The Break-Up Retreat(39)
Some of you might assume that it’s “How do I move on?” Others might think it’s “How do I find the love of my life?”
It’s neither of those.
The question I get asked most often is, “How do I get them back?”
Loss is difficult. It’s difficult for all the reasons you would assume—loneliness, and regret, and longing. But a break-up also re-activates old feelings.
As children, we learn shame through interrupted attempts at intimacy. We reach out—for a hug, or for a kiss, or for validation—and get rebuffed. It creates a holistic, full-body response in us, a voice that says: I am not wanted. The affection I have to give is bothersome. My love is a nuisance.
When my patients, or my followers, ask me how to get someone back, I always ask them why they want to get back together with that person. The first response is always some variation on the same theme; “I love them,” “I miss them,” “I thought they were the one.”
But when you dig deeper, you might find that the first response you give is not necessarily the truth.
You are not the one screaming out for the boyfriend, girlfriend, or significant other to come back to you. If you listen to that voice, you might find that it is the voice of a child. A small, wounded child, who thinks that by fixing this one broken relationship, they can fix all the things that have shattered in the past.
That is not to say that relationships cannot be healed. But first, you need to heal yourself.
When I feel the pull from the past, I always make sure to treat myself in the way I like to be treated. Today, that is through taking control of my gut health. @bloatinggirlies probiotics have really helped me get more energy—15% discount for the first 500 people to use the code #DoctorMartina! Link in my description :)
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Chapter 22
The only person in the dining hall is Pernilla.
She is sitting at the table, staring at a cup of steaming green tea.
At the sight of her, I’m struck by a ridiculous urge to sit down further down the table, keep to myself. It’s not because I don’t want to sit with her; it’s more that her icy perfection reminds me of some of my mom’s friends, the way they would scrutinize me as a teenager, after my dad went away and my mom retreated into herself in order to keep everything running.
Looking back, I know now that they saved us. They would come over after my mom came home from work, clad in light, gauzy shawls and with their heavy glasses perched at the tip of their noses, always carrying some takeout that they had “just happened” to pick up, so that both me and my mom would get fed. Sometimes, they would pour her a glass of wine, if she seemed like she needed it; other times, they would discretely dispose of the bottle, if they judged that she had had enough.
In their own ways, they were deeply, deeply kind. They cared so much for my mother. They kept her going.
But they didn’t know how to care for me, in the same way. And I wasn’t easy to care for, at the time. A small, furious ball of teenage confusion, hacking away at my hair and piercing my nose in the bathroom just to have some way of expressing how lost I felt.
So they would criticize me, instead.
Isobel, you look absolutely horrendous.
Isobel, how come you haven’t cleaned up around here?
Isobel, please, leave your mother alone. Don’t you think she has got enough to deal with?
I still have a hard time with well-put-together women in their fifties and sixties. They make me want to shrink, grow up smaller, take up less space.
They also make me want to throw things, scream at the top of my lungs, burst into tears.
But I’m not sixteen anymore. I’m an adult, and, nominally, a fellow patient. And I have questions for Pernilla.
So I sit down opposite Pernilla, and clear my throat before saying: “Good morning.”
She looks up.
I don’t think I’m imagining the fact that she’s scrutinizing me.
“Good morning,” she says, her own face quite inscrutable.
It’s tempting to just not talk, but I decide to go big, instead. Pernilla already doesn’t seem to like me; or, well, to be fair, she doesn’t seem to like anyone. So I can’t possibly make her esteem of me any lower.
“I can’t believe how nice you look, so early in the morning.” I gesture toward her neat cardigan, held together by one big button, the discreet row of pearls around her neck, the impeccably applied makeup.
“I could barely get myself to shower this morning, I was so tired. But you look so . . . well-groomed.”
Pernilla raises her eyebrows for a second, and I think that she’s going to cut me down with some incredibly elegant, scathing remark, but then she says: “Thank you. I feel better when I feel like I’m presenting myself well.”
“I get that.” I smile, tentatively.
The lightning quick once-over I get from her indicates that she doesn’t think that I get that, at all, actually, but she lets it go.