How do you react to the end of a love story? Each person will have a different reaction, with feelings that are close to those of real mourning. Discover the psychologist’s advice below to overcome it.When an important relationship ends, each of us can have very different reactions as it depends on the relational and emotion management strategies that we have learned during our life history. What many ignore, however, is that the end of a love relationship can be characterized by experiences similar to those of mourning .
The mourning of love
Although it is clearly a different kind of loss, it is still the loss of an important person, which therefore involves an experience similar to mourning. This obviously does not happen if the feeling has vanished before the breakup.
Those who face this moment still feeling important feelings for the other person, could experience a period that varies from a few weeks to 6 months, characterized by:
- intense sadness
- change in appetite
- decreased interest in pleasurable activities
- greater need to isolate oneself
Although these symptoms, if intense and prolonged over time, are the same as those present in depressive disorders, the fact that they are directly caused by the loss of the partner does not make them subject to diagnosis if they decrease in the time frame indicated above . For this reason, they do not require specific treatment, although it is still possible to request psychological support if necessary.
How to deal with this period
If you have faced it in the past, or are facing it now, you know how the phrase “Don’t think about it” is not at all useful to lighten the situation.
To manage the change and the emotional burden of the end of the love story, you can try to follow these tips:
- The first thing to do is to accept what you feel , whether you feel sadness, anger, fear, every emotion has a reason to be there in this moment and deserves to be lived. This will not make you weaker, but will allow you to have more awareness of what you feel to manage it better.
- Give yourself time, don’t rush to let everything pass , every important thing leaves its mark and requires patience to be managed. Know that it is normal to feel such intense emotions even after a few weeks, but you will notice that over time they will become less intense and less frequent.
- Pamper yourself a little. In times of sadness like these we need to pamper ourselves and take care of our suffering. Do pleasant activities, eat something good, watch your favorite TV series, take a hot bath, and so on. Create your own list of things that make you feel a little better so you know what to do in the most difficult moments.
- Even if in these moments we are led to isolate ourselves a little more, remember that we need to be in relationships to better regulate emotions. Give yourself time to spend with the people you love most.
- Express what you feel, don’t keep it all inside. You can vent with some friends or relatives, you can write a diary or you can turn to a psychologist who will welcome you in this critical moment.
