Men are scummy douchebags. They are all the same. No matter what you do for them they’ll never appreciate you. I can never love a man again. I will never emotionally invest in a relationship anymore. If I must go into any other relationship, I’ll use my head this time, not my heart.

These are some of the painful lamentations we hear often from our dear sisters who have experienced failed relationships. A heartbreak from a relationship could be extremely devastating; so devastating that a lot would choose never to make any attempt at love again for fear of being hurt a second time. It leaves you an emotional wreck or feeling like some damaged goods, unwilling to ever settle with any other man in a familial way again.

However, you have the choice of letting your heartbreak damage you and deprive you perpetually for the rest of your life, or strengthen you and make you emerge better prepared for the future. Therefore, the failure of one relationship should not stop you from indulging in another. The pains caused by love are better healed by love. Some people would prefer to put it thus: The best way to get over one man is to get under another. The caveat here is that it has to be in a halaal (lawful) relationship, not in a licentious entanglement. Also, this should not be confused with rushing into rebound relationships that are not carefully thought out.

There are just a few things to take care of, and you’re set to love and be loved again.

Give it Time

Time heals wounds. And rightly, many have argued that a person needs enough time to heal from a past relationship to get emotionally and psychologically prepared for the next one. Butte question is: How much time is enough time? I’ll save you the stress – the simple answer is that enough time is three months for a divorcee, after a consummated marriage, and four months and ten days for a widow, whether or not the marriage was consummated. This is the prescribed waiting period (iddah) in Islam, and there’s no other waiting time after the waiting time. To underscore the urgency of picking up and moving on within reasonable time, which could be as soon as the waiting period is done with, Islam permits a new marriage proposal to the woman in iddah, as long as it is done indirectly. Allah says: “There is no blame upon you for that which you (indirectly) allude concerning betrothal to (such) women or for that which you conceal within yourselves.” (Baqarah (2):235)

This indirect proposal, however, is only permitted in cases of iddah for mourning a deceased husband or irrevocable divorce, i.e. a third and final divorce, or marriage termination through khul (upon the woman’s request), or faskh (by the judge’s decree), not a revocable one (first or second divorce).

No calamity can be greater than the loss of a beloved spouse to the cold hands of death. Therefore, if I would have to mourn my deceased husband for only four months and ten days, after-which I would be free to remarry the very next day after the prescribed waiting period, then I’m not expected, as a woman, to spend two, or three or four years, brooding and licking my wounds over a bitter divorce. The bitter divorce plus the prolonged period of pain and regret would be double jeopardy. This makes sense, doesn’t it?

Time remains a healing factor, no doubt. But the success or failure of your new relationship is not directly proportional to the length of time between it and the previous. More so, the regrets, the sulking, and the brooding will not change anything from your past. You have a today to live and a future to prepare for. The earlier you put the past behind you, rather than make it a carry-on baggage, the sooner you’d start living again. Don’t tell your new partner, “I have a baggage”. Tell him, “There are things from my past that you need to be aware of”.

What Hit You Could Not Have Missed You

The fifth article of faith, otherwise known as pillar of eemaan, is to believe in divine ordination– the good thereof and the bad thereof, hence Islam forbids “had I known” and classifies it among the minor, unnoticeable forms of shirk (polytheism). There was nothing you could have done to prevent your bitter marital experience. It wasn’t because you weren’t prayerful enough. It wasn’t because you didn’t measure up to your duties and responsibilities. On the contrary, beyond human omissions and commissions, the eventual outcome of your marriage was Allah’s qadar (decree). Many went into their relationships having sought Allah’s guidance through proper istikhara and put in their best and still came out hurt. It was a trial Allah had written for them which they could never have escaped, and for which they will be rewarded for their patience and perseverance. Therefore, that shouldn’t prevent or delay one from having a fresh relationship. For many people, the reason for their alienation from success is their reluctance to try again after a setback. Your failures, in marriage or in life generally, are but temporary setbacks. They shouldn’t be treated as permanent impediments.

Relationships are meant to be experienced, and experience, they say, is the best teacher.

Making Your New Relationship Work

Do not go into a relationship with the intention of giving it half your commitment. This is what many women do when they feel they had given their all to a previous relationship and gotten less in return. But that is like setting yourself up for failure. If you come into the new relationship with half commitment and the man comes with another half, you’re not going to get a whole, as relationships are usually complex and exponential, not arithmetic. So, whereas you may be expecting half plus half to give you a whole, it may end up being half multiplied by half, and that gives you a quarter, which is much less. Now you know why the divorce rate in second and third marriages is even higher than that of first marriages. In a nutshell, people go into their first marriages with a hundred percent zeal, determination, commitment, love, optimism and whatnot, and when it crashes, they go into their second marriages, for those who muster the courage to move on, with less and expect more. No! Two half people in a relationship will only give you less than what you started with at the end of it.

Therefore, if you want a hundred percent out of your new relationship, you have to come into it with full commitment, not three-quarter, not half, not anything less. Reflect over the past and learn the lessons from it and be ready to start afresh and rebuild over time. Great relationships are not built in a day… they are built by the day. Never use your previous relationship to appraise or evaluate the worth and significance of your present one, nor compare your new partner to your ex. Every relationship has its peculiarities, and every individual has their differences.

Be sure to give your new relationship the time to nurture and grow. Do not be in a rush, yet do not be too slow. Build a solid friendship with your new partner. You cannot be lovers if you can’t be friends. Let trust grow and vulnerability show, and you will find love not only lovelier but more enduring this time around.

Partners, Not Competitors

A major cause of failure in relationships is that the spouses live together as competitors. They become too individualistic and selfish that they think more of themselves and their individual good than their collective good. But what happens when you compete is that you try to outdo and outsmart each other, and that can never be healthy for a relationship. Your marriage is not a game. If you try to make it one, then it means you and your partner will be on opposite teams and you would have to keep scores or count. And that in turn means a winner and a loser would have to emerge, as with all games. Definitely, you wouldn’t be cheering for the opposite team to win. So it becomes tantamount to looking for your partner’s downfall, wittingly or unwittingly. You can’t have an intimate, fructifying, and emotionally close relationship based on competition. It is one major reason relationships fail.

Your marriage, rather, is a synergy that combines the material, emotional, and intellectual resources as well as the potentials of both spouses to become one formidable force. It is a partnership in which the spouses are stakeholders. And as with every successful partnership, it requires a great deal of selflessness, teamwork and sacrifice. In it, you help each other grow and look out for each other’s betterment. There is no room for such thing as a successful husband and a failed wife, or a failed husband and a successful wife. You can either both be successful or both be on the drawing board working towards success. It is the only way you can both be winners.

Unfortunately, men in polygamy hardly enjoy this selflessness from their wives. The women see the husband as a shared utility, which he is anyways, and their co-wives as competitors struggling for their portions of this shared resource. Therefore, they believe that any investment in their husbands would be equally enjoyed by their co-wives, directly or indirectly. So, they think more of themselves and what will become of them individually when the husband is no more. Though it sounds kind of justifiable, it strains relationship with the man, especially when it is done so noticeably that he begins to feel used and uncared for, seeing that, “mine is ours” and the women’s are theirs alone. In case you don’t get what I’m saying, it means the man cares and caters for the women but none of them truly cares for him.

Finally, dear sister, life is short. You deserve to love and be loved. Loneliness breeds emptiness. If you cannot find happiness, create happiness. The secret is in taking responsibility and being the change you want to see in your new relationship rather than putting up walls around yourself and entertaining so much pessimism. If you want to see more love in your new relationship, be more loving. If you want more compassion, be more compassionate. Give your new relationship a hundred percent effort, commitment, love, compassion, warmth, humour and thoughtfulness, and it will all return to you in manifolds.

You deserve a good man to share your life and share your bed. Do not let your past deprive you.

Those in favour say aye!

Abu Bilaal Abdulrazaq bn Bello bn Oare