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No contact day 22: the trigger date
Anniversaries, birthdays and the dates you'd planned around start showing up. A known date is easier than a surprise one, but it still costs something.
What goes wrong on day 22
Dates carry a strong sense of exception — 'it's their birthday, it would be rude not to' — and exceptions are how counts end.
None of that is a prediction about you specifically. Day 22 looks different depending on how long you were together, who ended it, and how many times you've tried before — this is the shape it takes most often, and the part of it worth preparing for.
One thing to do today
Decide now, in advance, what you're doing on the date, and tell one person the plan. A decided date is survivable; an undecided one is a coin flip made at your weakest moment.
A slip costs a day. The spiral after it — "I've ruined it, why bother" — is what costs the month. If today didn't go the way this page describes, that's information about which door is still open, not a verdict on whether you can do this.
Where you actually are on day 22
Two minutes of honest answers and the read gives you your real day count, the pattern you're in, and the hour that's likely to be hardest.
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