After the Breakup

This is a short story about heartbreak. About losing so many aspects in (my) life. Losing my faith in love and relationship. Losing my trust in me. Losing my pride. Losing my joy. Losing some reasons of my happiness, my peace of mind, my dream. I’m losing a man I once loved dearly.

I’m ready now to write down this wistful story. I have passed all those stages I read everywhere on the Internet. Interestingly, those stages are not actually sequential. It’s not that once you crossed one stage, you can only move forward to the next stage. No, it doesn’t work that way, especially when the breakup is relatively fresh (I said “relatively” because everyone has their own timeline, and that’s totally fine). I’m approaching my fourth month now from the breakup. I feel stronger than ever. I can see things more clearly and I understand and accept that the breakup was necessary, the breakup was the right thing.

One important thing I learned this time is: not to be so hard on myself. “Don’t beat yourself up!” Seriously. If you’re going through a breakup, for whatever reason and whatever circumstances, don’t be too hard on yourself. Instead, take a good care of yourself. Acknowledge the pain (which may cause you doing things you won’t be proud of in a normal situation). Believe that you’re doing the best thing you could do at a given state of affairs. Always.

I still cry now and then. I’m torn. I feel my heart breaks again every time I realize that he fell out of love with me. Although… I also didn’t feel the way I used to feel about him. You know those feelings. How you don’t see the personality you were falling in love with. Getting to know more about each other made us realized how different we are. We want very different things. We became more distant. We became more easily irritated towards each other. Until the day came. The day when we agreed to break our tie. We cried like we never did before. We loved each other that much.

Now, at this point I finally have everything sorted out clearly. That fog hanging on my head is lifted up. The reason of the breakup was so simple. We are not the right person for each other. We tried. We tried real hard to make it work, for the love reason. But there were many other things didn’t fit between us: the dreams, the growing pace, the vision of what and where we want to be.

It’s not easy to accept those facts. It’s actually really painful. Because it’s not just merely about losing the love, but about all those dreams and hopes that have been built are now shattered, drifted to the gutter.

But there is an up side. I’m not only losing in this game. I’m gaining too. Life lesson is the obvious and direct reward from the hardship. Strength, patience, new perspective, time to explore who I am and what I really want in a relationship and in life, and most  of all: detached happiness (the kind of happiness that starts inside me, not others).

That is the beauty of breakup. We actually become a better person. The Failed Relationship is like one subject in the University of Life and the real breakup is like the test we should go through and pass. By now I have taken this class several times and I know for sure at least I get a B+ this time. I don’t intend to attend this class again to get an A, though.

Lastly, when you’re going through a breakup, take your time to heal. Seek for support from your closest friends, perhaps family too (if you are close to them). Browse the Internet to get a wealth of tips and advice to help you; pick the ones suit you. Fortunately for us, it’s not a close book test :).