Broken hearts

I read Lucy Robinson's blog in Marie Claire yesterday and felt it needed to be read by as many people as possible because it is quite brilliant.Click on the link to view.

The pain just drips off the page and as I was reading it I was almost in shock, as I realised that a heart could be broken so badly. After taking a while to digest it and reading it again a few times, my focus turned from pity for Lucy to intrigue at why break ups seem to hurt women so much more than men.

It was at this point that I stopped and thought whooooooo there! This is a nest of vipers you really don't want to disturb, be sensible, leave it there and walk away.Unfortunately the stubborn part of me kept wandering back for another dig around and I started to go back through the hazy mists of time to my own relationship break ups and those of my friends, to see if I could recall anyone hurting that badly.

Now I have had more than my fair share of break ups over the years, but I don't ever remember spending week after week crying and contemplating suicide. More to the point, I never heard of an ex of mine being in a bad way either. Is it just me, am I completely shallow? Was I actually such a crap boyfriend that nobody ever felt bothered enough to be upset by me finishing things?

One of my relationship's ended with me being beat up with a saucepan! After I had dropped the bomb shell that I wanted to end it, she stormed off to the kitchen to get a pan to scoop up my gold-fish because "I am taking my f****** gold-fish with me because it is my f****** gold-fish and not your f****** gold-fish, I f****** bought it for you and I f****** hate you and hope you die" at which point I started laughing. Big mistake. She proceeded to pound me with it before going outside and "keying" my car. I still have a phobia for all things Prestige to this day.Not long after she was in the tabloids linked to a member of the royal family so she clearly didn't have too many problems getting over me.

I remember one particular break up that I was slightly cut up about and I my well have spent a week moping in my bedroom, listening to Leonard Cohen. Other than that though I am at a loss to remember any lasting upset. There was always something else to do like playing football, drinking with mates, playing football and drinking with mates, playing football and ...... hang on, was it really that simple? Is that all it took to get over a break up?

While women spend weeks puzzling where it went wrong and what they could have done different, do men really just play or watch football and drink with their mates.Is that our only defence mechanism? Millions of years of evolution and the best we can come up with is football and beer.

Are we really that basic and shallow? Are we all the same? Do any men go in to a year long slump? Not that I recall. I remember Marc breaking up with Barbara when we were 15 and taking to his bed for a week because "We had a pregnancy scare and I really thought it had bought us together as a couple, but when she found out the test was negative she dumped me". He actually missed a Friday night disco at North Park over that, the pain was so acute. He eventually got up because "I could smell bacon and it was Villa Man U. on the telly"

I had another mate Dave who split up with Tor after seven years together at the age of 23. She was younger and "felt she was too young to be settled down" and as I recall, it hit Dave pretty hard. He spent about a month listening to tape recordings of Northants Fm's Sunday night Cuddle-on-the-couch-show and played crap for our football team at the time, but before you knew it was back drinking snake-bite and black propping up the bar at Rockefeller's looking for a new girl!

At the same time, I knew some girl's who were completely devastated and "would never be the same again" and "will never be able to love again" because of break ups. One girl I knew actually attempted an overdose while another eventually got married but still always kept a picture of my mate (who dumped her) in her purse and apparently does to this day!

Why do women seem to suffer so badly with break ups? One female friend theorises that men always "hold a bit back while women put their everything in to relationships" thus leaving themselves more vulnerable when things go wrong.I don't believe this for a minute. I think I have always given my all to relationships but sometimes they just don't work out. When that time comes you have to make a practical decision about what you are going to do. Maybe that is it, maybe men can compartmentalise things practically while women do it emotionally.

I don't know all the answers but I am so glad I have never spent a year feeling like Lucy - and quite a few of her readers who have tagged on comments. I really hope as well that I have never made anyone feel that way but if I have I am really sorry. Nobody should ever have to suffer the sort of pain Lucy describes but that, and her on-going search for a decent bloke through Internet dating make for fantastic reading.

SO thanks Lucy, not only for providing thought provoking and genuinely touching blogging but for also reminding me how lucky I am to have found 'A'. If she was to ever get fed up of my general idiocy and call it a day I may well be feeling your pain!

http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/community/blog/433798/a-soul-mot-in-365-days.html