This past seven days I saw two different people get their heart broken, and I observed how they handled it after their significant others broke up with them. Now, when I was separated from my ex-wife and the inevitable divorce I reacted pretty drastically. I started off heart broken, depressed and ready to mope the rest of my days and later grew stronger, with the help of anti-depressants. A few months later I was able to handle my feelings and as the saying goes, time healed my wounds. But I’m a guy, I react differently to divorce and break up. I think I’m more desperate than women when it comes to the break up because let’s face it, men need women more than the other way around.
One person I talked to, her boyfriend broke up with her and I would think, after a one year relationship, well at least I think it was a year, she’d be a little more upset. The love was still fresh, the honeymoon period was most likely still going on, and they were both young. Yeah, there was a six year different between the two, the boyfriend being older, but when the break up happens, guess who ended up being the mature one? I’m pretty sure you guessed the girl. Yeah, she was fine, and as a matter of fact, it empowered her.
From my own experiences in the past and from things I’ve read from studies, my time as a psychology major, studying research and surveys, I’m pretty sure that there’s a grieving period after breaking up and women need time to heal and to cry. Not in this case, she instead cracked her knuckles, gave a steely look and moved forward doing things just for her. She changed her look, she pampered herself and she and her friends knew she was better off. It was really quick, and it was surprising how fast she got over the break up. I talked to her a bit about it, but we’re not close so it wasn’t very deep, but less than a week after the loss of her relationship, she was standing tall.
It was interesting to see, and a little scary as she was most likely over the relationship before her boyfriend could drop the axe. My own ex was the same, having already been out the door before the actual separation and divorce happened. Its kind of like what I talked about before, in where people get bored pretty quickly and well, some people just stay in it because maybe they’re too lazy to leave. In this case, I can’t tell.
Then there’s the other way of taking a break up. I can relate to my friend becoming heart broken and becoming desperate to get her signficant other back. Many times the heart wants what the heart wants, and the person we’re pining for doesn’t always want us back. Pretty obvious stuff right? Well not to us who are smitten, twitterpated, infatuated. We’re so blinded by our interest and desire that we don’t care that the guy or girl isn’t into us. We’re too into them to notice. So if we’re in a relationship and we’re in this bubble of love or lust or like, it becomes that much harder to let go when they let us go. It hurts, its painful, and we turn from confident, positive, powerful people to…well…to put it bluntly, much less.
We become desperate, I was there once, and we beg and plead and try our hardest to reason with someone who left us a long time ago. They just made it official and we don’t know what to do. We’ve become dependent. Needing their time and attention so much that when they leave us, we have nothing. We have so little of nothing we spend most of our time crying or thinking about it. We become consumed and nothing else in the world matters. Its so hard to get out of bed or even wake up in general. We’re lost in a sea of despair.
It took therapy and medication to get me out of that funk, and up until then I was a firm believer we can do it ourselves if we REALLY put our mind to it. We can control our minds, our feelings if we want it hard enough. And some people can do it, some people can overcome that chemical imbalance that causes depression that takes away our energy and makes us sad, macabre people. Now I know, if you need the help, take it. Take that medication, see that therapist. Its not permanent for most people, you just take what you need until your body and mind compensate and you can handle the pain on your own. Until you can stand on your own two feet without the anti-depressants.
For those who want to handle it on their own, all I can say is, go ahead and be said. Not forever, but you’re allowed to have time to cry and to kind of just wallow, but not for too long. You know your limit, you know when you’re falling into that abyss. But give yourself a couple days, but no more. After that, give yourself a few minutes in the day to think about it, and then to get up and move forward. You can’t live under that dark cloud forever. So take the first step, and go out.
Yeah, I know you don’t want to go out when you’ve just lost a relationship. But try it anyway. Take baby steps. Get out of bed and sit on the couch and watch tv, yoru favorite movie or play an involving video game. Then the next day, go out to your front or backyard and find a place to sit and read a book or a comic or play on your iPad if you have one. Then the next day, get in your car and go somewhere. Get coffee, discover a new restaurant. Then when you’re up to it, go out with friends, talk to them on the phone, text them, or better yet, meet up with them. Hang out with friends or family, let them pamper you. You’ve just lost a boyfriend/girlfriend, they’ll most likely be sympathetic. Revel in that for a little while.
Time will pass, and you’ll notice it hurts less. Every day you go to work its easier to concentrate, to not get distracted by the loss. More time will pass and you think about it less. You stop begging them to come back and you can accept they’re not coming back. And as each new day comes and goes is a new day for you to grow and to become you again. And then…you’ll find a day when you’re happy. You’re laughing, you’re smiling, and the thought of your ex is much more distant. And finally, after months (yes it might take that long) you feel good, you’re fine being single, you’re doing things you love and you’re appreciating your friends and family more. And the last step, after how ever long it took you to get comfortable and after hopefully indulging in your singlehood, you find yourself ready to date again. If your’e in it you may be asking yourself, “Why would I want to date again?” Because we all move on, time heals wounds and you are capable of love. And you find yourself loving again.
So either you’re empowered right off the bat, or maybe you need time to find that power you need to move on, either way it happens. Just know that the world is not over, the world has not stopped turning, and life moves forward, and so will you. You might not see it now, but you will, and you’ll feel fantastic.
