A former WAG who battled through the breakdown of two marriages and overcame alcoholism to become a life coach has revealed how to help heal a broken heart.
Mother and grandmother Lorraine Costin, from Hertfordshire, has shared her six-step guide to getting over a break-up, highlighting the importance of communication, acceptance and learning to let go.
Speaking to Femail to coincide with the launch of her True Self VIP Experience coaching programme, she said: ‘Having experienced two marriage break ups myself, I know the importance of ensuring we protect our children from any pain and suffering that a break up could have on them.
‘There have been a lot of high profile splits in the news recently, with Ant McPartlin finding love quickly again after his marriage breakdown, Cheryl and Liam splitting shortly after the birth of their baby boy, and Caroline Flack and Andrew Brady ending their engagement after being together only a short while.
‘All break ups are different, but breakup recovery is a process, and as we begin to put the pieces back together in our life, we can start to move on to a better place.’
Ex-WAG Lorraine Costin, who battled through the breakdown of two marriages and overcame alcoholism to become a qualified NLP Practitioner and life coach, has revealed how to help heal a broken heart (seen left during her marriage to former footballer Paul Merson in the 90s)
1. Don’t Suffer in Silence
I was the master of this for many years and didn’t want people to know I was suffering. When people asked me how I was doing, I’d always say, ‘I’m great’, but deep down in my hidden emotions, I was falling apart.
Opening up and allowing people into our space can be painful, but once we make a connection with someone we feel comfortable to do this with, things start to feel better immediately.
Just talking to someone can make things start to feel so much better.
2. Feel Your Feelings
It is so important that we allow ourselves to feel our emotions. Don’t try and fight them, as they will not go away until they have been recognised and dealt with.
If you feel vulnerable sharing your feelings and heartache with family or friends, a coach specialising in this area can be truly life changing.
There are people out there who can help you, so don’t feel alone and helpless. Allowing my children to share their feelings from such a young age has been such an important part of them growing up. We all have feelings so lets feel them and talk about them.
It is so important that we allow ourselves to feel our emotions. Don’t try and fight them, as they will not go away until they have been recognised and dealt with
3. Having Contact with your Ex
This can be one of the most painful parts of a break up. We all need a cooling of period, you need to give yourself plenty of time to grieve and come to terms with the break up. It is hard in itself without the constant texts, emails and face-to-face contact.
Allow yourself time to build up your strength, and in time things will become much easier and clearer when having contact with your ex.
If contact is unavoidable due to young children being involved, just keep it simple and short for the sake of the kids.
Never badmouth you ex in front of your children, no matter how badly they hurt you. It is so easy to get children caught up in our feelings of anger, fear, frustration and anxiety.
It may be over between you and your ex, but that person is still significant in your child’s life and it is key to ensure the children know both parents love them equally.
Never badmouth you ex in front of your children, no matter how badly they hurt you. It is so easy to get children caught up in our feelings of anger, fear, frustration and anxiety
4. Letting Go
They say at some point, you have to learn to just let go, although I don’t feel this is always the case. If it only takes one moment to let go, then you never really held on tightly enough in the first place.
From a dream, a goal, a place, or a person, I believe you should let go little by little, which gives you the option to go and hold back on when you’re feeling a little scared and insecure.
Learning from those times of weakness is what will make you stronger in the long run- do not be ashamed of your weakness. We all have them.
5. Learning to Love Ourselves
Often people think throwing themselves into a new relationship will make them feel better after a relationship breakdown.
However moving on to a new relationship so soon after a break up can have such a big impact not only on ourselves but those around us too. You need to give yourself time to heal.
We come on into the world with two powerful emotional needs: To find connection and to avoid rejection.
For anyone who has struggled for years to overcome unhelpful belief systems that leave us feeling depressed, anxious, sad and isolated, the truth is our mind is actually very straightforward and easy to change when we know how.
There are many reasons people feel disconnected and rejected, and break ups can make you feel both of these things very quickly.
It’s how we choose to receive it and deal with it is the key to us moving forward.
We are all travelling a different journey and you should never compare yourself of your life to anyone else.
6. Clear out the negativity in your life
When you are feeling low from a break up or just feeling very down in general, negativity can push you over the edge and make you feel helpless.
Negativity can filter into our lives so easily through TV, magazines, media, social media, careers, family, friends, events, and even our own thoughts.
But it is how we choose to receive and deal with negativity that is the key to building a new relationship.
It is something that we have total control over.
Lorraine on her way to the World Cup in France in 1998 when she was married to England player Paul Merson
Whilst we will never change the way people think and talk negatively, what we can do is observe the feeling and thoughts that are coming through to us, and train our mind to see the positive in every situation.
Relationship ending and marriage break ups can be so painful, we feel so exposed to everyone knowing our private life, all we feel we want to do is run and hide and wake up when everything is better.
Hitting rock bottom gave me time for me to focus on myself and my journey to finding love and happiness, something that we don’t always have time to do.
My journey in becoming a qualified life coach and NLP coach has not only helped me run a successful business for the last 11 years, but also allows me to spend my time helping others on their own journey to finding love and happiness again.
Hang in there- it’s all part of the recovery process that we go through to heal a broken heart.