How To Go from "I Want Him Back" to Moving on
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It’s possible to find your strength and power again
You broke up, but can’t stop thinking about him even though the weeks have turned into months.
The ending was abrupt and left you feeling deserted, rejected and discarded.
There were so many beautiful days and moments together and the connection felt so special and different. You can’t make sense of the ending and why you’re not together anymore.
You thought there was a real soul and spirit connection there and you still cling on to that feeling, despite knowing he is already moving on.
You watch his social media accounts to see what he is doing now without you and feel intense pangs of sadness, anger, even jealousy.
You try to distract yourself with exercise, work and “working on yourself” but even so, you just can’t accept it’s really over.
It’s hard to sleep and your focus and concentration at work and at home is compromised. Your goals for your life now seem more distant than ever. What happened? You used to feel so driven, happy, even confident most times. Now you feel like you’re closing off a part of yourself and dimming down that light inside of you.
You wish you could just make him see what he lost. You fantasize about getting him back, him calling or texting to reconnect. He’ll once again shower you with attention and you’ll go on the travels and adventures you always talked about. The thoughts are often uncontrollable now and you give in to them because it’s the only thing left to hold onto. All of the excitement comes rushing back as you imagine laying together on the beach, holding hands as you explore new cities together, talking and talking into the early hours of the morning. Even just imagining lazy days in bed with nowhere to go fills you with a kind of hope that gives you something that feels important, meaningful, something to live for?
Your heart aches with the yearning. To feel loved, seen, understood and the exciting and fulfilling feeling of seeing eye to eye on so many things. The heart and intellectual connection you always longed for. You miss the companionship. The daily calls and check in texts. And the feeling of finally feeling…. Less alone in the world?
How to move on when it feels impossible right now:
Feeling the Feelings
It’s normal to want to escape the pain. You may turn to fantasy as a way to avoid facing painful feelings and live in the hope that he may come back to you. It might not be obvious, but you've developed this strategy as a way to avoid mourning the relationship that you had, the real feelings that you felt and the real person who you loved. When you stay in the past and reimagine the feelings and experiences you had with this person, you’re hiding out from the present and all of the new experiences that you can be participating in. But guess what? It’s impossible to do that until you fully mourn the relationship and find an inner closure so that you can move on, without hanging on.
Moving on, Without Hanging On
Sometimes relationship endings are not ideal and leave you hanging on and struggling for closure. Instead of turning the ending inward as a flaw inside of you that makes you feel unlovable and rejectable, I can help you to acknowledge the good parts of the relationship, help you process what you learned from it and integrate the pain and grief. You will learn to be with your feelings as they come up in a way that doesn’t feel overwhelming or scary. You will learn to soothe your own heart and not push emotions away as difficult feelings come up.
We’ve all tried a strategy where we tell ourselves that we just need to move on with our lives (date other people, get in shape, work on ourselves) and that will solve the issue of getting over a particular person or relationship that felt especially profound or connected. Rarely does this work because the unmourned grief can pop up again when least expected or even when your life seems to be going alright. A song, a particular smell or even seeing them in passing may be a trigger that brings you right back. Suddenly, you’re stuck back in the loop of not being able to get the person off your mind and you struggle to stop yourself from trying to reach out or wishing and praying they will reach out to you.
If you’re stuck on “getting him back,” there is a way to feel better that gets to the root of why it’s so hard to let go, so you can start to move on for real.
I help clients find inner closure on relationships that ended abruptly, whether you were ghosted or just floored by an unexpected decision to end the relationship by your partner or person you were dating. If you are tired of hanging onto the hope but still aren’t able to let go, even though you want to, I can help you go from “I need him back” to “why do I want him back?”
After working with me, clients often remark, “I thought that all I wanted was to have him back, now I wonder why I wanted him back. I finally feel free.”
