To realize the inevitability of parting and the complete uncertainty of the future is not an easy test. The feeling that one’s own life is slipping out of one’s hands creates a feeling of deep anxiety. Susanne Lachman, a clinical psychologist, reflects on how to survive this painful moment of waiting for the end.
When a relationship ends, everything that once seemed well-known and obvious loses all clarity. That gaping void that the gap forms needs to be filled and makes us feverishly look for reasons and justifications for what happened — this is how we try to at least partially cope with uncertainty.
The loss, the scale of which is sometimes difficult to imagine, unsettles and causes great discomfort. We feel fear and despair. This feeling of vacuum is so unbearable that we have no choice but to look for at least some meaning in what is happening.
However, the void is so vast that no explanation will suffice to fill it. And no matter how many distracting actions we invent for ourselves, the burden that we have to drag will remain unbearable.
In a situation where we have no control over the outcome, waiting for the moment when we can exhale and feel better or return to the original state together with a partner is almost a matter of life and death. We are waiting for the verdict — only it will determine what is happening or happened between us. and finally feel relieved.
Waiting for the inevitable breakup is the hardest thing in a relationship.
In this void, time passes so slowly that we are literally stuck in endless dialogues with ourselves about what lies ahead for us. We feel an urgent need to immediately find out if there is a way to reconnect with a (former) partner. And if not, then where is the guarantee that we will ever get better and be able to love someone else?
Unfortunately, there is no way to predict what will happen in the future. This is incredibly painful, but we have to admit that at the moment there are no answers that can calm or fill the vacuum inside us, the outside world does not exist.
Waiting for the inevitable breakup is the hardest thing in a relationship. We hope to feel better as a result of what is already unbearably troubling in itself.
Try to accept the following.
First of all: no solution, whatever it may be, can ease the pain that we now feel. The only way to deal with it is to admit that external forces cannot appease it. Rather, awareness of its inevitability at the moment will help.
Instead of looking for ways out that don’t exist, try to convince yourself that it’s okay to feel pain and sadness right now, that it’s a natural response to loss and an integral part of the grieving process. Being aware of the fact that you have to endure the unknown in order to feel better will help you endure it.
Believe me, if the unknown remains unknown, there is a reason for it.
I can already hear the questions: “When will this end?”, “How long will I have to wait?” Answer: as many as you need. Gradually, step by step. There is only one way to calm my anxiety in front of the unknown — to look inside yourself and listen: am I better today than I was yesterday or an hour ago?
Only we ourselves can know how we feel, comparing with our previous feelings. This is only our personal experience, which only we ourselves are capable of living, in our own body and with our own understanding of relationships.
Believe me, if the unknown remains unknown, there is a reason for that. One of them is to help us get rid of the prejudice that it is abnormal or wrong to feel such sharp pain and fear of the future.
Nobody said it better than rock musician Tom Petty: «The waiting is the hardest part.» And the answers we are waiting for will not come to us from outside. Do not lose heart, overcome the pain gradually, step by step.