Heartbreak

5 Reasons Getting Over A Breakup Hurts So Bad

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The fact that you can't stop hurting after a breakup is natural. But it doesn't have to last forever!

Getting over a breakup isn't easy. It can take a long time to heal, and in the meantime, can feel like it will never end.

Are you wondering why you can’t stop hurting after a breakup? Are you totally miserable, having a hard time getting past it and wondering why?

If you can’t stop hurting after a breakup, know that you are not alone. Letting go of love is challenging and takes time.

Good for you for taking the steps to figure out why you are feeling this way. Believe it or not, it is possible to let go of the pain and get on with your life.

While it’s not surprising that you are still hurting because your heart has been damaged, there are other, sometimes-surprising reasons you can’t stop hurting after a breakup.

Those reasons might be easier to manage if you have some awareness about them.

RELATED: How To Get Over A Breakup In One Hour (Really!)

Here are 5 surprising reasons why you're still hurting while getting over a breakup.

1. You have a fear of never being loved again.

When you're going through the pain of a breakup, you're experiencing fear in many forms.

You're afraid you'll be forever alone, and maybe that no one will ever love you again. You're afraid you're unlovable, that you’re flawed, that you'll never be happy, or that your dreams of marriage and a family will never come true.

These fears are certainly understandable. But fortunately, they are most likely completely unfounded — even if they feel really true to you in this moment.

I've never yet met someone who broke up and never found another person to love. There are millions of people out there, and at least one more of them is out there waiting for you.

You’re definitely not unlovable or flawed — you just weren’t well-matched with your ex. You will be happy again. I know that it’s hard to imagine right now as you go through the pain of a breakup, but you will be!

There's still plenty of time for your dreams to come true.

One of the reasons you feel so much pain is because of your fear. So, take a look at what you’re afraid of and question if what you fear is really true.

2. You're lonely and bored.

You can’t stop hurting after a breakup and believe you'll never be happy again. And these feelings are warranted, but a lot of your pain comes from sheer loneliness and boredom.

When you break up with someone, you lose a playmate. Someone to watch TV with, to go out to dinner with, to fool around with, to just hang out with during those downtimes. And now, you don’t have that person.

For a lot of people, when they're feeling depressed after a breakup, they stop doing things. They don’t feel like doing things because they are depressed, but they also aren’t used to doing things without their person, so they don’t do anything at all.

As a result, they're bored and lonely and spend lots of time thinking about their ex and they get depressed.

RELATED: After Our Breakup, I Hallucinated And Saw My Awful Ex Everywhere

I would encourage you to do whatever you can to keep yourself busy. I know it’s hard during these times of COVID to keep yourself busy, but now is the time to work to do so.

FaceTime with friends, read books, get into shape, learn something new, watch rom-coms; whatever you can do to keep yourself busy and not bored.

Honestly, you might not be missing your ex as much as you think you are. Keeping yourself busy might prove that!

3. You feel like you wasted so much time.

It’s interesting — many of my clients can’t stop hurting after a breakup, because they lament the time that they invested in their ex.

Everyone has hopes and dreams and when they lose someone, they feel like they have had to let go of their hopes and dreams forever.

Many people stay in relationships that aren’t serving them because they have "invested so much time already." They don’t want to have to go back to online dating and start all over again.

So, they stay. And then, when the relationship eventually fails anyway, they have wasted even more time.

Furthermore, people who can’t stop hurting after a breakup are often preoccupied with the fact that they had to let go of hopes and dreams about this relationship.

They rue spending so much time trying to achieve those hopes and dreams that they didn’t see the reality of their unhappy relationship.

If you’re obsessing about the time wasted in a relationship with your ex, let it go. Yes, it ultimately didn’t work out, but I'm guessing you had some really good times and perhaps you even learned some things about yourself that will help you in future relationships.

4. You question who you are in the world.

What you don’t realize is that when you’re feeling depressed after a breakup, it’s because you’re feeling bad about yourself.

If you’re left by someone, you question why you weren’t good enough. If you do the leaving, you wonder what is wrong with us that you can’t find a steady relationship.

You truly believe that you’re flawed in some deep way, and that you'll never be happy.

There's nothing wrong with you. Yes, you weren’t well-matched with your ex, but that doesn’t mean you’re flawed.

Of course, you can take a good look at yourself and see what you've learned over the course of the relationship. But that doesn’t mean that you’re damaged or unlovable in any way.

You, like anyone, are a work in progress and a human being. If someone doesn’t see how amazing you are, they aren’t worthy of you.

If you chose a partner in error, remember you all make mistakes. The important thing is to pick yourself back up, have faith in yourself and your ability to connect, and keep on looking for your happily ever after!

You’re absolutely worthy of a happily ever after!

5. You can't see the big picture.

One of the things people really don’t notice when can’t stop hurting after a breakup is that there is a whole lot more depressing stuff going on in the world. And those things make your pain over the breakup worse.

Ask yourself, what are you struggling with these days, other than your breakup? Are some of those things that you haven’t dealt with because focusing on your broken heart is easier?

If the answer is yes, understand that part of the pain that you’re feeling are those things and not just your broken heart!

The fact that you're struggling with getting over a breakup is totally natural.

It’s not fun, but it’s natural.

It's surprising that oftentimes, what you feel is causing so much pain — the end of your relationship — is not necessarily the only thing that is making us depressed.

You’re depressed because you’re afraid of the future, because you’re bored, because you’re struggling with wasted time and self-doubt, and because the world is a hard place to cope with these days.

So, as you ride out your broken heart, know that you'll get through this time and out the other side better than ever!

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Mitzi Bockmann is an NYC-based certified life coach and mental health advocate. She works exclusively with women to help them to be all that they want to be in this crazy world in which we live. Contact her for help or send her an email.

This article was originally published at Let Your Dreams Begin. Reprinted with permission from the author.