Andy,

Give up then.

But know this, you will never know what happens next. If you give up now, what are you going to do? just wander around aimlessly? If you give up, you gave up, you made a choice. But you have the chance, nay the opportunity to further yourself, whilst others across oceans and borders don’t have anything. I do not wish to make comparisons, suffering is suffering, but you need to realize your not the only one who feels pain at this very moment. And you definitely won’t be the last, take comfort in this thought. The pain will subside but only unless you begin to let go, let go of the fear of being alone and lonely. Let go of the past and learn from it. Free your mind from painful questions and perceptions. Embrace yourself. The reason we give up, is less about not being able to overcome something. It’s because we don’t trust ourselves, we don’t believe that we could do it. Learn to trust yourself, rebuild your belief in yourself. For without it, you truly are alone.

As for words:

“The art of being happy, lies in the power of extracting happiness from common things” Henry Ward Beecher

“If life knocks you down, try to land on your back. Because if you can look up, you can get up” Les Brown

Best of luck Andy,
Matty

Andy,

When I read your post, I decided to register for this site because I just had to reply. I know how you feel, man. It hurts like hell, doesn’t it? You feel overwhelmed, like you’re being crushed by the weight of it all, and all you want is for the pain to go away.

Forgive me if I’m wrong, but it sounds to me like your emotions have gotten the better of you — you’ve let your emotions be in control instead of your rational mind. You “feel” like disappearing, you “feel” like you’re only going backwards, you “feel” like you can’t make it. But feelings aren’t facts, my friend. You’ve mistaken them for The Truth. The truth is, you are making it because you’re still here. The truth is, you are going forward because you reached out to everyone here. That’s a sign of progress. And the truth is, you don’t really want to disappear because if you really, truly did, you’d have been long gone by now. So challenge your feelings. Just because something feels a certain way does not mean it truly is that way.

If you are seriously feeling like hurting yourself though, please call someone to help you get help, or go for help yourself. The pain of a breakup has pushed me to the point of suicide before, and I had to ask for help. I sought out a therapist who helped me understand that a part of me was almost (but not quite) mortally hurt by the breakup, but that if I gave that part time to grieve and to heal, and if I accepted that part of me for what it was — a very lonely part that wanted a meaningful relationship more than anything else in the world, eventually the suffering would disappear and the pain would lessen. And it did. And I’m still here.

You’ll make it, Andy. Hang in there.

Everytime that you have been helpless and hopeless, you have survived.

You are welcome, Andy- anytime!

anita

Happy Birthday Andy!

let’s celebrate it somehow, here on tiny buddha!

May you heal from this breakup, reach calm, peace of mind, be assertive, taking good care of yourself (not a people pleaser!)

May you find love and good things ahead!

anita

Dear Andy:

How unfortunate! To look for birthday wishes and find that instead! I am not familiar with fb: is that picture something she purposefully sent you?

Andy, this crushing is not celebrating your birthday. There must be a way to turn the frown into a smile for just a moment today, for your birthday!

Tell me, how are you doing? What are you thinking? Feeling? Doing??? I am concerned about you!

anita

Dear Andy:

She may be happy but the picture is no indication that she is happy. I had photos of myself when I looked so happy and yet I was so miserable. When a photo was taken of me, I looked into the camera and smiles on purpose, the biggest smile I could place on my face and I tried to make it look authentic. Some years ago I threw away all my photos because the showed me happy and I was not.

So photos are no indication that she is happy! We often show to the world what we want the world to see. Unless a photo is taken without the person knowing, you can’t trust a photo.

And if there was an invisible camera taking photos of her, you would see her sometimes miserable. Photos are such misrepresentation: not only a person looks happy when not so, but the photo stays on the screen or on paper or in our memory as this stationary thing, something permanent when in reality, the person is no longer that 2 dimensional permanent image.

You don’t know if she bounced back quickly or if she is falling right now. You can’t know.

Please do take care of yourself as you hide, make it a pleasant hiding today, nice music perhaps, a movie?

anita