When a break up happens, inevitably one person is going to be the one that gets dumped and the other one is going to be the heartbreaker.

But when this happens, the two people involved will be starting at two opposite ends of the break up scale, and here’s how it works.

Level 1 vs level 10

While a break up may heart wrenching and make your stomach hurt, take some solace in knowing that if you’re the one who’s been dumped, you’ve started at level 10 (which is the worst by the way) … this is the top end of the break up scale, where you can’t sleep or eat, you don’t know what you’ll do without them in your life and you feel as though the world as you know it is falling out from under your feet.

The person who’s broken up with you however, they’ve started at level 1 … they feel pretty relieved, in their head they had probably already ended things with you a few weeks before they actually had the guts to do it in real life. So right now, they’re just happy its all over and done with and they can carry on their life without you, the one they think they want, but realistically there’s no progress for them to make in this situation, there’s nothing they have to deal with because it wasn’t a shock for them, they knew what they were going to do. So starting at level 1, maybe not as great as we think it may be!

Level 3 vs level 8

Now lets fast forward a few months, your level 10 has now dropped to a level 8. You still miss them like crazy, but after lots of free therapy sessions with your friends, you’re starting to feel a lot better than how you were when you initially got the news, you can see that you can still have a life without them and it won’t be as awful as you think.

Our level 1 people, well they’re now at level 3. They’re still doing all the things they wanted to do, going out and being selfish with their own time and they’re enjoying it. But every now and then, something will happen in their every day life and they wish they could tell you about it, but of course …. that privilege is gone for them now. They don’t have the person there who used to take a keen interest in their work, or smile at the dog pictures they used to send, but it’s fine and they’re not too bothered by it, they know they’ll find someone else to do all that stuff with soon anyway so it’s not a big deal.

And here’s where it starts to get interesting, because ever so slowly, the two of you are coming towards being at the same level of getting over your break up but you’ve come from different ends of the scale, as the one who started out heartbroken and devastated is now healing and moving forward …. the one who done the heartbreaking is now starting to realise what they’ve given up on.

Meeting in the middle at level 5

At around the five months later mark, our level 8 people have probably now dropped to level 5. You’re making future plans and when you’ve been making them you haven’t even considered your previous SO in the picture, you haven’t been doing a ‘well what if‘ kind of plan that might involve them, nope. You’re focusing on you and you’re thriving as if a glow was going out of fashion.

At the same time, our people who were at level 3, are also now at level 5 too. They’ve been on a few dates and each one without even wanting to, they’ve been comparing them to you. They’re keeping active tabs on the person they thought they were ‘so done‘ with. They want to know what’s happing in your life, they can see that you’re doing good and you look happy, they’ve heard about all your exciting plans and they’re gutted they don’t have a more active role. They miss you …. but now they don’t know if they want to try and make a come back.

You see how although you’re both at the same level, because you’ve got there via two very different routes, it just isn’t the same situation for both of you!

Level 5 is the pin point, because if the person who broke your heart does decide to reach out, PLEASE make sure they don’t push you all the way back to level 10 again …. because if you hit level 10, it means they’ll go back to level 1, they know you’re still there and that satisfies their ego …. unless of course they really are sorry, but if they are, then they need to work HARD to get you back!