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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Aibu to ask how the hell to permanently get over someone

54 replies

phoebemakesnoise · 11/05/2020 19:45

I've tried deleting social media, not contacting them, not bringing them up in conversation with others, trying to find other things to do .. But still, I can't seem to get over them and stop obsessing and being jealous over thoughts of them with someone else. It is really unhealthy and I just want to be able to enjoy my life and be happy without any of my happiness depending on them. I have lovely children and not a bad life at all so why is it so hard. Any advice greatly appreciated.

OP posts:
Susanna85 · 11/05/2020 20:42

A good therapist!!

Accepting how you feel. Allow yourself to feel hurt. Get busy with a project (could you do some DIY? Learn a langue, write a novel?), connect with others, make plans for the future. Attention from someone else, if possible

Flippinfurloughed · 11/05/2020 20:42

Agree with the ladies above - time is the only way, you are making it easier for yourself with going cold turkey and cutting contact. I know how hard that is though! Another book that helped me loads was its called a break up because it’s broken. Hang on in there Flowers

PorpentiaScamander · 11/05/2020 20:43

Time. I'm 6 months post break up and still think about him pretty much whenever I'm awake Sad

HollowTalk · 11/05/2020 20:45

Was it someone who was already in a relationship, OP?

damnthatanxiety · 11/05/2020 20:46

OP an awful lot of missing someone and 'heartache' is actually about the sense of loss, the sense of a failed relationship, the loss of a dream, of a perceived future etc. It can be really helpful if you can determine if you actually miss HIM or miss the concept of him and what it represented. And an AWFUL lot of the heartache is hormonal. We produce all kinds of love hormones when we are in a relationship and are intimate with people. These hormones take months to settle. It can be many months. This is why it really is about TIME. Depending on how long you were together, it can be 6 months, a year, 2 years....but it will pass. Best thing is to keep busy - which is tricky right now

Drivingdownthe101 · 11/05/2020 20:46

Time... or finding someone else, in my experience!

Jojobar · 11/05/2020 20:48

I'm in the same boat, although only a month in and it is bloody hard. In some ways it's as bad as the day it happened, if not worse as he's now asked if we can be friends. I can't be friends with someone I'm still in love with, I can't be in his life when he moves on and meets someone else.

It's grief and it takes time. I've coped with grief before and I will again, I know but in the meantime it's bloody painful. I'm sorry for those of us going through it now because it is shit. I just wake up most mornings wishing it hadn't happened, and that things were different. But they're not and it did.

HappyHammy · 11/05/2020 20:54

Do you really need to have any future contact. Do you have property or dc together. Write down all his bad traits. Believe in yourself. You will get over him.

Jojobar · 11/05/2020 20:55

For me I know what hurts is losing my best and closest friend. Losing our entire planned future together, including the dogs we were going to get and what they'd be called. None of that will happen now. I might be lucky enough to meet someone else eventually, but it won't be the same plan. He might hate dogs, or be allergic. At the moment my I feel like if my future was a series of photos, it's like one of those time travel films where they change something and the photos start to fade and things disappear from them, like our future dogs.

SharonasCorona · 11/05/2020 21:01

Write them a letter with how they made you feel and burn it.

Allow yourself 10 minutes a day to think about them and then outside of that, when your thoughts drift to him, start thinking or doing something else.

Make sure every email/photo/memento is deleted.

BelfastNonBlonde · 11/05/2020 21:03

Time

P999 · 11/05/2020 21:07

Can I ask why you need to stay in contact? Is it kids? Work? Agree with everyone: time. And minimal contact
And definately not asking or trying to find out about anything (literally anything) going on in his life. Except bare minimum necessary For co-parenting. And when I say bare minimum, i mean absolute bare minimum! For me, i also ditched all mutual friends and his entire family. Family were all awful so no loss. Friends, just necessary. He treated me v badly, so I could do this all guilt free. It's worked. Eventually. Everyone much happier now. Including kids Flowers

Becca19962014 · 11/05/2020 21:12

I never have.

By eventually allowing myself to accept that, and the reality of our situation and writing about it when I need to in my diary, it's become easier to live with but its not gone.

It's been 20 years. So when I say I tried everything, I really did!! All that was left was accepting reality. Even though I still dream about them, I can accept that for what it is now.

SharonasCorona · 11/05/2020 21:14

Also look up limerence.

LangClegsInSpace · 11/05/2020 21:17

Imagine them eating spaghetti from sideways on.

RabbityMcRabbit · 11/05/2020 23:46

@Jojobar, I know exactly what you mean. It's been 7 months for me and it's still really extremely painful. He's already met and moved in with someone new Sad

LizzyButton · 11/05/2020 23:52

It might seem counterintuitive, but when someone intrudes into your thoughts too much it can help to schedule when you will devote time to thinking about them. Make them an agenda item. Then space the slots further apart. Then forget to schedule.

BackseatCookers · 11/05/2020 23:57

If it's feeling this hard still then I think therapy - it can be life changing if you find the right therapist. Is that something you've tried at all?

Time of course as well, and filling the gap they left in your life with other things that aren't another romantic partner.

Loads of people talk about hobbies but i have never really had one, so I turned to catching up with old friends, podcasts, reading, box set binging... but all of those still need therapy to undo the trauma of a bad break up or deep loss.

It's like grief - every person has a unique experience of it but most people would benefit from at least trying therapy.

MorganKitten · 11/05/2020 23:59

I wish I knew, I’m Still trying after a year

Purpletigers · 12/05/2020 00:25

Get under someone else ?
That may be a line from Friends !

pumpkinbump · 12/05/2020 01:12

4.5 months isn't that long in the grand scheme of things. It will just take more time.

P999 · 12/05/2020 18:06

Focus on the bad stuff about him too. That helps Flowers.

Osirus · 12/05/2020 18:40

I didn’t get over the break up until I got back under him Grin!

That was two and a half years after. I thought about him every day. On bad days I tried to imagine him dressed as a woman with big Pat Butcher earrings! Gave me something to chuckle at. I don’t know why it took me so long; maybe because we were actually meant to be together? For various reasons, I still had a lot of contact with him too so it was really difficult, especially when I had to listen to him talking about dating other women.

We’re married now!

I think dating again will certainly help.

ALongHardWinter · 12/05/2020 19:35

4 - 5 months is really not very long OP. How long were you together? I was with my exH for 12 years,married for 10.5 of them. I felt absolutely knocked for six when we first split up. After about 9 months,I did start to feel a little better,but it was a full year before I realised that he wasn't the first thing that I thought of when I woke up in the morning. I know it's a cliché,but time really is the best healer.

Patch23042 · 12/05/2020 19:44

Do you need to stay in contact because of children or work?

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