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writes: So, you have been recently dumped. You had to dump someone else. Maybe you're still in the "no contact" phase after the breakup. Months or years have passed. There is still an ache in your heart for that person. Sometimes it overtakes you emotionally.You wonder when will this horrible pain and longing finally leave me alone?You've done all that crap about keeping busy, taking care of yourself, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah. Listened to all that stuff about time healing all; and you've spent a fortune on publications, and ebooks telling you how to get through it. Okay, I have been through it. I'm going through it. Here's the truth. I feel much much better. How long before you get over someone who kicked you to the curb; actually depends on you.Yes, YOU!!!Here's something you should know. You sit alone, and you hope they'll call you. You daydream about them all day, and you think about them all night. You read their Facebook page, you listen to songs that remind you of them. You're probably wearing his old tee shirt right now. You constantly tell yourself you can't live without them, and they were the center of your world. You cry until your eyeballs bulge, and your friends are avoiding you. They don't want to hear you going on and on about how he/she broke your heart. Your poor mom has all her lady-friends scouting the neighborhood for eligible men, or women, for their poor abandoned baby. Your dad, hides his face behind the laptop screen; because he can't believe he raised such a wuss of a son.You want to rip your skin off the minute you see the latest update on Facebook, that she/he is dating someone else.With all this going on, how the hell are you going to get over the breakup? Hello!!!! They have gotten over you. Life goes on. They seem so happy. WTF!!!Maybe they even call and you still take booty calls. You're still "friends." Yet you want to fall on a sword every-time they tell you about their new love-interest. Hey, if you're just friends, why does it bother you? Why be friends with someone who makes you feel rejected? Seriously!?Hey, you still have to go through your emotions for the loss.You need to go through all those wretched feelings; because that is what we call grief. Grief is what you feel after a great loss.The mind is letting go. Preparing itself to give up knowing they will never return. That has nothing to do with addiction. That's a valid human emotion. Then comes the detachment after healing.Let me tell you something, you whining sniveling foolish person.Falling in love is a chemical process in the brain. The brain produces the chemicals phenylethylamine and dopamine. You feel good when you are around the person you've attached your feelings to.You were getting off on these brain-chemicals; and the deeper you think you felt for them, the more addicted you are to those chemicals. When they cut you off, they turned off that supply.Now you're going through withdrawal. Your love-addiction is driving you up the wall. You twist and turn in your bed at night. You have obsessive thoughts. Even if they were totally nasty to you, all you can think about is how sweet he or she was, when they were nice to you. They even cheated; and you'd forgive, and take them back if you could.You can't get over them; because you don't understand what is going on in your brain. You think its all about love. First off, you have to stop romanticizing what love is. People fall in love with the wrong people, and don't realize it. We get so high on our brain-chemicals, we don't see their faults, and we don't see our own faults. All we see is some false perception of our feelings, and claim it's love. We are good at creating things in our imagination; if it won't materialize in reality. Denial is our best friend, it stalls away the pain of truth.It didn't work out. That's because you have some unconscious criteria all made-up inside your mind about who that wonderful Mr./Ms. Right should be. So the first person who comes a long and meets that criteria, and gives us a little attention. POW! WHAM! BOINK!!!They imprint on our brains, and we start falling. We get so caught up that we only see what we want to see. We by-pass red-flag warnings along the way. We place them up on a pedestal, and worship them as demigods. Bells and buzzers and huge "X's" flash above their heads, but he/she met the love "criteria." I love him. She's the one and only. I know it. Good sex seals the deal. Can't tell you nothing now. Your parents are your enemies, if they don't approve. Screw your friends, who needs them now?You read all sorts of junk that tells us what love is. We watch stupid movies, and we become all wound up and swept away by media-produced perceptions; and don't look for the people who are really right for us. We get addicted and so attached; those chemicals just keep feeding our high. The love-addiction is formed. We are hooked on love. We're actually infatuated with the concept of being in love. In-love with love. Too late. You'll learn the difference, when you break up for what seems to be a stupid reason.You forgot a few things before you went and took the leap of faith. Were you even ready to make such a big plunge? What did you lack, that you needed to fix before you hitched your wagon to that horse? Were you needy? Did you have a poor self-image?Did you feel inferior to everyone around you? Were you lonely and felt unlovable? Are you over-weight? Are you insecure about your looks? Are you broke and laden with debt? Are you getting older, and fear you'll be undesirable soon? Oh here's a good one...is your biological clock ticking?When you fixated on this person, if you were carrying this baggage, you were not ready for a relationship. You were looking for someone to compensate for your weaknesses. You were looking for acceptance, and someone to numb you to all your troubles.They gave you a morphine-like high that made you forget all the things you didn't like about yourself. Filled in the gaps, and pulled down the shade.They saved you from you!!!Guess what? Those imperfections are still there. They didn't go away. You found a person, and assigned them as your personal "pain-killer." They shade you from your imperfections.The sucky thing about it all, is they probably did the same thing you did. You met their love criteria. You made them feel sooooo good! The hell with the red-flags! Nobody's perfect. So what, he drinks like a fish, she thinks her thighs look like mailbags; but they make me feel good. They make me feel worthy. They make me happy. They are perfect and wonderful. They have no faults; and all mine are lifted and invisible to the naked eye.Like all highs, they start to fade. Reality starts to set in. You have a fight. Your insecurities start to surface. You start to lose trust. You find text messages to their exes, you find a used condom under the seat of his car. You fight like cats and dogs. The anger subsides. Then you go back to peaceful co-existence. The brain-chemicals flow. All is well.Then suddenly; they ask for space. They grow distant. They refuse to talk. They stop texting. They find fault in everything you say or do. They say terrible things to you. They try to control your thoughts and movements. They accuse you of things.You get suspicious of them. You accuse them of things. Things build to a climax. It breaks.Now you feel profoundly lost. Totally miserable. Overwhelmed with grief. You have a head full of questions. You're begging for closure and relief. The agony is totally unbearable. How did you forget all the hell and bull that lead you here? You are in withdrawal. You are facing the truth that you don't want to face. IT DIDN'T WORK! It's busted. Kaput! Over!!!Not because you're a failure. Not because you're unworthy. Not because you don't deserve love. This may even all be true.You didn't deal with it all before you attached your heart to someone who wasn't right for you. Your brain followed your heart, and it did what it does when it thinks it's fulfilling your wishes; because you found someone that fit the "criteria." Most of it was make-believe and unrealistic. So the relationship was doomed to failure; but you're addicted to love-crack anyway.How do you make it stop? How do you make the pain go away?Here's what I had to face. I was where you are. I hated "no contact." I wanted to kick my ex in the balls. I wanted to text him in the middle of the night. I wanted answers and an apology. It was all stupid and unnecessary. I needed a fix. He denied me my "love-crack." Get your minds out of the gutter. The metaphor is like a drug folks. I attached my feelings and over-looked my own weaknesses, and I looked to him to fix me. I used him as a pain-killer. To make my worries and troubles go away. It was too much for him. His weaknesses were too much for me. I didn't meet all the things he needed to make him feel immune to everything that made him feel incomplete, weak, or unhappy. Reality found it's way in.So, he dumped me. He cut off my love-supply. I went into withdrawal and I felt like hell. I slept in fetal position, and sucked my thumb. Just a dramatization here. I just slept in fetal position.The reason the pain seems so amplified, and hurts so bad; is because you refuse to accept that it is over. You hold on to just a wee bit of the possibility they will come back.You're clinging to a little molecule of "hope," that it isn't true that he or she could let you go. It's a temporary lapse in judgement. They will realize it's a mistake. I need to be around when they snap out of it. It wasn't all a lie? Was it?Maybe they weren't the one lying. You ignored a lot of stuff.If you're drunk or high, you could forget your underwear. Love addiction will make you forget how much of a dick he is, and how much of a bitch she really is.If they really loved you, how could they just stop? Because they perceived you to meet all their criteria and you didn't. You weren't a strong enough "pain-killer." Their high wore off, before yours did. The love-cloud dissipated. Their old troubles returned. Now you seem like a pain in the ass. You're irritating.They were everything you thought you needed to make the pain and unhappiness go away. They were the cure to your loneliness. Then it all came back, when they decided they didn't want you anymore.Stop and think. When a family member dies, you go through grief for the loss. You love them so much. You can't bear the thought that you will never see them again. All you have left of them are their pictures and loving memories. Yet somehow, you get over the grief, and you move on. How come?You accepted the fact that they are gone and that they aren't coming back. You have no hope they'll come walking back into your life. They are gone forever. Maybe until we meet in another life.Well, when you allow yourself to stop waiting by the phone. Stop looking at your vacation pictures. Stop repeating in your head that you can't live without your ex. Realize they have now spun out of your universe. Healing will start. There is no hope. The relationship died of natural causes. Your ability to find someone else didn't get buried with it. So stop telling yourself that. You love crack-head you! Withdrawal makes you lie to yourself. It distorts the truth. It makes you want what you can't have. You're clinging by a thread.It just feeds into the agony of withdrawal. It prolongs that anguish and inner-turmoil. You think by some small chance, if you just hold on. They will come back. As long as you feel that way, you will feel the longing. You will hope to get that high again. You will go through withdrawal, day after day.No, keeping busy will not help. Pampering yourself will not work.Talking to your friends won't substitute for missing him or her.By holding on to false-hope, you dilute and weaken the effects of these good remedies. By the way, you neglected your friends while centering your universe around Mr./Ms. Wonderful. Now you feel totally alone.You didn't make new friends. You isolated yourself, and made your relationship the reason for your existence. Shame on you.That's proof you weren't ready for a relationship. They didn't break you, you were already broken. You forgot while you were away in lah-lah land. You put your baggage in the back of the closet. It was over-stuffed and never unpacked.It bubbled to the surface, when you got jealous. You felt inferior to his/her ex. You compared yourself to porn-stars. Ignored him when he said he didn't care about your weight. Called her a liar, when she said she didn't do anything. You had no proof, only suspicion to back it up. Where's your fix?My inner-peace came when I realized I will survive. When I realized I had work to do on me. I had to get to know myself again; and learn to deal with my own troubles. I had to face my faults and not bury them behind taking care of someone else. I had to reacquaint myself with me. I find that living with me isn't hard at all. I'm a nice guy. Not perfect. Not totally flawed either. I will work on me, and see me for who I am. Not through what I want to be, by having someone else makeup for what I lack. That is dependency, that isn't love.Stop romanticizing love into some fairytale event in your life.It has its ups and downs. People are not responsible for fixing you, and you are not going to fix them. You will not get over a breakup; if you think holding on to being friends, will keep some measure of hope open for their return. Settling for crumbs. Giving in to desperation. You'll look pitiful to them. They'll dump you completely; as soon as someone else comes along to help shake you loose. You'll probably pretend you're okay with it. You'll be devastated.You have to give up on the old dead relationship. If they wanted you, they wouldn't have left you. Or, if they were right for you, you wouldn't have left them. What works doesn't easily come apart. It is easy to repair. There are plenty of spare parts on-hand. The right person comes with spare parts, not missing any. They shouldn't have to borrow yours. They'll deplete you of what you need to rebuild yourself when you're in a crisis. You support each other, but you don't drain each others energy. Always keep some love in reserve for yourself.Now you need it, and it isn't there. See what I mean?The relationship is dead. You will heal when you accept that it is dead. If by some miracle it is revived, consider it a rebirth. The old relationship is still gone. No books, no CD's, costly miracle get-your-ex-back plans; and no expensive therapy is going to make it rise from the dead.If you save your marriage, that's because it was fixable. It was built on the right foundation to begin with, and things went a little south. Sometimes divorce is the only cure.You can't save it; if it's a total loss. So you let it go. Make yourself available to find the right person. You are given a life-time to correct your mistakes.Accept the truth, and you can move on. Don't look them up on Facebook everyday; and think you can move on. Don't keep hanging out with them, thinking you're rekindling your love; if they don't come right out and ask you to get back together. They'll use you if you let them. You're only using them; if you keep it up. They'll meet someone else; end result, they'll move on anyway. You'll meet someone else; but if you cling on, you'll kill it. Still waiting for the ex. It's unbelievable how long some people hold on. Therapy will not change it. It's a waste of time trying to save a fool.People play around with breakups, going back and forth; because the withdrawal is so hard to deal with. So they live on little fixes, thinking they'll build a slow immunity to the pain. The brain is not that simple. If that person is around; it will produce those chemicals, and keep that high going. When they leave again, it will rip you totally apart.So, if you want to know what to do to stop the pain. Forget about him or her. Stop playing their old CD's. Stop reminding yourself of them on a daily basis, trying to get a fix. If they aren't there, it's because they don't want to be. So you have to learn to love yourself again. Make friends with you, and use hope to find the person who is actually right for you. Stop looking for human pain-killers. Look for people you feel you can trust and don't make you feel like something is missing, when they are. You have to feel whole; even when they disappear. You still miss them; you just don't feel abandoned. Love isn't identified by some "soul-mate" or "Mr. Right." It is a complete person who has found you. You hit it off; because you don't need anything from them but "love." You have no demands, you don't need approval, you don't feel unworthy. No pressures, and you feel you are in control of yourself for the first time.You will feel at peace with yourself; when you let go of what is no longer yours. You may always miss your ex. The emotions that tied you down, will fade. You'll miss them like someone who passed on; but you still feel the love. I talk to my older friends. I reach out to my family, and find that there was never a love-deficit in my life when he left. I had turned my back on others, thinking he gave me all I needed.I know better than that now. So here, I'm passing it on to you.Remember all I've said above, when you are tempted to go stalk Facebook. When you hear he or she has a new GF or BF. If they're getting married. It's because they were smart enough to keep looking until they found the one right for them. It wasn't you. You will find yours; when you stop looking back, and start looking ahead. They're somewhere in front of you. Not behind you. You don't want your ex back, you miss that high. You have to break your addiction. Accept the relationship ended when you broke up.So put hope into finding the right one, and let go of the hope that your ex will come back. You'll heal faster. Clinging to your ex when you're in a new relationship, will kill all your future possibilities. Destroy your happiness, and prolong your pain. So let go, and you'll move on.If you don't believe me, try it.
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a break, best friend, booty call, broke up, condom, debt, divorce, drunk, facebook, get back together, insecure, jealous, liar, move on, my ex, porn, text, underwear Reply to this Article
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male
reader, N91  +, writes (8 November 2016):
 As always wiseowl, fantastic read. Really related to this one and it made so much sense and made me realise how stupid I've been the past few months.
Thank you
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female
reader, anonem  +, writes (13 December 2015):
 Omg, wisely said. I had to come back to reread the whole thing. Your post touches every aspect. Thank you so much for being on this forum to help people with your blessings.
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reader, Anthony E +, writes (7 July 2015):
 This article is a work of true wisdom. All of my adult life I have sought solace in the arms of another after all of my break-ups, maybe without even realising it. The human pain killer you speak of. I've never before taken the time or sought to find my true self after parting with a lover. The truth is, as so many people say, you have to find wholeness alone, happiness being just you, before you can offer another person the right you. To rebound is to use someone else to make up for your own failings, to circumvent the pain and the grief. It works, sure - but as what cost? Rebounds just lead to more rebounds. The true path is to discover happiness alone first.
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reader, Solidus +, writes (10 April 2015):
 This really helped me. Thanks for sharing.
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reader, Pitinha  +, writes (18 December 2013):
Thank you so much. You have helped me before and still helping me a lot now. I really thank you for your kindness.
Love the article.I will follow your advise.
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 November 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you for reading!
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reader, danibodemann +, writes (10 November 2013):
 You are literally so amazing!! Thank you so much for this. This is what I needed to read. Best advice I've ever been given about breakups and relationships.
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reader, anonymous, writes (14 September 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you for reading my friend.
The point is, when there is no hope in fixing your relationship; let it go. It will not be easy. There is more than just the act of detaching; the brain undergoes changes that add to the discomfort of letting go. It's not as easy as walking away and forgetting. Emotional detachment is involved.
When you understand what is going on inside your mind, you know better how to deal with it. You allow yourself to accept the loss, to heal, and move on. This will take time.
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reader, darecooldude  +, writes (14 September 2013):
Dude you are really awesome.you explained evrythng,every detail so well.
You are right, why do I need someone? If I really need someone to live with whom I can't live without, so that person might have borned with me, attached to me but I we are born alone and so We can live happy being single till we find a great match for us..!!
But next time I will be beware not to get that much attached to someone whom I love!!
Now I can say I am not sad/depressed much as I used to be before, now I am feeling excited about my breakup..whch I am gng to do.soon..!!
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reader, anonymous, writes (3 September 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionHello, janniepeg!
We often wonder why people won't let go of someone that isn't reciprocating love anymore; or why we can't shake that longing for someone when our conscious mind knows they have moved on. The love we feel is real; but the agony and difficulty of letting go, may go just beyond that.
Thank you very much for your comment, and reading my post.
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reader, janniepeg  +, writes (31 August 2013):
 Love addiction is the silent killer. It has no form and invisible. There is no AA program or rehab. But the emotional damage is just as bad as a wrecked liver. There is indeed a broken heart syndrome. It's scary to think that our obsessive mind can be our greatest enemy.
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reader, anonymous, writes (27 August 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you.
The length is to be inclusive of those who want their particular issue to be addressed. People want to see their own problems in order to relate.
I appreciate that you took the time.
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reader, emptypenguin +, writes (27 August 2013):
I read the whole thing. It was long but very enlightening and helpful. Thank you.
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