Learning how to live and love after heartbreak

At the start of this year, I wrote a blog post called Grief. It was probably the most personal thing I've written and especially the most personal thing I've ever posted online. It's also my most read article, which still surprises me to this day. I didn't think my story of heartbreak and pain would resonate with so many readers but I'm glad it did and that some of you found solace in it.

So, I thought I'd check back in nearly 11 months later as to where I'm at now in terms of the healing and grieving process. The first three-four months were the worst. In the first month alone post break-up I lost six kilograms; I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep and I no longer had a daydream to get lost in, which hurt the most. At the end of the first month was my twenty-first birthday party, which my ex, let's call him Sam, had helped plan with me. I still had an amazing time, but it was full of awkwardness. For the first thing, Sam rocked up hungover and wearing a shirt that I'd bought him not long ago for this birthday (triggered) and we kept finding ourselves sharing the same chair and still looking into each others eyes and cackling at each others jokes. I didn't help that Sam was the only person there that my little brother knew, so he clung to Sam all evening. He still hasn't fully wrapped his head around the fact that we are no longer together, although I've tried so hard to explain to him.

In February, I still felt incredibly bruised. On Valentines Day, I forced one of my best girlfriends to go out for a drink with me and see a theatre show, just so that I wouldn't be alone at home crying. On the day, I put a Facebook post up saying that if anyone was finding Valentine's Day hard to deal with this this year, then they could message or call me anytime. It surprised me how many people did. It was also in February that my best friend had a birthday party, which Sam was still invited to, in which there was a lot of alcohol consumed. This lead to me getting even more emotional when I saw Sam talking to another girl or what I thought, was him ignoring me. It resulted in me trying to run and hide away from Sam whenever I had to cry and Sam trying to find me. It ended with a stranger finding me, me telling the stranger how I was feeling and the stranger having a chat with Sam, which lead to Sam going home without saying goodbye to me. I think that hurt the most of all.

In March, I met up with Sam in the city and I read him a story that I wrote about our relationship. It's called the Yellow Submarine, because that's what we used to call his bright yellow car, and it's about two people that fall in love and then fall out of it. I recently read it out loud at an open mic night and made everyone in the front two rows bawl their eyes out, so I'm thinking that it must contain some powerful stuff. When I read to Sam in that restaurant I was bawling my eyes out throughout all of it and I could hear him sobbing as well. I say hear as my eyes were so blurry that I couldn't lift them off of the paper, even though I'd memorised the story by heart. For me, writing has always been a form of catharsis and this felt like my first step of moving forward.

A week after our meet up came the two months of lock down, which I think made the healing process quicker as well as brought us closer. We would watch Killing Eve together virtually and then call and discuss about it, stuff like that. However, this was also the time that I noticed that Sam had started drinking more and he'd often text me when he was drunk. Sometimes even call me and he'd often say things subconsciously that would hurt me and I'd patiently listen. Whenever we had these drunk conversations it always left me feeling more hurt then when I started. Eventually I had a chat with him about them and he stopped messaging me when he was in that state and then I started missing his drunk messages. It's strange as to what the heart yearns for. During this time was also when a good friend and I made a short film (virtually, I might add) called Waiting which was about grief, which was another moment of catharsis.

Flash forward to July in which I came to the realisation that I'd always have a place in my heart for Sam and that I'd always love him but I was no ready to move forward with the pain. In short, I thought that I was ready to start seeing other people. After a guy that I'd been seeing for three weeks said that he was no longer interested and I ugly cried in his living room so hard as it felt like it was Sam breaking up with me all over again; it turned out that I wasn't exactly ready to get back on the dating bandwagon. My friends were very very supportive at this time and reminded me to take everything at my own pace.

When I thought I was ready to give dating another try, I met up with a guy who was really lovely but wasn't the right fit for me. Soon after that, I found myself crushing hard on another boy. We'd been talking for a few weeks and had a lot in common. The only problem was that he lived in New South Wales so he came up to Brisbane for a weekend and we had the most amazing time, but that was all the time we could have. We still keep in contact though via social media, but it's just as friends now. As you can imagine, it was quite frustrating that distance was the thing that was keeping us apart and the pain of that impacted both of us quite significantly.

That was July and now we're approaching near the end of August and Sam and I have managed to build and maintain a healthy friendship. To be quite frank, I didn't think I'd be able to do it as he hurt me really badly and, what I felt at the time, was beyond repair. He'd torn out all of my insides and I was left with a cacophony of pain. He was my first big love and I truly thought that we were going to be endgame; that he would be standing by my side and me beside his, when we were achieving our respective dreams. And when someone doesn't feel the same way you do and when someone stops fighting for you without telling you (yes, I still have no closure) it truly hits you like a tonne of bricks and the bruises linger for quite some time. But, I did it. We did it.

It was also in August that him and two of my friends (one whom I spent Valentine's Day with) start creating our own theatre show which we hope to stage in January. That was a big leap for us, but we haven't yet jumped into any hurdles. Apart, we work much better creatively then when we were together. Weird, right? There are still moments when I remember how it once was between us and normally those are the moments in which Sam shows me kindness and care. Like when I kept passing out from having an endo flare at uni and Sam insisted on driving me home or when Sam and I have deep and meaningfuls in his car before he drops me off at the train station.

We recently had a very big conversation and it was about my romantic life. Since early September, I'd starting seeing a guy, let's call him Mark, and after two months. At the start of us dating, I had my walls up around me, protecting me from any incoming storm of pain. I'd told Mark about my experiences with heartbreak this year and he completely understand and supported me/continues to support me with that journey. His last relationship had also been a long term relationship so he understood where I was at. When you first start dating someone new, you're in this weird limbo space in which whenever you make a new memory with your new partner you're reminded of the first time you made that memory with your ex. It could be something mundane like the first time you brushed your teeth together to the first time you said I love you. I've come to acknowledge that I have the power to make this reminders feel more painful or not, but I'm still working on that.

When I told Sam about Mark, I was scared. I'm still very protective of Sam and didn't want him feeling hurt, even though he was the one who hurt me in the first place. So it broke my heart a bit when Sam said that he was feeling hurt but it filled me up a bit when he said that he was glad that I was happy again and that he didn't think I'd be ready to date again for a long time because he too saw and experienced how crumbled I became after our break up. That conversation happened about three weeks ago and now, we often talk about Mark and Sam will always ask how he is. It still feels strange, talking about your new partner and your new forever person to who you thought was going to be your forever person, but I'm sure it'll get easier over time.

It also surprised how much in a bit under two months, I'd grown to love Mark as I honestly didn't think that I'd be able to love again. I was finally out of the woods and in the clearing with a person who'd given me so much these past few months, that I don't know how I'll ever be able to repay him. A person whose face I wake up to see every morning, who kisses me on the forehead and wraps his arms around me as soon as I wake up and reminds me how beautiful I am and how lucky he is. A person who makes all of the pain I felt this year worth it.

So there you have it, that's my recount of the last few months. It's hard to grieve and it's even harder to move forward from or with it. But once you do and when you do, you'll be blanketed by an aura of peace and happiness. You'll have your glow back and you'll realise just how much you missed having that glow.

It might feel awful right now, but you've got this.