Getting over a breakup

[Liv234]

Feeling totally heartbroken. I’m 25 and my boyfriend of five and a half years has just ended it with me and I am gutted.

I knew it was coming, he’s found someone else and I thought I was prepared but now it has happened I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach. I feel completely hopeless. The thought of going out and dating again kills me and the idea of him being with anyone else breaks me down.

All I can think of doing is sitting in bed and crying but I know that’s not healthy. Does anyone have any practical advice on how to start healing? Anyone been through this and now out the other side that I can take comfort in? Thanks in advance.

I’m so sorry you’re going through this. I had something similar when my boyfriend broke up with me after 3 years. I was almost 25. It will ger easier.

My situation was that I was his first ‘proper’ girlfriend and I think he didn’t want to settle down with his first. Plus we weren’t 100% compatible sexually which was a problem.

We had been very close friends for 4 months before going out so I knew we could possibly be friends again. I loved him so much and was completely heartbroken. He said there was no one else but 4 months later he said he had a new girlfriend who he had met 2 months earlier. As it turned out, years later I found out that there had been a 2 week overlap between us.

For the first few days I was a mess. I’m not a drinker but I used alcohol in the evenings to get through it (bad idea). I cried at work and an older lady took me aside and comforted me. But then I knew that if I grieved properly then I risked spiralling downwards and never coming back up. So I compartmentalised it and forced it into a box at the back of my mind. I didn’t speak to anyone about it for 6 months. I buried it. Big mistake! In retrospect I should have faced the grief head on. I should have felt every raw emotion even if that meant lying on the floor sobbing in the foetal position for a week. I would have survived. Instead I buried it and, 20 years later, if I get asked about it I still cry.

All of our friends were mutual friends so I decided that I wanted to keep him in my life. We had contact for the first few months but it was painful. Then we went NC for 3 months and it helped. Eventually I broke the NC and we became friends again. We’re still close friends. I’m good friends with his wife and children. He’s godfather to one of my sons!!

There’s a saying that if you can be friends with someone you once loved then either you never loved them or you still do. I think I still love him even 20 years later but I love him as a friend now. I would do anything for him. But if we were single then I wouldn’t get back together with him. That ship has sailed. I’d always feel like second best.

So in summary:

• grieve fully
• you will get through this
• there is someone out there for whom you are their number one!
• you will love again.

Feel free to PM me whenever you like. I know exactly how you’re feeling.

Lots of love xxx

Going out with friends and opening myself to new possibilities helped. The best way to get over someone really is to get under someone else. I broke up with someone after 5 years when I was your age.

3 years (and a lot of fun casual sex) later, I met my soulmate and love of my life.

I know it feels like everything has ended and the future is bleak, but I promise you, it's going to end up being the relationship that prepared you for The Big One.