How to securely cope with breakup?

alexandra, i'm sorry you're hurting.
i hear your disappointment in yourself, for reaching out to him when you understand that there is no way forward in any kind of relationship with him right now.
You made probably a deeply reflexive choice to re-establish contact, and like you said, i think that's really understandable. You still have grief.
Remember, the grief process has stages- denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance.
these stages are not linear- you may move through them in cycles and bounce around a little, even for just a short time.
maybe you slipped into a little denial, or bargaining, to some degree, and reacted to that, because to hold back and remain no contact may have felt like the path to depression, and sadness you don't feel like you can really bear the full weight of. so you took a little turn perhaps.

i hear some fear, maybe, a fear that you might find yourself sliding backwards so to speak, when you have worked so hard and have come so far and are really aware of what you need, and how to take care of your heart. You've made a terribly difficult choice to say no to what hurts too much to continue. Maybe you have some of that desperation we sometimes feel, that futile impotent feeling of not being able to change reality, and also not being able to accept it. that sad and despondent feeling of WHY?

In order to proceed with processing all this, maybe the best place to start would be to rest from your fears about your future in this. Maybe, since you are really suffering some loneliness and feeling of missing him, which creates a feeling of lack, you could fortify yourself with a good gratitude session. Not to distract from or deny your real pain and sadness, simply to make a nice stable place for yourself to deal with it. If you can take a moment to stop, look at all the things you are truly thankful for, to strengthen yourself , you might be able to approach the feelings and fears you have from a place of higher confidence. From a state of more abundance, less lack and discontent.

Coming from a place of stability in gratitude, even though you have grief, you may be able to feel larger in it, and able to stay grounded and find true insight into your best way forward.

all you have to do is do the right thing, right now. regret can leave you in a kind of impaired hangover, where you aren't feeling like your most empowered and confident and wise self. so let the regret go, find some gratitude for the things that are important to you, and you can sit with this loss and disappointment with more ability to stay rooted in your recovery and not be knocked down by this.

forgive yourself. and don't worry, you can move forward in a good way, nothing is lost. maybe some pride, but it's ok.

hugs.

Thank you for the responses so far. juniper, I think that's really helpful. One thing I still struggle with in general is gratitude for relationships that have ended, just for having happened. The pain of abandonment usually makes it difficult to really appreciate that me and whoever had something worthwhile until a loooong time after has passed. Since earning secure, I'm not fixated on or freaking out about or faulting myself for "abandonment," but it's still very difficult to fully let him go because -- as much as I've highlighted his behaviors that indicate he's not ready for a healthy relationship meaning I doubly had to accept the breakup and walk away -- the majority of our time together didn't revolve around that, and we are extremely compatible day to day, so I miss my best friend (locally, where I live), too. But I haven't been able to divorce that from my romantic love for him. So there's this feeling that we are so connected that abandonment really isn't necessary on either of our parts in the long run, but I don't know how to reconcile that at the moment.

I don't think it has slid me back to responding in an AP way, but I am sensitive to my part in contributing to the push/pull dynamic and think it will be very valuable for my growth to not be contributing to that. I'm very familiar with having a prolonged and thoroughly AP response, believe me And I'm not experiencing that, waiting around for more messages from him, wondering what he's doing, obsessing, anything like that. Still focused on how I need to best be processing my own responses, etc. But I'm interested in hearing advice, and checking and adjusting that what I'm perceiving as secure actually is as I continue to cope.

I also tend to stay friends with my exes, though not the ones I was in love with.

This is insightful. I hope it's ok if I respond again with examples from my life and people I know, that's the best way I know of to support my answers for these kinds of questions.

My impression, if I look at secure people I know and at myself when I am in a secure mode, is that when people feel secure they are generally less concerned about what other people think.

I was talking with a secure friend about how I didn't want to be friends with my ex (who I felt AP with) and I said some reasons I was worried about what my ex might think of me (for example that he might think I was trying to get him back if I went to a party he was at, or that I should've expressed more anger last time I saw him so he knows the way he treated me wasn't ok, etc) and my secure friend asked, "Why do you care what he thinks?"

When I look my interactions with exes when I felt secure, or with friends who I'd had boundary issues with, when I am feeling secure I don't worry much about what the person thinks about things like whether or not I am warm and magnanimous towards them. I evaluate what my boundaries are and maintain them, and sometimes they change and that feels ok too. I'm neither a people-pleasing doormat nor someone who feels the need to teach someone a lesson by shutting them out of my life. I just change how I let them affect me.

In the case of an ex who I perceived treated me like we were dating when we came back together the first time, when he was then not meeting some expectations I'd have from someone I was dating I initiated a conversation about it and it came out that he viewed me purely as a friend with benefits. I was feeling secure in this conversation and said I wasn't looking for that. I then didn't see him for a while, because I just didn't want to. It wasn't distressing, I didn't have to force myself to not contact him. After some time had passed, I contacted him just because I felt like talking to him. And I didn't feel any guilt or worry about that. He then invited me to do something and I accepted, but just treated him purely as a normal friend when I saw him. Another time I saw him I did treat him like a friend with benefits. And I felt good throughout all of this, at no point did I even think about what he might think about any of it, even about me going back on what I'd said about not wanting to be FWB, and since then I haven't thought about him much nor felt confused or pulled back into wanting to date him or anything. Now I'm not suggesting sleeping with an ex is a good idea, because you have to be feeling completely secure with zero expectations for that to work, I'm sharing this story to demonstrate that when I am feeling totally secure I can change my boundaries from a secure place, it's about what I want and feel is best for me at the time, as opposed to the kind of boundary-flexing, or lack of even knowing what my boundaries are, that goes on when I'm in an AP mode. It's when I'm feeling AP that I'm concerned with what others think. Don't do something that hurts you just because you think it's what you might do if you were totally secure though. It's secure to be able to recognize when something is likely to hurt you and not do that thing. Will being friends with your ex hurt you?

If I am not feeling secure, I think that is when I may have to have very firm boundaries in order to feel like I am respecting myself. Is one of your boundaries that you didn't want any contact after the breakup?