What It Feels Like To Have Your Heart Break

It’s like watching a car crash in slow motion. You feel yourself falling apart. You see your lover pulling away. You not only feel an emotional distance from them, but it manifests physically. They don’t hold your hand when you’re walking down the street. They don’t kiss you when they first see you after a few days apart. When you sleep together, they don’t hold you anymore. You wake up in the morning on opposite sides of the bed, and the heartbreak is apparent.

The distance is not only emotional anymore, but physical. You beg. You grovel. You get on your hands and knees and become desperate. You’d move mountains to save the shambles of your relationship, but they wouldn’t do the same. The desperation is unrequited. The heartbreak is your own, because they’ve been gone for quite some time now. You try to fix your relationship. You try to fix them. You try to fix yourself. You try, and you try, and you try, and you try. But sometimes, love is not enough. You don’t understand. You don’t know what to do. How can you fix something on your own? Something they don’t feel the need to fix or rather something they don’t want to fix. There’s a fine line between need and want. You need them, and they don’t even want you.

“I don’t want this as much as you do.”

You see yourself clinging to the edge of the cliff that is their life by your fingertips. You see them at the top debating whether to pull you up or let you fall. Then you see them let you go. They let you fall. With your heart in their hands, they let you go. They’re not afraid of losing you forever.

The first few days aren’t as hard as waking up the next morning, the morning after the breakup. The morning after you spent the night crying yourself to sleep or drinking scotch to numb your mind and heart. Waking up the next morning is unbearable. You have to wake up and remember that it isn’t a bad dream. It’s real. This has happened to you. This is real. You relive every moment of the breakup. Your mind is a broken record of the last things they said to you.

“I care about you.”

You don’t understand. You don’t know how things got this far. You are shocked and heartbroken. You can’t even watch TV. You lay awake in bed and stare at the ceiling constantly reliving the demise of your love. You check your phone and search for any sign that they still want you, that they have made a mistake. You remind yourself this isn’t a dream. You dream that they call and apologize. You dream that they tell you they love you and want to be with you. Your dreams aren’t so bad anymore. In exchange for the nightmares of helplessness and hopelessness, your dream world now consists of them fighting for you like they won’t do in real life. If you truly love them, your pride goes out the window. You beg them. You show your desperation, even though you know you’re being pathetic.

“It’s a weird feeling I get while I’m with you too. I feel distant even though I’m right there with you.”

You plead. You’ll do anything to make this work. You’ll wait for them to be ready for this relationship. You’ll change. You’ll try harder. You’ll give them space. You’re pathetic, and you know it. But what is the worth of pride in comparison with losing the one you love? You’re hopeful, and you hate it. You hate to admit to yourself that you hope they’ll change their mind. In the eyes of your friends, this makes you even more pathetic. They all pity you, and you feel it. You fall apart. You feel so alone that you don’t even want to get out of bed. You don’t want to go out. You don’t want to meet other people. You can’t imagine ever loving someone else. You remember all those times they told you that they loved you, and you cry even more. You feel defeated. You hold onto your hope like it’s a dying candle in the darkness.

“I wouldn’t say that the feeing is mutual, because I’m not 100% in it.”

You can’t believe this has happened. You can’t believe your love has let you go. You don’t answer messages from friends or phone calls from family. The only person you want to hear from is the person who you know will never call again. They don’t want you, even though you need them. They’re not afraid of forever. They’re not afraid of losing you forever. You are something they want to lose, and your heart cannot take it. They say it takes time to put yourself back together, to repair your heart, to unwind yourself from a love you allowed to encompass every aspect of your life. You hear your mother telling you how much they love your significant other and not to fuck this up. You can’t bear to imagine telling your mother that they left you. They don’t want you. You don’t even want yourself anymore. You begged them. You begged them for time. Maybe if you spent time apart, things would change and be better. Maybe you could be happy again, like you were in the beginning.

“I don’t want to promise you anything. I don’t want you to go this entire time believing I’m going to be right back to where we ended.”

But this is the end.