I’m close to my one year of breakup with my high school love. We were inseparable, and although it was mutual, this separation hasn’t been easy for the both of us.
The back and forth of blaming her for her mistakes and blaming myself for my own, the constant reminder of her in my day-to-day tasks, not being able to send sweet morning texts, and not getting to see her face before bed every night, it took a larger piece of my time, peace of mind and productivity than I expected.
The Tipping Point
As easy as I thought it’s gonna be to get through, I realized that it wasn’t, and spent a couple of months literally doing nothing but wasting time. My work was being affected, I couldn’t even maintain focus on things that I used to enjoy, like listening to music, or watching a TV show, writing journal and so on, as I was constantly thinking about us.
7–8 months in, one morning, I read a part of a journal I wrote back in 2012. At an instant, I started missing that person who wrote that journal, and not the person with whom I’ve had a separation with.
I do miss her and us together, and have nothing but love for her. But me denying what I have for her, only makes it more difficult.
What Would The “Past Me” Would’ve Done?
This is the question I still ask myself everyday as I am finally beginning to heal from this separation.
The feeling of having nothing but love for her, but not having the ability to make things work for us and being separated instead was killing me everyday.
So I asked myself what would I have done in the past, started reading more from my old journal and it saved me.
I came to realize that the “past me” would’ve just enjoyed this state of being in selfless love, crushing hard over someone, even if it’s the same person he separated from, and would’ve slept peacefully. He would’ve accepted the fact that it will never work, and still continue to be in love.
That old version of me would also be involved in so many things and kept himself occupied and at peace, and relationship would be the last thing he would worry about.
To Conclude
Surely the version of you in a relationship isn’t the same version of you pre-relationship or post-relationship. We all go through a series of change that sometimes makes us miss how we used to be, how joyful we used to be as a kid or a young adult.
For me personally, the habit of writing a journal really helped me find the past me.Now I accept and move on, as I used to before this relationship. And I am still in the healing process.
Just remember, the old you in this present moment, has many options to explore now and grow each day on your own, without being co-dependent on anyone.
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Previously published on medium
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Photo credit: by Ivan Aleksic on Unsplash