The length of a relationship doesn’t always determine how hard a breakup hits. A short fling can leave you reeling in ways a long, committed relationship doesn’t. Amy Chan, relationship expert and author of Unsingle: How to Date Smarter and Create Love That Lasts, has spent years working with people recovering from relationship loss. We asked her why some endings feel so painful and what can help us move forward.
Why do some breakups hit harder than others?
“I often have clients who struggle more with their three-month situationship ending than their divorce after twenty years of marriage,” Amy says. One reason is timing. “When a relationship is cut off during the highs of the honeymoon stage, there’s all this possibility, the hopes that never actualize, the fantasy that this person will change your life.”
A long marriage, by contrast, has already burned through some of the fantasy. You may have seen each other at your worst, and there may be less mystery to romanticize.
Breakups that come as a complete blindside sting for a similar reason. “[The person who was broken up with] keeps ruminating and trying to solve the mystery,” Amy explains. “They keep obsessing over which red flags they missed, and trying to close the loop with answers, but it only keeps them more attached.”
What's happening in the brain during heartbreak?
“After a breakup, your body goes through a neurobiological process,” Amy says. “Brain imaging studies show that people who were recently broken up with have activity in the same region of the brain as a drug addict craving a fix.” This tracks with a widely cited fMRI study, which found that romantic rejection activates brain regions associated with reward and addiction.
“Your brain is a prediction-making machine, and it got used to receiving regular hits of dopamine and oxytocin from your partner,” Amy says. Logic doesn’t move as fast as biology. “Even if you know logically that the relationship is over, it takes some time for your brain and body to get the memo.”
How long it takes to get over heartbreak can depend a lot on what you do after your breakup. “If you keep checking their social media, reading old texts, or contacting them, even having breakup sex, you do not allow the old neural pathways connected to your ex to prune away.” New experiences can help weaken old pathways through a process called synaptic pruning.
Amy’s advice is to basically treat an ex like a drug dealer. It sounds dramatic, but it’s this kind of comparison that can cut through the denial. Cut contact as soon as you can. If you have to stay in touch because of kids, pets, or other logistics, keep it strictly neutral. “Don’t go to them to share good news or pick fights with them,” she says. “The emotional charge keeps you hooked.”
What do our relationship patterns reveal about us?
Most people insist they don’t have a type. Amy disagrees, at least emotionally. In her book, she asks readers to list their last three partners alongside physical traits, values, who pursued whom, and the main emotions they felt in each relationship. “You then go and circle any common themes across the relationships. Chances are, there’s an emotional experience that’s repeating.”
Psychologists call this repetition compulsion. “The psyche subconsciously tries to recreate the scenario from childhood in an attempt to change its ending,” Amy says. Someone who grew up earning love from an unavailable parent may find themselves drawn to unavailable partners as an adult, convinced that trying harder this time will finally win the love they missed.
Is "keeping busy" after a breakup really helping?
The short answer is not always. “There’s a difference between doing things that help you feel productive, social, and moving forward versus distraction and avoidance,” Amy says. Overloading your calendar with work, dates, or vices doesn’t process the grief, it delays it. “You’re just procrastinating your pain. The emotions don’t just evaporate because you keep pushing them down the line.”
What does healthy grief look like?
“Healthy grief does not mean you don’t feel challenging emotions,” Amy says. It means feeling them, taking the time to process them, and using tools to regulate yourself so you don’t react in ways you’ll regret. The real trap is getting stuck at either extreme. Villainizing your ex, or putting them on a pedestal is not useful. “Staying in either of those extremes is not being in reality, and it’s very hard to heal and move forward if you’re not working in reality.”
What can slow healing down the most?
Amy points to two habits in particular that can delay the healing process:
Rationalizing a reunion. “They are in withdrawal and miss their ex, so they make excuses and rationalize why they should get back together or see them one last time. This just keeps you hooked. It’s like going back to square one each time.”
Rushing into friendship too soon. This is often driven by the person who initiated the breakup, “sometimes due to guilt, and sometimes because they want the emotional connection without the responsibility and commitment of the relationship.” Amy calls it “super selfish,” because it keeps the other person bonded before the dynamic has had time to shift from romantic to platonic.
How do you rebuild your identity after losing yourself in a relationship?
At her Renew Breakup Bootcamp, Amy leads what she calls the “pie exercise.” Draw a circle, then divide it into slices representing where your time and energy went during the relationship. “This is usually when the gasps happen, as a lot of participants share that over 70% of their pie was consumed by their relationship.”
Next, draw a second, more balanced pie, with slices for friends, self-care, hobbies, travel, and community. “You have to be proactive about filling the gap the relationship left,” Amy says. “If you don’t fill it with things that feed your identity and independence, you’ll fill it with rumination about your ex.”
Keep that second pie visible, even once you’re dating again. “Check in with your pie regularly,” Amy advises. “It’s natural for a new relationship to take up a bigger slice, but if you notice it swallowing the whole pie, that’s your cue to course correct.”
How do you know you're ready to date again?
“You have to get honest about where your need for connection is coming from, because the root of that intention will impact the outcome,” Amy says. Seeking a relationship to escape the pain, she warns, is “like trying to grow a garden from soil with no nutrients.” Real readiness comes after reflection, taking responsibility for your part in what went right and wrong, and after doing the work on the patterns that kept tripping you up.
Her litmus test is to imagine that your ex walks into a restaurant with someone new. “Would you be a bit triggered but return to normal, or would that cause you to completely spiral?”
If it would send you into a spiral, Amy says, give yourself more time. You’re ready when your life feels full again.
Heartbreak has a way of taking up all the space in your brain. Healing is how you slowly take that space back, one new habit, plan, and memory at a time.
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