If you can’t find the words to tell your significant other it’s over, it’s not you—it’s the fact that not much is harder to initiate than a breakup conversation.

That’s what Morgan Cope learned in her early 20s: “I would get so anxious to the point where I couldn't physically say anything,” she recalls. Now, as an assistant professor of psychology at Centre College in Kentucky who researches breakups, she developed a framework that was both clear and compassionate in order to make it easier for people to stand their ground, rather than being coaxed into giving things another try.

The result: a five-step script she calls “the breakup butterfly” that’s informed by relationship theory and data , and that she describes as “detailed and dignified.” If you decide to use it, start preparing y

See Full Page