Beautiful's Road to Recovery for the Recently Ditched

[BEAUTlFUL]

Dearly Be-Chucked, we are gathered here today because, for whatever reason, our man has dumped us!

Whether we were dating, cohabiting or married, we are now to use therapist-speak well effed-off about the whole business and are desperate to regain our fabulosity.

Well, this is the place! This is where we regain our positivity, our self-confidence and eventually our mojos. We might think at the moment that we'd also like to regain our men, but that might not last long, as we'll soon realise that anyone who could put us through this does not deserve us.

Come in and start regaining your brilliance! I will be setting us exercises to complete that are based vaguely on self-help books, beauy tips and Feng Shui, or we'll just have a right good bitch until we feel completely drained and sick of the sound of our ex's names. Whatever works.

I'll start. My name is Beautiful, I am 38, and I have just been dumped. My DH of almost 10 years has been gone 6 weeks, citing "We're just not right for each other" as the "reason". I am willing to consider that he has met somebody else, but have no proof.

We have DC together and are sharing them.

I was vvVVVvv upset but have just decided that moping is very 1990. Instead, I'm now turning this around so that I feel positive about the situation, and optimistic. I know this sounds like cock, but I think it's possible.

Things I want to focus on to get me through this are:

1. Dieting and beauty;
2. Creative things, writing, painting and doing the house up;
3. Imprvng my social life during the alternating weekends when I'm childless.

Anyone else?

God, there'd better be other people or I really will feel like the only married woman who couldn't keep her man! [blush}

or even

If anyone has any sure-fire tips for getting through heartbreak, I would LOVE it if you posted them here. Mainly so that, when we read them, we wouldn't be just drinking wine and eating ice-cream, and sobbing.

Oh beautiful I am so sorry

No tips. I am fat, old and ugly so I'd be stuffed if mine upped and left.

Love this idea... just 4 years to late for me... and the thought of having to go through those feelings ever again stops me getting involved with anyone else

Thank you, Orm, but I'm determined to see this as a good thing that's happened. The Universe has obviously decided that my DH just wasn't the right man for me. And I really don't want to have anyone married to me who doesn't want to be.

So... Onwards and upwards, chin up, tits out.

Beautiful you are so not alone from the many threads I've read on here.

I though, am happily married to dh no. 2 so the first one didn't last too well.....

I am lifeissweet. It is a misnomer at present.
I am 31.

I split up with dh of 3 yrs last year (mutual decision) and have just been dumped by dp of 8 months. I realise this is not comparable with end of 10yr marriage, but am feeling rather devastated anyway. I was dumped because new dp couldn't cope with the 'baggage' of my beautiful DS.

I feel very unattractive and unsure of myself at present, so would agree that the way to get positive and over this is to do the dieting and beauty thing.. I want him to be sorry and beg for me to go back so that I can tell him to get stuffed .

I also have every other weekend childfree, so am reconnecting with my ever diminishing number of child free friends to get some form of social life back.

Hang on in there, Beautiful. We are going to be just fine.

haven't got time to post properly. but am belle, XH walked out 2 years ago - abusive bellend. I dumped XP about 5 months ago, and been seeing a chappy for about 2 months - if you've kept up so far well done! lol.

chappy isn't sure, he's been binned off and so i'm back to being footloose & facy free.

weekends without DS are filled with shopping and coffees with friends.

dating is now off the agenda until the summer now I think have decided.

oh and to add to the mix I have a male best friend (GBF) who i'm in love with but who has a G so he knows nothing of it all.

YAY!

Oh - I meant to say, beautiful. I lurked on your post when this first happened and I am thrilled that you are sounding so positive. What a strong woman you obviously are.

BEAUTIFUL, I am with you! For the past year, since I got my own place, I have been turning to food far too much. Especially on the weekends the dc are away.

To be feeling good about myself physically would be fantastic but I cant seem to walk away from the junk food.

To get back to my best would be the last piece of the jigsaw for me, it is just getting there.

It seems the older I get, the less willpower I have.

Oh, this is SO brilliant! I don't want to say that I'm glad you've al been dumped, but I'm vv pleased we can all do this together. It really, really helps. Just that bit when lifeissweet said, "We are going to be just fine" was so fab!

Even though we are alone, we're not. Cool, eh?

Hmm, except we need someone who is good with fitness to help us sort our bodies out. I only know one diet and it's v strict. I do have to stop eating though -- i thought heartbreak was meant to put you off food? I've been stuffing my face!

Hi all. Happy to join the dumped group although I'm not in such a positive place as some of you. Beautiful you are an amazing woman with a very positive attitude. Come and teach me how.

Split up with horrible nasty xh about 2.5 years ago and have been seeing someone for the last 13 months. He dumped me about a month ago and I'm afraid to say I am still totally devastated. I am also in temporary accommodation with ds (friends, then parents, now caravan) until my flat goes through. What a sodding mess at the moment.

I am also feeling very low and crying pretty much non stop and have to go to work tomorrow.

you see I loved my xp very much and didn't see the dumping coming at all. He told me 3 weeks previously that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me!?!? Can't get past it at the moment.

Am looking forward to all the tips on offer on this thread, especially how to stop feeling totally and utterly gutted and shit.

Yeah, I lost so much weight at first but the thing dragged on for so long........ I knew when I got a bit of an appetite back I was over him.

I mean, it is not rocket science is it? Eat less and lose weight but it is the emotional comfort I get from food that is the problem.

Hi Lamby - I'm glad you're here. I read your other thread and it sounds as though you are really going through it at the moment.

I am in temporary accommodation too at the moment and it really doesn't help does it? Nothing feels settled and I think it's far harder to find any peace in yourself when you're all over the place.

I am not surprised you are finding this hard to come to terms with. I don't know how someone goes from saying they want to spend the rest of their life with you to ending it in 2 weeks. What a mess.

I am feeling pretty floored too. I don't really feel justified as we weren't exactly together for long, but it was such a welcome antidote to my disasterous marriage. He was so lovely and sociable and interesting. I could never quite believe he wanted to be with me.. but then, evidently, he realised it was pretty inconceivable too.

It hurts. I am eating everything I see pretty much - just sort of think it doesn't matter if I'm fatter and uglier. Can't get much worse can it? - Except, of course, I know that is not the way to think. I am TRYING to be positive and for me that's going to be the first step - step away from the biscuit tin!

I mean it, though. We will be fine. There are enough people on here with encouraging stories. It's just a case of living through this bit, which is tough. At least we can vent on here and have some support.

'moping is very 1990' for quote of the week please

< quietly waves pom-poms in background >

Can I join too?!? I'm not as 'recently ditched' as some of you, but it hurt more than anything I've ever had to experience....though I am coming out the otherside!

I'm 35, was with exH for nearly 14 years and then with exP for nearly 2.....exP dumped me without warning at the end of Jan/beginning of Feb and I was completely devastated. He was one of those who promised me the world (talked moving in, marriage etc without me saying a word) but didn't deliver. I am still none the wiser to the real reason why, other than he told me he needed some space (over the phone!). Haven't seen him since. I've also managed to only text him once, the day it would have been our 2nd anniversary, which showed rather surprising restraint on my part!!

I have kept myself busy, mainly redecorating, but any advice re diet/exercise (esp as I'm going to be a bridesmaid next year) and improving social life/hobbies etc much appreciated.

Sorry for waffling on but wanted you to know that I know how you feel too!

Thankfully the hurt has subsided, but the sadness is still there sometimes, thinking about the good times we had. The hardest times is when it's the 'first/anniversary' of something we did together - ie, last halloween we took the kids out together and then to the zoo the day. Or when I went on holiday with the kids on my own, I remembered the last time I was sat at that airport he was with me, going to Amsterdam. Once you get past the first anniversary of those things, it does become easier.

I did lose a bit of weight to start with (I remember the feeling of having wet cement in my stomach for about a month) but in the past few months as my heart has started to mend, my stomach has been crying out!

Hi Lamby and lifeissweet, I am 46, had been in relationships since I was 19 and when I left ex h had been a SAHM for 12 years.

I have since:

done up a house
settled dd1 in new school
done 1 year of retraining
got job
now in next part of training
leased a car on my own

I could not have faced a relationship but if I can achieve that, anyone can.

Getting in shape would be the icing on the cake for me.

You will be ok, honestly.

I think my positive attitude comes from being dumped really horribly before! I've had two vv bad splits, one aged 17, one aged 23, so I've earned my Dumped Stripes.

Things I've learned:

1. Let Go Of Hope as fast as possible, because Hope will keep you mentally attached to your ex. Tell yourself he's not coming back. Jettison all those What Ifs and If Onlys, because you can't change anything about this. You can't make someone love you. We haven't been dumped because of something we did/said/drank/wore. We were dumped because we don't fit the subconscious image of what our exes want. I'm sure it's that simple: we just aren't right for them. They had a big-boobed ginger nanny when they were 2 so now they can only fall properly in love with big-boobed gingers.

1. Allow yourself a Thinking Time. Set yourself a time, like 9pm-9.15pm - when you are allowed to think all your mopey, self-pitying, really miserab;le thoughts. During this time your mobile phone must be locked in the boot of your car, or in the hands of a trusted friend. let all the thoughts out then, really let go. At the end of the time, you STOP. Outside your Thinking Time, you must postpone any wallowy thoughts the second they pop into your mind. You can do them in the alloted time. Outside of this, you must think positive shit.

1. There is never ever a reason to contact your Ex. You will think of one, you will use up a billion brain-cells' in sheer mind-bending creativity to try to think of one, you will then seize upon it and think, "Yes! Here it is! This sounds plausible and logical!" STOP. Do not contact him. Men are arrogant. Your ex expects you to be devastated. Even if you rang him for something very sensible-sounding, he will think, "Ha! She totally just rang to hear my voice" and he'll feel better, you'll feel worse. So don't. The contact-craving will fade after a couple of minutes, ride it out.

1. Beauty treatments and new clothes will be the best way to pass the time right now.

1. Get a circle of friends and bore them in rotation.

I talked to someone v clever about the Eating thing. She said it's because of our 2nd chakra. (No, bear with me...) Apparently our 2nd chakra deals with eating and talking. So if we feel blocked in the talking (for example, our exes refuse to discuss why they dumped us), we will fill that gap with comfort food.

Lifeissweet -- I think that too! "Oh what's the point, I might as well get MASSIVE as I'm going to be alone forever", but we can't give in to that! Wouldn't it be horrific if our exes saw us in 3 months' time waddling along the road to the bakers, and thought, "Thank Fuck, I had a lucky escape there".

The attention of other men is going to be a huge, huge help for us, and - as they are shallow - men will more likely chat us up if we're thinner.

LifeisSweet thanks so much for your lovely post. So sorry to hear the same thing has happened to you too. It's crap isn't it.

How long ago did this happen to you?

You're right we will get through this somehow although for me it's hard to see that at the moment. I'm still having to deal with the xh from hell. He has made my life hell for god knows how many years and continues to do so.

Sometimes I feel that I'm going to buckle under all the pressures on me. Friends tell me they can't believe that I'm still standing. Guess I am though.

So many questions on the meaning of life at the moment and why I seem to have been put through so much in my life - other stuff I can't discuss here.

I'll get there though in the end.

Do you all have your ex in your head as you do stuff? I do. Like, "Ha, look at me, I'm laughing and happy, I wish XH could see me right now!" or, "Yes! I haven't thought about xh for two minut... oh."??

I'm doing this all day. Although I've moved the mopey what-ifs to my 15-minute slot, the rest of the day is still predominantly Him. It's like he's the music playing underneath my brain, and I won't notice that until one day it stops.

Interesting re the 2nd chakra thing....