How can breakups rip the heart out of you but can still leave you begging for your ex-lover's affection years after the split?

That's the nature of the heart, I guess. The people we loved in the past will always be with us. We can't ever forget them or blot them out of our lives. They live in our memories, they made us feel emotions that can't be erased. But we can try to really resolve everything to do with that relationship, and look to the future. Sometimes we are meant to meet people who give us something, or teach us something, help us find things about ourselves, but they aren't meant to be with us. They are just a wake up call, or a way to gain strength and wisdom. So we have to accept that, move on, and look to the future. It doesn't mean we won't think of them from time to time, but we'll stop living in the past.

From my own experience...it was because I was unable to see that what I had was no where close to what I deserved. Sometimes we get into a relationship thinking that it's what we need...not what it is we want. We allow ourselves to fall prey to people who don't treat us right and in time we begin to believe that that treatment is what we deserve. As a living, feeling person we should step back and evaluate what it is we personally deserve. Sometimes when we look back at those relationships we forget to look at the real reason it fell apart...which can makes us crave that affection once more.

It is because the heart heals and it never forgets, especially the love and the good times. Do not feel bad if you are still longing for the ex's affection, your heart remembers how good the love was and not how the love has gone bad.

Because it is hard to completely get over someone who once meant so much to us. We tend to idealize ex-lover's and cherish the memories we have...so we think things will never be as perfect again. This makes us beg and crave for what we lost

From personal experience, it is because you still love that person and remember all the amazing times you have had. No one deserves to be hurt in such a way and clinging on to a traumatic break-up can leave you down. Try surrounding yourself with friends and positive people or pick up a hobby.

You feel comfortable with that person. When they're gone it can leave us missing the familiarity of having that person around, and thats what can hurt the most

When two people know each other, they form a gravitational force, the person who will have bigger individuality tend to attract more..if we get to grow or develop our own individuality,it will be easier to not get same pull,because the other person isn't growing anymore inside us..

It's the reliance that we had for that person. We felt validated by our partner and happy for every positive interaction we had for them.

Well, love is a very strong emotion. I still have strange feelings for my ex even though I was very hurt by the breakup and have been in other relationships since. Everyone feels pain differently, and sometimes, it's very difficult or impossible to completely move past. As far as I know, everyone wants love, and those who say they don't are probably lying! ;)

Just because someone hurts us doesn't mean that we stop loving them. Love is a stronger thing than that, sometimes to our detriment rather than our advantage.