Riley Mike - How to heal a broken heart in 30 days: a day-by-day guide to saying goodbye and getting on with your life

How to Heal a Broken Heart in 30 Days

A Day-by-Day
Guide to Saying Good-bye
and Getting On with Your Life

Howard Bronson and Mike Riley

BROADWAY BOOKS NEW YORK

Contents

Tip: Make a Plan for Action

Tip: Cry Till Youre Dry

Tip: Its About Time

Tip: Get a Good Nights Sleep

Tip: Body Support

Tip: The Stress Yardstick

Tip: Reason Trumps Feelings

Tip: Happy Meals

Tip: Water Works

Tip: Keep in Touch

Tip: Get Stoned"

Tip: No Hard Feelings

Tip: Getting Outside Help

Tip: Use Humor; It Heals

Tip: The Breakup Shower

Tip: Breath School

Tip: The Meaning of Suffering

Tip: Being of Sound Mind

Tip: Relaxation Prescription

Tip: In Praise of Paradox

Tip: Good News for Your Nose

Tip: Your Emotional Flashlight

Tip: Affection Protection

Tip: Master Your Subconscious

Tip: Grieving, God, and Giving

Tip: Make Love to Strangers

Tip: Change the Scale

Tip: Open Your Escape Hatch

Tip: Why Fear the Future?

Tip: The Hearts Garden

Introduction

GOOD-BYE. WHAT a strange way to start a book. But thats where our usefulness to you will begin: when you say that very significant good-bye which means Finally, its over. This is the end of an us. I am not going to go back there again. I cant. Or I wont.

After that, a door closes for the very last time, or a telephone handset is placed back in its cold, hard cradle, leaving only stillness and that ache of a final good-bye. Its too soon to be tempered with any faint flecks of hope that its now time, perhaps, to begin to move on.

For those of us lucky enough to become adolescents without suffering the loss of a friend, or a parent or other close family member, the end of our first romantic love often introduces us to deep emotional pain. No matter how many more times we may face that same pain again, as emotionally healthy persons, we know that pain is the irresistible partner to our losses in love.

Now, judging by the fact that youre reading this book, youve come face-to-face with that same pain once again or perhaps for the very first time. So youve purchased this book to help you to tip the balance from desolation to hope, all in just thirty days. Dont expect a perfectly linear process; you wont necessarily feel better with each new day. There may be times when your recovery will hurt. If youve ever suffered from frostbite and then come into a much warmer place, the first thing you experienced was pain before your normal feelings returned.

Who This Book Is For

THIS BOOK'S METHOD is intended for those who have suffered the end of a love relationship, and who want to make a more effective recovery. It doesnt matter whether it was you or the other person who decided to withdraw. It doesnt even matter if youve left your old lover for another. If youve shared a deep and special intimacy with someone, and now that intimacy has ended, you will suffer a loss equal to all of the meaning that relationship once had for you. And if you cant learn from your own mistakes, which played a part in that loss, your mistakes will pursue you in hauntingly familiar ways.

Your loss may provoke a wide assortment of negative emotions. Your specific feelings will depend on the way you parted. Shame, grief, fear, loneliness, rage, jealousy, vengefulness, scorn, and humiliation, felt alone or in combination, are just some of the dark side emotions. But so long as these emotions havent gotten the best of you, so long as you know that your pain will pass in time, we can help you.

Three realizations will guide all of those who have suffered romantic loss out of their pain:

My once primary romantic relationship is now really over.

The end of this relationship is causing me emotional pain.

I want to make this pain come to a healthy and productive end as soon as I can.

Notice that healing first requires you to accept that your intimate relationship is over.

Done. Ended. Finished.

If you believe you can end an important romantic relationship by immediately becoming just friends, our first piece of advice is to forget this idea. When the romantic commitment that underlies a loving relationship dies, it almost always takes time for the person who feels dumped to recover his balance.

Who This Book Is Not For

SINCE YOU MUST acknowledge that your relationship has ended to make use of this book, you must face the truth. This book is not for people who want to cheat on themselves. You can no longer afford to occasionally be intimate with your ex. You certainly cant continue to live together (the horror stories told by people who make this mistake really would curl your hair). Dont use money troubles as an excuse to continue to live together. Get out, now, while you still can. Put away that ring, the cute couple photo, or any lingering references to the two of you as a couple. That means no late-night phone calls to each other just cause Im lonely. Or worse, making those anonymous calls where you dial just to listen to your exs voice saying, Hello? Hello? Hello? (Click.)

The longer you put off facing the pain, the more difficult that pain will be to deal with.

And if you catch yourself secretly stalking your ex to get another glimpse of the one youve lost, get professional help soon. Stalking is a menacing form of potentially dangerous aggression. It is in no way an expression of love.

This book should not be the only remedy sought by people with deep and abiding emotional wounds. We include those people who are:

Addicts, to sex, drugs, or alcohol. Dont forget that denial is easy for an addict to hide behind. If in doubt, we urge you to ask a nonuser friend or relative who knows you well if you have an addiction problem. And this time, try very hard to listen, and, if need be, to get the help and support you need so you can learn to give and receive love in a healthy way in the future.

Abusers, or victims of abuse. If you have inflicted physical harm on a lover, or been abused by another, you need additional help.

People with depressive or bipolar conditions. Anyone who has had a long-standing history of periodic or chronic depression is highly susceptible to relationship sabotage.

Anyone who feels irrational urges to harm himself or another person, or who has urges which threaten to become uncontrollable.

At the very least, we urge any readers who fall into one or more of these classifications to seek help from a group of people with similar problems. Our award-winning website at http://www.byebyelove.com contains a full page of listings of national organizations that can put you in touch with others who share these challenges. It also can help you find experienced professionals who can help you come to terms with your pain. For those who can afford it, personalized professional help, whether just talking with your family doctor or in the form of brief or extended psychotherapy, is also worth considering.

Why You Need to End Contact

IF YOUR RELATIONSHIP truly is over, youve got to give yourself a chance to recover. The person youve parted from is like a drug to you now. Another hit will only maintain your addiction. Accept that its over, now.

For some, facing the need to end contact with their ex will happen in painfully protracted stages. This is particularly true when a parting may lead to divorce. The full price of such endings may take a lifetime to pay. Misgivings and second thoughts are natural, and often wise. But when a final parting is clearly the only way for either party to actively pursue the prospect of happiness, a complete break is the best and often only way. Forget about scripting a perfect partingtheres no such thing. When its time to end it, just do it, and move on.