The Psychology of Breakups: Read This if You’re Ready for a Good Day

It you’re currently recovering from a breakup you’ve probably been hearing those around you repeating ‘don’t worry, you’ll feel a bit better every single day’ over and over like a broken record. Frankly, I experienced a bit of anxiety in hearing this, as I felt like there must be something wrong with me: why was I not feeling any better at all?

This morning I magically woke up and realized I had a dream about someone who wasn’t Him. I had at least a few good hours where I forgot about his existence and finally had a moment in time in which I felt a little lighter. I finally felt just a tiny bit better!

I cannot tell you that today; week 6, I feel brand new, however what I will say is that when you are going through heartbreak, even 5 minutes in which you’re not thinking of that person feel like you have found your life again.

Today I finally made sense what everyone was talking about: change is a curve.

You don’t get better every day, you have to be patient, you have to work on yourself as much as you can, and you have to trust that in time you will wake up and with no previous warning that pain in your chest will feel slightly less intense. That constant voice in your head will give you 20 minutes of quiet time. That craving for chocolate or for constant exercise will subside, and you’ll be able to listen to a full song without associating it to them.

How to apply the change curve to your breakup.

Before getting into how you can apply the change curve to heartbreak, I want to illustrate the concept. It is absolutely not true that today has to be better than yesterday. Today can be much tougher than yesterday, yet a month from today you are likely to experience a week which was slightly better than the week that just went by.

Fundamentally what people fail to tell you is that your progression will never be linear and as such you have to keep believing that three months from today, if you put in the work, you will be closer to being okay.

I have illustrated this before in my blog but it’s worth bringing it up again. Change is not a linear process; it occurs in three phases and the first is ‘letting go’. This phase for me is by far the hardest.

If you don’t let go of what you are holding on to, no change can actually occur. Nothing new will come into your life.

I have just realized I have shared all of the phases I have gone through with you:

SHOCK: Have you ever heard of the surprise breakup?
DENIAL: From strangers to friends, from friends into lovers, then strangers again.
FRUSTRATION: How long does it take to get over a breakup?
NEGOTIATING: How to get your ex back or move on for good.
DEPRESSION: 5 Powerful tools to stay afloat when you’re drowning in your breakup.

Hello experiment phase, here I come!

The first phase is the one where you have to simply (or with much difficulty) let go. This includes Shock, Denial, Frustration and Negotiating.

Until you have decided to let go you will forever be stuck here.

This doesn’t only apply to heartbreak, in fact the change curve is something we typically familiarize ourselves with at work. We have all heard of a friend who has been complaining about their job for years yet they never seem to do anything to change it. Why is this? Because they never let go of their previous one. Their energy levels are low, their willingness to take risk even lower, their fear of failure at an all time high.

Or maybe you can relate to that friend who has been in a toxic relationship for years and never seems to leave it. Their fear of being alone, their anxiety about making the wrong choice, about losing that person, that pain that makes them believe that all of this tornado of unidentified emotions just mean they are in love, keeps them at a standstill.

There is no way out of it, if you want a new job, you have to let go of your old one. If you want a new partner, you have to break up with the one you’re currently with. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to quit your job before you find a new one, but if the effort you’re putting into finding one is 1% and you blame it on the stress from your current one and in your spare time you’re doing something else, effectively you are subconsciously still holding on to what you have.

If we don’t let go, the process of change cannot begin.

In a breakup it’s the same situation. The person you are trying to hang on to is gone. They may be texting or calling or thinking of you but effectively you are not with them.

So what is it that we so desperately try to hold on to?

I have three hypothesis:

The projection of future happiness we created when we were with the person
The memories that make us believe that this person must still be in love with us as we believe we are are with them (or we wouldn’t be reading this article)
The fear of change, which can be the fear of being alone, of rejection, of starting from scratch, of not finding someone better, of a new life routine, of planning vacation and life without them, of losing our main source of happiness.

Let me give it to you straight: we must face reality, and reality is that right here right now they are not with us. We already are on our own and what we are holding on to is not the person but that narrative we wrote in our own heads.

Personally, I never leave anything left unsaid, rather I put all ego aside and tell the person exactly what I want to say. Sometimes we need to get a pot thrown at our heads just a few more times, we need to really hit the wall and die to move forward.

Other times we need a planned out strategy, this is when we truly believe that it’s worth it, we want this person back because we may have made a mistake or because in our hearts we know this person is amazing; our relationship was not toxic and it’s just not over. Try reading this article on getting them back if you want to give it a go.

Finally there are those occasions when the other person doesn’t deserve to rip our heart out one more time. They don’t need to hear our deepest regrets and please, they don’t deserve us trying again. Screw it. If this is the case, we must decide to simply move on.

Traditionally I choose the first route but in this breakup, as I was trying route n 2 aka getting him back, I realized that he didn’t deserve any more chances to wound me and therefore after 6 weeks and 3 days from the unexpected ending, I’m out.

If change begins with closing a door, despite not wanting to close this door at all, I will ask for the help of friends and family to lock it and entrust them with throwing away the key. I know I would simply hide it and be tempted to use it on nights when I’ve had a bit too much wine.

Here are some reflections to help you move from phase 1 to phase 2 of change:

If you have anything left to do or to try or to say it, just do it. Screw it. No regrets.

The only rule you need to follow is NEVER EVER do this if you were in an abusive relationship. Get help from a professional (we all deserve this).

Grieve. Let’s not forget that every ending has a grieving process. You are mourning a person who is gone but who is not dead. They are moving on with their own lives, they may find someone new and be happy. Even the best of us struggle with this. We must mourn the living and make them ‘die’ in our own minds.

My tip on the grieving process is this: take a moment to identify what you learned from your previous relationship. For example in my case I am taking home 3 lessons:

When something feels off, it typically is.
Don’t rush into anything even when it seems amazing. Protect your heart a bit more and go just a little slower, it won’t be any less amazing, on the contrary.
Sometimes the other person doesn’t really see us and it’s not our fault. It says more about them than it does about ourselves.

As of today I find myself at the lowest energy point on the change curve, somewhere between Depression and Experiment. I had the first good day, the first lighter moments and though I feel exhausted and emotional, by looking at the change curve and rationalizing that what I am feeling is normal, I am beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.