Break up recovery period
 

This poll may not work because it may depend more on the situation than the person but I was curious so decided to post anyway. I'm curious about the time for an average break up recovery period. I'll define it as the time it takes after a break up that you are open and willing (but doesn't mean that you automatically will) to start another relationship or in other words pretty much back to normal. Now obviously I realize it could vary between relationships so I'm looking for your guestimated average time. Marriage (divorce) should be considered on a different level and may be better suited to a post if you're so inclined. What consitutes a relationship will have to be left up to your discretion, generally 1 month minimum, sex isn't required but certaintly a level of intimacy is involved.

Thanks for participating if you choose to, and as far as the general custom on this forum of sharing my experiences, well that is in part why I am doing this poll, I've never been in a serious enough relationship to warrant such a guess.


*The time it takes to want just sex, rebounders, or one nighters shouldn't be taken as "back to normal" when determining your time period.

I put my average since I turned 17 (before then it wasn't serious dating). For me it's a few months before I'm ready to move on. My first big break up ruined me for 6 months.

Basic rule: to be TRULY over someone, you recover for approximately twice the length of the relationship.

10 years? ah crap!

Ok, I think that works for relationships up to a year and a half or so....

I haven't grown up enough to compensate for my current seven year relationship...but then again, I don't think I'd EVER be over her if we divorced.

Well, I was dumped out of a relationship that lasted nearly 3 years and 3 months just over 4 months ago.

The thing is, I am already in another relationship, this relationship is great, and I love being in it, but it did just kinda happen without me intending it to. I'm still not back to normal from my previous relationship. Not that I could ever be described as normal.

I voted 6+ months because I don't see my self being fully over it anytime before then.

wtf?

Isn't it that it's supposed to take HALF the time you were with a person? Double the length of the relationship is just plain ludicrous. If I date a girl for only 3 months, there is no way in hell I would still be getting over her 6 months after we broke up.

I dunno though, maybe it is true? Certainly not for me though.. I voted 8-21 days. Usually no less than 2-3 weeks for me.

I'm not sure what to pick as my answer. In some cases it took me a month or so. However, when I broke off my engagement it took less than one day. As you said it depends on the circumstances. I knew that my engagement was bullshit about 6 months before I broke it off. I was with jj the same day that I broke off the engagement. My family called it a rebound, but if that's what it was it's a rebound that has lasted 7 years with 4.5 years of marriage. :lol:

The typical rule of thumb is that it takes half the time of the time of the relationship...
1 month=2 weeks
6 months=3 monthsf
etc.

Quickest way to be over someone is to start having sex with someone else.

Much quicker than moping and feeling sorry for yourself.

Whenever I broke up with a girl during high school, my dad would always make me do a shit load of work. He'd notice me acting all depressed and shit and then he'd tell me to go dig up a palm tree or redig the ditch along our driveway or something.

He said hard work takes your mind off of it and then you get over it faster.

I say 2 months per year of relationship.

I'd call that a unique circumstance in that you broke up 6 months ago...you just happened to stay together officially so to speak.


And wow it looks like I underestimated the times, I should have put more options for over 6 months. They also vary more than I thought they would, as it seems to be 50% of the time you were together to 200%. I expected most to fall within the middle of the options and very few to fall at 6+ months. Though it's only been a day, guess we'll see if things change significantly. As is being indicated by the responses recovery period seems to be a complex matter based at least equally in circumstance as personality characteristics.

Keep the responses coming guys, especially the unique circumstances.

And did it seem to work? Whenever I'm feeling down I usually go for an intense run/jog/hike and that makes me feel better. Although those downers are things that take me relatively little time to recover from.

Its a good thing I have a perfect marriage because being out of the picture for 7 years would be a bit extreme :lol:

Yeah, it actually did work. At the time I was pissed though because not only had I just broken up with someone, but then my freakin dad was making me do all kinds of hard work. I never admitted it to him, but I was secretly glad he made forced me to quit feeling sorry for myself.

pretty much!

How come no women voted in this poll?

carn: check out sheesus' gender. check out some of her avatars/exhibition definately a woman ;)

for me, serious relationships usually take about a year or so to be really cleaned out. less serious relationships, less time.

Oh how would the women of the world cope...:lol: :D That better be a nice present for Mrs Ustwo :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In my case - it depends on the relationship- I dont think there's a standard response... one was over before it started so 'recovery time' was nil... Another the relationship didn't last long, but it was based on a friendship that was in place for years before.. I'm still not quite sure I'm over that...

1/2 the length of the relationship defintion -was one of the lamer sex and the city episodes (I know I know, they're all lame) In some cases that may be true - in other cases - not so much... it all depends on what the relationship was

It took me a long time to get over my first love...I was still getting over it when other relationships by the wayside and I wasn't bothered by them the way that one relationship bothered me. Even though it seemed as if I'd recovered quickly, the sting and hurt lingered on for some months after the final break (this taught me to end it quickly, however, versus letting a bad relationship rule you).

The upshot of breaking up is that my dad would always send me some money to "go have fun with" in order to take my mind off of everything. Never really worked, but it never really hurt either.

I heard this before it was on Sex and the City. Also SATC isn't lame...but we've already had this discussion mal :p :icare:

When I posted earlier, no women had voted on the poll. They posted, but not voted.

Looks like two of them voted now.

as long as it takes... for some people I dated it was hours, one or two still haunts me during quiet moments yet I've been happily married for 4 years now.

and I didn't vote on the polls for obvious reasons above

The getting over someone in 0-7 day plan for females. Well, for me anyway, but then again I'm a little insane.. so try at your own risk. ;)

Day 1 (Break-up day)-- Break something really expensive that doesn't belong to you, preferably something that belongs to who is now your ex.

Day 2-- Cry a little, eat a little, and discuss all the details with your #1 best friend. (helps if you are attracted to your friend and they are to you as well)

Day 3-- Spend whole day furiously creating musical havoc on guitar or other loud insturment that you happen to have collecting dust in your closet.

Day 4-- Begin looking for someone else.

Day 5-- Find someone else.

Day 6-- Begin dating someone else.

Day 7-- Have sex with someone else.

You should be feeling better by now and be completely over the other person... what was his name again... hmm.. thats funny.. i cant seem to remember his name...

Okay, I will admit that is not entirely true, but it is slightly comical.. only slightly, though. :)

shit! thats still 18 months for me!

I'm a twice-the-length-of-the-relationship woman, if it was something serious. I haven't had any non-serious relationships, though, so who knows if it would take less time! :lol:

But yeah, my longest relationship before my current one was for a year, and it took me 2+ years to get over that. I was single for four years after that break-up... so even after I got over it, I was still not ready to be vulnerable again for a long time. (I was thoroughly committed to not rebounding because I wanted to heal properly.)

Oh, I guess one time I had a crush, crush didn't work out, and I got over it in less than a day. It helps that the guy wasn't sure if he was straight or not (and chose that moment to tell me, when I was telling him I liked him). I think I was GLAD to get over that one quickly! :rolleyes:

It all depends on the relationship. I don't know how long the latest one will take. It's a bit hard to make a guess at this point. And since this was my first serious relationship, I can't really put anything else out there.

Non-serious, I was usually over day of. I classify my relationships in two categories. Some are just two people having fun with no real long-term plans involved and some are the sort that you think could be forever. For the first type, it's easy for me to walk away because I knew from the beginning that it had to end sooner or later, so I can honestly just be glad for the good times I had. The second kind...

well, how do you get over that exactly? That's the sort of relationship that changes you, as a person. So it's not as if you can just go back to where you were beforehand. I'm still learning about that one.

Not gonna vote, because I reckon every situation is unique.

That's a cool take on it.

This is a subject we actually went over in one of my group dynamics classes. Basicly we decided that the time that a person needs to recover both emotionaly and physically from a relationship is roughly 1/2 the legnth of the relationship itself. Eg: 2 year relationship, you'll need about a year to recover.
Why so long?
If you think about it, it makes sense. You just put 2 years of your life out for this person. You invested time, money and emotion....among other things into this person. you cant expect to just end it and all that investment just come back to you. even if the relationship ends on good terms, you'll still be emotionally closed off for quite awhile. that's why "rebound" relationsips never work. but..it's 2am and i could just be hazed..heh.

I have always had long relationships relative to people my age and haven't had all that many, so I can't say I have a whole lot of "data" to go by. Also, except for two times I was the one doing the dumping.

It REALLY depends on the circumstances. If you're the one that called it off, it will be easier to get over it than if you're the one that got dumped. Also, why did it get broken off? I dated a girl for about 9 months my sophomore year of high school, broke up with her, and was open to dating someone else pretty soon afterwards....but that's part of why I broke up with her: I was interested in someone else (*waves to onodrim* :icare: :p). Before that though, I was in an 8 month relationship the summer after 8th grade and into freshman year of high school. She's the one that broke up with me and I would say I wasn't really over her for quite some time afterwards...at least until the summer before my sophomore year, which is incidentally when I started to be interested in that other girl I mentioned. Now, though, I think I could probably get over an 8 month relationship much more easily if I were in that position. I am certainly more mature and having been in a relationship for 6 years now, 8 months seems like nothing.

Twice the length of the relationship? You've got to be kidding. I find it hard to believe that a 1 year relationship would take two years to get over. I've been in the situation and it took less than a month. So exactly, what are we talking about? Alot of times I have not dated as quickly after a relationship, but it really had nothing to do with getting over the girl. Instead, it was me trying to be more wise and find someone who I am more likely to have a loyal and loving relationship with.

The problem with this is that it should not take very long to get over the relationship. Any somewhat intelligent person can figure out when things are going bad. However, I think what takes people time to get over is theire naive fantasies that never really existed to begin with. A good example is that guy in the 40 year old virgin movie that was obsessed with that girl. I think most people that have tough times with break ups are in the same way delusional of what was ever there. They are obsessed with something about the person or the fantasy of spending their life with them. Perhaps something sexual even.

The only time I could think of long recovery time being legitimate is if the person you are in the relationship with dies. I've known someone who has lost two fiancees, so I can see how that really has long term effects.

So I was inspired to write a poem to answer this question, don't ask me why..
----------------------------------------------
Hola, Guten Tag, Hi...

Call me callous or call me heartless, I don't care which you do..
0-7 days, no matter who.

My life's too short to waste on sad,
Or wishing for something I had.

Its not that I don't care,
I'm only being fair.

No matter how much time we've shared,
Be it two weeks or two years,
We shared our lives and our fears.
But, quite simply, we're not meant to be paired.

That's fine -- I'll move on with my life,
You move on with yours.
You weren't meant to be my wife.

Sayonara, auf wiedersehen, goodbye.
-----------------------

Hehe, very nice JinnKai :)

depends on how much you liked her and if someone else is on deck

damn, that would make 6 years for me!!!!! EEEEK. No way.

6 + months - as long as it takes.

Thanks to some NLP I'm learning, I've cut the recovery down to half :).

The quickest way to get someone out of your head is to fuck 'em out.