Breaking up is hard to do. It is often a painful experience whether we get heartbroken or do the heartbreaking. Different people recover in different ways but most people believe that they will never get over a breakup. In time, they always do and according to research, faster than they think.

A study led by a psychologist at Northwestern University shows that we fail to accurately forecast our emotional resilience and recovery. Basically, after following romantically-linked students for nine months, and keeping track of who broke up, the researchers found that their subjects weren’t as upset as they thought they would be.

I’m not sure how reliable this study is. First of all, it’s hard to say whether being monitored by these researchers caused the students to break up. Also, it’s just weird having your relationship, and following breakup, analyzed by researchers for a study. If that doesn’t add devastation to an already difficult experience that is breaking up, I don’t know what will.

The study didn’t even take into account the possible causes for a breakup such as cheating or being too busy. Obviously the former would be more upsetting than the latter and thus take longer to recover from. I know that if someone cheated on me, I would feel like I would never get over it, no matter what the research says. But like I said before, everyone has their own way of coping with a breakup and no study can change that.