A few elements such as loneliness, anxiety and strong feelings of love will prevent you from getting over your ex.
These feelings might be a product of past trauma, your attachment style, and your habit of having unrealistic expectations.
Going through these uncertain feelings will lead you to an obsession which will make it harder for you to move on.
Once, you cannot process these mixed feelings, you will be attached to memories from the past for a longer time.
So, healing is not linear, you need to slowly embrace the process of grief and seek emotional support.
To understand in more depth what is preventing you to get over your ex, here are 14 main reasons:
1. Your ex is giving you hot and cold vibes
Once your ex doesn’t have clear intentions after the breakup, you will get mixed signals.
They will text you enough to keep you hooked. One day you will get a text and they will love-bomb you, then the next days they will disappear.
If you cannot cut off the communication with your ex and you’re puzzled, you will continue to romanticize the relationship.
Being exposed constantly to your ex and not moving forward with your relationship, won’t help you in healing.
Therefore, you need to cut off all communication with them until their intentions are clear and genuine.
2. You’re finding it difficult to leave your comfort zone
It’s common when the relationship ends to go through pessimism, emotional distress, and fear of being alone.
The fear of facing all these struggles prevents you from grieving and detaching from the past.
Immediately, you connect happiness with the past and misery with the present and future.
After being codependent in the relationship, your self-esteem will be crushed.
You will feel like no one will ever love you the same and you will never love someone the very same.
When you think of moving on from the past or your ex, you link it with negative emotions.
Then, you go through some emotional issues while refusing to let yourself grieve, which are anxiety and depression.
3. You keep ruminating on the reason you broke up
Rumination is a result of not being able to embrace your feelings and reality.
Lack of closure and regret keep reminding you of the reason you broke up.
Being in this vicious circle, the anger and pain keep you roaming around your ex.
At this moment you can’t let your ex go. You hope that something will change or that could be done differently.
You think and feel that you have the power to change the situation.
Unfortunately, things aren’t under your control anymore.
You can’t heal from a breakup unless you take control only over your feelings.
4. You’re dealing with post-break anxiety and loneliness
What prevents you from moving further is your mindset and your low self-esteem.
Researchers have found that negative feelings have a huge impact on how you feel within and with other people.
What lowers self-esteem after the breakup is the feeling of not being chosen or valued enough.
- In this case, you need to allow yourself to embrace these feelings by crying and watching rom-com just to let it all out.
- Find a new activity that will help you cultivate new feelings such as painting, dancing, or any type of art.
- Try to connect more with people that have the same vision and priorities as you.
5. You suppressed your feelings
As the researcher Helen Fischer pointed out, rejection and heartbreak stimulate the same area of the brain as drugs do.
Now, all that pain from the breakup and the difficulty of dealing with rejection will turn into an addiction.
Once you push away your feelings and don’t let yourself feel them, you’ll get stuck in the past.
So, to start the process of detachment you need to keep your mind occupied.
It doesn’t mean that you need to be busy and forget about your ex.
When you start a new activity or go out, you start to replace negative feelings with positive ones.
6. You did not cut contact with your ex
If you’re constantly surrounded by your ex this will prevent you to move on because you cannot grieve while being in the past.
Many intense feelings are released when you encounter familiar odors, their clothes, and familiar face that remind you of them.
1. Therefore, if you are still hanging out with the same entourage, try to hang out with new people.
2. Moreover, even if your friends or family talk about them constantly, try to spend time more alone.
Hence, don’t use this time to isolate yourself but go out and watch a movie, or drink something on your own.
Use this time alone to cry, and reminisce but also know yourself in depth.
7. You’re forcing yourself to forget your ex
To get over an ex, you need to trust the process and not force yourself to forget them.
Therefore, when you suppress your feelings those will come out of the surface.
- You will convince yourself that you do not have feelings for your ex anymore. Instead of suppressing try to write down what you are truly feeling.
- If you’re lost, then write I am lost and what can you do to connect more with yourself.
- If you’re feeling hopeless, then write it down as that. Just let yourself feel.
8. You’re dwelling on your mistakes
Dwelling on your past mistakes will cause anxiety that might isolate you from the world.
You keep replaying the moment before and when the breakup happened.
What I advise you to do before reflecting on your mistakes, you should reflect on your feelings.
~First, you need to feel the pain and then improve your life and love skills.
~If you jump immediately to reflect on all that burden, you’ll never get over your ex.
~Try to surround yourself with people who love you and do what makes you happy.
~Do not take your ex’s mistake as your own and blame yourself for that too.
9. You’re caught up on your past trauma
Being out of a toxic relationship and dwelling on the past, you can easily mix being in love with a trauma bond.
Your ex’s manipulative behavior will impact how you feel also after the breakup.
Since you’re used to your ex’s controlling behavior you need their validation.
This means that your ex prevents you to heal while playing mind games.
The help of a therapist is important to help you understand what you’re going through and draw boundaries.
10. You still keep in touch with them
Having feelings for your ex and being around them, will make you even more confused.
Immediately, you will stop considering working on your grieving process and move on.
Every little activity that you do will remind you something of your relationship.
To pull yourself out of this situation, you should set boundaries.
~Take your time to heal and take responsibility for your actions.
~Try to forgive your ex if there is a need to do so and be compassionate.
11. You still have feelings for your ex
It is hard to move on from your ex if you’re an empath and you’ve been in a long-term relationship.
If you have been emotionally attracted to one another then it’s hard to detach within a month or three months.
That’s why you start to not embrace reality and prioritize your old feelings.
Therefore, every day you will wake up with a new plan to get your ex back.
I am not implying that this isn’t possible but if you don’t grieve first, the relationship will be built up on rambles.
Instead of doing it try to be the best version of yourself by working on your flaws step by step. Then you can discover what you feel about your ex.
12. You feel that the last relationship was perfect
It’s hard to move on once you feel that your ex was the one. You might not want to move on from your ex but you need to try.
You feel like you’ll never find love again and you won’t be able to be loved ever again.
This situation is created when you have high expectations for a certain partner or a relationship or they manipulate you.
Try to write down or reflect on the reasons that your relationship didn’t work.
~So, start to set healthy boundaries such as voicing your opinion.
~Then, try to not interact with them on social media.
~Avoid flirting with them and when you feel like doing it, try to distance yourself.
13. You’re not balancing good/bad memories
Another reason that prevents you from getting over your ex is when you keep replaying the good or best memories with them.
This comes as a result of the trauma that this relationship has caused you or the enchantment that you went through.
In particular, if you are an overthinker, you will tend to find it hard to stop your thoughts.
It’s pretty understandable that you cannot shut down your thoughts and be oblivious to these memories.
- So give yourself time to go through these feelings and journal or record your thoughts.
If you were in a long-term relationship then it will take you more time to detach from these memories.
That’s because you think that no one could ever make you feel that way.
Hence, dealing with bad memories takes more time because you will go through, PTSD that will interfere with your present
14. You’re not certain about your feelings
What causes uncertainty after the breakup is the anger, pain, and fear of being on your own.
This will make you hold on to the past and romanticize it. Once, that you notice that you’ve lost them, you will start to panic.
~To learn how to balance these mixed feelings and thoughts, recognize that is ok to feel mixed up after the breakup.
~Talk with a professional therapist or coach about your feelings.
Venting to friends or family is ok but having a biased opinion will not help you to decode your feelings.
~Instead of fighting or feeding your feelings, try to feel them by crying, laughing, and being sad, and happy.
How do you let go of an ex you still love?
You can let go of an ex you still love, only if you take a step back and focus on your emotional well-being.
To know how to distinguish love and let go of your ex, here are a few steps:
1. You can block their number or mute them on social media.
If you’re not around your ex all the time, then you’ll have the time and space to reflect.
It’s important to not meet or talk to your ex after the breakup since you’re hurt and vulnerable.
When you’re vulnerable, you’ll act based on your ego and not on your logic.
You need to detach slowly emotionally from your ex, so you can move on.
2. Grieve, cry, and let your feelings out.
You need to let yourself feel the emotions. You can play sad movies or songs, go for a walk, or do whatever it takes to let your feelings out.
Talk about how you’re feeling. You can talk either to your friends, family, or even a therapist.
Find a support system where you can purge your emotions.
3. Take a step back and see the situation from a bird’s eye view.
Reflect on when the relationship failed and who made the first step.
It’s hard to do when you still have feelings but it will help you to focus more on your journey instead of your ex.
4. Try to not put pressure on yourself and don’t blame yourself for still loving your ex.
Try to find out why you love them. Is it because you’re feeling lonely or do you think that they are the ones?
To find the answer, you need to cut contact with them and connect with who you were before the relationship.
5. Don’t rush into a rebound relationship.
Creating a rebound relationship will not erase your previous feelings.
If you didn’t grieve your ex, you won’t be able to receive positive feelings from your current partner.
6. Respect your ex’s decisions.
You can move on when you focus on self-love when you start to respect yourself and respect your ex’s decisions.
Once, you recognize your value, your ex’s presence and opinion won’t matter.
Why can’t I get over my ex even though I’m in a new relationship?
There are various reasons why you can’t move on from your ex. It could be you, your feelings, your new partner/relationship, or your ex.
1. You find it hard to move on from someone.
If you have abandonment issues then it is hard to accept that a relationship is over.
Now, your partner cannot feel the void that anxiety has caused.
2. You entered the relationship too early.
You might have felt lonely when entering this relationship and not healed, that’s when the mistake was made.
If you haven’t processed the pain and love from your last relationship, it’s impossible to feel something new.
3. You entered this relationship to make your ex jealous.
If you started this new relationship to make your ex jealous then you’ll never move on.
Once you have feelings for your ex, you can’t feel the same for someone else simultaneously.
4. You never had closure.
When you don’t have closure that will torture for the rest of your relationships.
When any little inconvenience happens in your current relationship, the lack of closure will impact your self-confidence.
FAQ: I can’t get over my ex…
1. Will feelings for an ex ever go away?
The feelings will never go away, just the intensity won’t be the same.
Gradually, when you grieve, you replace old emotions with new ones.
2. Is it possible to never forget your ex?
You will never forget your ex, you will just learn to detach from them.
If you accept them as a part of your past and forgive them, you will be able to move forward.
To conclude it all: Why can’t I let go of my ex?
You can’t let go of your ex because of intense feelings like pain, hurt, love, and disappointment.
Other than trauma what prevents you from getting over your ex is your attachment style.
If you have an anxious attachment style then you will be afraid of losing them forever.
On the other hand, if you’re a fearful-avoidant, you will refuse to work on your feelings.
In the end, the key to getting over your ex go is to go back to your authentic self and allow yourself to feel sadness, loss, and anger.
You can do it,
Callisto
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