We’ve come a long way from getting dumped via a Post-It note à la Sex and the City. Technology has not only changed the way we find and develop relationships, but also the way they end and how we get over them. But, whether we’re technologically-dependent 21st-century millennials or Dark Age cave people, breakups can be incredibly alienating.

No one can say the right thing, no one understands what we’re going through, no one else has ever experienced an earth-shattering torment quite like this. And sometimes, you’d rather be left alone to listen to Leona Lewis’ ‘Bleeding Love’ with a never-ending pack of Kleenex at your disposal than face the patronizing nods, evasive hand-touching and anti-comforting smiles of your friends, no matter how close you are to them.

Enter the breakup app

Like friendly therapists that live in your pocket, break-up apps are downloadable counselors. They guide you through all the complicated thoughts, feelings and emotions you’re suddenly saddled with post-break-up. Want to reach out to your estranged lover? There’s an app to stop you doing that. Want to really sift through your heartbreak and analyze it to the most minor of details? There’s an app for that, too. Want to perform black magic on your ex and give them forty years of bad luck? There’s not an app for that, but these will help you forgive and forget, and they’re as easy to implement into your daily routine as a morning coffee.

And there’s more out there than you’d think. Mend has features for journaling, prioritizing self-care, peppy pick-me-up lock screen notifications and audio clippings from wellness gurus. Rx Breakup is a 30-day program that uses the power of writing to help break down unhealthy coping mechanisms that have arisen since the end of your relationship. Break-Up Boss, among many an impressive trick, turns your venting to overdrive via fake texts to your ex so you don’t ever have to worry about accidentally hitting the send button. Sanity and Self, though predominantly a self-care app, has featured geared towards improving your relationships, even the ones that cease to exist.

Feeling Like Someone is On Your Side

Break-up apps aren’t the latest plot point from an episode of Black Mirror. In fact, they’re a quietly burning phenomenon – and women you know are using them to get through the most crushing of heartbreaks. Women just like Hannah, a 24-year-old living in Brooklyn. “I live in one of the most expensive cities in the world – you think I could afford therapy when my rent eats up over half my salary?” Hannah’s long-term relationship came to an end when she discovered her boyfriend’s affair. “I was enraged, I was devastated and all people were saying is ‘why couldn’t you see the signs?'”

We can all agree that other humans sometimes just can’t understand how we feel, at least not like the cold embrace of technology can. “I didn’t know who would just listen to me without judging and offering fucking useless advice. I read about Break-Up Boss and thought the $10 purchase fee was a bit steep, then I realized traditional therapy would leave me out of pocket.”

And did it work for Hannah? “It’s not the be-all-end-all eureka moment, but feeling like someone – or, I guess, something – is on your side helps you get there.”

Self Care and Healthy Distractions

Image via The Gender Spectrum Collection

An anonymous therapist and dating blogger from London was also a fan of Mend. “I liked the way there was a little audio clip to listen to everyday – it became a good self-care part of my routine and I listened to it when I went for a walk every lunchtime. I liked the way it asked how I was doing each day, which is something a self-help book can’t. The developer had made lots of conventional psychology wisdom specific to relationship breakups. Almost everything she said fit with CBT and things I’d tell my own patients, but in psychology we’ve tailored things to specific mental health disorders rather than life events.”

Solana from Baltimore, was less revealing about the details of her break-up, although she credits Sanity and Self for aiding her move forward. “It was nice to find a new use for an app I was already familiar with.”

It seems that, when you’re feeling alone after a break-up, technology does its part in filling the forlorn void. Mary, a 22-year-old Englishwoman by birth but Parisian by trade, turned to saturating her social media feeds with anything but pictures of happy people after a heartbreak. “My newsfeed was full of pictures of vegan food and dogs for the first time and, the more I interacted with the images, the more I saw them, so they became a good distraction from checking people’s profiles. It made me forget there was something or someone missing – and now I have an excellent knowledge of dog breeds.”

Furry Comfort

Is it the technological human substitutes or the influx of furry creatures that’s so comforting? Dr. Jacqueline Alnes wrote a sweet and brilliant essay for The Boston Globe about turning not to a dating app after a break-up, but for a virtual match-up of another kind: Petfinder.

“It seemed like the options were endless,” she tells me. “The app gave me the sense that there were too many cats out there to even browse through them all, which made my options (and hope) for the future feel limitless. And also the option to “favorite” a cat meant I could return to cats I grew fond of—when they got adopted, I would imagine them in their new happy homes.”

In a world where we are so reliant on technology, it appears it’s become a very valid form of self-care. This isn’t about finding a new flame on Tinder or Bumble or Hinge, or whatever else you crazy kids are using these days. It’s about using technology – a supposedly soulless medium – to ease yourself into being alone again and gaining a certain comfortability in that.