1 year ago today. a message of hope.

[deejay74]

hello everyone. i would like to start this post by saying i hope everyone had a great holiday and for those who are still in pain, i hope that you made the best of this time of year by spending it with those who really care about you.

 

i wanted to post a message to all those who are hurting out there that things will get better. this message is actually more geared towards those who are having a harder time getting over their breakup than most.

 

those of you who have been posting on here for a year or more probably know my story. but for those of you who don't, here's what happened. i'll try to be brief. i am telling you all of this so you won't make the same mistakes i did. it prolonged my healing process.

 

One year ago today, my gf of 6 months broke up with me and turned my world upside down. i know that the relationship was relatively short, but i had a lot of emotional investment put into my ex and the relationship itself. when she broke up with me, it devastated me and triggered something deep inside my subconscious that made the break up 10 times harder to get over for me.

 

the first 3 months of this year, i barely remember. i was in a deep state of depression. i had contact with my ex a couple of times during these 3 months in which 1 interaction ended really badly in a public place. i kept on wanting to keep in touch/contact with my ex because i thought that we could be friends and/or that maybe she would change her mind. how foolish i was. you would think that after making a fool out of myself in public i would have learned. but no.

 

around april of this year i had run into her again in the city. our contact was brief but not bad. i misread our "run-in' and decided to call her. stupid move. it ended up with us yelling at each other and her calling me names. again, you would think i had learned, but no...again.

 

by the time april came around, i was feeling better, the fog was lifting and i was finally getting along with my life. after our "fight" on the phone, which was in the beginning of the month, i decided to send an email to her at the end of the month because she was going to europe for about a month and half of an internship. i remembered her saying that she may not come back if she gets a job offer. well, i felt bad about how things transpired between us and i thought it would be a good gesture to send an email to her apologizing for my immature behavior. well, i didn't get a response.

 

the summer came and i was doing really well. i felt better about myself and it was almost back to normal, until the end of august. that's when a mutual friend of ours had a party and i saw my ex for the first time in months. well, she was being really cold to me and i tried twice to talk to her. it made me feel bad about myself and i couldn't understand why she didn't want to talk to me because she had sent me a happy birthday text message on my birthday. so i sent her another email in october just basically asking her why she was acting so cold and not responding to my emails. it took her 4 days to respond to my email. i was not happy with her reasons and i replied back. this escalated into an email fight and then to a myspace blog war in which she was talking all kinds of trash about me but not mentioning my name. it was obvious who she was talking about, though.

 

that's the last interaction i had with her and it took this last fight for me to finally let go.

 

during all this time, i had been seeing a therapist and she helped me tremendously. she helped me identify the issues that kept me from moving on and the reasons why i wanted attention from my ex so badly. so, don't be embarrassed to seek out help from a professional. that's why they're there.

 

so as you can see, NC is very important. i kept on trying to contact my ex and it ended up in a very bad way. i didn't want that to happen.

 

NC is not a cookie-cutter template that can be placed over every break up situation. BUT, i would say it applies to 95% of all break-up. the ones where it doesn't apply is very rare.

 

so please, take it from me, walk away with dignity if you've been dumped. trying to seek out answers to your questions usually lead to more questions and so on.

 

i firmly believe if i had the strength to just let things go and let my ex be, i would have healed quicker. it wouldn't have made the pain any less, however.

 

and another thing, it is kind of selfish of us dumpees to keep trying to contact our exes in order to satisfy our needs. constantly trying to make contact only makes you look worse and probably affirms their reasons for breaking up with you in the first place.

 

so, sorry for the long post, i hope it helped.

 

take care of yourselves everyone.

 

(ps - you can the details of my story by looking up my old posts)

[kellbell]

Hey deejay,

 

Wow, it has been a year?! You have come so so far. I am proud of you and I hope your message will help others that are in the same situation you were in last year.

 

Well done.

[Northalius]

Nice to see that you've come out of this, and I'm sure you're so much stronger because of it. As I tell others that're attached to their ex's: Learn to respect yourself, and do not let your ex (nor anyone) be your emotional crutch for life!

 

If you do not respect yourself, then how can you expect others to respect you?

 

If you can't find anything to respect or love yourself about, then why be in a state of ignorance expecting another person to do so?

 

Being hung up over someone that doesn't respect you enough to stay with you and work through the hard times, is not worth being hung up over! It's as if you've let them be your [emotional] crutches.

 

Imagine if you grew up as an infant in a wheelchair, yet had the full potential to walk on your own. When someone takes that wheelchair away, you're left limp on the floor, crying out for help; constantly looking for that wheelchair again.

 

What you need to do now is start working out your muslces, to become independently strong on your own.

 

This is where you'll start respecting yourself, and show others they can then respect you back! Because if you respect you, then that shows others there's good reason behind them respecting you, as well.

 

Sounds like a broken record, but these things need to be repeated sometimes.

[deejay74]

oh, i forgot to add that it may sometimes seem like the hurt and misery won't ever end, but it does.

 

be patient with yourself and know that it's normal to regress in your healing sometimes.

 

again, if it seems like you can't seem to get over the pain by yourself, seek professional help.

 

someone's sig on eNotAlone says something like "if you're in hell, keep pushing" or something like that. it really is true - keep putting one step in front of the other.

[Lanterna Magica]

I believe it says

 

If you are going through hell, keep going.

 

Winston Chrchill

[Benson]

What happens if your EX didnt respect themselves??? Never had any confidence??

[cristal]

Deejay, thanks for pointing out that the pain DO come to an end. I am currently locked in the throes of deep emotional pain and turmoil and practicing NC for almost 5 weeks now. Just today, I was wondering, will this ever end? Am I one of those unlucky cases of 1 out of a zillion person, who may be suffering with an "extreme" case of heartbreak, that I may never ever recover from? Again thanks for that reminder that the pain is TEMPORARY.

 

And, I do admire how you so eloquently detailed your travels from heartbreak to acceptance and then peace.

 

You give me hope and strenght.

 

Happy New Year to you!