How To Overcome Sadness After A Separation

After a breakup, it is important to cope as best we can to move on with our lives and avoid falling into a vicious cycle. Otherwise, we may suffer a “post-breakup depression” or love depression. This has the following symptoms and characteristics:

Fear

Learning to live without that person who we considered so important seems dizzying. It is normal to feel a certain fear and uncertainty about what is to come, we can even consider it one of the phases of the improvement process. However, when this fear lasts over time and makes us unable to move forward, it is time to treat it psychologically.

Emotional burden: guilt

We look for all the existing reasons that could explain the separation with a person. “Why is our relationship over?” It is a very common question after the breakup. Sometimes, we carry all the responsibility for the events and blame ourselves for everything that has happened. When all that weight falls on us, it produces a feeling of psychological discomfort and lowers our self-esteem.

self rejection

When our self-esteem is so damaged, we end up rejecting and hating ourselves. This can turn into a spiral of uncontrollable self-hatred and must be controlled in time. The key is to think about the real responsibility for our actions, it may not all have been our fault, the important thing is to assume our part and work so that it does not happen to us again in the future.

Anger towards ex-partner

Another way to manage the discomfort of the breakup is to focus anger on the ex-partner. This frees us from all responsibility and is a mechanism to protect self-esteem. It is not the best way to manage our emotions, obviously, since in this way we will not learn from our mistakes and, with great certainty, we will make them again with other people.

Getting back together after ending a relationship is not easy, neither for men nor for women. While it is true that each separation is different, the psychological keys to freeing ourselves from sadness and being stronger emotionally are based on emotional management and the protection of self-esteem.

First of all, to know how to overcome sadness after a separation, it is necessary organize and conduct the entire cascade of emotions What we can feel after such a painful situation. If we feel overwhelmed by feelings, we probably end up thinking that we can’t control anything around us. To manage our emotions we can do the exercise of identify them before they explode and name them.

For example, we can identify the moment in which the feeling of anger begins, think about why we are feeling it and if it is really worth maintaining that unpleasant emotion. Learning to control feelings is not a simple process, but it can help us be strong after a breakup. In addition, this learning will serve as a tool for other conflicts in life.

Secondly, when we are able to control our emotions, we will have to learn to protect and work on self-esteem This plays a very important role in generating a more optimistic point of view on life, helping us develop resilience and make better decisions. To increase and strengthen self-esteem, we can do some of the following exercises:

• Positive thinking: It’s about turning the tables, stopping thinking about how badly we do everything and starting to value our decisions a little more.
• Self-acceptance and reaffirmation of our ideas: a very important step to know how to overcome sadness after a separation is to accept yourself. This is vital to having good mental health and being able to recover from a painful breakup. Having good self-efficacy expectations (that is, believing that what we are going to do, we will do well) increases the chances of success which, in turn, increases self-esteem.
• Positive affirmations: It is important to realize what language we use to talk to ourselves; if we are constantly attacking ourselves or thinking that we are not enough, our self-esteem will probably not be able to be strengthened correctly. That is why we should try to use language based on positive statements towards ourselves, such as “I can achieve this goal” either “I deserve to be happy and loved“.
• Realistic goals: We must propose small objectives, goals that we can achieve in the short term to direct our actions towards personal improvement. Seeing ourselves capable of meeting these goals will increase our security and, therefore, self-esteem. For example, we can suggest going out for a drink with new friends, taking short trips alone, reading a book that has always caught our attention…

Once the initial crisis is over, there will be much to work on. In some cases, getting out of a breakup means start a new life, apart from the entire circle of acquaintances already formed, even far from our former residence. A separation can entail a series of changes that we have to be willing to adapt to. The important thing is to be able to move forward on your own and develop the necessary tools so that, over time, we are able to have a normal and peaceful life, regardless of any past relationship.

Take some time without a partner It seems to be a good decision to develop our resilience and independence. Learning to be alone fosters our own belief system and helps strengthen self-esteem.

Once the separation is over, with the passage of time, we may be able to start a new relationship again. But to do this we must ask ourselves if we have really learned to love ourselves and to be emotionally independent.

Each person goes through a different process and there is no set time as the correct time to have a partner again. However, we must calmly consider and meditate whether or not we are ready for a new relationship, if the past no longer haunts us and if we want to try again.

This article is merely informative, at PsychologyFor we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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