I am by no means the "break up expert" - in fact, I'm very much learning all of this myself, but wanted to share with my readers how I have managed to cope in the couple of months after breaking up with my long-term partner. There are a few things that I would definitely recommend doing, so if you're going through a split, please read on!
1. Re-focus your energy on friends & family.
For so long you have put a lot of your time, effort and energy into one person. This person became an extension of yourself, you were a unit, so now that they're gone you probably feel a bit lost. The truth is, while you were investing so much in them and the relationship you had with them, you were probably neglecting other relationships in your life. Now is the time to fix that. If you used to message your partner all day, message a friend instead. If you met up with your boyfriend for a weekly dinner date, use that time to eat with your bestie! Reach out to the people around you and do things with them, maintain or rebuild and strengthen those relationships, this will distract you from that feeling of loneliness and remind you that you do have other people in your life who are very important to you! Hang out with your mum and dad, see if you can tag along to the supermarket with them or stick around for that family BBQ that you'd have been too busy for before, devote some of your newfound spare time to the people around you. Also, if you have been an absent friend, make sure you apologise. It's not fair to drop your friends then pick them up the minute you turn single, but it is okay to admit you messed up and to try and make things right when your head isn't quite so busy focusing on one person.
2. Talk about it as much or little as you want to.
Some days you'll want to talk about it in mammoth detail, others you won't want to mention it at all, that's fine. See how you feel and either get it all out, or keep it all in, there's no right option here. When my ex-boyfriend and I broke up, I texted all of my closest friends as soon as I could, just so that I could talk about it to them if I wanted to. Everybody was really supportive and asked a lot of questions, gave me a lot of encouragement etc, but because all of those discussions happened via text, I could stop the conversation at any point if I wanted to, which is why it's a good idea to have those chats via text/messenger if you can. This is especially good at the start when your feelings are quite mixed! Sometimes you want to talk but then you find that it's getting you down, or that your friend is getting a little too defensive on your behalf, and if that happens, you can just stop replying for a while! Basically, reach out to people and take it day by day, eventually you'll get it all out, and as long as you tell at least one person, you'll know you're not in denial.
3. Write about it.
Sometimes you'll want to express your feelings without actually having to communicate with anybody, you just won't want advice or even support, and I get that. When I became newly single, I wrote a LOT of blog posts about it. I talked about the reasons behind my decision, the way I felt about it all, my expectations for the future, and so on. I won't ever publish those posts, in fact they've all been deleted now, but at the time they worked as a great form of therapy for me. When you want to get it all out but don't want to say it to anybody, write it down. I found that this also really helped me to articulate my feelings and understand why I felt the way I did. Writing was like a practise run for when I came to actually discuss the breakup with people in person, so it was really beneficial for me.
4. Remember why you broke up.
This is what got me through and spared me a lot of unnecessary upset. I was very rational about my breakup for a lot of reasons, one being that I constantly reminded myself why it had happened. Whenever I found myself feeling nostaglic or reminiscient, I reminded myself that things hadn't been that way in a long time. Likewise, when I felt uncertain about my future and considered the one we once had planned out together, I reminded myself that was not going to happen due to the way the relationship had deteriorated - even if we had stuck together, we weren't going to be moving in anytime soon and living this lovely little life we had planned. So that helped, because it showed me that my reality as a single woman was actually far better than it was when I had a boyfriend. My relationship was going nowhere and I could pretend as much as I wanted, but we had no real future. As great as things had been in the past, that was over, and things hadn't been like that leading up to the split. You have to fixate on this and accept that this was the right time to breakup, even if you weren't the one calling the shots, try to understand why they did it and remember that something led them to this moment. It's so easy to just think about the good times and all that you're suddenly missing out on, but for you to have split up, things can't have been going well for a while - don't you dare forget that!
5. Find new purpose - in work, hobbies, pass-times.
The week after my breakup I had my final five days of second placement, my last ever observation, and a trip to Sheffield planned for the weekend - this was great because it meant that I couldn't dwell on what had happened. I was forced to keep occupied, which I'm a great advocate for. While I think it's important not to force yourself to be in a good mood - I recognise that some days will just need to be duvet days - I think you should try to keep busy. You'll know your limit, you'll know how long you can be out the house without it wearing you down, and as the days progress, you'll be able to extend that time! Start small but aim big. I've filled my spare time with lots of lunch dates, blogging, days out, university work and even gardening. I'm beginning a new career in September which is going to give me brand new purpose, and until then, I am finding comfort in the small things! I think it'd be really great to branch out even further and join some sort of club to be honest, especially because anything I start now will be totally detached form my life with my ex, so I'll see if there's any opportunity for that this summer and I recommend you do the same!
I've dealt with this breakup surprisingly well because I have followed those five pieces of advice. I definitely feel that it was the right decision, as much as it has brought some uncertainty to my life, I know I'm a lot happier now than I was at the end of the relationship. That being said, I maintain on good terms with my ex and though it's still a little raw, we hope to be friends in the future! In one way, I feel like I'm fifteen again - living at home with my mum and dad, relying on them a hell of a lot, finding that my brother and cousin are like my go-to for socialising... but then I know that really, I am such a different person now. I'm a woman! I've grown up, I have a degree, a PGCE, and a job. I've achieved so much on my own, but I've also achieved a lot through the relationship! I've been on holiday abroad twice in the last couple of years without my parents or any kind of adult, I've hopped on trains by myself and travelled all over the country, explored the entire city of London and lots of other places, and experienced what it is to love and be loved! When it was going well, my relationship really was perfect for me. I have had the happiest moments of my life with that man, and I'm so grateful for the opportunities that partnership brought me. I'm grateful for all of that actually, but I look forward now to seeing where I end up in the coming weeks, months and years. Now is time to do me! I really hope that you feel this way too, especially if you're newly single. Relationships can be great, but so can being single, you now have time to focus on you and broaden your horizons! So make the most of that.
Thank you very much for reading, this one is super personal but I tried to keep it less specific and more general, so the advice will suit lots of different situations and people. Stay tuned for Friday's post, some postgraduate advice for all of you graduands!! Oh, and if you're enjoying reading my blog this summer, please subscribe to keep up-to-date with it! There should be a tab below that you can pop your Email into - it means a lot to me, so thank you in advance!