These days, many teenage girls think that country-pop star Taylor Swift has a knack for summing up teenage heartbreak in just a few short verses. Most teenagers, however, have probably not read Greg and Amiira Ruotola-Behrendt’s novel “It’s Called a Breakup Because It’s Broken.”

The first paragraph is flawlessly written-completely describing what it feels like to have your heart ripped out of your chest.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH! It hurts. It’s rocking the very core of your being. You never saw it coming. You knew this was going to happen. You were going to do it first. You only broke it off with him before he broke it off with you. You guys were supposed to be together forever. You never liked him that much anyway. He was such a great kisser. You really liked his family. He hated your friends. You hated his shoes. You miss him soooooo much. There’s no doubt about it–breakups suck. And now here you are holding this stupid ‘Breakup Book’ because, quite honestly, you’d do anything not to feel like this and maybe this book will shed some light on what you’re going through. Maybe you’ll get some sleep tonight. Or stop sleeping all the time.”

There are different kinds of breakups. There’s the kind that’s equivalent to just ripping a band-aid off, and as soon as it’s over, you’re relieved, like a giant weight has been lifted off of your shoulders. Then there’s the kind that you knew was coming, but once it happens, you’re lost. You were so in love that you were fully convinced that one day, you two would be engaged and then married with 10 kids. That all changed in an instant, and now you can’t even make eye contact without it being awkward and painful.

Just like grief, there are five stages of a breakup, but in this case, there’s a different order.

First comes depression. He’s gone. You gave someone your heart, and now you’re scared to ever let someone in again because one of the greatest pains teenagers experience is a broken heart. Things that used to make you happy don’t even make you smile anymore, and all you want to do is lay in bed and shut the world out. The depression phase is inevitable-normal even-and it will come and go.

Junior Valerie Aich said, “At first it feels like it’s the end of the world. You just feel like all of your happiness has been taken from you, and all you can do is cry. It feels like you’re never going to be yourself again because you don’t have that one person by your side anymore, and to be honest, my heart actually [physically] hurt from all of the pain I felt.”

The truth is, there will be weeks that you feel fine, and then out of nowhere, it’ll come back and hit you like a bag of bricks. Girls aren’t the only ones susceptible to heartbreak, either. Junior Micko Kardenas remembers that when he went through heartbreak, he was fine when he was out with his friends, but when he got home, he would  “listen to sad music and go under [his] pillow and start crying.” While this is normal, the one thing that you can do to avoid this is to try to stop reminiscing. I know that it’s hard to control your thoughts, and they probably always seem to wander back to him, but as soon as they come, just push them out of your head. No one should spend their high school years in a pit of depression. Take comfort in the fact that we’re still young, and there’s more out there for us. You find yourself being unable to eat whenever you hear his name because it feels like there’s a rock permanently placed in the pit of your stomach. It’s scary to fall asleep because you find your thoughts wandering to him again, and it’s too hard to remember. Then there are the dreams – for some reason, you dream about him. Every. Single. Night. And those dreams are the best and worst dreams you’ve ever had.

If you’re having dreams about him, then it can’t be over, right? This is where the stage of denial comes in. In reality, however, you broke up for a reason. It’s called breaking up because it’s broken. Chances are he isn’t the same person anymore. For anyone in need of a reality check, here it is: he will never hold you or kiss you the way he used to again. He’ll never tell you he loves you, you’ll never have another movie night at his house, and there will be no more celebrating monthaversaries or looking forward to another year, because it’s over. Once you’ve broken up, the trust that you had in each other vanishes. You both probably promised “forever” at one point, and as soon as you broke up, the idea of “forever” was shattered and forgotten, and it’s not coming back.

Wait, how could he do this to you? You both promised that you’d always be there for each other. How dare he treat you like this? Anger suddenly kicks in, and you find yourself hating everything about him, and hating yourself for falling for him and giving him the power to break you. You don’t really hate him, you just miss him, and you hate the fact that he’s no longer yours. Sophomore Mario Ljubic says that “you feel like you did everything wrong, and you’re mad at yourself.” You hate the fact that he made you into this weak, fragile, vulnerable person, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it, no matter how hard you try. It makes you mad to think that someone else could one day make him as happy as you once made him or that someone could replace you.

So maybe it’s not really over. Maybe he’s ignoring you because he’s trying to hurt you or act tough. Maybe tonight’s the night that he’ll show up at your house, you’ll run into his arms, and it’ll be a total “Notebook” moment that ends with the two of you living happily ever after. Sadly, bargaining is something that we all do when dealing with grief, and it hurts us more than helps us. The single most harmful thing you can do to yourself when trying to deal with a broken heart is give yourself false hope, so the bargaining has to stop. Tell yourself that he’ll never come back to you, that it’s over for good, that you’ve both changed, because having no expectations is so much better than having high expectations and then getting no results.

Now that you’ve realized that you two are–cue Taylor Swift–“never ever getting back together,” the reality starts to set in. He’s gone. Okay, it’s time to move on. Embrace the acceptance. He’s changed. You’re not friends anymore, and you lost someone who was once an essential part of your life. So what? Everything happens for a reason. When one door closes, another opens. Insert any other motivational quote you have into this section. The bottom line is, life goes on, and maybe it won’t happen today, or tomorrow, or next week, or in a month, but you will be fine. The first step is looking towards the future with a new, brighter perspective and forgetting your past. Just stop moping around, stop crying, and get out there and do something to make you happy.  Jacob Robinson, a junior, says that once you move on, “it feels great because there’s no more stress.”

Like I said earlier, breakups suck. Studies show that the average person goes through an average of seven broken hearts before they find The One. That’s seven times to experience one of the worst feelings in the world, so sit back and brace yourself because most of us have a long way to go. Heartbreaks are a never ending cycle. English teacher Sharon Swanson still remembers how she felt when she was a victim to love in high school.

“There was this one time that I was dumped by this guy that I really liked. I still remember his name, and I remember just being devastated. My mom kept telling me things like, ‘there are more fish in the sea, if he dumped you he’s not worth your time anyways,’ and things like that, but I was really heartbroken. I know that as a high school girl, every time you’re in love you think that it’s gonna last forever and you really think that he’s your true love but it isn’t. [I don’t want to sound] negative, but when you get older you have a perspective that what you think  about love in high school is love in a teenage perspective. Not that it isn’t real, and not that it doesn’t hurt when it hurts, and not that you didn’t invest feelings into it, but my mantra is ‘this too shall pass,’ and this too shall pass.”