The Top 10 Things Not To Do After A Breakup

[Rachel-Russo]

When it comes to starting over with dating and relationships, knowing what you don't want is just as important as knowing what you do want. Likewise, after a breakup, it is crucial to know what you should and should not be doing to heal your heart.

If you want to leave the past behind and move yourself forward toward a happier, healthier relationship, here's what not to do:

1. Feel overly sorry for yourself: Everyone goes through a breakup at one point or another. You are not the only one with a broken heart.

2. Focus on your regrets: You can't change the past. If you learned something from the relationship, it was not as waste of time.

3. Stifle your emotions: It is okay (and often necessary for growth)to get angry and cry.

4. Put pressure on yourself to get over your ex on a timeline: As I always say, you can't turn feelings on an off like a faucet. Getting over your ex does not happen overnight.

5. Engage in destructive behavior: A breakup is not an excuse to abuse alcohol and drugs, have random, unprotected sex with strangers, or neglect your responsibilities in life. It is definitely a big mistake to have sex with your ex.

6. Be fooled into believing that you need "closure" to get over your ex: There is no such thing as the perfect conversation that helps mend your broken heart. You'll heal because you want and need to--not because your ex said something that made you feel better.

7. Contact your ex when you are sad, bored, or missing him/her: For some time after the breakup, you should adopt a no-contact-policy. It is too hard to attempt friendship when you are still grieving the loss.

8. Stalk your ex on social media: This is so counterproductive. Remember: Out of sight, out of mind.

9. Stay in close contact with your ex's friends and family: Now is not the time to be painfully reminded of your ex or have the false hope that the people close to him/her can bring you back together.

10. Romantacizing your past relationship; thinking that your ex is "the one that got away": Yes, your ex got away, and that is a good thing. Because your relationship was broken. If you believe there is someone else better out there for you, there will be!

Want to know what else you shouldn't do if you want to get over your ex? Check out my "50 Shades of Forgetaboutit" in my book, How To Get Over Your Ex: A Step By Step Guide To Mend A Broken Heart Italian American Style for forty more things not to do after a breakup.

Come get an autographed copy of this unique Italian American-themed breakup book at my next book signing event on February 5, 2015 in NYC's "Little Italy". Details about this fun, interactive event here.

[dragonfly6516]

I disagree with number 6. Without closure, you'll keep falling for them, or dwelling on them. Yes you do actually need closure, and it comes in many forms, Sometimes, it's as simple as YOU growing and changing into someone who no longer believes they need what that person once was to you. Other times, it's learning to get for yourself what you relied on them to get for you.

[Anonymous]

Another one should be don't rebound and give time to yourself. It's not fair to the rebounded and puts them in that cycle like it did to me.

[Rachel-Russo]

Good points! Be strong enough to stand on your own and not jump into the arms of someone else.

[Opinion Owner]

Well the thing is since I've never had a formal relationship, not that I haven't dated, but it's never led to anything and the closest thing to a relationship was being rebounded and it hurt like hell. Took a long time to get over it.

[Dargil]

The essence of 6 through 10, all valid, is simple. Never Look Back.
Further:
You may or may not be the principal cause of the breakup.
You may or may not have substantial complicity in the breakup.
Your (probably faulty) decision to enter the relationship in the first place may be the limit of your responsibility, compounded only by acquiescing when you should not have and attempting to "make it work" when it could not work.
You cannot know the truth during the early aftermath, Don't try and don't seek counseling either paid or free. Not even from your pastor. The only way you will find answers is with the passage of time. Your mind will work on it subconsciously and a "knowing" will gradually emerge. Be humble both in the good news I really WAS a good guy/girl) and in the bad (I really WAS an A-Hole).

Here's a handy tool.
Get a few sheets of Legal lined paper. Separate it into two columns
Head the column on the left "He/She Is:
Head the column on the right "He/She is Not:
List entries for any attribute you consider even the least bit significant. Personality traits. Ethnicity. Physical assets. Sexual appetites. Personal habits. Strain your brain for as many as you can come up with. Almost nothing is too trivial. Be intricately detailed on personality traits. You will develop a profile of who you want in your life and you will learn about yourself in the process, where you were realistic and unrealistic. You will also develop a structural knowledge as to why your breakup was inevitable and what to look for to prevent another. As you meet prospects, apply them to the list and don't try to mold them to it. We can adapt but we really can't change wither ourselves or others much.

After a recent catastrophic breakup I learned this. In getting with her, I had made the wrong decision for all the right reasons. I loved what I wanted her to be, not what she was. If I had used The List, I would have known better.

[DodgersGM]

I enjoyed this, thanks for sharing.

I believe that #7 (and by extension, #8 and #( as well) and #10 are particularly important in terms of what GaGers deal with. I see a lot of questions where people have broken up, but they have not broken free, and they also would benefit from focusing on what went "wrong" vs. romanticizing the good moments.

[fiego]

@Rachel-Russo This is very interesting, thanks for sharing. Might I suggest a follow up myTake..."10 things to do after a breakup" I would love to get your take on these.

[JoshyJames]

very well written, I few months back I had the same problem after trying some of the techniques listed above, things got better and now I am over that relationship

[kittykatg]

You forgot to mention not to get a hair cut. No worse hair cut then the break up hair cut.

[Ballerinasinger3]

i was gonna say that!!

[muspelhem_3]

I think everyone pretty much knows these things already. That doesn't mean people won't do them, we're just human after all. But thanks for stating the obvious.

[muspelhem_3]

Sorry. That was mean.

[KleinTeef]

You forgot begging your ex for his/her back and being friends with them. In my opinion staying friends with an ex prevents you from properly moving on.

[crystalt70]

That's part of #7. There's also 40 more things listed in her book. She only listed ten of fifty here.

[LotusFIowerBomb]

Think I got lucky because I did not do these :)) awesome take

[Prof_Don]

Good advice... but those points are MUCH easier said than done!

[Anonymous]

What if I was forced to end my relationship, and there was no reason to break up other that being forced?

[Rachel-Russo]

Hmmm... It will be harder to get over it if you didn't want it to end. But the same rules apply. Sometimes parents force it, circumstances force it, or someone treats us so badly that we have to end it if we have any sense of self-respect. The same rules apply of what is good to do and not to do--regardless of how the relationship ended.

[crystalt70]

My relationship was forced to end after 13 years with three kids and one on the way. He found somebody else. I was devastated. We had been together since the age of 16 and I was so in love with him. It took me a long time to get over it and he made things hard for me in many ways. Especially since he refused to fully let me go. HE kept trying to come back and still felt like he had a claim to me. I was the one who had to fight against it. Things aren't always so cut and dry.

[Opinion Owner]

I think I didn't explain myself.
I got married to a guy, whom my family accepted quickly, but our marriage didn't last. A juedge of the country I was living in, decided out of the blue to made void our marriage, forcing us to end it. We found out later he was in love with my twin sister and had abused from his power, she (my twin) did everything to fix what he had done; last year he was put behind bars for corruption.

[kat511]

#5 is the worst of the top 10 worst things to do after a break up.

[Unit1]

"Out of sight, out of mind."

We are ghosts :)

Very nice! GJ

[YourFutureEx]

Thanks for the line "Out of sight, out of mind."

[JackKerouac77]

Interesting take. Thanks for this.

[PhiOmega]

#5 sounds like a hard one

[zombiebabe]

interesting!

[GoldCobra]

looks good!

[Rachel-Russo]

Thank you!

[Anonymous]

thank you very much