I will never understand how you can love someone and hate them at the same time. How the person who swore they would never hurt you, could hurt you more than your worst enemy ever possibly could. How you can give someone everything and every part of you and when you’ve been completely used up and wrung out to dry, they can drop you like a used rag.
You wake up one day and suddenly you don’t know where or who you are. Things that had seemed so certain for so long are suddenly lost in the wind, floating away so fast you can’t catch them. All you can do is stand helplessly and watch as everything you ever wanted is lost.
Screaming into the void helps a little. It takes the edge off the overwhelming pain but not for long. The brain is actually tricked into thinking heartbreak is a physical pain and oh god can you feel it.
The pain comes in waves. At first the waves are all consuming. They loom over you and take every breath in your body, crashing into you and dragging you completely under. You gasp and struggle and try to scream for help, coming out the other side exhausted and depleted. At first the waves are big and they come often. You hardly have time to stretch your head above water and take a faltering breath before you are pulled right back under again.
Then slowly, as time goes on, the waves become smaller, more manageable. They are nearly as high but not quite as strong. They pull you down but when you kick your legs, you find you can escape the worst of it. Days pass and the waves settle down and suddenly you find you can breathe again. Don’t let this fool you, that’s my best advice. Something will happen. A message will arrive, a photo will flash up, a memory will surface out of nowhere. The waves that hit during those times will be just as hard and just as fast.
But here is the important part. The waves are like energy that enters your body and flows out the other side. You know it will hurt but sit with it, feel the pain, and know without doubt that it will pass on through. Don't try and stop it, don't ignore it or pretend you are okay. Embrace it, live it.
And when the pain is still there but you are now surviving it, it’s time to stop remembering the love as a mystical, earth shattering kind of love. Stop seeing the person you lost as your soulmate, the fairytale ending you always wanted. Stop thinking of the potential, the future plans and the dreams. It’s easy to think of the beginning when everything was special and exciting and romantic, rather than what the relationship really was in the end. Take it out into the light and study it for what it actually was. It felt real but it wasn't. They weren't who they said they were. It seemed like it was forever but it’s over. Whatever you do, don't look for closure, you will never understand why they have hurt you the way they have. But do look at how they treated you and swear never to let someone do that to you again.
And you know what? By walking away, they have done you the best thing they could have ever done for you. Because you deserve to be with someone who wouldn’t walk away. Someone who sees what you are worth and never takes that for granted. Someone who loves everything about you and will never give up at the first hurdle. Someone who loves you for exactly the person you are, not the person they hope you may change into.
So what now? You have experienced the pain, you have processed what happened, but what next?
Your heart has been broken but it will heal. The scar won’t go but that’s ok, it means you will always carry a part of them with you.
Don't let this pain stop you from loving again. Don't become closed. Your heart is broken but you aren't. Someone is out there waiting for you and when you find them, you will understand that you went through this pain to get to them.
My last piece of advice? Look after your heart but not for the next person. Look after it for yourself. Love yourself. If anyone else does, bonus.
Lauren x.
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