There is nothing more difficult on the body than breaking a bond. When we meet someone that we care about, who we feel cares about us, the body is onboard with our new found elevated emotional state. Why wouldn’t it be? If there is one thing the body likes, It’s feeling good.

When you start dating someone new the body releases a combination of hormones and chemicals to help support the partnership. Chemicals like dopamine, oxytocin and norepinephrine surge through the body and you start to feel like you are on a natural high.

These powerful chemicals, the similar combination that fuels addiction, create a reward loop that the body can’t get enough of. You might be stressed about work, or frustrated with a friend but one thought about your new found love, or time spent alone with them, and suddenly everything is all good again. Overtime, you’re able to stay in a good mood just by the thought of their touch or their smile.

You start to think about them every day and this becomes your new reality. Until one day, you don’t get the same morning text that you’re used to. You send them a message and they respond hours, maybe even days later. You try to make plans but they have an excuse for every day of the week.

It could be that they have disappeared altogether. Maybe it’s been days, or weeks, since they’ve contacted you and all of a sudden you start to panic. Could they be with someone else? Are they ghosting you?

The shift in their behavior seems to come out of nowhere leaving you wondering if you had imagined it all. You didn’t. What you felt was real.

So much so, that when our boyfriend or girlfriend starts to pull away, we go through somewhat of a withdrawal phase because the body no longer has that drip of good feeling chemicals that it has been used to. No more dopamine, or adrenaline, and the body does not like it.

You can tell in your mood that you are missing what you once had, even if it was brief.

Every day you spend thinking about something you are creating a memory for the body and that’s a mood. The moment that thought shifts from excitement to worry, the body starts to memorize a new combination of emotions. This is what missing someone feels like.

It’s your body asking for its daily fix of dopamine but instead it gets cortisol, the stress hormone.

So what can you do? Before you worry about getting your boyfriend or girlfriend back into your life, worry about how you feel now that they are gone. When you start to feel sad, or lonely, remember that it’s normal.

It’s the reality of missing someone but you don’t have to stay in that funk.

Think About Them In The Future.

When we miss someone, we tend to think of them in the past, in our memories. We want to remember the good times with them, but unfortunately those emotions are dated. Literally. If you want to feel good, even when the person isn’t in your life, think about them coming back into your life in the future.

The future is where everything happens, and it’s where you can create fresh emotions about the relationship. Instead of lamenting about what you used to have together, create an exciting future with them in it. You can’t go backwards so if your boyfriend or girlfriend does come back into your life, its’ going to be tomorrow, not yesterday.

Write It Down

Journal what you would say, if you could, about their absence. We don’t like to admit that we need someone in our life until they are gone. Sometimes it’s hard to express in person what our partner means to us, but when we no longer have the opportunity it is painstakingly clear how we feel.

Emotions are meant to be explored, and journaling can give you clarity on what you feel, and why.

Take time to write down what this person means to you, in case you ever have the chance to share it with them. Now, is not the time to bottle up your emotions or suffer silently. The more you get your emotions out of your body and feel them, the easier it is to get over them. Emotions are meant to be felt.

Think About Them In The Future.

The hardest thing to do every day is to think a different thought than the day before. Keeping our routine thoughts keep us in our routine patterns. If you want to avoid a negative spiral of emotions don’t tell a negative story about why your partner pulled away in the first place.

Our minds tend to be our best friends, or our worst enemies, unless we control how we think. There is no way of knowing why other people make the decisions that they do. Don’t blame yourself for their actions. Whatever story you are telling yourself about why they are gone, or why they have changed their behavior, can be whatever you want it to be. Sometimes it’s wise just to admit that you don’t know.

The best way to handle the separation and the confusion of losing the affection of a partner is to focus on what you can control. Focus on thinking and feeling better every single day. The better you feel, the higher your chances of attracting them back into your life.