Six years ago I was an undergraduate student. I met Brian at the store where we both worked. After a couple months, we started hanging out and together we had a really fun summer. Six years ago I was sitting in a summer class - Logic - completely distracted because I was thinking about this exciting new relationship I was starting. I couldn’t concentrate because I was so happy.

Today I am a graduate student. Today I sat in class - Management Seminar - completely distracted because I was thinking about a relationship that is ending. I couldn’t concentrate because I was so sad.

In six short years I went from being incredibly happy about beginning a relationship with one guy to breaking up with him and quickly getting back together, to breaking up again and breaking his heart, to meeting another guy and feeling even more elated and excited than before about starting a new relationship, to moving in with this guy, to becoming best friends, to becoming partners, to realizing we wanted to spend our lives together, to struggling to make it work despite all the love, to deciding to not live together but remaining committed to each other, to suddenly having my heart broken by him because it wasn’t enough anymore.

In six years. I was 21 when I met Brian. I was 24 when I met Brad. I’m now 27, six years older, and so much has changed. Where will I be in another six years? Will two more relationships have come and gone? Will my heart be broken again? Will I ever love again?

I’ll be 33, six years older, but what else will have changed?

Last night I was feeling kind of okay. I actually went a whole 20 minutes at one point without thinking about Brad, the breakup or anything related. I wasn’t feeling amazing, but I didn’t feel like I was going to throw up either. I wasn’t happy or chipper or light-hearted by any means, but I felt like I might actually survive.

Before going to bed last night, I repeated to myself, “Hold onto this feeling. If you can just hold on to this feeling, don’t backslide, just stay right here for awhile, you’ll be okay. And soon you might actually feel good. Just don’t go back. Hold on.”

But this morning I woke up with the usual knot in my stomach. It’s like I’m nervous and anxious and sad and overwhelmed all at once. Mornings are the worst, I’ve already said that. But it’s also the worst time to feel the worst because I have to sit at my desk, in plain view of everyone, and try to hold it together.

I decided to make some tea, hoping it would have some sort of calming affect on me. And while I was heating the water, I suddenly couldn’t hold it in anymore. I bent over, leaning against the counter, right there in the middle of the break room, because I couldn’t hold myself up anymore. After a few deep breaths, I rushed into the bathroom and fell against the wall. Crying.

Why is this still happening? How can I feel okay last night, then fall completely apart less than 24 hours later? Nothing happened to provoke it. It’s just there. Always. And always so strong the first half of the day. I expected that I might still feel a little sad at this point, but I didn’t it expect it to still overwhelm me. To still feel so deep and unmanageable. Why am I so weak? Why can’t I handle heartbreak with dignity like everyone else seems to? Why can’t my head start talking to my heart and tell it to get a hold of itself already!

I’m looking into counseling. I thought if I got through the first few weeks without it, I should be able to do the rest without it too. But if I’m still feeling so weak and still so helpless to make myself feel better, I might need some professional help. I’m not sure how to go about this, but I’m trying.

Breathe. Sometimes I have to remind myself to exhale. Sometimes I have to take a deep breath to steady myself. Sometimes I stop in the middle of what I’m doing so I can close my eyes, breathe and stop the spinning.

Sleep is becoming a problem. I haven’t gotten any real sleep in a week. The last two nights I had two Excederin PM pills in me, and I still laid awake for hours. I’m tired and I’m weary. It’s making it harder to stave off the sadness. I’m tired and weary and sad, and I keep forgetting to breathe.

Today I start classes. I woke up at 6:50am and I won’t be home until after 9pm. I need a nap, but instead I have to be “on” for 14 straight hours. I’m not ready for this semester. It should be a distraction for me, but instead it feels like a big heavy burden that I’m not strong enough to carry.

I’m so tired of feeling bad. Everyone keeps saying it will get better, and I know I won’t feel like this my whole life, but I can’t believe I still wake up most days and feel the heaviness on my heart. I still have the knot in my stomach, I still have the lump in my throat from holding back tears. It’s been just over five weeks, and I have felt every single second of those weeks. Not a second has gone by that I wasn’t aware of. Time flies when you’re having fun, but time is endless when you feel the weight of every passing minute. I wish I could wake up tomorrow and feel better so this could all be behind me. It’s so hard to imagine that in another five weeks I might still be carrying some of this with me. Five weeks? That’s like an eternity in my mind. I can’t possible get through another five weeks of this. I’m not even sure how I’m going to get through today.

I’m so angry and hurt that he made me feel this way. He’s the one who admitted he just couldn’t get himself to do the work he knew was necessary. He’s the one who was unwilling to commit. He’s the one who couldn’t give his all and who probably took me for granted. So why am I the one hurting? Shouldn’t it be me who says, I deserve better, so I’m done with you. Look what you’re missing, look what you’re giving up! Shouldn’t he be the one who regrets not doing enough for me and for us? Shouldn’t he be hurting? How did this all get so backwards?

I’ve tried to convince my heart that in fact it was me who broke up with him because I know I deserve better than him. All those times that I got frustrated and questioned our future and he asked me not to give up on him – well it finally was too much and I walked away for my own good. That’s what I tell my heart. But my heart doesn’t really care because no matter what, it’s broken. Even if I had been the one to leave, it would have been because this man who I had invested my whole self in decided he couldn’t do the same. Because the one person I wanted to love me forever couldn’t do that. Because all my hard work was rejected. Because all my faith in him was wasted. It would have been because I wasn’t loved by the person I loved, and that causes a broken heart no matter who does the leaving.

Still, he should be the one hurting, not me. But it is me.

And it’s still not going away.

I’ve learned that I don’t handle grief well. Or at least I don’t handle it quietly. I can’t push it away and I can’t ignore it. It’s always right there. I make lists of the things that I can be thankful for, I seek out the things that make me happy, I try to distract myself, I try to force myself to be happy. But after five and a half weeks I’m just so tired. And weary. And sad.

[Thank you to everyone for continuing to be there for me with your comments and emails. I know nothing I write really reflects it, but reading your support has truly helped. The last five weeks would have been even worse if I couldn't write about it all, and in return learn from all of you.]

Me. Sitting on the steps outside my sister’s house. Alone. Sobbing, shaking, rocking, choking for breath. Wishing someone would come find me and wrap me in their arms.

That was yesterday. I haven’t felt that bad in weeks, and it was a major step back for me. I’m still recovering. It was my fear – that as soon as I wrote about starting to feel better, as soon as I put it out into the universe, I would relapse. I didn’t expect it to be that bad though. I was a shameful mess.

It was a bad weekend. I’ve slept horribly the last three nights, so I’m trying to blame the intense emotions on sleep deprivation and PMS. Unfortunately I think the truth is that it’s all still there, just under the surface.

At this point, I am starting to regret the majority of that relationship. It doesn’t seem worth all this crying, all the anxiety and the constant knot in my stomach. If it was going to end anyway, why not much sooner? Why did he drag it out so long if he was going to eventually give up? Why did he love me for over three years and then just stop?

I gave him too much of myself, I see that now. With my last boyfriend, I held back a lot. I didn’t let him get inside my heart, I didn’t let our relationship hurt me because I didn’t open myself up. Brad knew this and he told me repeatedly that he couldn’t be with me if I was going to shut him out. So I let him in. I let him in and I trusted that it was worth it, that we would work together to make this thing last forever. He let me do that, and then he left me. Why? Because he had a huge transformation over one weekend? Because he couldn’t bring himself to do the work anymore? Well that’s fine, that’s what he needed to do I guess. I didn’t get a say in it, but I have to accept his decision.

But I wonder now if it was worth it, if it was a mistake to give him so much of myself. And I fear that I may be too scared to ever do that again.

Today was a bad day. Yesterday was good, but today was bad. That’s pretty much how my life has been lately. I’ve tried to write about it, but I can’t seem to accurately describe how I’m feeling, so I just stop. I think it’s because I’m in an in-between phase—in between feeling awful and feeling good again. Yesterday I felt great. I got through work fine, and I spent the evening helping Robin make wedding invitations for a friend. Then she even talked me into going out for a drink, and I went to bed feeling fine. But I woke up feeling awful. I was sad again, and as much as I tried to fill my time with friends and family, the sadness followed me all day. Sometimes it just wants to be there. As much as I try to kick its ass and tell it to leave me the fuck alone already, it insists on hanging out some days.

I know it’s good that I’m having good days though. It means I’m on my way. It’s been just over a month, so I figure in another month I’ll feel even better. And in another month I might feel good again. And in another month maybe even great. And so on.

Lately it has been less about being sad about Brad and more about feeling so hurt by how it all happened. I feel so deceived. I feel like the whole thing was cheap and it cheapened the entire relationship. I feel betrayed. I deserved more, our relationship deserved a better ending. I just can’t get past knowing that he knew it was over long before I did, and he didn’t tell me. I can’t get over how he told me one thing for a week and then suddenly changed his story and the hurtful truth came out. He didn’t cheat on me in case that’s what this is sounding like (or at least I don’t think he did - I’m not sure what to think anymore), but I still feel like I was cheated in a lot of ways. I was so hurt by the way things went down that I think even after I move on from Brad, I will still carry around some hurt from the way it all came crashing down.

I still do miss him sometimes though. Some days I feel genuinely excited about the prospect of dating again. About having fun and meeting new people. I am excited about the idea of falling in love all over again, especially with someone who can love and appreciate me so much more than Brad did. I actually feel good sometimes about what’s to come.

Then other days I get discouraged. I get sad, feel lonely, feel the emptiness, and wonder if it will ever be filled. I wonder why it all fell apart, why he didn’t love me, why he thinks he’s better off without me, and if it’s really feasible that I can fall in love again. I don’t know what each day will bring, or even what each hour will bring. I’ve been in this in-between stage for about a week now and it’s pretty tiring, but I guess the in-between stage is better than the dark, depressing month that preceded it.

I’ll probably go back and forth like this for awhile. My relationship with Brad was so much of my world, and it’s a lot to let go of. Some days I am really eager to see what kinds of experiences this has freed me up for.

And some days I just miss my Brad.

I want to go to bed - I’m tired - but I can’t. For the first time since he left me, I’d rather stay up than go to bed alone. Brad and I rarely ever went to bed at the same time, and neither of us were much for nighttime cuddling, so going to bed by myself hasn’t been as hard as waking up alone. But tonight I just can’t do it, so I’ve been sitting up, doing different things to avoid bedtime.

I was doing better for a few days, feeling stronger, but today I sunk again. I spent most of the day with my sisters, but I still managed to feel lonely. As soon as I drove away to come home I started crying, and I haven’t stopped for very long since. It’s been a few days since I’ve cried and I think my tears were stored up, waiting to come out. There’s just a sadness deep inside of me that needed to come out, something I had been holding back. Something I couldn’t stop this time.

I tried to do a lot of things to fix or ignore it. I tried to think of all things I have to be happy about, I tried watching funny things on tv, I tried reading, I tried eating a few times but mostly felt like throwing up, I tried sitting quietly and concentrating on my breathing, I called my sister, I packed for my vacation. But still I cried. Over and over until I finally ended up crumpled on the laundry room floor (where I had gone to get another box of tissues) sobbing out loud. To myself.

The thing I don’t get is why was he so significant in my life and I was so insignificant in his? How can two people be in the same relationship for over three years and have such different reactions to its end? I think one of the biggest reasons I’m such a mess is because I lost such a huge part me. He was so important in my life, so huge, so significant. Even if this is for the best, how do you not feel awful and empty and lonely and desperate when something that big is gone? Even if you choose to get rid of it, don’t you still feel a despairing loss when it’s gone? But he doesn’t feel that. Please don’t tell me I’m wrong. I know he’s not completely content, and I know everyone deals with things differently, but I promise you he doesn’t feel what he would feel if I meant to him what he meant to me. Even if he was done loving me, even if he couldn’t be with me, even if he chose to be done with me. If he was losing a truly significant part of his life, he would feel something more than “okay, mostly concerned for you.”

Even if he doesn’t deserve these tears, he gets them because I let him become such a fundamental and enormous part of me. Why wasn’t I that to him? Why doesn’t my absence warrant some meaningful pain? Why is he so quick and confident in his proclamations that he can and will and wants to move on from what we had to other things and other people? Why did I think I meant more to him than I did?

I haven’t talked to him in awhile, so I don’t know what he’s doing. But I know it’s not crying on the floor of his laundry room. I know it’s not avoiding a bed without me in it. I know it’s not trying to force himself to feel better after losing one of those most significant parts of his life. Why the fuck am I the only doing that?

This roller coaster stuff is not working for me. I don’t like seeing a glimmer of hope for the future just to have the shades pulled down, leaving me feeling dark and lonely again. Yesterday evening I felt pretty okay. I was prepared to curl up in pajamas and watch a movie, and I was completely fine with that. Then my friend Erica called, and she came to hang out with me for a few hours instead. We only talked about Brad and the breakup for about 15 minutes, and I didn’t cry once. After she left there was some drama with my sister, so that distracted me for awhile, then it was time for bed. I went to sleep feeling hopeful, like I could actually see an end to this. Like Brad doesn’t know what he’s giving up and I’m better off without him. Like maybe I could eventually get through a day without missing him or hating him for what he did. I didn’t feel good, but I felt like I could feel good someday.

Then I woke up and I had to face it all again. I feel really sad again today, and really lonely. Mornings seem to be the worst. Even though I managed to eat dinner last night, I still can’t eat breakfast. I still feel too depleted in the morning to put much effort into my appearance. I wear my glasses a lot because contacts are too much work. My clothes often don’t match or make any sense. I really don’t care. I spend the first few hours at work each day wishing I could go home and crawl back into bed and forget all this. Mornings are the hardest.

Next week I’m going on vacation with my family. We are staying in a cottage on Lake Michigan for a week, a trip we did last year as well. Last year Brad was with me – this year he won’t be. He was supposed to come, but three weeks before the trip he decided to do something about the fact that he doesn’t actually love me. Now I’m going as a single. Two of my sisters are bringing their boyfriends (the third has to work all week), my brother is bringing his girlfriend and kids, and my dad and his wife and two kids will be there. I’m the only one going solo.

I thought about skipping it because the thought of going to bed alone at night, in the same bed Brad and I shared last summer, while everyone else snuggles up next to someone else, breaks my heart. I’m not sure I can do that five nights in a row. I’m not worried about being left out of anything, but I’m worried about being a charity case, a third wheel, an extra. Emily organized all the meals earlier this week and sent an email requesting money from everyone. The list looked something like this:

Dad and happy family
Josh and happy family
Andrea and happy family (her boyfriend’s daughter is coming as well)
Emily and the love of her life
Shannon

There’s me, all alone. Single. Solo. And I’m just not sure I’m ready to face that so head-on yet. I know if I need to be anywhere next week it’s with my family, but there might just be too many memories of the fun we had last year, and too many reminders of who is not there with me this year.

My god, is it after noon yet? I hate mornings.

Well, I’m officially on Xanax. Or at least I have a small pill bottle handy for when I need it… which I hope isn’t often.

I’m glad I saw a doctor, but I must admit that I felt a little ridiculous sitting on the exam table explaining that I was there because my boyfriend realized he didn’t love me and he broke up with me, and I can’t handle it so please medicate me. I almost never go to the doctor and there I am, having my blood pressure taken because of a broken heart.

There was a moment when I was sitting in the exam room alone, after the nurse took my vitals and before the PA came in, that I suddenly became aware of myself. Sitting in a sterile room, staring vacantly into a corner. Feeling empty and alone. How did this happen to me?

And worse. Instead of snapping out of it, I seriously wished I could curl up in that corner and just lay quietly. Maybe sleep if I’m lucky. It was a corner kind of tucked behind the exam table. It was dark and small and private. I wanted to just curl up and be there until they made me leave.

Then suddenly my alarm went off. I heard the little tune that my phone plays when I have to use it as an alarm. And for a second I wished that maybe I was asleep and I had been dreaming all along. And now it was time to get up and live the life I had a month ago. But no, it was just a cell phone in the next room. Thin walls I guess.

But oh well. This is my life now. We’ll see what I can do with it I guess.

Everything fell apart last night. Again. Everything is so much worse. I thought I was on my way to being better, but I’m back where I started. I thought I had already hit rock bottom, but this feels lower.

My whole body is consumed with this. I want to crawl into bed and not wake up until this is over. I want to not be me, not be here, not be this anymore. I want to take back everything I ever gave him. I want to hate him. But I can’t. I can’t do any of that.

I don’t even know what else to say. I can’t believe I’m here again. At the bottom.

People are starting to catch on at work. They ask me what’s wrong and when I say I’m fine, they come up with their own reasons. Are you tired? Not feeling well? I just agree with them. It’s easier to say I’m tired or sick than to tell the truth.

One sign of the times: I haven’t had a bowl of cereal for breakfast since Wednesday, before the all too honest email. Breakfast cereal to me is like coffee to most people—my day doesn’t feel right if it doesn’t start that way. But I’ve hardly been able to eat anything at all.

The Xanax has been nice, mostly because it knocks me out. I don’t usually sleep well, but I took some both Thursday and Friday before bed and fell asleep hard. Unfortunately that means I can’t take it during the day when I sometimes feel the worst. Saturday I almost fell over in the shower because I couldn’t stop crying and I couldn’t hold myself up. I often find myself stopping to just lean on something and catch my breath even though I haven’t exerted myself at all. I don’t want to take anything unless I really think I need it though, so I survived Saturday med-free. But on Sunday I started to feel panicky, and I took a Xanax to relax. Instead of just relaxing, I waited a half hour, then stumbled to bed where I slept for two hours. Sleeping keeps the thoughts away though, so I don’t mind.

My friends and family have been pretty awesome. Robin and her boyfriend Jason took me miniature golfing on Saturday where I actually found myself laughing a few times. That was nice. Too bad I can’t distract myself with putt-putt all day every day. My sisters check in with me regularly to make sure I’m okay, and both mom and dad and many friends have called or emailed to check in too. My friend Lauren said she wanted to visit me on Sunday, but she lives on the other side of the state, so I told her she was crazy, I was fine. She came anyway. Bearing gifts. She drove over two hours to see me and came through the door with her arms full of books, candy and flowers. My sadness could not possibly be worth such incredibly kind acts of friendship.

Lauren let me talk about the things I needed to talk about, then we talked about a million other things because she and I are so much alike. She’s very wise and has an amazing outlook, and I’m so thankful for her visit. And for everything all my friends and family and blog readers have done. I try to gain perspective by knowing that others are going and have gone through much worse, but I’m not very good at that. So thank you to everyone who doesn’t think I’m ridiculous for struggling so much with this.

Last night Lauren actually had me convinced for awhile that despite my incredibly high standards, hopes and expectations, there really could be someone out there for me. If the one person I’ve found who met (most of) those standards doesn’t want me, how am I ever going to find someone else? Brad was the one and he didn’t want me. What can be left? But she really made me believe it was possible.

Except when she left I went to bed lonely and woke up feeling empty again. Why doesn’t he want me? And why do I even care anymore? I should be able to know that I deserve better than to cry over someone who isn’t crying over me. I wish my heart could figure that out.

Things are getting worse around here. I’m not handling this well at all. Which is hard for me because I normally handle things pretty well. I don’t know how to do this.

I sent a desperate and pathetic email to Brad on Wednesday, I completely poured my heart out to him. When he finally wrote back later that day he only (I think intentionally) pushed me away. He said some things that were hard to read. And I realized some things about this break up that I wasn’t acknowledging before. Things aren’t the way I thought they were – they’re much much worse. I completely freaked out. I fell to the floor in my bedroom and sobbed until I couldn’t breathe.

I spent the evening and the next day with two of my sisters. I couldn’t face another day at work, another day of hiding the pain, choking back tears. I had to come home yesterday evening for my class, which I couldn’t miss. On the drive home I started having a break down. My stomach was a mess, like I was nervous but worse. I kept taking deep breaths so I didn’t pass out. My hands were shaking. Andrea told me I needed to call my doctor and try to get something for anxiety, so when I got home that’s the first thing I did. While I was on hold, I crumbled. I completely fell apart. I sobbed to the receptionist, asking her to get me in as soon as possible, but I couldn’t get an appointment until next Wednesday. When I hung up, I started choking on my sobs. I couldn’t breathe and I couldn’t sit still. I paced my house, trying to get control of myself. But I couldn’t. It was definitely a low point.

I went to class, but I left after an hour. I couldn’t sit there. I called my mom and drove straight to her house. She had some Xanax she could give me, and I knew I wouldn’t make it through the night (let alone the days until Wednesday) without something. She let me cry and talk to her, then I took a pill, went home and slept to forget my feelings. I’ve never taken anything like that before, I’ve never felt bad enough. But I need something to turn off my thoughts, make me functional and get me through the day. At least until enough time has passed and I can finally face this on my own. I can’t eat, I don’t sleep well, sometimes I can’t breathe. I feel like I never stop crying, and I can’t stop thinking. I have a final for my class, I have work, I have interviews. I need to be able to function.

I had to work today, but it isn’t easy. Everyone can tell something is wrong, but nobody knows and nobody asks. My supervisor asked how I was feeling since I didn’t come in yesterday, and I almost cried right in front of him, a person I never ever want to cry in front of.

All I can hope is that this is rock bottom and it’s only up from here. It’s been almost two weeks and I’ve gotten worse instead of better. I know there’s an end to this somewhere in my future, but that is small comfort when I can barely get through the day.

I hesitated to write any of this here because I’m no longer comfortable with Brad knowing how horrible I’m feeling when I know he is fine. I know you’ll all say that there’s no way Brad is totally fine, and I’m sure he’s feeling something. But this is what he wanted, this is what he wants. He did this because he would rather be alone (or with someone else) than with me. So maybe he hates that his needs are hurting me, but essentially he is fine. It hurts to know that the end of our relationship is a relief for him when it’s completely devastating for me.

He said I could talk to him any time I needed to and I didn’t need to feel bad because he wanted me to understand, and he wanted to do what he could to help me get through this. But when I turned to him in a weak moment, he told me the truth and he pushed me away. It hurt. It broke my heart all over again. But I can’t expect him to care for me when the whole point of doing this was to get away from me and focus on himself. He is ready to move on from me and probably has been for awhile in fact. So as much as it crushes me, I can’t expect him to miss me or help me. I hate knowing that.

And I don’t mind if he reads my blog – I make it public for anyone to read. But I thought twice about writing so honestly about my feelings now that I know exactly where he stands.

However, I didn’t want any of that to keep me from writing in my own space. You guys have helped me so much and I haven’t even said thank you yet. I know it sucks to come here each time I write and read another heart broken, tear-filled post. And I know it’s hard to say the same things over and over to a sad person who doesn’t seem to be hearing them. But each and every comment you have made has meant something to me. I hope you won’t abandon me while I find a way out of this sorrow. I’m told that eventually I’ll feel better, and even though that doesn’t help me right now, I believe it. So eventually this blog will get back to normal. But for now, I can only be honest about what this is doing to me.

While Brad is out there finding himself (and maybe finding someone else to love), I am losing myself. I’m losing control. I feel like I’m losing everything.