I hear your pain and if this helps, let me share with you what I’ve experienced having been on the other side. When it comes to break-ups I’ve been in both scenarios.

The first is where I am cold and distant, pretend to be relieved to be free, which is simply a suit of armor I put on so that the arrows of pain of the person I’m breaking up with bounce off of me. This is mostly a defense mechanism because in reality I too am suffering the pain of the break-up and to experience someone else’s pain in addition to my own would be more than my heart could take. Don’t let his external facade trick you into believing that he’s not feeling any of it. Even if he’s the one who broke it off, he may be suffering just as much as you are.

The second scenario is where I do break-down and cry in-front of the person exposing my raw painful feelings. If I’ve broken up with a person (for whatever reason), but I’m still really attached to them (perhaps co-dependently so) then break-up can feel like withdrawal symptoms from a drug and my emotions are in such turmoil that I look for support from the source of my addiction. This scenario makes the break-up drag on even more painfully as with every moment of despair I turn back to the source of my addiction apologizing for leaving and looking for some sort of external release and permission to be free.

As painful as both scenarios are, I personally prefer the first approach to the second – go cold turkey, cut ties, and begin some serious soul searching and reflection to learn more about yourself and what drove you into that obsessive, addictive, and co-dependent relationship in the first place.

I know it hurts. If there was a way to avoid the pain of a co-dependent break-up, I haven’t heard anyone describe a better way to do it.

• This reply was modified 11 years, 4 months ago by John.

Listen to John, he and Matt give excellent advice and have helped me through my almost six week break-up…John also gave you the answers that most of us seek when the other party does the breaking up…as women we always assume that the other half is great and has dealt with the break up better, with more confidence, and with a lack of feeling…you can’t always assume the worst…one thing though, even if your ex was to be feeling as u are or otherwise, the point is that it’s over and it’s time to move on..find who you are and soar…there is always a lesson from every relationship we have from the people we meet…think of the positive and remember that a higher being always puts people in our lives for a reason,we don’t always get the results or answers we want but in time you will. Love yourself first and when you least expect it you’ll be stronger, wiser, and will have appreciated this experience for the better. Hugs! E

Carrie,

I’m sorry for all the suffering you’re going through. 🙁 Its only been two weeks, so feeling the aches is pretty normal. One of my teachers said that it is important to make space around big events, such as loss. Attachments cause us to make mountains out of molehills, but sometimes they also make us try to make mountains into molehills.

Consider that losing a relationship is a painful loss, as there is a death that happens. Our dreams, our “old pattern”, the pleasures of intimacy… all gone in a poof. This is distressing to our body, which has to grieve and heal. This is normal and expected. We can’t rush the grieving process, but we can make space for it to happen.

For instance, when we ache with grief, our mind tries to get involved and ask “why”. We think that if we know why we will feel relief… so we chase answers around in our head by asking our partner why, our friends why, God why… but each answer doesn’t really help the grief. Usually it just makes it last longer, as the thoughts absorb our attention away from our body awareness.

Instead, what we can do is answer the why directly, internally. Why does it hurt? Because I am grieving a loss. Why do I have to endure this pain? Because the body loves, and loves to love, and misses what it has lost. Any other questions might help a little, but not with the ache. “Why did he do this to me” is slippery and unsatisfying. “What did I do to deserve this” is better looked at later, after the healing. Etc etc.

To help the ache directly, we can try many things depending on what works for us. Usually self-nurturing is pretty helpful, such as quiet music, bubble baths, walking in nature, and of course meditating. If that doesn’t seem to help or you feel “wound tight” like you’re going to pop, consider having a good scream. Scream, curse, jump up and down, punch pillows, lay on bed and thrash your body. The energy might be stuck, and a good cathartic release in a safe way can get stuff flowing again. You might scream, then laugh, then weep… whatever happens just let it out, let it flow.

Remember that it takes time. I know how pain makes us wish that it would just go away right now, but that doesn’t seem to work for any of us. 🙂 We walk, we breathe, we cry, and eventually heal. My heart goes out to you, distant sister.

With warmth,
Matt

Break ups are so hard! And it can be very challenging to move on. Take some time for yourself and learn about yourself. Try some new things! You now have time to just worry about yourself.