Breakup survival #1

You are doing a PhD, you are pretty much in a world of your own focused on the stresses associated with that. Unfortunately, you don't exist in a bubble and some time life gives you a bit of a slap in the face...

In April of my 3rd year, my boyfriend broke up with me. CRUSHED! It was a complete shock - a bit like I imagine being hit by a truck would feel like, well fewer broken bones, but still shaky and nauseous. AND he did it just after a had put in a 96 well PCR, which was a massive moment for me given that so little of my lab work had been working. That PCR was (expensively) abandoned, that page in my lab book out-of-bounds. I managed to smile my way through a quick meeting that afternoon (A true testament to my stiff-upper-lip English ancestors) and then we drove the 67km from Pretoria to Johannesburg in the same car, but no longer together.

BLISS - 200m away from the new
house - definitely worth the stress

This all happened in a really manic week in the history of my family. My parents were retiring and moving to KwaZulu-Natal, my sister and her fiance were out from England (he was meeting most of the family for the first time); there was lots of stress and the emotions associated with leaving the house we had grown up in and lived in for over 20 years. Also, it wasn't just me hurting, everyone close to me was surprised and sad about the break-up. We (the boyfriend and I) had also booked a weekend away to attend a wedding (can you imagine going to a wedding with a broken heart?) that I still feel sad and guilty about missing, particularly since I still haven't given them the present.

So obviously, stressful time, and then THIS! I lost my appetite (that's never happened to me before!) and to this day I haven't managed to finish reading Duncton Wood, not because it is sad but because I couldn't stand that two moles (jealous of MOLES!? Really Shannon?) could be so in love and my heart was broken. Still, I went with my folks to their new home and I tried to be helpful and enthusiastic and to be honest it was a great trip. It is also probably the only holiday I've had in many years where I did NO PhD work and didn't feel even a tiny but GUILTY (*unexpected bonus*).

If you ever have this experience - and I sincerely hope you don't - I want to let you know there are actually good things about it too. Hard to believe, I know, but maybe some of the things I learnt can help you out??

• My family was AMAZING, so supportive and actually... I have no words. 

• My sister, +Kerri McDonald, and her husband, +Chris McDonald, compiled an awesome collection of angry chic music (Google - there's lots out there) to which I could sing (badly) along.  We also watched YouTube videos which were so much more angry than I was feeling (or indeed have ever felt) that, oddly, I felt a better instantly. She also gave me chocolate for breakfast  (*unexpected bonus*). 

• My cousin, Sandra, gave me an A5 notebook in which, she told me, I was to write 3 pages every day and NEVER look back. (Of course I looked back - it is full of the most awful, miserable nonsense). I always find writing therapeutic, (I guess that explains the blog), and it was good to have somewhere to moan without exhausting my friends/family. 

Uvongo beach:
 my childhood favourite.

• My mom, never a fan of road-tripping was even more indulgent than usual and we did some great trips around the KZN south coast with Dad, +Tessa Hampton and her man. (*unexpected bonus*)

• My friends were so awesome, either with their indignation and anger that saved me the trouble of being angry, or just their silent support. I truly felt so loved that my heart still swells with gratitude for my awesome friends years later. It really stopped me taking them for granted in my PhD-addicted life. (*unexpected bonus*)

• Once back in Cape Town, I went to the campus therapist (he had the same name as the ex, but I didn't hold that against him) and he told me the most USEFUL thing I can probably share with you: he said that I wasn't depressed, I was sad and in mourning, and that I should LET myself be! Sometimes you actually need someone to tell you this because I think we all feel like we should do the stiff upper lip thing and feel guilty about crying (I am a crier), but actually, a really good sob (multiple good sobs) is really what you NEED (and chocolate/wine!)

• So many people shared their own stories of heart break with me, and it really helped to know they had survived, they were happy, functional people, many in excellent relationships. Obviously, you know the hurt won't last forever, but in the moment it is hard to visualize the end of it. 

Brinny - master Easter egg deliverer
- loving her new home by the sea

• The dogs were even amazing. There was one moment in particular, I was sitting in the lounge and something had made me cry, Brinny (the dog) got up and left the room. When she came back, she was delicately holding an Easter egg in its (undamaged) tinfoil wrapping between her teeth which she dropped at my feet. (There had been marauding monkeys in the kitchen earlier that had abandoned the Easter eggs at a height accessible to her).

Thieving monkeys are still cute!

OK, this is rather a long post for modern attention spans, and I was going to mention some of the positive things I did to make life fabulous again, but I will save that for another post...

Exploring KZN. Oribi Gorge (left top and bottom and wildlife),
Umtumvuna Gorge (Right bottom and with me looking over edge)
Brinny (with cone) and Jill happy to be at the beach.