After a painful breakup, you need some time to process what happened and what to do to move forward. No matter the circumstances of your split, your feelings are valid and you need enough time and emotional distance to recompose. It’s important to understand that breakups take time, recovery is a process, acknowledging and respecting that can help you create a healthy and authentic path to growth and healing. Don’t feel guilty for needing your time alone. Allow the range of sadness, hurt, anger, frustration, fear, even hate come to you; face them, experience them and move through them, be as compassionate toward yourself as you would be to a friend whose heart had just been broken.
Even though keeping yourself busy is a great way to get over a breakup, when it is recent you need enough alone time to grieve. If you’re feeling overwhelmed and lost, and have the need to distance yourself from your social life it is best to do so. It’s okay not to answer the phone, it’s okay to want to stay on your own – you are fixing yourself, you have a lot to process and need to put your head on straight.
I remember how I shut down to the world when I was trying to understand what was going on inside me. “I just want to be left alone,” were my thoughts. I didn’t want to talk to anybody, I wouldn’t visit or call any family member or friends; I would decline invitations for gatherings and parties. The last thing I wanted was to be on social events acting happy when I felt a wreck. I didn’t want to be a victim either, so it was best for them not to see me at my worst. I needed the time to understand my emotions and to learn how to cope. I took it as a therapy – I knew I would be fine, but at that moment I needed to heal and it felt right to be alone. I later explained to my family and friends why I had distanced myself, in which they understood.
It is okay not to be okay. Healing happens with acceptance when you allow your emotions to flow. Don’t be afraid to feel the pain, it will hurt more and take longer if you don’t deal with it from the start. I normally tell my clients that you have to feel, deal, in order to heal. You can’t heal unless you deal with it, you can’t deal with it unless you know what you’re feeling. Be present with whatever you’re feeling, you can’t run away from it because it is there, hurting. So, give yourself permission to mourn.
It’s okay – you will be okay, sooner than you think you will be thriving and feeling alive again. It takes one day at a time. There’s no getting around it: breakups are painful, even if they’re handled with compassion. They can shake you to your very core, causing you to question your confidence and your faith in love itself. And in those first few brutal days and weeks, you’ve got every right to feel inconsolable. In time you will be back on your feet again and will be looking forward to your new life ahead.