It Hurts

Yes, thank God she didn’t give herself to him physically, because that would only make this pain oh, a billion times worse. When we get physically intimate our brain releases a cuddling hormone that cements the two of us together. If he doesn’t love you after that event, it’s like sticking a lightening bolt into your heart and staking you to the ground with it. It really hurts.

Another woman described it as … “Being lonely, sad, depressed, a little lost maybe, it feels like there is no purpose in life, self confidence deserts you – it hurts like crazy!”

Many people who have been hurt by being unloved have taken to protecting themselves from further love by closing off to loving anyone else. It seems like a natural defense against pain. It is our human way of protecting ourselves from pain.

When I was in college and my then girlfriend broke up with me, I thought the pain would kill me. The heartache was distracting, unpredictable, and unmanageable.  I couldn’t eat, sleep, or breath without pain. It hurt to see her, hurt worse to see her with another guy, and all I wanted was our relationship back the way it was. But it would never return to the way it was after that.

The wisest advice I received was from my friend, Lisa Blankenship. She said something like,  “Let it hurt for a time. Your heart is like a balloon right now, it stretched out to hold more love than ever before, it takes time to retract. Your capacity for sadness increases your capacity for love in the future.”  Either that, or she said, “Forget about her, how bout them Dodgers?”