Jan, I’ve actually experimented with the “30 Day No Contact Rule”, but let me tell you, it really varies depending on the person and the situation…To give you a better idea, I think I’ll explain some of my experiences with it.

In one of my relationships, I was crushed emotionally by the guy. He turned on me and decided to tell his friends that what we had was “nonexistent” and that I was a “stalker” and a “psycho”. For a while there, I became so depressed that I believed it. I wanted to let out all my feelings…unleash EVERY bit of anger on him that was pent up inside of my mind. I even started to. But my mom told me that it was a bad idea. She told me that I’d get farther ignoring him completely than I would saying even one word to him. I argued with her, saying, “But wait, if I say nothing, won’t that make him think he’s won? Won’t it make him think he’s right?” My mom told me that no, it wouldn’t work like that. She told me that all I had to do was cease any and all contact with this guy and he would eventually come back to me, trying to talk to me again. I told her there was no way he would. I said that there was no way this guy would ever try talking to me. Why would he, after he’d said all those terrible things about me? And so I tried it her way. I didn’t talk to him, I didn’t text him, didn’t call him, didn’t interact with him on his social media sites…nothing. And for a while it was torture. I couldn’t take it. Days and days on end passed and there was no indication that he’d try talking to me again. I began to doubt my mom’s advice. I almost texted him a few times. But I stopped myself. And then one day, about two or three months after we’d stopped talking, he started a conversation with me as if we had never ended things…as if he had never called me all those names. It was so mind boggling, let me tell you. But after I thought about it for a while, it made sense. Ceaselessly texting or calling a guy and trying to make them come back to you just translates to them as needy and psycho…and that’s exactly what you DON’T want them to think. If you ignore them and pretend like they don’t matter to you anymore, THAT’S what’s going to bother them. They like to gloat and feel as though you’re going to be miserable without them, and hell, that’s true a lot of the time. I’m miserable right now because my boyfriend left me, and I love him still. I’m still in the process of THAT no contact period, and to tell you the truth, it doesn’t necessarily take 30 days. It could be less than that, or more. But remember this. If a guy sees you doing well, looking good, smiling and laughing, they’re going to beat themselves up wondering what or WHO is making you this happy, since it’s not them anymore. Don’t keep emailing the guy. Let him have time and space to miss you. If the relationship actually meant something to him, which it sounds like it did, then there’s no way in hell those feelings just disappeared. You have to wait. Be patient. If things don’t work out, then maybe it wasn’t meant to be. I hate to be the one to say that, but it’s true. I wish you the best of luck.