160+ Sad Love Quotes to Overcome Heartache, Grief, & More

Searching for a sad love quote to capture your emotions and nurse a broken heart? We’ve got you covered. For this article, we’ve compiled an extensive list of quotes to help you heal from a breakup, unrequited love, or loss. We also interviewed relationship coach Amy Chan for the best tips on getting over someone. Keep reading for the most moving quotes about heartache.

Sad Love Quotes & Lyrics

“The hottest love has the coldest end.” — Socrates
“Love is so short, forgetting is so long.” — Pablo Neruda
“Now, you are just a stranger with all my secrets.” — Unknown
“You call me up again just to break me like a promise.” — Taylor Swift
“For you, I was a chapter. For me, you were the whole book.” — Tom Neal
“Pleasure of love lasts but a moment. Pain of love lasts a lifetime.” — Bette Davis
“The shattering of a heart when being broken is the loudest quiet ever.” — Carroll Bryant

Section 1 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes About Heartache

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Turn to a sad and relatable love quote to cope with heartache. If you’re feeling the pain and sorrow that comes with unrequited love, lost love, or the end of a relationship, reading a sad quote can capture exactly what you’re going through. Here are some sad love quotes to help you accept and express your emotions :
- “We loved with a love that was more than love.” — Edgar Allan Poe
- “Pleasure of love lasts but a moment. Pain of love lasts a lifetime.” — Bette Davis
- “Love is the most beautiful of dreams and the worst of nightmares.” — Aman Jassal
- “Love begins with a smile, grows with a kiss, and ends with a teardrop.” — Unknown
- “To fall in love is awfully simple, but to fall out of love is simply awful.” — Bess Myerson
- “Love can sometimes be magic. But magic can sometimes just be an illusion.” — Javan
- “It is sad not to love, but it is much sadder not to be able to love.” — Miguel de Unamuno
- “I wonder if I could take back every ‘I love you’ ever said to you, would I do it?” — Faraaz Kazi
- “You know, a heart can be broken, but it keeps on beating, just the same.” — Fannie Flagg
- “Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter quite like unrequited love.” — Charlie Brown
- “There are all kinds of love in this world but never the same love twice.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald
- “Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go.” — Hermann Hesse
- “Our greatest joy and our greatest pain come in our relationships with others.” — Stephen R. Covey
- “There is a distinct, awful pain that comes with loving someone more than they love you.” — Steve Maraboli
- “For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.’” — John Greenleaf Whittier
- “If someone really loves you, they wouldn’t let you slip away no matter how big the situation is.” — Unknown
- “Some stories don’t have happy endings. Even love stories. Maybe especially love stories.” — Kristin Hannah
- “It’s amazing how someone can break your heart and you can still love them with all the little pieces.” — Ella Harper
- “Some people are going to leave, but that’s not the end of your story. That’s the end of their part in your story.” — Unknown
- “A broken heart is the worst. It’s like having broken ribs. Nobody can see it, but it hurts every time you breathe.” — Unknown

Section 2 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes for Him

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Get all of your feelings out by reading a sad love quote for guys. Due to societal expectations, most men struggle to express their needs and emotions in relationships, which can lead to anxiety, depression, and other physical and mental illnesses. ^{[1]
X
Research source} Instead of acting strong all the time, read some sad quotes to help you connect with your innermost feelings and articulate the pain you might not be able to express in words:
- “You were my forever, but I was just a moment for you.” — Unknown
- “Do not haunt my soul; I have done well forgetting you.” — Jack Kerouac
- “For you, I was a chapter. For me, you were the whole book.” — Tom Neal
- “We were a puzzle but you disappeared with your piece.” — Maxime Lagacé
- “I wish I could go back to the day I met you and just walk away.” — Unknown
- “I hate the way you can move on so easily while I’m still stuck in the past.” — Unknown
- “I wish I could erase you from my mind, but my heart would never let me forget.” — Unknown
- “Sometimes, the person you’d take a bullet for ends up being the one behind the gun.” — Unknown
- “The silence in this room screams your name, a constant reminder of what we used to have.” — Unknown
- “I don’t know what went wrong, but we were never able to go back to where we started from.” — Haruki Murakami
- “"My heart feels like a shattered kaleidoscope, beautiful fragments of our memories scattered everywhere.” — Unknown
- “Will anybody ever love me? For good reasons, without grievance, not for sport.” — Sufjan Stevens
- “I've been heartbroken. I've broken hearts. That's part of life, and it's part of figuring out who you are so you can find the right partner.” — Heidi Klum
- “Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.” — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- “And in her eyes, you see nothing. No sign of love behind the tears cried for no one, a love that should have lasted years.” — The Beatles, “For No One”
- “I’m not crying because of you; you’re not worth it. I’m crying because my delusion of who you were was shattered by the truth of who you are.” — Steve Maraboli
- “I know someday, you'll have a beautiful life. I know you'll be a star in somebody else's sky, but why, why, why can't it be, oh, can't it be mine?” — Pearl Jam, “Black”
- “I’m working on erasing you, just don't have the proper tools. I get hammered, forget that you exist. There's no way I'm forgetting this.” — Frightened Rabbit, “My Backwards Walk”
- “Remember we used to dance, and everyone wanted to be you and me? I want to be, too. What day is this, besides the day you left me?” — Dave Matthews Band, “Stay or Leave”
- “You said you’d always love me, all of my life. And then you said your last goodbye. Why all the sudden changes? Why all of the lies? I should have seen it in your eyes.” — Black Sabbath, “She’s Gone”

Section 3 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes for Her

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Capture the pain that accompanies love with a sad quote for girls. When you’re struggling to move on from someone and keep wondering if you’ll ever be able to love again, you need a sad love quote to help you process your emotions. Here are the best quotes and lyrics to help you pick up the pieces and mend your broken heart:
- “He taught me how to love, but not how to stop.” — Unknown
- “I made you my mural, my temple, my sky.” — Taylor Swift, “tolerate it”
- “I have nothing if I don’t have you.” — Whitney Houston, “I Have Nothing.”
- “One day you’ll finally see, your biggest mistake was not loving me.” — Unknown
- “Even though you’re not mine anymore, my heart still belongs to you.” — Unknown
- “You call me up again just to break me like a promise.” — Taylor Swift, “All Too Well”
- “I’m not afraid to fall in love. I’m afraid to fall for the wrong person again.” — Unknown
- “The saddest thing in the world is loving someone who used to love you.” — Unknown
- “I used to think you were the best thing that happened, but now I think you might maybe be the worst thing.” — Silver Linings Playbook
- “We both drew blood, but, man, those cuts were never equal.” — Olivia Rodrigo, “the grudge”
- “To live in a hallucination of being loved is more painful than rejection.” — Vinaya Panicker
- “Sometimes, the person who made you happiest now makes you the saddest.” — Unknown
- “You can only push a girl away for so long until she walks out of your life on her own.” — Unknown
- “Never lose yourself while trying to hold onto someone who doesn’t care about losing you.” — Unknown
- “What am I supposed to do when you used to be my lifeline?” — Gracie Abrams, “This is What the Drugs Are For”
- “There is one pain, I often feel, which you will never know. It’s caused by the absence of you.” — Ashleigh Brilliant
- “Can't get over you, no matter what I do. I know I should but I could never hate you.” — Billie Eilish, “Male Fantasy”
- “The saddest thing is to be a passing moment in someone's life when you've imagined being their forever.” — Unknown
- “I wish I could go back to the day I met you and just walk away. Honestly, it would have saved me so much hurt and pain.” — Unknown
- “So I'll watch your life in pictures like I used to watch you sleep, and I feel you forget me like I used to feel you breathe.” — Taylor Swift, “Last Kiss”
- “You promised you wouldn’t hurt me, but you did. You promised you would stay, but you left. You promised you would love me, but you lied.” — Unknown

Section 4 of 9:

Deep Sad Love Quotes

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Use a deep love quote to describe your innermost thoughts and emotions. They say nothing hurts more than a broken heart, and if that rings true to you, reading a deep love quote can help you look back on your relationship and get back to your old self again. Here are some deep quotes to make you feel sad, nostalgic, reflective, hopeful, and everything in between:
- “The opposite of love is not hate; it's indifference.” — Elie Wiesel
- “The shattering of a heart when being broken is the loudest quiet ever.” — Carroll Bryant
- “It will never rain roses: when we want to have more roses, we must plant more roses.” — George Eliot
- “The emotion that can break your heart is sometimes the very one that heals it.” — Nicholas Sparks
- “Breathing is hard. When you cry so much, it makes you realize that breathing is hard.” — David Levithan
- “You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.” — Jonathan Safran Foer
- “We must understand that sadness is an ocean, and sometimes we drown, while other days we are forced to swim.” — R.M. Drake
- “Relationships are like glass. Sometimes it’s better to leave them broken than try to hurt yourself putting it back together.” — Unknown
- “It’s amazing how quickly your mood can change, how deep your heart can sink and how much one person can affect you.” — Unknown
- “The same people who are candy to our eyes can be poison to our hearts. Study their ingredients before you feed them to your soul.” — Kimberly Jones
- “You can close your eyes to the things you do not want to see, but you cannot close your heart to the things you do not want to feel.” — Chester Bennington
- “Maybe we tried to leave as much memories of ourselves with each other because we knew one day we wouldn't be together anymore.” — Makoto Shinkai
- “When love is lost, do not bow your head in sadness; instead, keep your head up high and gaze into heaven for that is where your broken heart has been sent to heal.” — Unknown
- “There are many ways of breaking a heart. Stories were full of hearts broken by love, but what really broke a heart was taking away its dream—whatever that dream might be.” — Pearl S. Buck
- “Falling in love is like holding a candle. Initially it lightens up the world around you. Then it starts melting and hurts you. Finally it goes off and everything is darker than ever and all you are left with is the…BURN!” — Syed Arshad
- “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of withering, of tarnishing.” — Anaïs Nin
- “You cannot convince people to love you. This is an absolute rule. No one will ever give you love because you want him or her to give it. Real love moves freely in both directions. Don't waste your time on anything else.” — Cheryl Strayed
- “I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end it’s just too much. The current’s too strong. They’ve got to let go, drift apart. That’s how it is with us.” — Kazuo Ishiguro
- “That's when I finally got it. I finally understood. It wasn't the thought that counted. It was the actual execution that mattered, the showing up for somebody. The intent behind it wasn't enough. Not for me. Not anymore. It wasn't enough to know that deep down, he loved me. You had to actually say it to somebody, show them you cared. And he just didn't. Not enough.” — Jenny Han
- “It hurts to let go. Sometimes, it seems the harder you try to hold on to something or someone, the more it wants to getaway. You feel like some kind of criminal for having felt, for having wanted. For having wanted to be wanted. It confuses you, because you think that your feelings were wrong and it makes you feel so small because it's so hard to keep it inside when you let it out and it doesn't come back. You're left so alone that you can't explain.” — Henry Rollins

Section 5 of 9:

Short Sad Love Quotes

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Stick to a short and sad love quote that resonates with your feelings. The end of a relationship can be a rollercoaster of emotions (to say the least), but a short love quote can perfectly capture what you’re feeling inside. Whether you’re sad, angry, lonely, regretful, hopeful, or free, the following quotes can describe you to a tee:
- “The hottest love has the coldest end.” — Socrates
- “The heart was made to be broken.” — Oscar Wilde
- “The heart will break, but broken live on.” — Lord Byron
- “Love is so short, forgetting is so long.” — Pablo Neruda
- “It hurts to leave a light on for nobody.” — Graham Foust
- “You can’t give your heart to a wild thing.” — Truman Capote
- “Sadness is but a wall between two gardens.” — Khalil Gibran
- “Now, you are just a stranger with all my secrets.” — Unknown
- “If you love something, be prepared to lose it.” — Haruki Murakami
- “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” — Unknown
- “Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs.” — William Shakespeare
- “I never got to fall out of love. I just had to move on.” — Christina Lauren
- “Tears come from the heart and not from the brain.” — Leonardo da Vinci
- “To have felt too much is to end in feeling nothing.” — Dorothy Thompson
- “One thing you can't hide is when you're crippled inside.” — John Lennon
- “Hearts will never be practical until they are made unbreakable.” — Unknown
- “I always like walking in the rain, so no one can see me crying.” — Charlie Chaplin
- “Tears are words the mouth can't say nor can the heart bear.” — Joshua Wisenbaker
- “Love is the hardest habit to break, and the most difficult to satisfy.” — Drew Barrymore
- “There is an ocean of silence between us… and I am drowning in it.” — Ranata Suzuki
- “Of all the words of mice and men, the saddest are, ‘It might have been.’” — Kurt Vonnegut

Section 6 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes About Life

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Remind yourself that you’re not alone with a sad love quote about life. Breakups can be a shattering experience, but after some time, self-care, and personal reflection, you will be able to get back up and believe in love again! Here are some love quotes to give you a new perspective on love and life, and reassure you that it’s better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all:
- “This, too, will pass.” — Eckhart Tolle
- “The things which hurt, instruct.” — Benjamin Franklin
- “The pain of yesterday is the strength of today.” — Paulo Coelho
- “Learning is a gift. Even when pain is your teacher.” — Maya Watson
- “Life's under no obligation to give us what we expect.” — Margaret Mitchell
- “All endings are also beginnings. We just don’t know it at the time.” — Mitch Albom
- “The walls we build around us to keep sadness out also keep out the joy.” — Jim Rohn
- “One must not let oneself be overwhelmed by sadness.” — Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis
- “The word ‘happy’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.” — Carl Jung
- “Sometimes, it takes a breakdown to experience a breakthrough.” — Joshua Fields Millburn
- “Things change. And friends leave. And life doesn't stop for anybody.” — Stephen Chbosky
- “There is a time for departure, even when there’s no certain place to go.” — Tennessee Williams
- “Those who truly love take the risk of being hurt. They also take the chance of living fully.” — Maxime Lagacé
- “Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.” — Mark Twain
- “The excursion is the same when you go looking for your sorrow as when you go looking for your joy.” — Eudora Welty
- “I have learned now that while those who speak about one's miseries usually hurt, those who keep silence hurt more.” — C.S. Lewis
- “It is perhaps when our lives are at their most problematic that we are likely to be most receptive to beautiful things.” — Alain de Botton
- “Let the ground crack and rocks crumble around you because that’s how something amazing grows, through the cracks.” — Marilyn Mason
- “You see, I usually find myself among strangers because I drift here and there trying to forget the sad things that happened to me.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald
- “There are moments when I wish I could roll back the clock and take all the sadness away, but I have the feeling that if I did, the joy would be gone as well.” — Nicholas Sparks

Section 7 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes About Loss

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Turn to a quote about loss and separation to help you move forward. If you’re trying to let go of someone, it’s important to acknowledge and process your emotions first. Here are some sad love quotes to help you accept (and get rid of) all the sadness and anger from a prior relationship:
- “All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.” —Helen Keller
- “I still think about you, even though I know it’s over.” — Unknown
- “You never truly realize what you had until it’s gone.” — Unknown
- “The hardest part of loving you was knowing when to let go.” — Unknown
- “You flew off with the wings of my heart and left me flightless.” — Stelle Atwater
- “I will endure a lifetime of missing you for the privilege of loving you.” — Unknown
- “I wish I could turn back the clock. I'd find you sooner and love you longer.” — Unknown
- “You make me feel like a firefly. Trapped in a belljar; starved for love.” — Ayushee Ghoshal
- “It hurts to breathe because every breath I take proves I can’t live without you.” — Unknown
- “You were the one I wanted to grow old with, but now I have to grow old without you.” — Unknown
- “Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” — Alfred Lord Tennyson
- “Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold.” — Zelda Fitzgerald
- “There is no greater sorrow than to recall, in misery, the time when we were happy.” — Dante AligherI
- “Stab the body and it heals, but injure the heart and the wound lasts a lifetime.” — Mineko Iwasaki
- “The worst feeling isn't being lonely, it's being forgotten by someone you'd never forget.” — Helen Hywater
- “Broken relationships are a source of heavy heartbreak that seem to affect every family.” — Jerry B. Jenkins
- “Who has not sat before his own heart’s curtain? It lifts: and the scenery is falling apart.” — Rainer Maria Rilke
- “You're like a song that I heard when I was a little kid but forgot I knew until I heard it again.” — Maggie Stiefvater
- “Letting go means to come to the realization that some people are a part of your history, but not a part of your destiny.” — Steve Maraboli
- “Sometimes you got to hurt something to help something. Sometimes you have to plow under one thing in order for something else to grow.” — Ernest J. Gaines

Section 8 of 9:

Sad Love Quotes About Death & Grief

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Share a love quote about death or grief to bring you comfort. Struggling to put your thoughts into words? Turn to an author, celebrity, or public figure for help. Their quotes can comfort you during this difficult time and capture the depth of what you’re feeling. Here are some meaningful quotes to help you cope with grief and honor a passed loved one:
- “What you remember saves you.” —M.S. Merwin
- “Death ends a life, not a relationship.” —Jack Lemmon
- “The life of the dead is placed in the heart of the living.” —Cicero
- “Death is not the opposite of life, but a part of it.” —Haruki Murakami
- “Love is how you stay alive, even after you are gone.” —Mitch Albom
- “Our dead are never dead to us until we have forgotten them.” — George Eliot
- “The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again.” — Charles Dickens
- “Would it be the same if I saw you in heaven?” — Eric Clapton, “Tears in Heaven”
- “Grief is not as heavy as guilt, but it takes more away from you.” — Veronica Roth
- “Death is the dropping of the flower that the fruit may swell.” — Henry Ward Beecher
- “You meet everyone twice in this life, when they come and when they go.” — C.C Aurel
- “So it's true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.” — E.A. Bucchianeri
- “There are no goodbyes for us. Wherever you are, you will always be in my heart.’ —Mahatma Gandhi
- “They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it. Death cannot kill what never dies.” —William Penn
- “The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.” — Harriet Beecher Stowe
- “To have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever.” — J.K. Rowling
- “Death is a great revealer of what is in a man, and in its solemn shadow appear the naked lineaments of the soul.” — E.H. Chapin
- “Since I can’t be with you right now I will have to be content just dreaming about when we will be together again.” — Susan Polis Schutz
- “What is hardest to accept about the passage of time is that the people who once mattered the most to us wind up in parentheses.” — John Irving
- “If you gave someone your heart and they died, did they take it with them? Did you spend the rest of forever with a hole inside you that couldn't be filled?” — Jodi Picoult

Section 9 of 9:

How to Cope with Pain & Heartbreak

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1
Acknowledge and accept your emotions. “Studies show that bereaved people who avoid grief and make an effort to suppress emotion take the longest to recover from loss,” according to Chan. Instead, recognize the emotions you’re feeling in your body, and “write down how you feel and where you feel it.” That way, you can “process the emotional energy that is stuck in [your] body.”
- “Close your eyes and see what sensations come up in [your] body,” says Chan. Do you feel tightness anywhere, hot, or cold? Think of what this emotion needs from you in the present moment and “cry, scream, shake, or dance” to give it a voice.”
2
Practice self-care and positive self-talk. When you’re heartbroken, it can be difficult to stay on top of things like personal health and hygiene. However, doing small things for yourself can make a huge difference in how you feel. Saying positive things can also challenge negative thoughts that creep in as you recover. Instead of thinking “I’ll never find love again,” for example, you could say “Every relationship teaches you a lesson, so the next one can be even better.”
- Chan also advises to “create a morning ritual so you can be intentional on how you start your day…and an evening ritual to help you wind down.”
3
Reach out to friends and family members for support. Sometimes, getting your feelings off your chest can help you cope with heartbreak , so talk to a trusted friend, family member, mentor, or therapist. Chan recommends “putting parameters for the conversation by explaining that you are not seeking advice…and are looking for someone who can hold space for you to share your feelings without judgment.”
- If you don’t have anyone to turn to, look for a support group online. There are numerous support groups for people who are going through, or have already gone through, similar experiences.
EXPERT TIP

Amy Chan
Relationship Coach
Amy Chan is a Relationship Coach based in New York, New York. She is the Founder of Renew Breakup Bootcamp, a retreat that takes a scientific and spiritual approach to healing after the end of a relationship. She has over 12 years of experience helping clients work on their relationships with strategies rooted in the psychology and science of relationships and personal development. Her team of psychologists and coaches at Renew Breakup Bootcamp has helped hundreds of individuals, and the Bootcamp has been featured on CNN, Vogue, the New York Times, and Fortune. Her book based on her work, Breakup Bootcamp, was published in 2020 and was featured by the New York Times.

Amy Chan
Relationship Coach

Take time for yourself after a breakup. Immediately after a breakup, self-care, self-compassion and community support should be a focus. A breakup can feel traumatizing, and it’s normal to take time to grieve, process and get back to an equilibrium.
4
Digitally detox from your ex and create space. “Delete old messages, unfollow your ex’s accounts, and take a break from social media altogether. Block their number if you have to, so you don’t obsess about your ex not contacting you,” advises Chan. Keeping in contact with your ex will only make you feel worse, so try not to reach out to them at all.
- If you feel the urge to reconnect with your ex, “replace the urge for connection with another behavior that forces you to be present,” says Chan. This could be going for a jog, calling a friend, or cleaning your room.
5
Reconnect with yourself and meet new people. Being single is the time to reconnect with the relationship you have with yourself. Chan says to, “start that passion project you’ve procrastinated on, develop those friendships that have been on the backburner, or take that solo trip you’ve always wondered about. Your breakup is merely the end of one chapter and the beginning of your next. So make this next chapter colorful, vibrant, playful, and fun!”
- Dating can be scary or overwhelming at first, but the goal is start slow and focus on making great connections. You can meet new people by volunteering, going out to bars, or joining an intramural sports team or some other organization.

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160+ Sad Love Quotes to Overcome Heartache, Grief, & More

Sad Love Quotes & Lyrics

Steps

Sad Love Quotes About Heartache

Sad Love Quotes for Him

Sad Love Quotes for Her

Deep Sad Love Quotes

Short Sad Love Quotes

Sad Love Quotes About Life

Sad Love Quotes About Loss

Sad Love Quotes About Death & Grief

How to Cope with Pain & Heartbreak

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