Debora Spencer, a Seattle photographer, split up this summer with a longtime boyfriend with whom she lived for four years. Like many exes, she grappled with whether to remain Facebook friends. “At first I could not defriend him,” she said. “It seemed so high school. I mean, I’m 50 years old.”

Image Credit... David Plunkert

Early in the relationship, Ms. Spencer’s partner had friended many of her Facebook pals so their networks overlapped. After the breakup, she still received his status updates and read comments he posted on her friends’ walls. That made her realize that he knew everything she was doing, too.

So she defriended him, hoping it would stop the flow of news.

It didn’t. One friend continued to forward her ex’s status reports and comments. Another called Ms. Spencer after seeing a photograph of her former boyfriend with another woman. “It’s not like I wanted to know this,” Ms. Spencer said. Finally, she decided to block her ex completely and asked friends to stop sending updates.

“You learn things so quickly, within minutes,” she said. “Even if we had lived together in a small town, I don’t think I would have learned half of what I did as quickly as I did on Facebook.”

Still, with any failed romance, there is always the temptation to follow up with an ex. And social networks, by design, sate hungry curiosity. Sally Che, a 25-year-old medical student at George Washington University, ended a possible romance three years ago after the man started dating a former girlfriend. (Ms. Che learned about the affair in a status update on his Facebook page.)

She hasn’t spoken to him in years and has no desire to restart their relationship. Despite that, the two remain Facebook friends. And, every now and then, and against her better judgment, she said, she trolls his page seeking fresh news. “The temptation is to look and find out what someone is up to even if it hurts,” Ms. Che said. “People who you would never talk to again are only a click away. You see where they are traveling. You check out the picture of the new girlfriend to see if he downgraded. There is this fine line between being that crazy girl who de-tags photos and gets rid of every little thing and the one who willingly continues the charade of friendship.”