The David Himmel Method for Getting Over Breakups
A few weeks back, I was asked by a friend, “What’s the David Himmel method for getting over breakups?” This friend was once a camper of mine when I was a summer camp counselor, so although this friend is now in his mid-thirties, I maintain the summer camp counselor responsibility to shepherd him to the best advice I have access to for a life lived well. That, and he asked for advice. And what good are friends if they can’t help you get over heartbreak? No good, that’s what.
We talked. I threw some of my tried-and-true steps to getting over a breakup at him. He ain’t out of the hurt yet, but with patience and persistence, he’ll get there. And if your rejected heart hurts, too, I know you’ll get there as well.
✶
Breaking up is hard to live through
Sometime in 2005, I was riding shotgun in my friend Tamar’s Jeep Cherokee. I couldn’t tell you where we were going or for what reason, but the conversation was about heartache—romantic breakups, specifically. I was finally winding down a breakup with a girl that had been going on for about as long as the relationship itself. It had been years. I was tired. Hurt. Disappointed. Angry. Sad. Vengeful. But mostly tired—emotionally drained.
“The thing is, Tamar,” I said, “I wouldn’t wish a breakup on my worst enemy. And I’m starting to think that the best way to avoid this crippling pain is to avoid relationships altogether. No relationships, no relationship problems.”
Tamar, who was engaged and high on love, tried to talk me out of such a hardline position. I wasn’t having it. My mind was made up. Love was not for me. All relationships end and most of them end badly. Even if they last years, they still end. Even the happiest marriages end with heartbreak when one partner dies before the other. Some will say that this is a defeatist’s way of looking at love, but it’s true. If you don’t put yourself in the position to be hurt, you won’t be.
The breakup Tamar and I were discussing was the second of my Big Three. The first was five years earlier. And while different in almost every way, both had me feeling I wasn’t good enough, handsome enough, smart enough, tall enough… But worse, they had me feeling I was too much. Too loud, too irreverent, too intense, too skinny… too much David. I was desperate to feel better by any means necessary.
The main crutch I used to help me up and around the bad feelings of self-loathing and doubt was to drink copious amounts of beer while playing Grand Theft Auto III at my friend Christopher’s house through the nighttime hours. Drunk, I could safely go for long drives in a stolen car listening to the video game’s screwy radio stations. Sometimes it was a stolen motorcycle. Sometimes a stolen tank. I’d take my aggression out on innocent pedestrians and hookers and cops using cheat codes to build an arsenal and avoid arrest or significant harm. My Grand Theft Auto III avatar was living his best life and it was terrible. But it was better than feeling the way I felt.
In the morning light, with an hour or two of restless sleep under my belt (because I would pass out in my clothes), a gentle hangover, but no regret for the carnage I caused in Liberty City, I sulked and suffered through the days. I wrote my feelings down in notebooks no one should ever read. I counted the minutes before it was socially acceptable for me to start drinking again. I daydreamed of dropping tanks all over the city and shelling the hell out of unsuspecting Liberty City neighborhoods.
At twenty-six years old, I resigned myself to avoid romantic entanglements of any serious nature. I had no fear of ending up alone because that’s idiotic. I still had a heart capable of love. And I had family and friends to prove it. I was fine with that kind of love. And I was fine with casual romantic trysts. Drunken romantic trysts were preferred. Feed the beast, let it out of its cage to run around a bit then put it back in before things got ugly.
Here’s the hard truth: Most relationships aren’t worth saving.
I was happy with this decision. It worked well for me for two years or so. Because that’s when I feel for love’s old tricks again. The next relationship lasted the better part of three years. However, less than a year in, I regretted giving love another shot. Still, I fought hard for it to work because I did love her but what’s more is that I did not want to go through another breakup. Better to be miserable in love than having to find your way back from it, I convinced myself. So, when that relationship ended, I was filled with all the usual disappointment, anger, and sadness but none of the self-loathing. I had been through this before. I knew I was better than I had allowed her to make me feel. So, I approached the healing process differently.
There was no sulking, only confident action, even if I did allow the disappointment of the relationship to occupy my brain and heart for at least a year-and-a-half. What helped was doubling down on my idea of avoiding all serious romantic relationships. I was wholly committed, more than ever before, to remain single; free of attachments and domestic accountability, but most importantly, I was preventing another from having to face me at my worst or even my mediocre. Never again would anyone get too much of David Himmel. They’d only get my best and I’d always leave them wanting more.
And then I met the woman who would become my wife. And despite all my efforts to prevent another serious romantic relationship including trying to talk her out of falling in love with me, I caved. Katie broke me. And so far, so good. But I realize that another breakup is always a few terrible decisions away. I can only try to avoid such a horrific fate. Emotional Hell has more locations than Starbucks and McDonald’s combined.
Should it happen, I have my arsenal of advice. This is what I told my friend, and this is what I’ll tell you.
Drink
It’s the ubiquitous, obvious way to go. It also works. It immediately numbs the pain and, when managed correctly, it’ll help sweep the brain clean of excess failure and hurt to allow for social confidence and unique perspective to take center stage. It’ll help you be brave enough to sort your feelings out, dipping deep into each and every one. But, if the drink gets away from you it can lead to pathetic drunk dials, texts, and lovelorn groveling. That, my wounded friend, is a step back. Because in sobriety you’ll have the original hurt still there but now he has a pal with him—a plus one named Regrettable Embarrassment. Drink responsibly, kid.
Write
Journaling is fine. So is blogging. Novelize your heartbreak if that’s what helps. But I’m specifically talking about writing letters to your ex that you’ll never ever send. These letters/emails/whatevers are your side of the story. State your case against every emotional pummeling you took. You have the floor. An uninterrupted opportunity to say exactly what you need to say—what you’ve always wanted to say along the way—and the audience living rent free in your mind has no choice but to take it. Like the drinking, this is an exercise in pain removal. An emotional remodeling. And before any remodeling project can truly get underway there needs to be some demolition. Get all of your arguments out now so you have a head and heart down to the studs ready for the rebuild.
Embark on a sexual bender
You feel low. Unattractive. The one person who really desired you no longer wants you. But, kid, I’m telling you, you’re still fuckable. Go prove it to yourself. Seek sex the way America approaches drone strikes—anyone is a target, even the ones we don’t want. Hit them all. Swing for the fences. Slum it. It doesn’t matter. The world is your sexual oyster. Get them pearls. Make love through your imagination. Picture your ex’s face and hate fuck them to excise all that sexual aggression. You might feel yucky. You might feel attractive. You’ll probably feel both simultaneously. It’s okay. This is all about distraction. You see, if you’re trying to get laid by strangers, you’re not thinking about the familiar body that you can no longer be familiar with. Not only is a sexual bender fun, it’s also conditioning your mind to not think about your ex.
It is extremely important when on your sexual bender that you pick up new techniques. This will make you a better lay for your next lover. And when this happens, then you know that you didn’t waste your best bedroom romps on your ex. And if you do find yourself in bed with your ex again, you’ll wow them with this new and improved version. And that’ll leave them wondering what they missed out on and remind them of how truly incredible you really are. Most importantly, make it clear to your sexual bender partners that this is what it is. Don’t lead anyone on. You’re in the business of healing hearts not breaking them.
And always use a condom.
Sulk
There are times for putting on a brave face and times for letting yourself feel the entire weight of shittiness. Let it wash over you. Bask in it. Bad feelings are a part of it. They’ll never go away if you ignore them. Let them play and eventually they’ll grow tired and retreat into the deepest, darkest depths of your spirit.
Have a funeral
I’m a historian. I save things. I catalog. I curate. I’m not one to throw away letters and photos of relationships past. I’ll tuck them away deep in a box way back in the garage under other boxes so the tangible memories aren’t on display or of easy access. I keep them because every now and then it’s good to go back for reference. For a story. For a reminder of where I came from, how I got here. But some things need to go. Permanently.
The end of a relationship is much like a death. It needs to be mourned but it also needs to be buried. Shortly after the final break up of my Big Three, I took a few choice items given to me by my ex that represented our time together and I cremated them. Outside of my apartment, I placed them in a pile, said a few words out loud to myself and any gods listening then doused them in kerosene and threw a match at them. Up those symbols went in smoke to the night sky, forever belonging to the cosmos. Of all the things I did during my healing from that disappointing relationship, setting those symbols on fire was the most cathartic.
Talk about it
Here’s where you need your good friends. Your patient friends. The friends who understand you best. The ones to listen to you drone on for months about your ex. After all, it’s hard not to talk about them. You have those experiences and they shaped you, and what is there to talk about if not the shit we do in our lives with people. And those good friends will listen, hold your hair back, be your wing person, and tell you when enough is enough.
Months after Number 3, at our usual bar over our usual drinks, I was telling a story and mentioned my ex’s name. My friend Tommy slapped me across the face. He told me that he was tired of hearing about her but also that it was time I stopped talking about her. So, every time I mentioned her name, he slapped me. He was right. It was time to dial back how central she was to my experiences. The Pavlovian approach worked, I stopped saying her name. She became known as Whatsherface. Just like in good warfare, you need to dehumanize the enemy. Recast your ex as a background player. They no longer deserve the spotlight.
Take time
My friend Alana once told me it takes half the time of the relationship to get over it. It’s not perfect math but it rounds out about right. You have to go through the stages of loss. You’ll drink, write, screw, have the funeral, but only the passing of time can get you to where you need to be. And one morning, you’ll wake up and you won’t feel bad. You won’t feel sad. You won’t feel anything. And that’s the best feeling in the world. Not when you fall in love, but when you realize you’re over it. Because that’s the finish line. And when you cross it, you’re a new you.
Time heals all wounds, even the nastiest of wounds—a shattered heart.
✶
You won’t find this method in any scientific studies, but I assure you this method works. It works because it forces you to reevaluate the relationship, yourself, your ex. It rebuilds your confidence and prepares you to move on. Here’s the hard truth: Most relationships aren’t worth saving. They fizzle or explode and fail for plenty of good reasons. And if one of your big breakups happens to be The One That Got Away, well, you won’t know that until much later.
And if you do come to that conclusion, maybe you can try to begin again with them. But you need the time away and the healing to become that better version of yourself. Give that heart of yours some scar tissue—it’ll beat stronger. And if you can’t rekindle and you still feel like the relationship was The One That Got Away, you’ll be in the right place to keep it in your memories for the occasional fond look back. And you’ll eventually fall in love again in a different kind of way so that old memory of an old love is nothing more than a story you’ll tell in casual conversation. Just be careful to tell it without getting slapped in the face.
You’re going to be okay. You’re worth more than your broken heart has you believing. You’ll live to love again. Or you’ll live. And that’s enough. Because you are enough. Be it for yourself or someone else. Someone who won’t leave you in a puddle of misery the next time around. And if they do, you’ll be ready for it.
