Introduction

Breakup Girl to the Rescue! : A Superhero's Guide to Love, and Lack Thereof
by Lynn Harris

I am Breakup Girl.

I am the only superhero whose domain is love … or lack thereof. My job is to fight crimes of the heart, stop dating indignities, get your stuff back, help your mom through your breakup, make good relationships great … all the while trying to find time to have romantic problems of my own, if you know what I mean.

My headquarters: the Studio Apartment of Justice.

My virtual headquarters: the award-winning Web site BreakupGirl.com - where thousands of visitors go every month to follow my adventures and, ideally, my advice.

My motto: “I'll be right there … 'cause I've been there!”

My core belief: We can make our breakups, and thus our relationships, and thus our bad selves - and thus the planet - better.

Breakup Girl's Vision for World Peace

How do I make the jump from our own little worlds to, like, the whole world?

Easy.

First of all, I can fly.

But more to the point, “relationships” (lust, romance, dating, courting, “concentrating on me,” whatever you want to call it) are not merely the fluff piece at the end of the evening news. Love - or lack thereof - is right up there with Supreme Deity of Choice as the prime mover/shaker behind most wars, voyages, art, and really tall buildings. Relationships are our comeuppance, our downfall, our overlord. The floods may come, the bombs may drop, the market may crash, but we are rarely a moment away from thinking, “Did he call?” “Will she say ÔYes?'” “Which tie should I wear?” Or even “I can't believe I missed my Nobel announcement. But I just had to check my voice mail.”

So that's why saving love lives isn't so far removed from saving the world. And that's where I come in. Natural disasters, criminal masterminds, and global conspiracies - they've got their own superheroes. Why not a superhero for relationship issues … you know, natural disasters, criminal masterminds, global conspiracies?

I'm not offering simple answers to such massive questions as “What, besides razor design, are the true differences between men and women?” “How can we all get along - no matter what our persuasion/orienta-tion/position on the ketchup-on-eggs question?” “Why would anyone marry Dennis Rodman?”

But I do know this: When it comes to social change, our social lives are an excellent place to start.

… And Where You Fit In

You fit in to my vision because you helped shape it. Your questions are my primary source of answers. The letters forming the spine, if you will, of this book are the actual missives submitted to my online advice column by the world's inquiring hearts: male, female, gay, straight, married, single, hopeful, jaded, and everyone in between.

That's right, everyone. Breakup Girl is an equal-opportunity superhero. I'm a girl because I was born that way, not because I take gender- or other-based sides. My fundamental mission and message is this: We can all transcend icky, limiting stereotypes; we can be dignified and respectful; we can all get along. In certain combinations, maybe, for only three months at a time, but still.

True to that mission, BG works hard for:

• Both sexes.
  Men are not from Mars, women are not from Venus; breakups are from hell. If you're not with me on that last one - even regarding the kindest, gentlest, mutualest splits - I don't know what planet you're from.
  
  
• All ages.
  Teen love is different from grown-up love mainly in that teens are more likely to measure their relationships in lunch periods, and adults are less likely to use Scotch tape on their walls. Teens are wise beyond their years; grown-ups play house and buy Hello Kitty. Let's listen to each other.
  
  
• All sexual preferences.
  Gay, straight, curious, tri - no matter what our lifestyle choices, we all manage to achieve our shared goal of freaking out our parents.
  
  
• All political persuasions.
  I will treat you according to how you treat others, not according to how you treat Jesse Helms. (Keep in mind, however, that how you treat others is sometimes directly linked to how you treat Jesse Helms.)
  
  
• All phases of attachment.
  Lots of people write to me to say, “Dear Breakup Girl, I wish I'd had a breakup because that would mean I'd had a relationship.” Sure, but the goal here is not to Get a Relationship. If you think that once you do, your work is done, you've got another think coming. Like, think about packing. The goal here is to have a healthy relationship - especially with that hottie named Numero Uno. You know, you. Because Numeros Dos, Tres, et al. are icing. Gravy. Hot chipotle mayo on your sweet potato fries. Not essential, but … yum.

Love, or Lack Thereof: The Pep Talk

COME ON, BREAKUP GIRL, HOW DO I FIND SOMEONE? Okay, okay. It's actually a good question. Does the real thing come only to those who wait to be tapped by the wand? Is “trying” a jinx? Or does finding love - like keeping it - simply demand hard work? People do approach this love thing with rules and lists and “if … then … ” functions and spreadsheets. Which are not necessarily a bad way of organizing your thoughts and plans.

But you can't organize people. Or feelings.

I mean, one advice-seeker lamented to BG that she kept getting led into relationships “by the heart.”

Um, that is how you get there.

All your missives to me - and all the minutiae, all the micro-introspection, all the madness therein - are part of the whole great big crazy messy love thing. So yo, make room. When your head's buried in Compatibility 2.0 for Palm Pilot, you might not notice the stranger asking you to dance.

And if questions come up, just write to Breakup Girl and let her take some superpowered guesses. Oh, and read this book, where you'll find:

• A curl-up-with-it compendium of BG's advice, derived from and highlighted with actual letters from BG's column
  
  
• “Getting the Digits” - statistics from surveys answered by visitors to BreakupGirl.com
  
  
• All-new episodes of the comic Adventures of Breakup Girl!

Remember, Breakup Girl is only a superhero, not a psychologist. So who comes to the rescue when I call for a pro? Belleruth Naparstek, Official BreakupGirl.com Psychotherapist in Residence, author of Your Sixth Sense: Activating Your Psychic Potential and creator of Health Journeys, a bestselling series of guided imagery audiotapes for mind-body health. Her virtual headquarters are at www.healthjourneys.com.

I'm not promising to trim and buff the world of love into some creepy, perfect Disney village. Lame dates, bad good-byes, mixed signals, grody rebounds: This is the messy stuff of life, not the sloppy kiss of death. So go concentrate on you: enjoy, love, regret, respect, live, laugh. I'll concentrate on you too. Which is the same thing as concentrating on my career. And as “concentrating on me.” Which actually explains a lot.

Love,
Breakup Girl

Copyright ©, 2000 by Lynn Harris

About the Author

Lynn Harris is co-creator of BreakupGirl.com, now part of Oxygen Media. She is a comedian and author of He Loved Me, He Loves Me Not, and writes regularly for the New York Times, the New York Daily News, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, and other national magazines.