I Don’t Know How To Move On From My Ex & It’s Killing Me

I want to find real love but there’s one thing holding me back: the former love of my life. I really do want to move on and let go of what we had, I just have no idea how to do that. No matter what I try, I can’t seem to stop thinking about my ex.

  1. We spent many years together. It wasn’t like we were together for a few months and I can’t get over a short-lived relationship—we were each other’s everything for years. We built a life together and then one day that life was just over. He was my routine every single day for not weeks, not months, but years. He might be technically out of my life now, but after all that time, he seems to be holding a permanent space in my brain.
  2. He’s the first thing I think about each morning and the last each night. The problem is that I’m still in love with him. He was the most important person in my life, my very best friend, and now he’s just gone. It feels like there’s a huge hole in my heart. I’m missing him because he stole a piece of me and I don’t know how to get that piece back.
  3. I can’t help but wonder if he thinks about me too. If our relationship meant so much to me, he must think about me too, right? Otherwise, our relationship was only that good in my head. I dreamed a fairytale where he meant everything to me and I meant nothing to him. I need to know if my heartbreak is one-sided.
  4. Everything reminds me of him. We shared so many memories and it feels like everything in my life is attached to something I did with him. Of course I got rid of all of our relationship mementos after we broke up, but that just wasn’t enough. It didn’t do the trick. My entire home reminds me of him, every place I go in this small town makes me think of him. We were together for too long and he left his mark everywhere and on everything.
  5. Even my subconscious is working against me. I can try to block out my thoughts of him during the day but at night, he haunts my dreams. I wake up in the morning wishing that my dreams in which we were still together were real. Then I come back to reality and feel the pain of heartbreak all over again. If I can’t keep him out of my thoughts when I’m awake, how am I supposed to control it in my sleep?
  6. I really thought we had a future. Now I don’t know how to give up on that future. We planned out our whole lives together and since we broke up, it just feels like all my dreams were shattered. I thought he was “The One” and I don’t know how to get over that. I spent so long dreaming of the life I thought we were going to have. I’m not just trying to move on from a man, I’m trying to give up on a dream that I never imagined wouldn’t come true.
  7. Every guy I meet just doesn’t compare to him. I wish I could meet someone who would get my mind off of my ex but I never do. I try to put myself out there, flirt; I try to find someone, anyone, to distract me from him but they never do. At the end of the night, all I can think about is the fact they’re not my ex. No one has made my heart skip a single beat and I haven’t felt any butterflies or met a single soul I have a real interest in. My biggest worry is that my ex was the one for me, my last shot, and that I’ll never feel real love for anyone but him.
  8. No matter what I do, I can’t seem to forget. I’ve tried everything to get him out of my head but he’s stuck in there like gorilla glue. I wish I could just forget everything he was to me and everything we had but I can’t. He’s a vital part of so many of my greatest memories. I want the bad times to overpower my brain but every time I look back, all I seem to remember is the good.
  9. I just keep analyzing our relationship over and over again in my head. I’m still trying to make sense of where, why, and when things went wrong. We were perfect for each other once upon a time and I need to know what changed. It’s a puzzle I can’t seem to solve and the unanswered riddle is making me obsessed.
  10. I keep looking for distractions but he invades my mind anyway. No matter how busy I keep myself with work, friends, family, hobbies, and everything in between, I still can’t seem to get him out of my head. He’s always in the back of my mind. I’m not sitting at home wallowing in self-pity, I’m out living my life, but at the end of the day, I think about him so much it feels like he’s still with me.
Kelsey Dykstra is a freelance writer based in Huntington Beach, CA. She has a bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing from Grand Valley State University and been writing professionally since graduating in 2013. In addition to writing about love and relationships for Bolde and lifestyle topics for Love to Know, she also writes about payment security and small business solutions for PaymentCloud.

Originally from Michigan, this warm weather seeker relocated to the OC just last summer. Kelsey enjoys writing her own fictional pieces, reading a variety of young adult novels, binging on Netflix, and of course soaking up the sun.

You can find more about Kelsey on her LinkedIn profile or on Twitter @dykstrakelsey.
close-link
close-link