'What to Do When You Get Dumped'

Summary

Podcast Summary: "What to Do When You Get Dumped"

Podcast Information

• Title: All Of It
• Host: Alison Stewart, WNYC
• Episode Title: What to Do When You Get Dumped
• Release Date: February 13, 2025
• Description: A deep dive into the cultural and personal aspects of handling breakups, featuring authors Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman discussing their collaborative book, What to Do When You Get Dumped: A Guide to Unbreaking Your Heart.

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1. Introduction to the Topic

Alison Stewart opens the episode by acknowledging the upcoming Valentine's Day and its bittersweet resonance for those who have recently experienced a breakup. She introduces the focus of the episode: navigating the emotional turmoil following a breakup, using insights from the newly released book by Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman.

[00:37] Alison Stewart: "Valentine's Day is coming up. We know that being in the mood for love is not universal, particularly if you've just been dumped."

2. Authors’ Personal Experiences

Susie Hopkins shares her personal journey of coming out of a 30-year marriage that ended abruptly when her husband left her for someone else. She discusses the initial shock and the prolonged period it took to accept this new reality.

[02:02] Susie Hopkins: "The first hump to get over was just the sheer shock of after a 30-year marriage... it took honestly months to accept that that was the reality."

Hallie Bateman, Susie’s daughter and co-author, reflects on her decision to collaborate with her mother on the book three years post-breakup. She emphasizes the therapeutic nature of their joint effort and the cathartic process it entailed.

[02:47] Hallie Bateman: "...we were like, yeah, let's do this book. And it felt like guaranteed catharsis of some sort."

3. Navigating Vulnerability and Healing

Susie delves into the challenges of being vulnerable in front of her daughter during the healing process. She highlights the difficulty of admitting hardship and the strength required to openly grieve.

[03:49] Susie Hopkins: "...having Hallie witness my healing process. Very difficult. As a parent, you want to just set the strong example of soldiering through."

Hallie adds that witnessing her mother's vulnerability was instrumental in her own understanding of facing life's challenges.

[04:40] Hallie Bateman: "I've seen how much strength it requires to be so vulnerable and how healing it is to be open."

4. Creative Process and Book Structure

The conversation shifts to the structure of their book, which employs a countdown from 1,582 days to symbolize the journey of healing.

[06:10] Hallie Bateman: "...it's a countdown to really, when I actually felt that my heart was unbroken."

Susie explains that the countdown serves as a motivational tool, encouraging readers that healing is achievable within a defined timeline.

[06:28] Susie Hopkins: "...the whole book was, in a way, a pep talk and note of encouragement to myself."

5. Audience Interaction and Callers' Insights

The segment includes multiple listener calls, offering diverse perspectives and coping strategies for dealing with breakups:

• Mavis from LA emphasizes the importance of cutting off social media connections with an ex to prevent lingering emotional pain and focusing on self-love and personal space reclamation.

  [08:07] Mavis: "Do not follow the person who you broke up with. It's just going to make you feel bad."

• Tony from Fort Lee, NJ advises allowing oneself to fully experience emotions, seeking therapy, and maintaining perspective by not idolizing the lost relationship.

  [09:05] Tony: "Give yourself that time to cry. Get it out. Don't act like it didn't happen."

• Loris from West Orange, NJ shares her experience with divorce, highlighting the necessity of honesty with oneself and rebuilding a new life aligned with personal needs and desires.

  [16:24] Loris: "Being honest with yourself about what you really want and need change."

6. Key Strategies for Healing

Susie outlines fundamental strategies presented in their book, emphasizing the uniqueness of individual grief processes and the importance of self-compassion.

[13:32] Susie Hopkins: "Grief is unique, and you have to give yourself permission to grieve in a timeline that matches what you need."

She also discusses practical exercises such as making to-do lists that range from allowing oneself to cry to engaging in new activities, demonstrating the balance between processing pain and fostering personal growth.

7. Creative Expressions and Illustrations

Hallie Bateman discusses the role of illustrations in the book, which complement the narrative by visually representing complex emotions and milestones in the healing process.

[30:48] Hallie Bateman: "The illustration is so important to be so lush and big, to give the reader a way for that feeling that can't really be encapsulated in words to wash over them."

The authors share specific examples, such as the depiction of a house transformed with pink elements, symbolizing Susie's embrace of new beginnings.

[24:14] Hallie Bateman: "I think when I hear that, I just think about this epiphany, perhaps, that the mom had where, oh, this feels good to my eyeballs."

8. Conclusion and Final Insights

In the concluding segments, Susie and Hallie reflect on the transformative journey of writing the book. They underscore the importance of self-forgiveness and distinguishing personal reality from distorted thoughts post-breakup.

[22:06] Susie Hopkins: "Trust is different than it is. And that's where that came from."

Alison Stewart wraps up the episode by encouraging listeners to engage with the book and continue exploring the multifaceted nature of healing from heartbreak.

[32:13] Alison Stewart: "If you've been dumped in your relationship, we'd love to hear what was helpful to you to heal from it."

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• Susie Hopkins [02:02]: "The first hump to get over was just the sheer shock of after a 30-year marriage..."
• Hallie Bateman [02:47]: "...we were like, yeah, let's do this book..."
• Mavis [08:07]: "Do not follow the person who you broke up with."
• Tony [09:05]: "Give yourself that time to cry."
• Loris [16:24]: "Being honest with yourself about what you really want and need change."
• Susie Hopkins [13:32]: "Grief is unique, and you have to give yourself permission to grieve..."
• Hallie Bateman [24:14]: "I think when I hear that, I just think about this epiphany..."
• Susie Hopkins [22:06]: "Trust is different than it is."

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Final Thoughts "What to Do When You Get Dumped: A Guide to Unbreaking Your Heart" by Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman serves as a heartfelt manual for anyone navigating the complexities of a breakup. Through personal anecdotes, strategic advice, and engaging illustrations, the authors offer a compassionate roadmap to healing and self-discovery. This episode of All Of It not only highlights their collaborative effort but also fosters a community of shared experiences and diverse perspectives, celebrating the resilience of the human spirit in the face of heartbreak.

Transcript

[Alison Stewart]

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[Susie Hopkins]

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[Susie Hopkins]

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[Alison Stewart]

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[Susie Hopkins]

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[Hallie Bateman]

This is all of it on wnyc. I'm Alison Stewart. Thank you for spending part of your day with us. Valentine's Day is coming up. We know that being in the mood for love is not universal, particularly if you've just been dumped. If it takes you by surprise, it can really rock your world and your sense of self. A new book explores the healing process with words and some hilarious illustrations. It's called what to do when youn Get A Guide to Unbreaking youg Heart from author Susie Hopkins and illustrated by her daughter Hallie Bateman. They're both with me now to talk about it and to share some of the insights that might help you heal a nursing a broken heart. Susie Halley, welcome to the studio.

[Caller]

Thank you so much for having us.

[Susie Hopkins]

Thank you. Nice to see you listeners.

[Hallie Bateman]

We're talking about getting getting dumped. If you've ever been broken up with after a long term serious relationship, we want to hear what was helpful to you to heal from it. 2124-3396-9221-2433-WNYC. Tell us about your getting over breakup strategies. Or you can call in with a question if you could use some guidance after being broken up with yourself. 2124-339692-21243 wnyc Susie, you wrote this book inspired by your story, but you really aimed it to to be helpful to anyone who's been broken up with. What did you see as the really first hump to get over after being dumped?

[Susie Hopkins]

The first hump to get over was just the sheer shock of was after 30 year marriage and in one day I learned that my husband was gone. He had settled into developing a relationship with someone else and it was done and unbeknownst to me, so the shock of that took honestly months to accept that that was the reality. And all along the path I said am I the slowest person ever to learn to accept something that is clearly intellectually I know has just happened? And it was that disconnect that I found really the hard first hump.

[Alison Stewart]

Hallie, what were some of your first thoughts when you decided to join this project with your mom?

[Caller]

I was so Happy that my mom was deciding to embark on the book. It was about three years after the breakup that she made that decision. And we just knew we were gonna do it together. And, you know, this was, you know, my parents divorce, and so it really rocked our entire family. And getting to explore and dissect and look at the whole thing with my mom was so appealing to me. I mean, it sounds like, depressing or something, but it wasn't. It was this. That we both were like, yeah, let's do this book. And it felt like guaranteed catharsis of some sort, because, you know, as artists and writers, that's what it is. And so I was excited.

[Hallie Bateman]

What questions did you have, Susie, about Hallie being involved?

[Susie Hopkins]

Well, we had done a book, so we had already worked together on a book and what to do when you're.

[Caller]

What to do when I'm gone.

[Susie Hopkins]

I can't remember what to do when I'm gone. So we had. And that, to me, was an accidental book about the loss of your mother and dealing with the grief from that. So I hadn't expected to write a book. And I guess the challenge was having Hallie witness my healing process. Very difficult. As a parent, you want to just set the strong example of soldiering through. And I really had a tough time to be vulnerable enough to let her see that and understand that that was my grief. And really to at some point just say, listen, I'm having a hard time, which I think is very hard for a lot of us to admit and to take steps to try to deal with it in a constructive way.

[Hallie Bateman]

How is that for you?

[Caller]

Well, to your credit, I think that if. If you had soldiered through, if you hadn't shared what you were going through, I would be left in the dark. And being by my mom's side through this journey through which she's been very open about the pain and exploring that in a book together, I've seen how much strength it requires to be so vulnerable and how healing it is to be open and to just to say. I think it's a very hard thing to say. I had my heart stomped on, and I'm sad. And to, you know, to say that to people you love. You don't want to bring bad news, but it's not. It's something that, you know, we got to be there for her. I got to support her as a family member and as a co writer in this book, and I think that's such a gift. And my mom really cringes when anyone calls her brave, but I Really, I can say it. I think it's so brave. And I think it's a powerful example as her daughter, to see someone go through something so difficult and unexpected and to really face it and sort through it and express it to me, that's such a powerful example. And it makes me think, all right, I'm going to face hard things in my life. And I have a powerful example of how to go through that.

[Alison Stewart]

You go, Mom.

[Caller]

Yes.

[Hallie Bateman]

We're talking to Susie Hopkins and Hallie.

[Alison Stewart]

Bateman, the mother, daughter, author and illustrator.

[Hallie Bateman]

Behind the book what to do when.

[Alison Stewart]

Youn Get A Guide to Unbreaking youg Heart. One of the book's framing devices is on the pages. It says it's got a countdown, 1582 days, and it goes down to 1,571 and on the way. Why was this a framing device?

[Susie Hopkins]

Well, because when I started the book, I wrote the first draft. It took me about a year. And it was a framing device because I was somewhere in the middle, which in the book is in three parts. It starts at the end when you get dumped and you're in panic mode. It goes into the muddle, which is this very, for me, two year period was the muddle and then the beginning, which is sort of the start of your new life. And the framing device was kind. I mean, the whole book was, in a way, a pep talk and note of encouragement to myself that I didn't find out in the world of either grief literature or online, you know, sad chat rooms. I tried to visit because I. I'm a very private person, and I wanted to read something in the privacy of my home that made me feel like I could get through it. I just needed some encouragement from a vantage point of never having felt as alone in my life. And I was 58 years old, and I thought, you know, you think you got this stuff figured out by the time you're getting that old. And I'm starting back at knowing nothing and feeling directionless where I land with this breakup. So the framing device was a countdown to really, when I actually felt that my heart was unbroken. And I hope that readers that read the book will have a much, much shorter time of it.

[Hallie Bateman]

Let's take a couple of calls. Let's talk to Mavis from la. Hi, Mavis. Thank you for calling, all of it. You're on the air.

[Caller]

Hi.

[Mavis]

Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited.

[Hallie Bateman]

Great.

[Mavis]

Well, I have two things that I think are really important about going through a breakup. Whether you've been dumped not number one is I think you have to be super strict with social media, like, do not follow the person who. Who you broke up with. It's just going to make you feel bad. So I feel like that's just a rule you cannot break. And number two is I just try to focus on, you know, when you're in a relationship. I think this is especially true for women. But you compromise so much, and that's great, and it's important. But when you go through a breakup, you don't have to do that anymore. So I kind of focus on falling in love with myself and indulging on all my crazy habits and reclaiming my space and having my world exactly the way I want it.

[Hallie Bateman]

Mavis, thank you so much for calling in. Let's talk to Tony from Fort Lee, New Jersey. Hi, Tony.

[Tony]

Hey, guys. Great topic. And, yeah, unfortunately, I'm the king of being dumped. So I have a lot of experience at not not only multiple relationships, but divorce, too. And I would say, you know what? Number one, I would say give yourself that time to cry. Get it out. Don't act like it didn't happen. You know, you. You have to give yourself time to what they call embrace the suck. Don't act like it didn't happen. You know, cry it out. Good week of that. And then for me, after that, you get yourself a therapist, get into the gym, proper nutrition, proper sleep, proper connection with the people that you love. And lastly, I would say there's an old saying, there's only one God. Don't make your relationship your God. Don't make, you know, don't worship. It's not that it's not important, but I found when I was making that person my significant other, my God or the relationship, my God, that was not good, because like I said, there's only one God, and it's not my relationship. Those things will end in one way or another. So putting things in perspective made me a lot stronger and be able to get through those hard times.

[Alison Stewart]

We appreciate it, Tony.

[Hallie Bateman]

I was gonna ask you, Haley, you have a picture in here of somebody.

[Alison Stewart]

Just on the ground just crying, Just crying.

[Hallie Bateman]

Here she's in the toilet. It's a mess, but it's good. But she's a mess, basically.

[Caller]

Oh, absolutely.

[Alison Stewart]

What was your first drawing that you made for the book?

[Caller]

I. Maybe it was that one. I mean, I remember it kinda looks like it would be in the beginning. Yeah. I mean, so for listeners, Allison is pointing to the. Really the first direction in the book, and the direction says panic. And then you turn the page and it says, keep panicking. And yeah, I mean, I think that the idea here, which I love that the listener pointed this out, is like, embracing how much it sucks. Like, I think that there's so much of a tendency to say, I shouldn't be in this much pain, I shouldn't be struggling this much. And a lot of self help literature, I think, can be kind of alienating because it has a bit of a like. And now take a deep breath and then you're gonna meditate and it's like, no, you're gonna be screaming, crying, and throwing up because you're so heartbroken. And so I think that our book is. It's my mom's story. And I think it also, hopefully, in telling my mom's story, helps the. The reader just trusts their own instincts on how to get through this because there's just so many directions in the book that are, you know, really real to my mom. And they might not be exactly what you would do, but by seeing that, like, my mom allowed herself to take a sledgehammer to the kitty litter box that she and my dad owned together, like, you know, you really have to, like, own it to go through that. And I think that that's like, that's kind of what the first caller pointed out too, was like, living your truth. You don't owe anyone anything anymore.

[Alison Stewart]

What did you find out that you didn't know before about the relationship?

[Caller]

Oof. Oh, yeah. Well, I think in a lot of ways I found out how flawed it was that, you know, through really this kind of a postmortem on the relationship, I think I learned the truth about it, which, you know, when you're a kid and you're growing up, like, I think I was like, yeah, this is what a marriage is, right? Like, you don't really know. And actually I was engaged as my parents were going through the divorce. And in many ways that was really painful, but I was actually so thankful for it because I felt that I got to learn just the truth and I got to really gain a lot of wisdom from my parents experience that I could carry into my own marriage about, you know, just like the importance of communication and couples therapy and all these things that, you know. Yeah, maybe. Maybe we all need to learn about Susie.

[Alison Stewart]

As the book progresses, you encourage people to repeat certain strategies at different points in the process. First you say make a to do list with examples like sob uncontrollably, stare out the window. Fair. But the second to do list has invite a new acquaintance for dinner, take a road trip, sign up for a ceramics class. Why are these both important for the healing process?

[Susie Hopkins]

I think the gist of it is that you have to give yourself. Grief is unique, and you have to give yourself permission to grieve in a timeline that matches what you need. And I think I can tell you I can see the people in my mind who got really tired of watching me cry in public when I saw them, and would I have liked not to cry in public. Yes. I had professional meetings where I just dissolved. I just had a frailty about it. And I'd sure like to say, well, that's not me, but I learned that I was carrying it and it had to get out, and that was okay. And giving myself permission and finding really, through the writing of this, in which I'm really talking to the reader, but the book is really me talking to myself as I'm healing and acknowledging what works and what didn't. And it's all about being nicer to myself and finding permission to go on in the way that I need to grieve, whether that's in complete isolation or finding people. And it's your path that nobody else. And if they judge you for it, you have to ignore that and just say, I need to get through this the best way that I can with the resources that I need.

[Hallie Bateman]

This is a great text. Thank you for doing this segment. I will have to read the book. My husband recently ended our marriage after 33 years and three kids. It was a total shock, and I felt so stupid and naive. My heart is permanently broken, but that also opened up my heart, and I feel so much more empathetic towards others. My daughter has saved me during this time, and I don't know what I would have done without her.

[Caller]

Wow. Well, I just want to say we wrote this book for you. Really?

[Susie Hopkins]

Yeah. Yeah. It's. It's. I needed something I couldn't find, which was a bit of encouragement that I would be pulled out of the dark woods by my own effort and time and things that. And people who I could find that were willing to listen and support me along the way. And it's a. It's a tough road, especially after a long relationship. And there's not a lot of examples of. This is what I did to get through. And it wasn't pretty. What I did wasn't pretty. It was messy, it was embarrassing. It was somewhat humiliating. And here it is in a book, and it's like.

[Caller]

And there's so many, you know, funny moments and unexpected closeness. Like, you talk about your daughter getting you through it. Like, I think about how close my mom and I have become throughout the process of making this book. And there's so much to grieve. But then there's, like, these weird silver linings to it that, you know, you start to be able to see.

[Hallie Bateman]

Let's take a call. This is Loris, who is calling in from West Orange, New Jersey. Hi, Loris. Thank you so much for calling.

[Loris]

Hi, there. Thank you so much for this segment. I am one year out of my second divorce. The first one was an abusive marriage that I had to leave. Like, I did it, and it felt great to leave. The second one, he broke my heart. We were in a very public space. So my ex husband was our music minister at church, and we had a very deeply public and spiritual family ministry to our congregation. And so for years, I was hiding emotional abuse and affairs and just showing up every Sunday, Everyone, you know, I spent all of my time building up this idea of this perfect family that we had. So when he left, it just felt like I wasted so much time. But I guess the real thing that got me through is being honest with myself. So for the first year, I was just like, he's gonna come back. We're gonna be okay. And then I just stood with. I'm a vision boarder, as you know, take it or leave it. But the one that I had done a few months after he left, I stood with it when we were about to go into litigation, and nowhere on that did it say, be angry and bitter and make him suffer, or like, this house is yours and you can't do it. It said, travel and celebrate joy and be with your daughter. And, you know, I ended up settling for next to nothing for our home that I didn't even really like.

[Mavis]

Yeah.

[Loris]

And it's just being honest about, like, I don't actually want this house. I want to be somewhere else. And being honest with it doesn't feel good to be at church anymore because I was still doing that for a year. And then people started saying, like, that's an emotional drive by. Someone literally said, that was an emotional drive by that I just witnessed. And so I left my congregation and in building this wholly new life, that hurts sometimes, but it's going to be so much better. And just being honest with yourself about what you really want and need change.

[Alison Stewart]

Yeah. Laura, thank you so much for calling. Was there anything she said in there that resonated with you?

[Susie Hopkins]

Well, okay, go ahead.

[Caller]

Oh, I was going to just reflect that, you know, throughout this experience of making this book with my mom, speaking of like the silver linings and realizing what you really want, I just have had the privilege of seeing my mom just open up and become more and more herself in a way that I didn't understand that, you know, in the marriage there were these things that were held back and, and that were, was like some of the pain that you were carrying. And it's been so beautiful to get to see you, you know, the pain, of course, is nothing I would wish on you, but it's been incredibly beautiful to see you come into your own and just be so full yourself.

[Susie Hopkins]

And what resonated with me was in my we had a childhood where my mom was pretty badly abused. And when I went into parenting, I had a very strong value of I wanted an intact family, a marriage that was an example. I had the image and I loved my husband very much. When we were first married, I just felt like I had just married the person who was the best fit for me. And we had three children that we love and so many things to be grateful for. Although many challenges in the marriage. And for me, I think part of it really was that value system was so strong. I wanted my children to feel safe at home. I wanted to be in an intact marriage, whatever it took to get through. And so worked very hard to try to do that. And sometimes it doesn't work. Sometimes it's just not the right match. And that's the simple version, but very hard to go through. And that's what resonates with her. I think she had a sense of wanting to keep the thing together for.

[Caller]

Well, and then like choosing safety, like leaning so far towards safety, it can become a cage.

[Susie Hopkins]

Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

[Hallie Bateman]

We're talking to Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman, the mother, daughter, author and illustrator behind the new book what to do when youn Get Dumped, A Guide to Unbreaking youg Heart. If you've been dumped in your relationship, we'd love to hear what was helpful to you to heal from it. 2124-3396-9221-2433-933, WNYC. When we come back, we'll talk about distinguishing thoughts from reality. Stay with us.

[Ira Flatow]

I'm Ira Flato, host of Science Friday. For over 30 years, our team has been reporting high quality news about science, technology and medicine. News you won't get anywhere else. And now that political news is 24 7, our audience is turning to us to know about the really important stuff in their lives. Cancer, climate change, genetic engineering, childhood Diseases. Our sponsors know the value of science and health news. For more sponsorship information, visit sponsorship.wnyc.org.

[Hallie Bateman]

Listening to all of it on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. My guests are Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman. They wrote a book called what to do when youn Get Dumped, A Guide to Unbreaking youg Heart. A page which really resonated me with me is page 50, distinguish thoughts from Reality. So one person, it says, you stole X from me. And X meaning your ex, went willingly. One, it says, the thought says, I'm an idiot. The reality is you trusted your existence. It's very different from idiocy. X ruined my life. My ex ruined my life. Your life was already in tatters. Denial is a coping mechanism. Tell us a little bit about this list.

[Susie Hopkins]

This list was really me talking to myself. And each of those came at different times, but when it was time to write. And one of those I can still remember. My oldest son lives in New York. He's 37, Ben. And I was on the phone with him and having a sad day maybe two years in, and I said, I just still feel like such an idiot for, you know, why didn't I know this was going to happen? Why did I stay? How did this. And so kicking myself, just kicking myself, and then said, trust is different than it is. And that's where that came from. And for me, that sounds so simple. But it was a huge revelation because I was so stuck. I'm an idiot. I had no shortage of demeaning ways to flagellate myself over this as I worked through it. And I did come. I came out of that and I came to see it. But the first one is that the girlfriend or the person who your partner goes to, it's not their fault. Your partner made that choice. And that's very hard because sometimes you want to do your revenge campaign and it's foolish. It's. It's the person. The person made a decision. They're an adult. They left. You're done. And so I had all these moments that went into the book, including when I called a divorce lawyer a couple months in. And after I said maybe two minutes worth of telling my story, and he said, oh, he's been done with you for some time. And this also came as news to me, the person I thought was, yeah, my. My best friend.

[Hallie Bateman]

So I have to read this one.

[Caller]

This is.

[Alison Stewart]

Well, it'll illustrate something to you. In the Illustrator, my mother pinked the house. What I mean is that she got lots of things around the house some shade of pink. The rug became dusty rose. The shower curtains were stripes of pink. The wallpaper became pinkish. She pinked the house.

[Hallie Bateman]

Wow.

[Alison Stewart]

What do you think of that?

[Caller]

I love that. Yeah, I think that, you know, when I hear that, I just think about this epiphany, perhaps, that the mom had where, oh, this feels good to my eyeballs. And leaning into that and not questioning it and allowing herself to, like, buy all the pink stuff. I fully encourage this.

[Alison Stewart]

Another text. If you have something you can destroy, that helps.

[Susie Hopkins]

It does help.

[Alison Stewart]

It does. Really? Okay. So this person said, when my husband dumped me, all I wanted to hear was the sound of breaking glass. So I took his beloved set of New York's giants glasses and I broke them all one at a time. Of course, being a very careful person, I broke them over the garbage can, but it was extremely cathartic. Okay, so you beat up on the cat box. You said, yes, I had a litter box.

[Susie Hopkins]

And I just. I had a day of rage. And this is maybe three years in, and I go, oh, it's still coming back, and I gotta do something with this anger. And so I got a sledgehammer and I went out into the driveway. And it took a long time. You think it wouldn't take too long with a sledgehammer, but it was, you know, particularly good for getting it out. And. And that was a very fun illustration.

[Alison Stewart]

I would say the illustration is really funny when you see it. Let's take a couple calls. This is Amanda calling in from Essex County, New Jersey. Hi, Amanda. Thank you for calling all of it. You're on the air.

[Mavis]

Hi. My breakup advice is. Well, I have. I have an ex. From the last time I had an ex, I was 2010. We dated in college, and we had all kinds of communication. Emails, text messages. My advice is to delete the number, Delete every message so you cannot dwell. Emails, Facebook messages, everything.

[Alison Stewart]

Thank you for.

[Mavis]

That is how you get over it.

[Alison Stewart]

That is how you get over it.

[Caller]

Scorched earth policy.

[Alison Stewart]

Let's talk about to Holly, who's calling in from Coney Island. Hi, Hollywood.

[Caller]

Hey. Great to hear from you.

[Alison Stewart]

Love having you call in. What do you have to say?

[Caller]

Thanks so much. Love this segment. I want to say that in the year 2000, I got out of a really toxic wonder wheel of a situation in Los Angeles. And for me, I drove cross country to get to Brooklyn, where I always wanted to live. And I pulled over in my first stop and started writing on cocktail napkins to a fictional Dear love and the first Letter was dear love, this is my last letter. And the cocktail napkins went on and on. Drawings, letters to the love. And in the end, I had about 250 napkins that got turned into a book. This year, an indie publisher picked me up over Covid. And it's an art object, but it really is addressing so much of what your guests are talking about. Self forgiveness, I feel like it is. My book is pre Gen Z. They love it because they can open to any page and a chapter might be, you know, three sentences. They're like, I'm reading. I love this. But I'm getting a lot of feedback, a lot of opportunities to read from it. And it really is a manual for the future because in the end, I celebrate myself as like the Phoenix rising. Looking at all your mistakes. I really feel the author is like saying, I feel like such an idiot. I think self forgiveness is the hardest part. But I'm so proud. My cocktail napkins. I didn't believe anyone that said it was a book.

I had a.

[Hallie Bateman]

But you believed in it. When you believed in it, it went to life. When you thought about it, when you thought about her taking her experience and turning it into something creative. Susie, did you find that for yourself or did the book come after.

[Susie Hopkins]

The book came? See if I can address it. The book came during.

[Hallie Bateman]

While you were doing it.

[Susie Hopkins]

The book came when I was in the middle of healing and the book came, I resonated with her story because I also wrote notes to myself and stuffed them in a box. And that was how I'm a journalist. I've never stuffed notes in a box before. And when the box was full, I went on a retreat and started to put the first draft together. Interesting. A real impetus was talking to strangers who'd been badly dumped before I decided to really write the book. And those people, in hearing their stories of how they made it through, and in some cases they'd been five or 10 years, some cases 20 years earlier, had been dumped. But talking to those strangers really made this book emerge because I understood that talking to them made me feel much less alone. Sure. And helped me get out of that space. And so piecing it together was, in fact how I also did this book.

[Alison Stewart]

You have a page here that says, blame if you must, my reality versus your ex's reality. What was the impetus for this page?

[Susie Hopkins]

That was one in which Hallie and I really went over. And it was very painful to write because it was acknowledging parts of my childhood past and what I brought into marriage, which was I came from A very dysfunctional family with a lot of unspoken grief and childhood from the abuse that we witnessed. And my husband, who I don't think it's fair to talk about, but it's lightly represented in this book, had whatever issues he brought in. And it's acknowledging that everybody does bring it in. And when you get together and you're really in love with somebody, you can't see that stuff. It comes out over time. And hopefully with communication, you bridge those gaps and you build your life together in a way that grows together and sometimes that doesn't happen. And that was the. So she and I, I wrote an initial version that wasn't. Didn't go deep enough. And Halle then said, well, that doesn't go deep enough. So we really. That was part of our collaborative is Hallie, who wasn't in. It was a. Difficult to write in parts because it's facing the truth of what. What my life was. And Hallelujah would call me on it and say, A, I can't illustrate that. You gotta rewrite it. And B, it's not quite deep enough.

[Alison Stewart]

I wanted to ask about the end of the book. It's full, gorgeous pages where there were a lot of illustrations and a lot of white around it. Tell me a little bit about the gorgeous. The images going right off the pages at the end.

[Caller]

So, yeah, the ending of the book is about this moment that, you know, my mom really chose to unbreak her heart. And I think that's kind of an interesting twist of the narrative, is that it's not something that's done to you. It's something that, at least for my mom, it was a decision she made herself. And I think that the illustration is so important to be so. So lush and big, to give the reader a way for that feeling that can't really be encapsulated in words to wash over them. The feeling of self discovery. And it's an illustration of the main character who's based on my mom walking up a hill toward a sunset. And what I just love so much about combining words and illustration is the power of the art and the words combined to, you know, you're. You can rest on that page as long as you want and you can, you know, the words. It's not a ton of words. And a heartbroken person doesn't have to work that hard to absorb the message. Even if you just looked at the picture, it could be, hopefully, a gift and a relief to you. So. So yeah, these. These paintings are trying to do justice to. To my mom's conclusion of this book.

[Alison Stewart]

The name of the book is what.

[Hallie Bateman]

To do when youn Get Dumped.

[Alison Stewart]

A Guide to Unbreaking youg Heart. It is by Susie Hopkins and Hallie Bateman. Thanks so much for being with us.

[Caller]

Thanks for having us.

[Susie Hopkins]

Thanks for having us.

[Ira Flatow]

I'm Ira Flato, host of Science Friday. For over 30 years, our team has been reporting high quality news about science, technology and medicine. News you won't get anywhere else. And now that political news is 24 7, our audience is turning to us to know about the really important stuff in their lives. Cancer, climate change, genetic engineering, childhood diseases. Our sponsors know the value of science and health news. For more sponsorship information, visit sponsorship. Wnyc.

[Susie Hopkins]

Org.