How to Let Go of Someone You Loved Deeply

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This article was co-written by Elvina Lui, MFT. Elvina Lui is a licensed family and marriage therapist specializing in relationship counseling. She received her Master’s degree in Counseling from Western Seminary in 2007 and has been MFT certified for over 7 years.

There are 7 references cited in this article that you can view at the bottom of the page.

This article has been viewed 170,983 times.

Perhaps love is one of the happiest, most memorable and enjoyable human experiences. Whether it is love for family, friends, children or love between couples, love is always an experience that people cultivate together. People are as happy as they are when love is at their peak, but they are also extremely sad when love leaves and have to give up the person they love. Whether you have to give up love because the person you love has passed away or because it is time to end the relationship, you cannot avoid suffering. You will grieve for what was lost and time will heal that wound. When you accept to give up someone, you can know how much pain you can bear, but don’t isolate yourself, learn how to heal from the loss itself.

Table of Contents

Suffering for Relationships

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Grasp the five stages of suffering. These five stages can be more accurately described as a process. You may skip a few steps in the middle of the process, not go through a few at the end, or find yourself stuck at a stage. But you can also go through some or all of the steps over and over again and again. Those five levels are: ^{[1] X Research Source}

Denial and withdraw: In this level, you deny the fact that exists. It’s a natural response to try to forget the pain.
Anger: That is the stage that comes when the pain you tried to forget comes back to torment you. You will be angry possibly with inanimate objects, with strangers, with family or friends. You may even feel angry at the person who has died or gone, but then feels guilty for being angry.
Inner Struggle: At this level, you find yourself needing to get back on your feet and get rid of hopeless thoughts. You think you should have been better or you should have asked for help sooner, and so on.
Falling down: This stage is when you feel sad and regretful when you realize that the person you love has really gone. You will feel miserable, want to cry, and so on.
Acceptance: This stage is when you have calmed down and don’t hold back anymore. Some people may never go through this stage.

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Accept the pain. Your relationship is really dead. It’s like having a loved one die. No one has the right to forbid you from grieving your loss. But ride the waves of suffering, don’t let them pull you down or drown you. Don’t try to fight them. Acknowledge what they mean: the waves of emotion will help you get through the events for a while, in the longer term will heal your broken heart. Enduring suffering is also a step towards healing.

Even if no one close to you knows what you’re going through, you can still keep them to yourself. When you feel bad, stop for a moment and say to yourself, “I’m sad but I’m fine. Everything will be fine”.

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Share your pain with others. People around you may not be able to deeply understand your feelings, though don’t hesitate to share your sadness with a few people you know you can trust.

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Seek professional help if you feel you need it. If you are worried you may become distressed or fall apart, you can seek professional help. A therapist can help you know your sadness and see if you are having a breakdown.

Read the article How to get rid of depression to learn more about it.
Even if you don’t fall, it’s still helpful to talk to a therapist. Your doctor can show you ways to work through your pain.

Heal Wounds With Time

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Don’t force yourself to be fast. The old adage “Time heals all wounds” holds true. ^{[2] X Research Sources} . However, that only comes true when people dare to face their emotions and give themselves time to calm down. We always want the wound to heal quickly, but that hardly exists with true love. Accept the healing of time and don’t force yourself to be fast.

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Live well in the present, don’t worry too much about the future. Give yourself a few moments to get rid of the worries of life. You should take a break from planning long-term goals. This is really the time to just live in the present.

Remember Your Relationship

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See your love with a real lens. When you get over the initial pain of losing someone, it’s time to take a closer look at the past relationship. Start by seeing what’s happening. If you’ve lost someone you love because they’re gone and you’re trying to move forward with your life, you may find that you idealized your love, you didn’t remember the bad times. that the two of you went through together. You cherish the person you love by remembering the happy moments a lot and forgetting the bad times together. Instead, remember exactly who the person you love is. If love exists between two people, separate the things that make your lover special and the things you do to overcome the differences between the two of you.

Don’t hold onto your loved one unnecessarily. Holding that person too tight will only make it easier for you to lose love and see ahead, which is not what he wants from you.
If you lose a relationship and it’s not because of someone leaving, then everything is the same. That relationship is not perfect. If it was perfect then you wouldn’t have to try to move on. Even if you’re not the type to actively throw things away, it will always be a superficial relationship and it’s completely right when you end it.

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Be honest about both the happiness and the pain of being in love. Your relationship, like most relationships, probably has its ups and downs. If you’re not the first to initiate termination, you may find yourself idolizing it a bit. You should look back and remember the good times. But one important thing is that you need to be realistic. The two of them also had some not-so-happy times.

Appreciate the good things that the relationship and the partner bring to you, the things that make you who you are now.

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Acknowledge the things that have hurt you. It’s also important for you to know that the relationship brought you the worst. That doesn’t mean the other person is bad. But it can show you how hurt you were when you were still in love.

Once you know the things that hurt you, you can learn how to heal your wounds. Knowing what hurts you helps you avoid pitfalls in other relationships. It also helps you to reflect on what you have lost. Knowing the things that hurt you, you’ll be free to move on.

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Don’t focus on bad things. It’s important to be fair about your relationship and your partner’s, as it helps to release your current emotions and urges you to leave the relationship and move on. It’s also important to avoid badmouthing your partner, even if he or she treats you badly. The more we dwell on the past, the more painful it is. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

Negative thinking or indulging in painful moments will keep you from thinking about that person and it will make it harder for you to let that person go. In fact, your love may turn into hatred. That doesn’t mean that person will disappear from your heart. You simply don’t care about that person anymore. You deserve to feel happy and free to move on, so be careful of keeping negative thoughts about that person in a few compartments of your heart.

Communicating with Others

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Get in touch with your closest people. You isolate yourself, that’s normal and you’ll be fine for a little while. But you must not isolate yourself from the people closest to you for longer. They love you and need to know that you’re okay. Sometimes they will understand you better than yourself. They can help you find yourself when you were at your best.

These people are the ones who understand you and know when they can help you forget it all and enjoy yourself. They know how to make you laugh and are a shoulder when you want to cry. You don’t have to share with everyone, but trust those closest to you.
These people can also help you realize if your sadness is bringing you down and if you need professional support.

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Set limits when talking. Your friends and family may talk about the person without realizing how much internal struggle you are having. So let your friends know when you want to change the subject of the story. Be honest and let them know you need time. Be clear about what hurts you and what you want to avoid right now. ^{[4] X Research Sources}

Express Yourself

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Speak out your feelings. Emotions can bury or even silence a person. Listen to your own feelings. Share it with a family member, friend, counselor, or loved one.

There are times when it’s hard to talk to someone you know about something private. You might consider making an appointment with a counselor or a monk. Emotions come out in a jumble, which makes it hard to articulate clearly. An objective third person can help you by asking the right questions to untangle your feelings without imposing their own opinion.
The important thing here is to start talking about the problems in a simple way instead of keeping them in your head where no one can understand or help regulate your thinking.

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Write a letter to that person. Write a letter to someone you love. In the letter, make it clear your choice is to let the person go. Some people will be relieved to burn the letter, declaring the end definitive. Or you may prefer to show affection so that the person’s place will always be held in your heart. That way it will be appropriate for you to forget someone when that person is dead.

You might like how to write your message on a helium balloon and let it fly.
Another option is to make a sky lantern, write love words on it and let it fly as if you were sending a letter to someone you love.

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Write your feelings in a diary. You can also choose to journal your emotions. Write about your current feelings as well as the ones you want to find again. ^{[6] X Research Sources} . You are one hundred percent honest with yourself when you journal because only you can read what you write.

It also helps you to realize how you think, act, and behave.

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Create your own change. Changing even the smallest things in life can help you feel fresh and remind you that life is still beautiful. Rearrange furniture. Try a new hairstyle. Drive to work the other way. Eat dessert first. Whatever you choose to change, no matter how small, will bring something interesting. It may only give you a temporary boost, but it can remind you that you can still smile and enjoy life.

Keep Going Your Way

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Enjoy your own life. That relationship has caused you pain and you’ve taken the time to be honest about it. You have learned how to endure as well as how to overcome your emotions. You have begun to accept others and find yourself. Now is your time to move on. Appreciate the life of the person you love by living your life well. That person’s love for you affects you by how he lives, not how he dies. Let’s continue the love and life story by moving forward on the path of love and life ahead.

People often let sadness wear them down when they think about the best memories they had with the person they passed away. Instead, let your love continue by giving them a happy corner in your memory. Learn to smile and laugh out loud every time you reminisce about your loved one. They will continue to bring you joy as the memories come flooding back. Joy heals wounds. ^{[7] X Research Sources}

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Ask yourself if you still want to come back. Giving yourself time to heal is important because a broken relationship is important, but at some point you will feel ready to take on another person. Even so, you don’t want to start a new relationship with a yearning for your past love, whether it’s friendship or love. Ask yourself if you’ve stopped thinking about your ex. If you still think about that person, even twice a day, you might still want to come back. The desire for love can even get you into trouble because you feel like you need someone to fill a temporary void in your heart that makes it easier for someone else to come to you. But this relationship does not seem to be entirely good. In fact, it really doesn’t give you anything other than filling a temporary void in your heart.

Steps