, here’s what it’s actually like dating your best friend.

1. 2-in-1

You were friends before you started dating which helps establish a sort of foundation for your relationship. This provides a more comprehensive view of each other which can result in a variety of outcomes. Since they know you on all levels, they know how to push your buttons and prevent a spiral all in one. This layering aspect is a positive most of the time but there are those choice moments when your partner will intentionally cause silly arguments mainly because they know how you’re going to respond. It’s that teasing aspect of best friends that slips into the relationship from time to time!

2. You Aren’t Immune To Work

Dating your best friend may seem like an ideal scenario that couldn’t possibly contain disagreements, but you need to wake up from that dream! Every successful relationship requires an incredible amount of work to get through disagreements, rough patches, and milestones together. The tricky part is sense you are dating your best friend who you would normally turn to with relationship problems, you have to turn to an outside source. Disagreeing with the primary person you trust takes a lot out of you, but you know that you must work things out together. You like/love this person and need to put in work just like everyone else.

3. Trips Galore

Maybe you took trips together, big and small, as friends but now you get to go as a couple! You get to take corny pictures with even cornier captions on Instagram and experience the world together. Whether it is a trip to the beach or out of the country, dating your best friend guarantees a good time on a vacation together. You already know each other’s likes and dislikes so you are going to take the time to plan a time you’ll both enjoy. The “guess work” is taking out of planning and you get to spend time away from everyday responsibilities with your favorite person in the world.

4. You’re Braver For It

Dating your best friend automatically gives you a sense of bravery. You both decided to take that next step to me more than friends and it is an incredible feeling when a risk like that pays off. It can translate into other areas in your life because you’ll remember how much better your life became after taking that risk. If you hadn’t tapped into that bravery and acted on it, you could end up pining after your best friend for life when you could actually be together!

5. Growth Together & Individually

Typically, as time marches on, you see how your best friend changes due to life experiences and they watch your growth from afar as well. When you are dating your best friend, you witness this growth up close. Whether they are changing careers or working hard to reach that degree, you see their changes and support them. Although you are witnessing each other’s personal growth, this makes growing together a little harder. With so many things changing on both ends, it takes a lot of patience and flexibility to factor that into the relationship. You want your best friend to succeed and you want to become a stronger couple for it.

6. Endless Love

I may be incredibly biased because I have been lucky enough to date my best friend but there is just something more about this kind of relationship. You get the friendship that you have cherished for so much time and you get the added romance. You are fortunate enough to be in love with the person you cared about most in the world before you even held hands. Although there are definitely instances where dating your best friend doesn’t work out in the cases where it does, you should know that there is no greater feeling.