Navigating Heartbreak During the Season of Love.
There is no good season for heartbreak. There is no perfect time to lose out on love or feel shattered inside. If there was, there would be a scheduled time of the year for everyone to choose when to break up, and people would do it then. The truth is that heartbreak is challenging at any point, anywhere, any time. But especially a Valentine’s Day season break up.
During heartbreak, it is natural to feel more alone, to struggle with knowing how to take care of yourself, and to find yourself having trouble believing that you will get through the painful chapter that heartbreak brings on. The truth is that it will take time. But with patience and taking each day one day at a time, you will heal. Healing is nonlinear, meaning that it may feel like one step forward, two steps backwards, repeat. But time gives us the gift of space and of perspective, and although it may feel impossible that you will ever feel okay, there are certainly ways to support yourself during the hardest parts. The only way is through.
Here are some tools to support yourself with evidence-based techniques to help during the harder chunk of time, the beginning. The beginning is always the hardest.
1.Reframe and reality test:
Often, during heartbreak, we can easily slip into the comparison game. We may begin to think in all or nothing phrases (take note if you catch yourself using words like always, never all, or none!). Often, this can lead us to (naturally) compare ourselves to others. If you catch yourself thinking things like “everyone else is with someone” or “I will never find love” it is important to actively challenge those beliefs. This narration is not helpful or useful. Observe those all or nothing words. But if you are going to entertain evidence for those beliefs, the evidence against those beliefs also deserves some air time. Pretend you’re in a debate competition and you are on both teams. Make a list (even if you have to fake it ‘till you make it) of all the reasons that those statements are not true. Make space in your psyche for those ways of thinking to be confronted and challenged. Do this as much as you need to. Practice is helpful for internalizing reframing.
2. Mindfulness exercises to stay grounded through emotional moments:
During heartbreak, we can often become overwhelmed with intense emotion. In moments where we feel completely out of control and unable to ground ourselves through pain or discomfort, it can be helpful to have tools on hand to stabilize.
Listen to an anxiety reducing frequencies playlist (they have plenty on Spotify and Apple music), which is soothing music that calms our nervous system down by signaling to our neural pathways to decrease our anxiety and encourage relaxation.
Create a calm down kit: put together a pouch or an easily transportable box with some of your favorite many little things that tap into various senses. You can pull this out whenever you need it! Engaging in as many senses as you can helps us ground ourselves when we are overwhelmed. For example, a soothing lotion or essential oil, a piece of gum or candy, a fidget toy, etc.
Journaling has empirical evidence that supports how much it helps improve mental health, sleep, and our immune systems.
Reading is a very mindful technique.
Using an adult coloring book can be extremely mindful.
Practice breathing techniques (look up five finger breathing, square breathing, or alternate nostril breathing.
3. Redirect Energy: When we are navigating heartbreak, we can often feel lonelier or less motivated. However, the longer and more we isolate, the worse our mental health will get. It is always important to take time for yourself, but if you are feeling stuck and like you have too much time on your hands, think about engaging in some of these ways of redirecting your extra time and energy:
Pick up a new hobby you’ve been wanting to try.
Set a goal for yourself, like a reading goal, creative goal, exercise goal - anything you can work towards.
Invest in your family and friendships.
Invest in your work/career.
Explore new spots in your neighborhood - like a new coffee shop, museum, etc.
4. Sit and feel the feelings:
Sometimes, there is nothing to do but to sit in your feelings, and that is okay. The best thing to do, is to make sure you do not repress your feelings, or worst of all, judge them! No emotion is wrong. No feeling is shameful. You deserve to feel it all. You are who you are and your feelings are valid. Invite them in. Pushing them away or choosing numbing behaviors only works temporarily. Those feelings will come out in one way or another, eventually. Often if we choose later, they come out in more confusing and destructive ways. Here are some ways to sit with your feelings:
Label them: Name your emotions without judgment, just observe them as they come up in you without pushing them away.
Body awareness: Observe where in your body you feel the emotions physically come up.
Mindfulness: Practice operating as a third party observer of your thoughts and emotions. Pretend you’re watching them from a far passing through you without getting pulled down and entirely caught up in them.
Acceptance: Give yourself permission to feel each feeling in its entirety. Don’t try to change the feeling.
Remind yourself of your values: Remind yourself of what is important to you and focus on choosing to operate in alignment with your values, regardless of if you are experiencing difficult emotions or not.
5. Self worth work:
Breakups can sometimes lead to us feeling quite self deprecating. The reality is that during a break up, we need to enhance our self love and self compassion more than ever. We deserve kindness, gentle empathy, and acceptance towards ourselves. Sometimes that can be hard to access. Here are some ways to practice self compassion during heartbreak:
Daily affirmations
Gratitude list/journaling
If you can, get a hold of The Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook: A Proven Way to Accept Yourself, Build Inner Strength, and Thrive by Kristin Neff & Christopher Germer and read one chapter a day.
You will get through – don’t forget to breathe and to put one foot in front of the other.
If you or someone you know is interested in receiving support surrounding relationships, we encourage you to connect with one of our talented clinicians here.