Pathologically Bad at dealing with Break-ups

[StephenP59]

Hi

 

I've noticed, certainly with me, how tough I seem to take break ups, I've only been through a handful and each time has hit me really really hard. Take the most recent one - a month intense relationship - physical, emotional, you name it, it ended suddenly in a fairly awkward way. Thing is I remember when being with her I didn't feel an enormous emotional connection, it was great fun, but I knew the feeling that maybe she wasn't 'the one', and actually that loosened me up a bit to enjoy things a bit more without the pressure of thinking we were destined to be together or whatever.

 

But since we split up its as if she has become a completely different person in my mind - now I really miss the connection the intimacy the companionship - which of course I can find with someone else but its as if the very core of my being gets shaken when I get rejected - like I am frozen with an absolute fear, she is in my dreams like she never was before - its like having a shadow relationship with the person who left you, but based upon negative feelings. I think it has something to do with pain and suffering, knowing that point where you are not recovering but just wallowing. I'm very good at challenging negative thoughts, the whole last week since it ended I've accepted that the next few weeks I won't be 'myself' and therefore should be a bit detached and just look in on the whole process, which has helped enormously.

 

I learnt alot from my last big break up, in terms of practical/cognitive ways of moving on/letting go, but emotionally it feels very similar. I think it seems to be that people have varying levels of pain/investment in each broken relationship, the only thing I think you can do is always use your head never your heart post-break up, become like a logic machine otherwise you just won't get through. The problem seems to be that when you follow this line of action or inaction, that you tend to think about break ups alot more - ie what went wrong, what you could have done etc.

 

Maybe a balance of mind/heart in a break-up scenario is needed, you need to make the mistakes - contacting, hitting lows etc to re-address the balance

 

Just a though - maybe I'm thinking too much! I miss her

[odile]

If you didn't feel really emotionally connected when you were actually together, then you should consider the possibility that you're fixing on her as an emblem of what you would have liked her to have been, rather than what she really was.

It does sound like you are idealising a bit.

Try to get things into perspective.

[AlBundy]

You sound like me man. I'm going through a post break up right now, only a couple of days so far. It sucks, I feel not myself, down, etc. I know it will pass, it has before. I think I did a good deal of idealizing, more so now. I'm trying to be logical about it as best I can. It's hard once you have that connection with someone to not see them as something more than what they are. Why is it so hard to find someone that is everything we envision?

[sparkles4]

I think it's more the rejection that's bothering you than the end of the relationship itself. You said that there wasn't a big connection and you didn't feel that she was the one, but now that you've been dumped you're suddenly seeing her differently. Now that you can't have her, her perceived value has increased while yours has decreased, and the only way to get your value to be equal to hers again is to somehow win her back. One thing that might help you move on is to realize that relationships have nothing to do with your value or status as a person. Being dumped does not mean that you weren't good enough or that you should have done something differently. A lot of the time, a breakup just comes down to compatibility. You said yourself that the emotional connection was lacking, and maybe she felt the same.