@ Kkasxo, likewise, hoping you are making it through this one ok.

Hey Shelby – and welcome to Sylvie, a grand name! Yep, she’s quiet and sometimes real hard to hear but she’s always there and truly wants what’s best for you, unlike Martha. The more you listen and trust in her, the quieter Martha will get. But it takes time and practice and effort.  A thought for you to ponder on a walk on this wonderful sunny day – when you find yourself spending a lot of time missing him, thinking about him and the relationship etc and reminding yourself and Martha of what you are missing out on – how much effort do you put into consciously choosing to think about something else? It may feel strange to willfully “change the subject” in your head but what we choose to focus out attention on naturally then has our attention. It can be perversely comforting to go down the same old rat-holes and round and round the same ‘problem’, looking for a different way to ‘fix’ it this time. When in reality there is no magical new solution and there is no answer, just more mental energy wasted.

One thing that helped me was to consciously choose to focus on other ‘problems’ to solve in my life as if you have a brain that likes to problem-solve and analyse things out, it can be easier to refocus it that way instead of simply trying to stop thinking about the relationship problem and focus on other areas of your life instead.  You mentioned previously issues at work you’d like to deal with, focus on planning how to attack those. Or start to think about planning a big hairy scary adventure trip like you used to do. Just something not relationship-focused in the least.

Martha will scream at you for giving up on her favourite topic but it’s literally like a bad habit that needs the cycle breaking.