Breakup Advice

Breaking Up and Going Wild - Why Some Party Hard After a Breakup

Advice Seeker: Dear April,

What's going on with all these celebrities who have on and off relationships and get married and divorced just as easily? If that isn't enough to deal with, they go out and have a jolly good old time as if everything is normal! I also have friends who tend to start partying like crazy if they've just gotten out of a long relationship. I wish I could be just as carefree after I go through a break up. Are there any problems with behaving this way when you're getting out of a relationship?

Sincerely,

Care 2 B Free

April Masini's advice:

Dear Care 2 B Free,

There is a big difference between having a good time and creating a problem, but some people use partying as an excuse to hide problems and hide from problems. The person who comes to mind most immediately is celebrity Britney Spears, who is a great example of someone with real life problems that everyone else has, but because she’s a celeb, is getting an extra large dose of spotlight. Ms. Spears is suddenly a single mother of two young children who is suffering the degradation of divorce. Like many divorced singles today, she and the rest of us, see divorce as a competition. One of the divorcing parties comes out on top or ahead of the game, while the other of the divorced couple is behind. That’s the common equation that everyone likes to hang onto so that they have someone to blame for the failure of the family.

The truth is that when a divorce occurs, everyone loses, and the competition to appear on top of one’s game is just a symptom of the fact that a family has suddenly become a competition. Spears lost her husband and her new family at a critical time in her family’s life — when two young boys are being raised. This is a tragedy. It doesn’t matter if her ex-husband is a skank, a louse, a loser and a deadbeat. It doesn’t matter that he dallied around. He is still the man she wed and promised fidelity and her future to — and vice versa. The marriage break up is a loss, and Ms. Spears is not accepting her loss gracefully. Instead, she’s partying like a crazy person, as if to show the world she doesn’t grieve or mourn the loss of her marriage or her family because she’s above it all. This is actually typical behavior from most divorced people. And it’s unfortunate.

Watch out for people who start partying excessively suddenly. Long time excessive party-ers are of less concern than anyone who suddenly changes their behavior in any way. If someone is suddenly partying excessively, they may be covering up another problem that they don’t want to deal with.

Singles who start partying too much may be overdoing it because they are distressed that they’re not in a meaningful relationship.