How To Start Over After A Breakup: 8 Tips To Follow
In the life of a couple there are beautiful, romantic and fun moments, but there can also be problems, conflicts and arguments that cause, sooner or later, the end to come: the breakup.
Breakups are painful, something totally natural. Accepting that someone you loved no longer loves you is difficult and leaves a wound in the heart that stings for a long time.
But there is no breakup that cannot be overcome. It involves a lot of effort, but it can be achieved. Know how to start over after a breakup This is what we are going to discover next.
Breaking up with your partner is never easy. Whether it was us who broke up or he was our ex, breakups are without a doubt one of the most painful experiences we can live through. Regardless of what blew up the relationship, a breakup upsets us in such a way that, at that moment, we get the impression that we will never get over it. We come to believe that this pain will never go away..
Breaking up with someone shakes our lives so strongly that breakups are precisely one of the most frequent causes for request psychological help. Although it rarely evolves into a pathological condition, it is undeniable that they can affect our mental health, especially if they are handled poorly or have occurred unexpectedly.
In order to help you move forward, throughout this article we are going to see how to start over after a breakup, although we already anticipated that there are no magic recipes. It is a process that requires patience, effort, self-reflection, strength and, above all, time. You have to trust the passage of time which, after all, is what ends up healing the wounds.
Grieving a breakup
For some, talking about grief after a breakup may sound strange. Why call it mourning if no one has died? No one has died, but something has died: a life together. When you date, it is inevitable to think long term, to believe that in the future the two of you will still be together. and, as a result of this belief, illusions, projects, hopes are created… All of them die when the breakup occurs, which is why one can live with a lot of pain.
When we break up with our partner, whether we are the ones who broke up or the other person left us, we begin a period of mourning. It is expected that this duel will be experienced by both parties, but normally it is the one who has been left that suffers it most intensely. There are people who, after a breakup, take some time to tell their loved ones. They do not tell their loved ones that they no longer have a partner because they still hope that this is only a temporary situation, that their expectations will be met and that the part that has decided to break up will return.
Holding on to the hope that this is a temporary breakup is part of the denial phase of grief associated with this process.. The shock of the breakup can be so great that one refuses to believe that they are in the new situation. It is not pathological at all, at least at first, but rather a strategy that helps us give ourselves a little time to get used to the idea.
Phases of grief due to breakup of a couple
Like any other grief, a breakup involves going through certain phases. Each person can experience it in their own way, because even in this aspect people show individual differences. However, despite personality differences, we can identify some more or less universal phases in all grief due to a breakup.
The first phase is the initial impact, the shock of the breakup. This applies especially to the person who has been dumped, who is surprised by unexpected news and her feeling is one of disbelief. After this, comes denial. As we have mentioned, it is common that one of the attitudes of the dumped person is to see the breakup as something merely temporary, the product of a specific argument or a misunderstanding.
This is one of the reasons why the person does not inform those around him of what has happened, hoping that it is something temporary. Think “Why report something that is going to be solved?” There is hope that they will reconcile, but this is nothing more than false hopes and refusal to accept reality.
But In the end he begins to understand the fact that he is no longer with that person he loved so much.. Thus begins the next phase, one marked by the intense sadness of having to accept the fact that she no longer loves him. Symptoms of depression begin to appear: sadness, apathy, sleep problems, changes in diet, obsessive thoughts… Given the emotional intensity of this stage, it is very important not to repress emotions, but to let them come out. This release is therapeutic, it will help you get over the breakup in the best way possible.
Finally you accept what has happened and the new situation. This does not mean that you are immediately happy. What happens at this moment is that the person begins to cheer up, trying to recover what they liked to do before meeting their partner and resume contact with family, friends and other loved ones.
As we said, each person is different and this is also shown in their way of grieving a romantic breakup. The grieving process does not have a specific time, but depends on each person.. However, if six months have passed since the breakup and depressive symptoms are still evident, we can speak of pathological grief and it is advisable to seek professional help.
What to do to get over the breakup?
Now that we better understand what it means to go through a breakup process, let’s see what we can do to get over the breakup as soon as possible and in the best way possible. There are no magic recipes that make this process easy and fast, and that is why It is essential to have a lot of patience and allow ourselves to feel what we have to feel..
We cannot repress our emotions by letting them eat us up inside. We feel bad, and we have every right in the world to release our emotions. If we don’t feel like doing anything, then let’s do nothing. If we feel anger, let’s allow ourselves to feel and not blame ourselves for it. But this should be for a season, not forever. Stretching it out forever is going to deprive us of living life, giving us the opportunity to feel better.
When we are tired of crying and feeling bad, even if it still costs us a little and we barely feel like it, we must force ourselves to do things. The time has come to meet up with friends again, join the gym, study a language, go on a hike, buy nice clothes, indulge yourself… whatever it takes to activate ourselves, to get out of the momentary depression in which we find ourselves. submerged the break. And we must also seek professional help in case we see it necessary.
1. Accept reality
So, just as it sounds: accept reality. The best thing is not to cling to what could have been, nor to obsess over “maybe we can go back.”. Holding on to what you think could have been but has not been, maintaining the hope that the relationship will be resumed, is only anchoring yourself to the past and will not allow us to live in the present or the future.
It’s going to cost you, you’re not going to like it at all, but you have to accept that this breakup is part of your life. Accepting reality is painful, but it is much better than maintaining hope in something that will not happen and stretching out the suffering it causes.
2. Stay busy
Staying as long as we can is one of the best ways to get over the breakup.. When we are paying attention to other things, the sadness disappears and little by little we regain our hope. Almost without realizing it, we are raising our heads and stop obsessing about our ex.
3. Zero contact
A classic in all breakups is to apply the zero contact strategy. This consists of cutting off all possible contact with our ex-partner. No contact with that person is going to help us, it is best to cut it short.
To achieve that moment when our heart no longer hurts, it is essential that we completely distance ourselves from that person.. We have to remove her from our contacts, not send her messages, delete her from our social networks… this way we will avoid keeping an eye on him or her, gossiping about her photos to see if she has rebuilt her life.
4. Not staying friends
Don’t meet your ex as friends. It sounds wonderful that you reach that agreement, but the reality is that it is something very exceptional and rare that, in any case, occurs after overcoming grief. It is very difficult to be a friend of someone you once loved on a level as intimate as a love relationship. Staying friends with an ex right after the breakup only serves to ease the paincontradicting the previous point of zero contact.
Better not to look for culprits because, although it may be hard to admit, there probably aren’t any. Of course there will be responsibilities, but these will be shared between the two. You both did things that, no matter how small, caused the relationship to reach a point where it was unnatural to continue. It is never just one person responsible for a breakup..
You may be interested: “What is guilt and how can we manage this feeling?”
6. Resume contact with loved ones
Dating doesn’t mean we lose touch with our friends and family. However, there are many times that the love relationship takes such a priority in our lives that we leave our loved ones a little aside.
Now that we’re going through a breakup, There is no excuse to re-establish contact with those people.. It’s time to reconnect with friends and family, dedicate more time to them.
Friends and family are crucial during this period as they will help us vent, expressing what we feel. Of course, we must understand that we should not prolong this relief for too long, because by turning our old relationship into an obsession we will not be able to free ourselves from the past. Furthermore, the patience of our friends and family has a limit, and having to put up with someone who has been complaining about their past for too long and doing nothing to improve the present is not pleasant.
7. Go back to doing what we like
In the same way that by dating someone we leave our loved ones apart, the same thing happens with our hobbies. It usually happens that in your life as a couple you abandon those activities that you liked so much.either because you don’t have time or because your partner simply didn’t like you.
Now that it is no longer part of our lives, it is time to go back to doing what used to fill us with satisfaction. It is time to resume all those activities that you really like, those that make you feel good. We have to pay attention exclusively to our preferences, have fun doing what we really like. It sounds obvious but, when you do things that you like and have fun, it improves your mood and, in this case, helps you get out of the sadness of the breakup.
Related article: “Behavioral Activation: one of the most effective therapies against depression”
8. Take care of yourself
Actions as basic as brushing your teeth, showering, combing your hair and dressing are difficult to do when you are immersed in absolute sadness. Not having a partner is not the end of the world. It hurts at first, and it may be difficult for us to even get up, but we have to make an effort and not neglect our health, promote self-esteem and pamper ourselves.. We must not forget to maintain a healthy life, eating healthy, exercising from time to time and taking care of ourselves.
