After being together for three years, the founder of Tesla Elon Musk announced on Friday that he and her superstar singer girlfriend, Grimes, have separated.

In 2020, the couple sent the world buzzing when announced that they welcomed a son together and named him X Æ A-Xii.

However, Musk, 50, used a very particular statement to announce the breakup. “We are semi-separated but still love each other, see each other frequently and are on great terms,” Musk told Page Six. “It’s mostly that my work at SpaceX and Tesla requires me to be primarily in Texas or traveling overseas and her work is primarily in LA. She’s staying with me now and Baby X is in the adjacent room.”

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The announcement has left many curious as to what accounts as “semi-separated.” So let’s take a look. 

When a relationship is seemingly coming to an end, the couple will drift apart in slowly paced steps — termed as the process of semi-separating. It involves three stages before the couple finally decides to divorce.

1. The first stage of the semi-separating process starts with choosing to stay in separate rooms. This is easy to explain to the kids by citing a different cause, such as waking up early for work or the other person being sick or snoring. This gives both of them their own area to help relieve stress while keeping the status quo for the kids.

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2. In the second stage, the parents start taking turns to have the children on a weekend. This prepares the children for separately spending time with both the parents. One of the parents will have to be away and out of the house for the process.

3. The final stage sees the parents no longer sharing meals together and they will eventually begin leading separate lives during the week.