What to do when relationship end?

It cannot be emphasized enough that the loss of a relationship is hard.  It doesn’t matter if it is a romantic partner or a very important friendship or even a family member separating themselves from specific family members. All of these situations are capable of causing much grief, pain, and emotional turmoil.  An important step in healing when experiencing the loss of a relationship is to allow room for feelings such as grief to be experienced and validated.  It is human nature to want to automatically start thinking about the positive side of the relationship ending.  But, it is important to know that this will eventually happen later on down the line during the healing process and not rush to get to that state before different feelings have been processed or felt.

The first step that I always suggest for clients whenever they have this type of loss is to begin analyzing what their life will look like outside of that relationship.  This step is about determining just how much of an impact this relationship might have had on someone’s life.  It needs to be recognized that a person’s life is going to change when their relationship ends.  It might be as subtle as not receiving a phone call on important holidays or as significant as going to bed alone. Still, either way, something will bring about feelings of grief related to the loss of that relationship.

The second step is that I ask clients to write a letter to that person.  This letter should contain what the client wants to say, what they wish they would have said, and if they have things that they feel as though they need to apologize or make amends for.  The point of this is not necessary to have a letter ready to send to the person.  It is to allow the client to analyze what might bring them closure.  Is closure going to be reaching out to the person in the future to apologize for different mistakes?  Is it going to be saying what they wish they would have said before the relationship ending?  Is it going to be confronting problematic behavior that the other person exhibited when they were in a relationship?  The closure is very important in processing the loss of a relationship, but it does not come quickly.

The final step I have clients take involves developing tools around acceptance.  Although there are some relationships that, when they end, it is very amicable, there are still many more where this is not the case.  This is where it is vital to the ongoing healing process for a client to determine what they are having difficulty in “accepting.” One phrase I always use is, “You don’t have to like that this is your new reality, but it will help you substantially to accept it.”

Everyone is different in their approach to processing grief, including the grief associated with the loss of a relationship.  The truth is, there is no one best way to start moving forward in the aftermath of a relationship’s ending. However, support options such as counseling, peer support, or even support groups can be beneficial.