Step 1: Eat breakfast. Eat lunch. Eat dinner. Just eat. It’s not productive, but it’s soothing and it allows us to remember fondly, the good times; with something comforting that will never let you down.
Step 2: Realize that eating has become a self-destructive, obsessive, dangerous behaviour. Suddenly you turn around only to realize none of your clothes fit anymore. You’ve lost control.
Step 3: Blame yourself – for the heartbreak, for the overeating, for the fact that you’ve landed in this terrible rut which is surrounded by darkness. Look up and see only black clouds above you. Realize you’ve spent months – almost a year – living to please someone because you think you aren’t good enough for them and all you want is to change their mind. Continue to blame yourself by pressing on not just these bruises, but all your past bruises.
Step 4: Wake up one day and see – really see – what your life has become. You don’t enjoy spending time with your friends anymore. You don’t go for walks anymore. You don’t even have a job. There is nothing to busy you except dark, demeaning thoughts. One drab summer day, spend an evening with the person who broke your heart and become shattered to see they have moved on and left you behind. See that he’s ignoring you; hear for the first time how inconsiderate, unfunny and rude he is; walk away that day thinking, “There is more to life than this.”
Step 5: Lose weight – in fact, lose 60 lb. Finally get your drivers’ license. Work your ass off to get a career job and prove him wrong, because he was always telling you that a BA is a useless degree. Look behind you one day and see you’ve left behind that cartoonish dark forest with the arm-like branches and sinister knot hole faces. You are walking towards green grass and sunshine.
Step 6: Attempt to glean something physical from people who don’t matter because you finally got over your heartbreak. Attempt online dating, only to realize all the men you’re meeting are either only there to hook up, or they’re DYING for a relationship – the kind you don’t want at all, with someone you don’t want at all. Then revert to dance floor make out sessions at dance clubs you’re too old for. Meander between a few incredibly meaningless dates and once again realize there is more to your new life than these types of encounters.
Step 7: Learn that what you want and what you need are two different things. Learn that healing doesn’t happen through violently kissing people whose names you can’t remember. Remember that you’re 25 years old for fuck’s sakes, and you are old enough to be honest with people and with yourself. Communicate. You’re not a 12-year old girl slipping secret heart-shaped notes anonymously into a boy in your class’ locker. Once you’ve realized this, look back and remember: it was heartbreak that got you here.
Step 8: Be grateful for steps 1 through 7.
New York Fruit Stand 