how should I let coworkers know my fiancé and I broke up?

A reader writes:

My fiancé and I just broke up after 6.5 years together. The underlying factors contributing to the split had been percolating for a long time, but the actual break-up happened very suddenly and unexpectedly, and I’m in a lot of pain right now.

I was wondering if you had any scripts for how to broach this subject at work. I’ve talked about my partner, his career, our upcoming wedding, etc. a lot to my coworkers, and many of them have met him. I don’t know how to now announce that we broke up without trauma-dumping, but obviously I can’t just pretend that we’re still together.

I’m sorry!

You don’t need to make a big announcement at all. You can simply stop mentioning him and if it comes up organically (like if someone asks a question about him or is otherwise says something that clearly assumes you’re still together), you can say, “Oh, we’re not together anymore.” The person might look sad and say they’re sorry to hear it, and you can say “thank you” and quickly pivot to a different topic. That’s really it! People at work aren’t likely to be expecting you to go into the details, and it’s perfectly fine to just deliver the news when it’s directly relevant and not let the conversation get mired in it.

If at some point it gets weird that people are clearly still assuming your wedding is approaching, you can always address it more proactively (“I’d mentioned I’d be out in November for my wedding and honeymoon, but Ray and I actually split up so unfortunately that’s no longer the plan”) but the same principles apply — don’t dwell on it, don’t give details, just deliver the basic fact of it and leave it there.

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