I’m a relationship expert and I know EXACTLY how to deal with heartbreak – here’s everything you need to know about overcoming a split

This Morning relationship expert Michelle Elman has revealed she believes her cheating ex truly loved her, despite being devastated by his betrayal.

In April 2023, a heartbroken Michelle discovered she had been cheated on by her partner of three years, just hours after their engagement.

Speaking to MailOnline while promoting her new podcast, In all honestyMichelle gave her advice to fans who are struggling with heartbreak themselves.

She admitted that she was in shock for the first three months after her split and then felt a wave of anger.

Although she seemed to be coping well with the breakup, her vulnerable emotions surfaced in the months that followed.

Reflecting on her experience, she said that people deal with a breakup in different ways, but that shame is a common emotion.

She said it’s normal to feel this way, but there is a healthy way to deal with it.

After using ‘her entire life coaching toolbox’ to deal with her own heartbreak, she has now discovered how best to deal with a breakup with a partner who doesn’t know how to love you.

She told MailOnline: ‘I’ve often said to people who are going through similar situations that the shame is not on them. Because I understand that you instinctively feel shame when you’ve been cheated on, but that shame is not on you.’

Michelle’s first tip for healing with this is to ‘feel everything’, because ‘every wave comes.’

Reflecting on her own journey, she said: ‘There were times when I thought, Why am I not angrier? Don’t worry, it will come. I just wasn’t at that moment. I think what shocked my friends and family the most is that the anger came very late. And it wasn’t much.

“Especially as a life coach, anger is one of the emotions that I’m most comfortable with. And it was just the emotion where I didn’t feel as angry as I thought I would be.”

Her next piece of advice was, “Stop judging the order in which you experience your emotions.”

“I think we have this set idea of ​​the order of a breakup. First you cry, then you’re sad. But that doesn’t have to be the case,” she said.

‘I was saddest about three months after it happened.

‘Immediately after it happened I was in a state of shock. I was almost in survival mode. I was just trying to keep going and my mind was trying to make sense of what had happened.

‘I think the pain of a breakup is mostly caused by what you tell yourself.

You might tell yourself horrible things about yourself, like: You deserve all of this.

‘My training as a life coach has given me good control over my thoughts. That made the break with my relationship so much easier: I never blamed myself.

“I took responsibility for my side in terms of our relationship. But as I’ve said many times, we didn’t have an unhappy relationship.

‘The misconception that men in particular cheat means they are unhappy is not true.

“That may be true, but there are multiple reasons why people cheat.”

“And then I think of another story that people use to hurt themselves: Well, if only I could do it differently,” she added.

‘Or what if I had checked his phone a month ago, all those things? And actually, in reality, you have enough to do.

You don’t have to come up with made-up scenarios to hurt your feelings more. And I think that’s where a lot of my training really helps me with the breakup.’

Her final piece of advice was that you should “stop contacting your ex.”

She told MailOnline: ‘If someone has cheated on you, you can’t remain friends with that person.

‘I also don’t believe you can go from a relationship to friends, even if the other person isn’t cheating.

‘And you need a period of time where you really distance yourself from each other, especially if you’ve been in a relationship for a long time.

“And if you don’t have that space, you’re never going to be able to fully heal if that person is still in your life.”

While Michelle’s top three tips for dealing with the grief of losing someone you don’t love may seem simple, relationships are much more complicated.

That’s why she started a new series of her own podcasts, In All Honesty With Michelle Elmen, one of the top five educational podcasts on Spotify and Apple Music.

She discusses these issues with a number of celebrity guests and explains how to deal with a breakup and many other issues.

Michelle’s first episode was released this week and saw her reflect on what started out as the best day of her romantic life: a marriage proposal, introducing her new fiancé to her social media followers, and the shocking end of her engagement after discovering infidelity. All of this happened in the space of 24 hours.

Listeners can expect the episode about heartbreak on her third release.

She will pour out her heart out every minute of her life during the three weeks between her divorce and her announcement.

“I basically threw my entire life coaching toolbox at my breakup, absolutely everything,” she said, teasing about the episode.

Michelle has respected her ex-partner’s privacy throughout their relationship. She says it would break her heart if he was trolled online, after having to deal with fat shaming and name-calling on her own profile.

She said she wanted to go public with her story to support other women who have gone through the same thing, and hopes her honesty will show them that they don’t have to feel ashamed.