I still feel pain and break down often and just want it to stop. I know it will eventually and I will follow these steps but I think the most messed up things and just go crazy sometimes. I think about her dating another guy or sleeping with a guy often. That on top of the anxiety in your chest of missing them dearly. Is it normal to think those things after just breaking up? For some reason I fear of hearing she’s met someone else or slept with someone else or is just happy with someone else. It just makes me go crazy sometimes.

I met her 5 months ago and I was the first guy she has dated since losing her husband in a rafting accident 2 years ago. They were together for 13 years and have 2 beautiful little boys together (which also makes it so tough to leave them too). She ended it because she said she wasnt ready even though we connected so well together. Hung out all the time, I stayed over sometimes 4 nights a week and even took the kids on a trip together. I know she was still hurting inside and could never promise me a real relationship. But it just felt better than anything I’ve had before and she never left my arms when we were together.

I dont want to think this but I guess I was the rebound guy and that bothers me too. So much. Is all this jealousy, insecurity normal after a break-up? Am I just crazy? And how come I hurt more after this than I did when I ended it with my fiancee 3 years ago.

If anything this helped me to vent my hurt and frustration. Thanks Eddie for this site and I will read it everyday to help me get better.

I have found that sometimes really nice people get ’stuck’ with not so nice people. It is not that they have necessarily changed, it may be, that with time, the real THEM comes out. Trust me, you sound like a very nice girl with lots of love to give. SOMEONE will come along one day and get you and tell you how lucky they are to have found you. I am about twice your age and I can tell you that with time (not to be critical of your age, no way) but with time people often come to mature and realize a good thing a lot faster. Not sure how old your EX is, but I do think that girls often do mature faster than guys so if he is your age, he might have the mental and relational maturity of a 13 year old which is not cool, but better to find that out now instead of going together for years and then him showing his immaturity when you have fallen even deeper in love.

I wish the best for you. Please keep us all posted to how it goes. If you can move on to a mature man (mentally mature at least) I think you will be a happy lady!

I am 20 years old.I read the posts above and realised that I do need to focus on my life goals and accept that I am the cause of my own unhapiness. However, I find it really difficult to understand alot of things that my ex did. I actually knew him for a long time, but during the summer vacations when i went back home to visit my parents i spent a lot of time with him and eventually grew to like him and den love him. After I moved back to Australia we kind of started dating and we would speak everyday. One fine day he jus said he was busy and from then on he kept saying he was busy and stopped talkin to me all so randomly. It was really hard for me because I had my exams that time. I would call and message and email and he wouldnt pick up my calls or reply. Then one day he said he was sorry. However I still dont know why he did all this. When I asked him before the break up why he changed he would jus go offline without replying. I am on ma vacations right now and sometimes i get very tempted to call him. He speaks to me normally. But wen i text him saying sorry or anythin he doesnt reply. It hurts me alot. I still dont know what went wrong. I have my results coming out in a weeks time and I am really scared that i might fail and I tend to start thinkin about everythin that happened between me and him each time i think about my results. I do not understand what I should do.I really feel I need to know y he behaved this way after givin me the hopes of being together forever, but i know that if i ask him wen i call he will either hang up or not pick up. Also because i have nothin to do in the holidays as its always raining i cant go out and I dont have a job I tend to sit at home the whole day and think about wat happened and why all this happened. It hurts me alot because its happened the second time. The first time i dated a guy was for 3 years and after 2 years i thot may b i was ready to date again. Do you feel I still need to know y he changed all off a sudden? I dont know how i should deal with this.

Thanks

As to why I wrote that note, at that time I felt stymied that I couldn’t communicate all that was in my head. I sent it to her just before I posted it here.

The breakup was a real shock to me…I probably should add some context regarding where I was coming from when I wrote the note I posted here…

My ex had been contemplating our relationship issues for the last 6 – 9 months before, both privately and with a therapist on her own. I understood her therapy to be more focused on her depression, but they discussed issues she had with me, as well. Her long-held concerns regarding our relationship were, to a great extent, a surprise to me…she’d never shared those feelings with me.

She’d kept a draft email for quite a while, jotting down thoughts on her own and from her therapy session…she finally shared that with me AFTER she told me we were over. She wrote, “I guess I should have sent it last year.” Her note was written over time, with lots of “ifs”, “nevers”, “I knows”, “I wonders”. When she shared the note with me, she wrote, “I have no more secrets, so I needn’t tell you any more lies or half-truths anymore.”

I think it was her way of cementing in my mind that this wasn’t an out-of-the blue decision on her part.

She went straight from “our” relationship to a new one, moving directly from “our” place to a new co-habitation arrangement with another man. I’d been telling her how that made me feel that she just went out and fell for someone and decided to discard me. But she expressed to me that “he” was not the cause, that our relationship had been waning on its own.

I was very disappointed that we never had a chance to (try to) preserve our relationship (at least I felt that way).

In that context, I felt I needed to get my thoughts down in writing. I felt lost and disoriented.

So there’s the why, and I’m glad you asked that question.

Fast-forwarding to today, 6 weeks later, she’s recently moved out, her new beau has moved to our city, moved in with her (left his wife of 19 years). She and I are ’somewhat” in touch, but I have made my peace with the fact that our romantic relationship is in the past and will remain that way. We are “normalizing,” I hope.

I’m on my own now, but have thrown myself into a very happy social scene. I am healing and taking your words to heart. Yes, there are “ups and downs,” but I feel strongly that I am moving in the right direction, that I am getting better.

Eddie, thank you so much for your guidance and for engaging with us.

And, to those reading here, in the depths of despair, in confusion, at a loss for how to go one, I can promise you Eddie is right…you will get better, you will heal, you will be happy again. I know it is hard, but you will get there!

Cheers to all.

@Eddie Corbano

I am also going to repeat it with my dad and i plan to show them both – the last lecture video and read them wonderful wonderful stories from you. Like – Jerry’s and of the Butterfly from your cousin.

Where in Europe, Eddie?

Wow, what a comment .

Mayur, come to Europe and I’ll buy you a beer! Thank you for your kind words and the vivid and inspiring description of your healing process.

I feel the pain you’ve been through.

It is a good thing that she moved to Russia permanently, this will make it easier for you. My major problem back then was that she was always around, me in constant fear to meet her.

Originally Posted By Mayur
Why was I feeling so hopeless?? Why I started thinking that I will never never never be happy again – except only if she came back??? why did I limit myself??? How comes I forgot that I was a person on my own whom she was pulled to in the first place and that that i can be the same old me – WITHOUT HER??

This is an important realization, every healing lies within it. See that you cling to it, like a lifebelt.

In my experience the healing process has ups and downs. So if you feeling euphoric today, you might feel bad tomorrow.

Know that and don’t allow that it get you down. It’s 10 steps forward and 3 steps back. That’s the game.

Originally Posted By Mayur
It is this external twanging that makes us oscillate and the harder the twang, greater the time taken to regain idle state and louder the noise.

… and the stronger we ultimately get!

Hang in there my friend!

I want to jump on the plane and come to you.. Just to give you a five. Just to see you in real and feel you and be in the aura that is around you. I am feeling so free and light, just being on your portal (which is like periphery of the aura around you) I am glued to your website since morning.. whole day long. Jumping from link to link between work.

I am feeling very much out of the abyss(1) that i was when i woke up this morning (i hardly slept in last 3 months. waking up is finally getting out of bed – some how)

She finally left me on 26th June. In last 45 days, i experienced extremes. The worst-worst of pain. Crying with whole body but tears. Sleepless nights and hopeless days. It was a long distance relationship (wow – i could say it was!!!) and she went back to Russia(saying it was almost to never return) I am in India. She was still in touch with me for first 3 weeks. But it was only after she stopped any communication with me, that i started hearing some one else inside me!! it was ME. The real me. My true true self. I had few strong moments in this worst patch. One was when i read something very very interesting on a billboard -

‘Going got so tough, so tough,
that the tough got going’

I thought for a second over what i read just for a fraction of second as i read it while traveling on a bus. I was laughing the next moment. I felt then like how i am feeling now. The difference is that it didn’t last long then and its more sustainable and lasting state after you Eddie. Thanks.

I also visited book store, several times in these days and co-incidentally found a highly inspiring movie called -

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

The bigger co-incidence was that she is a great fan of Richard Bach and it was her who introduced me to him and his books. She wanted me to read Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I never did. But i finally watched this film based on the book – Just like that.

Now, As i once again, stand under the knowledge that ‘only i am responsible for my happiness and sorrows’, i am able to look back on the past and our relationship. I am able to forgive myself and her and rejoice our beautiful beautiful relationship. No anger, No hatred, No Ego, No fear, No worries, No PAIN.

Before you Eddie, i spent hours reading websites selling books relationships and tips on how to get them back and blah blah.. but what you know and share here is so genuine, self-less and vital. I realized that 3 years ago, before i met her – i was on my own. I was the bringer of joy to me. I was a free spirit. You helped me to re-connect to that ME.

Why was I feeling so hopeless?? Why I started thinking that I will never never never be happy again – except only if she came back??? why did I limit myself??? How comes I forgot that I was a person on my own whom she was pulled to in the first place and that that i can be the same old me – WITHOUT HER??

This realization alone is giving me so much hope for tomorrow – with her or with out her.

I must say one thing here – I realized that she had more insight and in-depth understanding about relationships. She tried her best to make me understand, but i didn’t until it was too late. I was being told things of wisdom by her and things that she thought would help me and her and US for better future. But she was leaving and this alone had shaken me – devastated me that i was not eligible to receive any wisdom any more. I went schizofrenic. I suffered from bipolar disorder.

I pictured that stage as if a string of guitar was twanged hard and then it was making a spectrum the string oscillating either sides.. negative – positive – negative – positive – many in one. Illusory but real. Real but illusory. And it would continue to be in this state until it finally calmed down to its original being. Which it will eventually. So i think by nature, we are meant to be peaceful, happy, idle. It is this external twanging that makes us oscillate and the harder the twang, greater the time taken to regain idle state and louder the noise.

I remember that idle and peaceful original state which i need to reach.

I feel so much closer to that original being position – NOW. Now, i can smile a smile that is lasting.

I think it is really a good time once again in my life, time to be burnt out and reborn. I can see light at the end of my tunnel. Eddie… thank you so much.

I can go on and on and on about so many experiences and mental stages that i had been through. But i realize this is not the place. I will write everything everything to you Eddie, in a separate mail. My past experiences will be like pages of a book – something so precious.

I had begun to unwind, break free and bounce back. In the process i met you and i am in the top gear now. Like those 0-120 in 4 seconds thrill rides.

All the quotes, songs, book/movie recommendations on your website are just so good. Each one like another step towards freedom. Ultimate Freedom.

Eddie. I will see you one day.

Excellent advice. Thanks for helping out .

I have made the observation that it is sometimes easier to open up when talking to a stranger. This could be a counselor or therapist.

Journaling is also a good way when there is nobody to talk to.

Hang in there guys, your pain won’t last forever… I promise!

Eddie

Hang in there Sheela! Nice talking with you here.