• Are you going though a breakup?
• Have you recently ended a romantic relationship?
• Are you kind of stalking your ex on social media after a breakup?

Breakups are not easy. If you are going through a breakup or have been dealing with the pain from a relationship ending for a while, Mind Connections wants to support you. We have step-by-step strategies to help you to get over a breakup in your healing process.

Losses after a Breakup

Breakups can happen for many reasons. Some reasons are very obvious – someone cheats, breaks trust, or really hurts you. However, some reasons are not as clear or as easy to define.People who once were super close can grow apart or change. Sometimes the person you never stopped laughing with becomes the person you have trouble making small talk with. This change can be subtle, By the time you finally realize your relationship has changed, it is too late for repair.

Regardless of the reason, breakups can cause a lot of pain. With the end of a relationship, the partners who were a part of it are different towards each other. What was previously in a relationship, love, care, attention, loyalty, and intimacy, no longer stays. Subsequently, the loss of a relationship could lead to other losses. They may include:

• Loss of self-identity and lowered self-esteem

Going through a breakup can easily affect the way you define who you are. In particular, you may feel betrayed, abandoned, confused, or guilty about the breakup. At least temporarily, this could make you doubt of your worthiness. You may tell yourself, “I’m not likable or lovable”, “Nobody wants me”, or even “I’m worthless”. 

• Loss of shared memories and hopes for a shared future

Indeed, a breakup brings losses of time spent together, the laughters, the tears, and the closeness. Meanwhile, you might have dreamed of having a family, getting married, having kids, and growing old together. With a breakup, this is all gone.

• Loss of trust in others

After a relationship ended, it may also change the way you look at others. For example, if your ex cheated on you, it is not uncommon for you to have trust issue in a romantic relationship. Sometimes, you may even overgeneralize to the whole group of people, such as “all men are cheaters”, or “I’ll never date again”. 

Above all, getting over a breakup means you are dealing with grief. In order to heal and move on, you first need to grieve this relationship. 

Grieving Stages of a Breakup

It is hard to accept a breakup, especially in the beginning. Depending on how it ended, you may have many things to process and deal with. It can feel like you are grieving the person or relationship you lost.

In times of great loss, Psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross says that people go through 5 stages of grief. These stages are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. You may be able to relate to some or all of these stages of grieving a relationship in some way. 

• Denial over your relationship ending

It may be hard to believe you can come to terms with this chapter of your life closing. You may tell yourself, “This can’t be true”, “I can’t believe this is happening”, “It is just a nightmare and everything will be fine when I wake up”. Sometimes when it is too painful to face the reality, postponing or avoiding your grief can be a way to cope.

• Anger over your loss

Anger may be a step to show that you are facing some ugly reality. Your anger could direct to your partner, the situation, or yourself. You may feel angry towards the person you are no longer involved with. They may have betrayed you or given up on your relationship when you felt like they should have held on. You may tell yourself, “This is not fair”, “How could they do this to me”? or “I hate them”.

Even if you direct the anger to yourself, it can still be empowering. It means no matter how hard it is, you are not avoiding the reality any more. Your anger is enough internal discomfort for you to work through this loss and grief. Meanwhile, it is the beginning of a proactive change for better.

• Bargaining over your breakup

For this stage, you may be trying to negotiate a plan with a God, a higher power, or fate to stop this loss from occurring. During a relationship breakup, you may try hoping or praying for a better outcome. You also may reach out to your ex and try to find a way to compromise. Many people try to go back to their ex and establish some connection at one point or another. 

During this stage, you are willing to compromise and repair all relationship issues on your own. That is, you hold yourself accountable for all issues in a relationship when it actually should take two people to tango. Bargaining helps you to gain some control over the breakup. At least this illusion may help you to get distracted from the grief and give you some hope for a better future.

• Depression about your breakup

Breakups can be very sad and overwhelming. This can cause you to feel down about yourself and life. You may feel sad, hopeless, tired, and isolate yourself from others. Your sleep and appetite can be a problem; Besides, you will likely believe that these feelings will never end and you cannot move on with your life.

For some people, such sad and depressive feelings could persist for a long time. If you also withdraw from others, constantly have negative thoughts about yourself, others, and the world, lose interest, stop engaging in life, or even have suicidal thoughts, you may be facing clinical depression that require treatment. 

• Acceptance of a relationship breakup

In the final stage of grief, you will detach or resign from this grief. It doesn’t mean that you will not miss the person anymore. Actually you are just trying to move on with your life and find peace with the situation.

Remember, grieving stages after a breakup may not be linear, that is, relapse is not uncommon. Sometimes you feel you have already got over your ex and moved on with your life; however, you could go back to denial, anger, bargaining, or depression again. Your pain could easily surface when you pass by a restaurant you used to dine together, when your anniversary comes, or when you hear a sad song. This is totally normal though. 

Strategies to Get over a Breakup

For one thing, grieving a relationship is not always a linear process. This road can take many twists and turns – at times,  you may feel like you take are taking one step forward and 3 steps back. Here are a few ways to help you on your way to healing. 

1. Feel your Emotions to Heal a Breakup

In times where you feel your worst, remember to have patience with yourself and show yourself kindness. In other words, there is no timeline to get over a breakup. You own your emotions. So be gentle with your emotions and honor your feelings. Embrace that some days will just feel awful. In fact, the quickest way to recover from your breakup is to allow yourself to recognize your emotions and truly feel them.

All difficult emotions exist for a good reason. Overall, it is totally understandable to have emotions such as sadness, fear, shock, irritability, embarrassment, guilt, shame, numbness, confusion, etc. Feeling your emotions means you do not have to suppress them and quickly get over them. 

You can even schedule 15 minutes a day to feel your emotions. During this 15 minutes, you acknowledge the existence of your emotions, feel in your body when your emotions manifest, and reflect on your relationship. Once your 15 minutes is up, tell yourself you do not need to dwell on this breakup for today. If by any chance your thoughts come up before your scheduled 15 minutes start, simply tell yourself to wait till your scheduled time. Stay mindful of what you focus on in the moment to dive into the day. This way, you keep a good balance between your everyday life and reflection of your breakup.

2. Journalling after a Breakup

Journaling can be a great way to face and express your emotions. Some journal prompts can include:

• How are you feeling today?
• Did anyone make you smile today? If so, how did they do it?
• Name three things you like about yourself. Explain in detail.
• How did you show yourself love today?
• What are some ways you can improve your life?
• What is no longer serving you in your life? How can you change these things?
• Write the lyrics of a song that you can relate to write now.

3. Take Good Care of yourself

Self-care after a breakup is super important. When in distress, you may naturally have low appetite, difficulty with sleep, and cry easily. When you feel miserable, you may be tempted to use some unhealthy copings to make yourself feel ok temporarily. Whether it is emotional eating, drinking, drug use, or self-harm, unhealthy copings can only make things worse in the long run. Therefore, it is really high time to learn to use self-care after a breakup.

Good self-care strategies could include something as simple as healthy eating and sleeping. If poor sleep gets in the way of your daily functioning, it may be helpful to practice mindfulness meditations, use essential oils, and practice good sleep hygiene and other ways to treat insomnia naturally. In addition, preparing and eating your food mindfully could calm you down and redirect your attention to the here and now of your life. Practicing emotion regulation could also assist you to face and manage your emotions effectively. Similarly, routine exercise is also a great way to increase your dopamine level and reduce your stress. 

4.  Lean on Social Support

As much as this one person meant to you and still may mean to you, know that there is a whole world full of people who can care and have love for you. Talk to your loved ones about the breakup and appreciate any advice they offer.

It is important to process your emotions and put in work to healthily get over a breakup. With this in mind, also remember to try and do things with others to get your mind off of the situation. Go to dinner with your friends, blast a catchy album in the car, and remember that although life is tough now there are still beautiful moments and experiences yet to come your way.

5. Social Media Cleanse

Remember that your mental health and stability should always be a top priority. Social media can make you feel negatively about yourself, your body, and your social life. It may hurt you to constantly see pictures of the person you are no longer in a relationship with on your feed. Some social media tips are:

• Unfollow or mute the person you are not in contact with anymore
• Unfollow or mute people who may post with this person a lot
• Delete or archive pictures that hurt to look at

Follow more accounts that make you feel good (positive quote accounts, youtubers who make you laugh, etc.)

6. Reflect on the Good Reasons to Break up

Many times when we miss people, we selectively think back to the good times only. As amazing as those times could have made us feel, there are reasons why this relationship did not work out. Journaling can be a great tool to use in this situation, as well. 

Write down the reasons why you felt that you needed a break from this person, how they disappointed you, what you could have done better etc. Also, a pros and cons list can help you see the good and bad things about this relationship.

7. Meet New People when YOU are Ready

When you break up, people might want to help you and try and set you up/introduce you to an admirer. Take all the time you need to do so! All these dating opportunities will be available when you feel ready to put your heart back out there.

8. Work on Bettering Yourself

As we know, time itself does not heal a breakup. The efforts to understand a relationship and better yourself are the real healing forces. Understand that things happen for a reason. A breakup can be a great foundation for self-exploration, development, and growth. As mentioned before, after a breakup it is important to review what has happened. Think about what the other person has done, but also remember to hold yourself accountable and find areas where you may want to improve yourself.

Work on your confidence! A breakup may cause you to feel bad about yourself in different ways. Show yourself love by doing things that make you happy, surrounding yourself with good people, practicing positive affirmations, focusing on gratitude, reminding yourself of who you really are. 

Seek Therapy after a Breakup

You deserve to have people in your life that bring out the best in you, make you happy, respect your boundaries, and love you for who you are. Remember that you have survived 100% of your worst days, that is, this pain will pass and you will heal.

If you find yourself feel stuck for too long, you have repeated the same relationship or breakup patter again and again, or you hope to understand and improve yourself, seek therapy after your breakup. Psychotherapy provides a safe environment for you to unpack your past, get insight of your behavior and thought patterns, and practice healthy coping skills to better manage your daily life and relationships.

If you are going through any sort of relationship issue, breakup, or more, Mind Connections wants to help. Our therapists at Mind Connections provide effective and supportive relationship counseling. Our therapists can help you to deal with your breakup, work on your self-esteem, and assist you to better yourself. You do not have to go through your breakup alone! Contact us by email or call us free for 15 minutes, we are here for you.

Content Creator, Victoria Gallo; Reviewed by Dr. June Cao