How NOT to Cope with your First Adult Breakup

1. During the first few weeks, keep wearing the promise ring she gave you and her old band t-shirts. Make it so none of it feels real. When your mother asks about the shirt, lie and tell her it’s laundry day. Don’t mention how they still smell like her whipped shea butter and cool-water incense; how you pretend that the loose thread on the sleeves are her fingertips feather-dancing against your skin again. & When your mom asks about the ring, don’t tell her it is the anchor that is keeping your hands from shaking. Keep finding excuses not to put the trinket away. Eventually your hand will learn to accept its new nakedness.

2. Eat everything. And I mean Everything. Even the food on the diabetics DO NOT CONSUME list. Ignore your blood sugar. Lay in bed with ice cream and leftovers while the fatigue seeps into your limbs like melatonin, lulling you into a sleep that will surely delay the pain. Open the snack wrappers quietly so that your roommates don’t hear you eating crap at 3am. Allow the dishes from your binge-sessions to become ceramic mountains in the sink. Feel your stomach twist with guilt while your friends patiently pick up the slack of your abandoned chores.

3. Make a Tinder account and convince yourself that you aren’t using it to fill a void. In your profile, write that you are “just looking to have fun,” whatever that means. Swipe right on the girls that resemble the one you lost. Send them each a message and wait indifferently for a response.

4. When you do meet someone, hook up with them on the second date and tell yourself that sex isn’t that deep anymore. Allow the stranger into the space where only one other person was welcome, and ignore the urge to stay 'stop.' When you wake up the next morning, ignore the hollow ache in your chest. (The tears are just the result of too much weed.) Find your shirt, tell her you’ll see her soon, and then delete her off Instagram.

5. Keep your sadness to yourself, even as it wilts into depression. When your friends ask if you are okay, smile and nod. Close your door, roll a spliff, and take a nap that lasts throughout the day. At night, toy with the idea of asking your roommates for the hug you desperately need. Get as far as knocking on their bedroom door, but then dismiss the thought completely and return to bed. Recall that It has been 6 months since she last wrapped her arms around you. Sit inside the silent memories for hours into the night.

6. Skip your therapy sessions because you know nothing can ease the agony of solitude. Hold back the tears. Don’t bother anyone with your problems. Stop taking your medication for a few weeks so that you can drink the whiskey you bought for the New Years party. (The one you didn’t actually share with anyone.) Tell yourself that a few missed doses won’t make a difference.

7. On the days when you can manage to get to work, stare at the computer blankly while the back of your eyes burn from missing her. Believe the crass voice in your head that says this was a huge mistake, and no one will love you like she did. Ignore the lack of logic in that voice, and the to-do lists that keep multiplying. Close your office door, turn off the lights. Lay your head down on the desk and pray your boss doesn’t catch you. Sit hopelessly in the loneliness that accumulates, like the dust on your floating shelves.

[1/17/2019]