How long's a piece of string?

The age old question; how long does it take you to get over an ex? Some say half the length of the time of the relationship. When Carrie gets broken up with via post-it note, she famously spends the same amount of time mourning her relationship as he did ending it. Some people hop straight on-to and in-to the next (nightmare) relationship and others take ages, years even. 

I am the latter. 

Historically it takes me ages to get over an ex. I spend many months analysing what went wrong, feeling either absolutely ecstatic to be free from the latest loser or suicidal at the thought of being single. Actually no, it's not that I don't like being single - I actually love fending for myself, I am the ultimate single gal after all, it's more the searing pain of loss I don't like. The way it feels like you've lost a limb. 

Take my last break up for example. It really didn't take me long to realise Mr Boy was never really meant for me. How could he be? I could never be with someone who would break my heart in a blink of an eye. But, I still felt the pain. I missed him so much. Probably too much. Plus I had all the questions that would never get answered. Lots of loose ends and insecurities just floating around all over the place.

I never admit to anyone just how much I still think about him. I think I do this for many reasons but mainly because it's embarrassing. I find the whole situation embarrassing if I'm honest; how was I surprised that a 21 year old boy didn't want to stay committed to a 27 year old woman? I was dumped by a 21 year old for goodness sake. What's more it had/has such an affect on my life and the they way I feel about most things - how could I have let him have that much influence over me? (You see all the questions...?!)

Woman find it romantic when men still pine for them years after the end of their liaison. Men on the other hand label woman desperate and crazy. There's another reason why I keep schtum. 

My Mum hit the nail in the head at the weekend. She said that Mr Boy broke my heart so much that it caused me a lot of damage. She said it will take me a long time to trust someone, to enter into a relationship again and she's definitely not wrong. 

Hello 2016

I love a New Year. It's a fresh start, the perfect time to reflect back on your previous year, learn some lessons and look forward to good times ahead. So here goes my now obligatory New Year resolution post.

This year I want to focus on my personal life, I want to fill my week nights and weekends with creative hobbies and exercise. Of course my job is important, it always has been, but I think I just need to address the work-life balance.

I have publicly committed myself (via Instagram) to a #29ToneUp challenge. In just over 7 weeks I will be turning 29, I am already as slim as I was at 22, now I want to tone up and have the hottest bod I have ever had, like ever. I am running, taking walks and doing yoga. Creatively I am putting my mind to good use with new colouring books and my new fave writing journal; 642 Things To Write About. I also want to publish more on here, so watch this space.

This year, much like two years ago, I want to promise myself lots more fun. I want to get dating, start booking in trips and holidays and I want to spend quality time with good friends. I am so lucky to have so many good friends, a bunch of whom have been around for so long - I kinda take them for granted. They are like my chosen family. I know the ones who will always be in my life and that makes them way more important than any guy who could just walk out of my life with just a moments notice.

Recently I have been feeling so much stronger - physically, thanks to my running and yoga, but also mentally. I think that's thanks to the work I've been doing on myself, work with my councillor and just generally taking better care of myself. I realised a little while ago that I was waiting for the day that I wake up and feel like the old me again, the me before all the Mr Boy heart ache.

That is crazy.

I will never go back to how I was two years ago, I can't, too much life stuff has happened. I am never going to wake up one day like 'Oh great, I'm back'. The sadness I feel about everything that has happened is still there, it will probably always make me feel something - just look at my last post about a guy I haven't even seen for 5 years.

All that feeling is OK. It's normal. I can either choose to let it get to me and make me feel weak or I can choose instead to see how far I have come over the last 5 months and use that to make me feel strong. I totally choose the strong option.

Four Months On

It's been nearly four months since Mr Boy broke up with me in my kitchen, out of the blue, on a random Thursday night. Since I last posted I have completed #100DaysOfHappiness, lost more weight (some people actually describing me as skinny!) and I have started to see a councillor. My new focus is me. I'm trying to get good sleep, watch the alcohol intake and be kind to myself. I've been spending time with friends and family, watching movies and generally enjoying having my house to myself.

Over the last week or so I've actually caught up with a couple of friends I haven't spoken to for a while.

My relationship with the Uni girls is a little complicated but we've been friends nearly ten years. We lived together when were just learning what it's like to be an adult, we've shared many a boy problem and many drunken nights. Whilst in Manchester those three years, these girls were my family. In general I do feel in quite a different stage of my life compared to them. They are really settling down and looking forward to their near distance future of babies and marriages. I suppose it's fair to say I've been reluctant to explain to them my latest relationship break up, especially after telling them nothing but good things whilst I was with Mr Boy.

Last night I caught up with one of them for post-work drinks. It turned out to be really good to talk the past 6 months through with her. Both my Uni girls were surprised when I told them my story - that always helps me to see that it was ok in being shocked too. My friend last night said it was a shame I had invested all that time and effort into something that ended so abruptly - she hit the nail on the head. I explained that at least I've learnt some lessons about guys, her response was 'yea, like you didn't know all that before'. Again, totally right - I've met my fair share of unreliable dudes.

I apologise for still to be rambling on about this four months on. One big worry of mine is that people think I should be over all this by now, that I should be like 'Mr Boy who?' and already be on to the next. I'm sure a few of my friends think that what I had with him isn't anything to miss, especially as some of my friends are dealing with breakups where they were planning their future with these dudes; but the trouble is you just can't help how you feel. If I could I would definitely not still be thinking about it all.  He really hurt me and it takes time to get your head around all that. I'm getting there though.

Good Change

A couple of things have really stood out in the last few months. Pieces of advice I have received, conversations that really stuck to me and that I hope to take forward into the next chapter.

The first one came from my Mum. During one of our late night chats about the mistakes I keep making in relationships, she told me she was furious with the most recent boy. She explained why she was so mad; she felt his actions had made me question myself again, impacting my objective train of thought. She assured me that I had not done anything wrong. She said I was good to him, I was faithful and that the only thing I might be guilty off is that I was so in love with him. And when has that ever been a bad thing? That's a beautiful thing. This chat really helped me see that the break up of our relationship was all down to him, there wasn't anything I could have done to protect my heart. I innocently and quite lovely fell in love with him.

The second piece of advice came from a work friend only last week. One lunchtime I was explaining that for me to truly move past all this I want to know he has regrets. That in itself is a bit narcissistic from my own point of view but nevertheless my very wise and straight thinking colleague helped me see that to admit you've made a mistake to the one person who it affects the most takes such courage. Something I honestly don't think Mr Boy has.

So that's that. These two nuggets of straight forward thinking have helped me out from many a dark moment and I'm sure they will continue to do so over the next few weeks and months.

This weekend marked a milestone. My housemate of two years moved out; pretty much to the date that he moved in. Instead of feeling sad and lonely I'm really looking forward to my time alone on my house. Financially I'm finally at a place that I can comfortably live on my own - that feels amazing. Also for various reasons I don't think I am lonely in my house.

Recently I've been putting myself out there again, chatting to boys, even having a little flirt. It feels good to be doing that all again, I'm actually excited about dating.

The next couple of months are kinda the build up to Christmas and then the new year. I love the new year, a fresh start. I plan to enjoy the next few months, spend as much quality time with my friends and my family as possible and to really rest up. I want to start 2016 off in the best frame of mind as possible.

Throwback To My Broken Heart

I wrote this ages ago. Way back in August but I've just found it and I thought it pretty much summed up exactly how I felt at he time. So, unashamedly, here is my heart laid bare:

I feel like I'm missing a body part. Something's missing from me. I'm ashamed to admit that it's you. I'm ashamed because you can't possibly feel the same way as me. I'm ashamed to feel so strongly for you as I do.

Sometimes I wonder if I am romanticising our time together, if I always did see you with rose tinted glasses. I don't know what's worse; feeling as strongly as I do about missing you or the idea that I am making more of it than what it was.

I already feel stronger without you than I did with you. The way I gave you so much of my heart worried me. This was my biggest fear realised yet I am doing good.

Initially I didn't get in touch with you in the hope that without me in your life you'd realise how much you missed me and how much of a mistake you have made. But as time has gone on I realise that if you did feel like that then you'd be in touch. Now I face the reality that you are better off without me in your life. That's gotta be the case for me too right? Maybe one day soon I will realise it.

We had such a perfect moment in time. I hoped it would never end. I didn't think about commitment, I didn't think about plans, I just loved being with you. You were my perfect buddy. Sadly I cannot think of you without thinking of that Thursday night when you came round and broke my heart. I realised then that I can't trust you, that I never should have and now I question everything we had together.

I'm broken but I will fix myself, I have to. I miss the person I thought you were and I will for a long time.

'Mugged Off'

Without trying to sound like a nineties chick-lit cliché ; I have major trust issues.

It's never really occurred to me before. In fact, I don't think I had these issues with any previous boyfriend; I always believed what they said to me and trusted them. For the most part this worked well. It worked well until I developed this obsession with being 'mugged off'.

Being 'mugged off' is a term that has been thrown about a lot lately, especially since Lee from Blue led on two relatively unknown glamour models in the Celebrity Big Brother house. But I have been using 'mugged off' long before Casey wailed it in the Diary Room on day 5.

To me, being 'mugged off' means someone (usually a dude) intentionally telling you a porky of which you trustingly believe. It's not until you hear the truth (usually from a completely innocent bystander) that you even realise you have been subject to such 'mugging off'. This leaves you, me and poor glamour model Casey feeling like an absolute idiot. An absolute idiot to have believed a word that came out of his horrible little mouth.

This is where, I think, I then take it to the next level. Following the feeling of foolishness, I then feel like the upper hand is given to the lier/dude/scumbag. That somewhere in the world he will be bragging to his mates about how he played me, he he made me look so stupid! And stupid is the last thing I want to look EVER. This is where the 'mugging off' really gets to me.

I didn't realise any of this until I got talking to my new therapist, er I mean housemate. My new, ahem, housemate listens to me intently as I relay my latest boy stories and how I feel about them. He always offers such sound advice.

Recently I have been talking him through a few boy tales. Tales of guys saying one thing and doing the other. This, to me, is classic 'mugging off'. My fear of being the receiver of such behaviour has led me to dis-trust pretty much anything a boy ever says.

My irrational mis-trust has been even more boosted these last few days when my housemate confessed that boys intentionally tell porkies just to make themselves look good! Now, instead of just mis-trusting their intention with me, their whereabouts on a Tuesday night and if they do in fact even like me, I find myself also questioning their rather gallant opinion on animal cruelty or third world poverty!

I know, I know. I have taken all this a little too far. Sure, it's good to keep your guard up, to protect yourself a little but you have to let go of some craziness sometimes right? Is it a case of trusting until proven guilty or is it more a case of building up the trust. My therapist says trust is something to build and I suppose that's right. Let's just hope I don't find out my therapist has been 'mugging me off' as well.

The break up survival guide

This weekend I have been consoling a very good friend going through a break up.

Whilst offering them my shoulder and sharing my recently learnt tips for survival, I realised how far I had come on my own road to heart-ache recovery. I found myself on the other side of the love madness. I sat for hours listening to the back and forth reasoning of how this could have happened, the reminiscing of the romance and the emotional hysteria of tears one minute and laughter the next.

I do not envy my friend. I did, however, feel inspired to collect my survival tips and to share them with the world (well ok, this here blog):

1. Head vs. Heart

I shared my emotional battle with anyone who would listen. I wrote many a blog post on how much I cared for this boy regardless of how much I knew he was a douchebag and how he was nothing but bad news for me; this is classic head vs. heart.

I think, that in cases of heart ache you should always listen to your head. Your head is the one thinking. Your head is balancing up the situation and telling you what the right thing to do is, the most sensible thing, the thing that will protect you.

And your heart? Well, your heart can be cruel. Your heart still feels the same way about that ex. It longs for that feeling when you used to hang out, when you used to kiss, when you used to be happy together. If you listen to your heart it will have you doing anything to get that again. Anything. Regardless of how sensible/foolish the solution is. 

2. Hope

I love this word. I love it so much I want to get it permanently written on me. You have to have hope in anything you do or what else is the point.

Hope however can sometimes be cruel. False hope is the worst. To hope that a near on impossible situation will happen is literally heart breaking. Clinging all your hopes of happiness on to a reconciliation with your ex will near on kill you. Instead you need to step back and focus your hope on happiness full stop. Weather that be with your ex or not. You have to hope things will get better someday, with or without your ex.

I found peace in the idea that if things are 'meant to be' then they will be. I had faith in that and in turn I had hope.

3. Nothing lasts forever

Everyone experiences down days. Everyone knows how it feels to be at their lowest. It's not nice, you can think the most tragic thoughts - but this does not last. Post break up you will feel horrendous; you have hours of desperation, evenings of tears, days of gloom but fortunately life always goes on. Things happen, situations change and nothing ever stays the same. So feel low when you feel low, it's ok, but do not lose sight that things won't always be that way. 

4. Time and space

I know, it sounds so cheesy right? But it's so goddamn true! Take it a day at a time. Soon those days turn into weeks, then months. Before you know it, nearly a year has gone by and guess what; your still alive! Your heart break didn't kill you and maybe there is some truth in that old cliche 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger'.

Hand in hand with time is space. Space without that person texting you or popping up on your Facebook helps you to come to terms with the reality of the situation. It helps you to focus on the most important thing; yourself, without any emotional upheaval. Space helps to clear your head (see, I said head not heart), to help you see the situation from the outside, to be objective.

5. Advice
You won't want to hear it. In fact, you won't be able to even process it. You will discuss your problems with anyone who will listen but you do not want to hear their advice. Their advice is probably the along the same kind of lines of what your head is telling you but that your heart is trying to drown out. It's ok. You have to go through this. When you're ready to listen you will and it will help.

I guess number 5 kind of makes this post redundant. Ah well. All this totally makes sense to me.