12 People Share The Best Part About Becoming Newly Single

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1. “I had time for stupid hobbies again. Even if they’re stupid, they can be great stress relievers.”

–Marc, 25



2. “Having a big queen bed all to myself. For a while, having to sleep alone again was one of the worst parts. But once that initial pang wore off and after a few months of being used to being by myself, I started to love sleeping alone again.”

–Lisa, 28



3. “Feeling like your brain has space to think about what it wants out of life without another person distracting you or affecting it.”

–Annica, 31



4. “I started trying some really cool things (making my own beer, taking Italian classes) because I didn’t have her as a crutch anymore and I felt pressured to find things to fill my life again, but the pressure ended up leading to some really cool stuff.”

–Simon, 29



5. “My breakup is the reason why I actually decided to face my anxiety and depression head on and spend that breakup year working on helping myself and trying to find some peace and some help for what I was going through mentally.”

–Jonni, 24

 

6. “I stopped relying on him to give me an identity. I feel like people always referred to us as a couple, never as individual people. Like, it was never just ‘Ainsley’ it was always Ainsley and [his name]. And I didn’t realize how much I missed being just my own separate person until I was on my own again (after having enough time to heal… because it did hurt for a while).”

–Ainsley, 26



7. “My family started checking on me a lot. I always had good relationships with my parents and siblings but they were extra vigilant because they knew how bummed I was and it ended up being really good for all my relationships with them, which was a silver lining to such a shitty thing.”

–David, 31



8. “I got healthy and in shape again. Lost at least twenty pounds, probably more at this point.”

–Trey, 24



9. “Go make a bunch of your friends go to a bar trivia night with you (a weekday one). I started doing that with a bunch of people when I was in the worst phase of the breakup and it’s now the thing I look forward to the most during the week and you meet so many cool people – both to date and to just be friends with.”

–Dylan, 30



10. “I really love my job, so I loved getting to channel all my extra energy into that without feeling guilty that I was neglecting someone. And I just got promoted, so.”

–Tanya, 27



11. “Honestly, once you get through those first really hard couple of months, going out starts to becoming really fun again. I am having a blast. You just have to take a step back from your couple friends and go hunt down all your single friends.”

–Mary, 26



12. “I learned to code and I built my own website. I promise I wouldn’t have ever had time for that if I was still with her.”

–Thomas, 25